Violent Jihad Not Islamic Jihad “Blowback” or “Clash of Civilizations”?
What are the causes of Radical Terror? (In the name of Islam) Since September 11th 2001, there have been over 127 incidents of Radical Islamic terrorism worldwide claiming 2500 more victims
What is Jihad? Three Forms (of “Struggle”) With oneself Within the Ulama Against the enemies of Islam - (Sayid Qutb)
Why Jihad? Poverty and lack of opportunity in the Muslim World (RD) The Presence of foreign troops in the Middle East, in particular the Holy cities The intractable Israeli-Palestinian dispute U.S. Foreign Policy towards Islamic states “Blowback” Clash of civilizations The Nature of Islam
Clash of Civilizations Samuel P. Huntington “Clash of Civilizations” Foreign Affairs 1993 The Book appeared in 1998
The History of Warfare since 1648 The wars between princes and monarchs Wars between nations and peoples Conflicts of ideologies & the Cold War
Huntington’s Civilizations
Why Civilizations Will Clash Divisions are basic & Real The World is becoming smaller Globalization separates people from local identities
Why Civilizations Will Clash The current global power of western civilization Cultural differences are less mutable Economic regionalism is growing
The West Versus Islam US support for Israel Desert Shield - Desert Storm Initial failure to protect Bosnia Russian destruction of Chechnya
The West Versus Islam Iranian Nuclear ambitions Iraq War II Pope Benedict’s comments The Cartoon Furor Ethiopia/Somalia The recent London car bombings
The Rise of Jihad 600 The Sunni-Shia Split 1300 Ibn Tamiyyah justifies revolt against Ottoman rulers 1700 Muhammed ibn Abd al-Wahab condemns Shiites, founds Wahabism 1916 British and French division of the Ottoman Empire 1928 Egyptian activist found “Muslim brotherhood”
The Rise of Jihad 1948 Founding of Israel approved by UN 1952 Col. Nasser coup in Egypt 1966 Nasser executes Sayyid Qutb and outlaws Muslim Brotherhood 1967 Israel crushes Arab armies in the Six-Day War 1973 Arab Oil embargo finances Islamic missionary campaign
The Rise of Jihad 1979 Islamic Revolution replaces Shah in Iran with Ayatollah Khomeini 1979 Jihad begins against Soviet occupied Afghanistan financed by US 1981 Jihadist soldiers assassinate Egyptian President Anwar Sadat for 1979 peace treaty with Israel 1985 exiled Saudi construction millionaire Osama bin Laden lay groundwork for al Qaeda in Afghanistan
The Rise of Jihad 1993 1st World Trade Center Bombing by Ramsi Yousef 1998 Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri issue fatwa calling on followers to kill Americans 1998 Al Qaeda bombing of embassies in Tanzania and Kenya 2000 Al Qaeda bombing of USS Cole in Yemen
The Rise of Jihad 2001 9/11 kills nearly 3000 in New York, at the Pentagon, and in rural Pennsylvania
Since Then
Rise of Daesh/ISIL
How can we fight terrorism? Intellgence & Military operations Eradicate Poverty Peace in Palestine Prevention of continued recruitment of Jihadists
What Can/Did We Do? Homeland Security Patriot Act Airport Security Invade Iraq Invade Afghanistan Invade Syria Intelligence Sharing Ignore it
Obama got Osama, the GWOT is over SEAL Team Six attack in Abbottabad May 2nd 2011 killed Osama bin Laden Withdrawal from Iraq December 11 Taliban don’t have international agenda Arab Spring Osama demonstrated the “divine mandate” of Jihad: morale will suffer
Obama got Osama but the GWOT is not over! ISIS/Daesh The al Qaeda threat remains viable -Ayman al Zawahiri Al Qaeda still operates openly in FATA/Waziristan region of Pakistan Osama’s leadership was only symbolic Pakistan’s Haqqani network is more dangerous to the US than Osama LeT, Jem, JaI provide similar threat
ISIS/ ISIL/ IS/ Daesh