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ISIS prominence is a failure on the part of security agencies.
9-10-2014
There is absolutely no doubt in anyone’s mind that ISIS is the threat to the western nations, it is even greater threat to the Muslims across the globe. Their definition of who is a Muslim is very subjective. After all, ISIS has not waged a war against non-Muslims, rather against Muslims whom they consider to be apostates. Simply stated, if a person is not practising Islam according to their definition of Islam is an apostate, thus worthy of being killed. This is the most dangerous aspect of ISIS, they are targeting Muslims. It is for this reason Muslim leaders across the globe have taken a firm and united stand to condemn this terror group.
However, condemnation from Muslim Leadership, or Islamic organization is not enough to solve the problem, and it is certainly not enough to eliminate both, short, and long-term threats. The federal government must also acknowledge that this was the biggest blunder on the part of the law enforcement and Intelligence agencies which resulted in Canadian Muslim Youth being attracted to join a brutal international terror group, which is set out to kill Muslims first, without anyone raising a red flag. How exactly was it able to organize and recruit members from western countries, including Canada?
We are not talking about Toronto-18. We are talking about a well-orchestrated, well-planned, well- organized, well-financed, extremely sophisticated formation of an international terror organization seeking recruits from around the globe, specifically targeting disenfranchised Muslim youth living in the west who feel marginalized. What was our country’s intelligence doing when ISIS recruiters were luring Canadian citizens, supposedly, online?
Muslims across all spectrums realize the threat ISIS presents, and have launched an aggressive campaign against it. Arab News reported, “Grand Mufti Abdul Aziz Al-Asheikh has urged Muslims to confront the “oppressive” Islamic State jihadists if they fight Muslims after seizing swaths of Iraq and Syria. If they fight Muslims, then Muslims must fight them to rid people and religion of their evil and harm,” he said in a response to a request from an Iraqi for a fatwa or edict on fighting IS. They have been killing ever since they began their fight. Their killing is filled with mutilations and hideousness that distort (the image of) Muslims,” Al-Asheikh said.
However, we must also note that every terror attack has shown failure on the part of the western intelligence where they failed to check or follow a lead which resulted in loss of lives. In regards to ISIS western nations must take the responsibility of an utter and absolute failure.
Everyone, still continues to ask questions, why is this, why is that, why so many young Muslims, many of them converts to Islam were lured by ISIS? Why the Youth from Great Britain, US, and Canada are deciding to leave western values, and take up arms, fight Jihad, Kill, people and be involved in suicide bombing, beheading people? Everyone is focussed on WHY, which is important. However, no one has bothered to ask the question HOW?
How a terror group, which no one had heard about just few months back have now emerged as the biggest threat to human civilization?
How the western intelligence did not detect this threat earlier? We are not talking about some small Al Qaeda Sleeper Cell, where individual members were pretending to be law abiding citizens, going to college, work, etc. we are talking about formulation of an army of terror, majority of them being recruited from the west. Were the western intelligence complacent or just lazy?
How did ISIS managed to recruit young individuals, whatever the method they may have used? Questions to be asked is, How were they able to attract the youth? How did they manage to build relationship with would be “fighters” online, in cyber space, which is, apparently being monitored at all time? How did they established trust to the point, where a person forsake all values and adopts whole new perverted values? How funding was channeled, and travel arrangements for westerners to join ISIS could have occurred without ever being detected by our intelligence services?
Regardless, what the western intelligence agencies were or were not doing when young individuals from US, Great Britain, Australia, Canada, started leaving the countries? Why didn’t anyone raise the red flag? Wait a second, why the Muslim youths are leaving, and heading east? Where are they going? How are they going there? Who is behind them? Parents have been reporting their children missing or unable to contact them? Was it not the responsibility of law enforcing agencies, and intelligence agencies to try compiling the data and try to find a pattern? Evidently, that was not done, and even if it was done, the concerned parties, especially, Muslim community leaders were kept in the dark. They were not consulted or asked to intervene and stop the bleeding.
Yes, sooner or later this hideous terror group will be defeated and brought to its knees. Simply because the extent of brutality it is willing employ to kill innocent people in Muslim Countries, because the leaders deemed them to be an apostate.
Sooner or later there will be defection, or thanks to the positive role being played by the Muslim leaders across the globe to ensure the expansion of this terror network by protecting the youth from falling in their recruiters trap. Nonetheless, it’s too little, too late for those whom have already fallen into their trap. The only thing Muslim Leadership at this point could do, is to protect those whom have not fallen into ISIS trap, and they are doing their best. However, immediate government intervention is needed on many fronts. Federal government needs to allocate resources, and make financial investment in protecting the Muslim youth from falling into ISIS trap.
This raises the secondary threat, as many of the youth, when they realize this is not fun anymore, or break up or division, within ISIS rank and file will have these individuals returning back home to Australia, US, Canada – more radicalized, more frustrated, angrier, for the failure of their mission or what they had set out to achieve. Regardless, whether or not they consider it to be evil or not.
Whatever the case might be. We are in the middle of a battle. This is not the time to play blame game. It’s time to identify the causes and finding solutions. The only ay it can happen is when the federal government takes an active role in resolving the problem by taking Muslim leaders and their respective organizations in trust an allocate resources, both financial and human to find a solution. Asking Muslim organizations and leaders to issue condemnation statement is not the way.
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