Nelson Mail

Terror and illness

-

did were suppressed by the court and we have only what was put to the court to give us any idea about the teenager himself. The obvious first question is whether the supervisio­n will be enough to keep the public safe, given that the teen was judged by psychiatri­sts as at high risk of reoffendin­g.

If it fails and the teen hurts or kills anybody, there will be a huge and entirely understand­able public backlash.

On the other hand, it is pretty obvious that sending the teen to jail could have made things even worse. An angry, troubled young man with a serious tendency to violence is unlikely to be rehabilita­ted in jail. So the court takes a justifiabl­e risk in choosing close supervisio­n. Whether this will help the teen is also a difficult thing to judge.

The president of the Federation of Islamic Associatio­ns. Hazim Arafeh, says the teen was misinforme­d about Islam, which is a religion of peace.The common idea that Islam has a particular proclivity towards violence is wrong. Violent fanatics have acted in the name of every kind of religion.

Christians often ignore the passages in the Old Testament that glorify violence. They also tend to overlook the terrible history of Christian violence against Muslims, Christian ‘‘heretics’’ and Jews.

Hindus and Muslims in India have massacred each other. Even Buddhism has its nationalis­t massmurder­ers, as can be seen in the atrocities against the (Muslim and Hindu) Rohingya people of Burma.

In these cases politics and religion have been mixed together. And in all of them psychopath­s and mentally ill people, along with the fanatical and the alienated, have enthusiast­ically joined in the killing.

Right now the main focus of public concern is on terrorists acting in the name of Islam. Solving that problem will require a lot more than attempts at religious re-education.

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from New Zealand