Why are young western Muslims drawn to ISIL’s killing machine?
Answering that question crucial to addressing the terrorist threat
One of the most confounding issues about the Islamic State is why so many young Muslims are leaving their relatively comfortable lives in Canada, U.S. or Europe to join this brutal group. The fact that many 20-somethings with bright futures ahead of them are throwing it all away for ISIL is one of the great mysteries of this conflict. It is one that must be solved quickly for the sake of all of us.
Westerners fighting abroad is not new, but the scale of their involvement in Syria is staggering.
According to western estimates, about 12,000 foreigners are fighting in Syria and Iraq for various militant groups. About 3,000 are from the European Union; France tops the list with around 900, while another 500 are British. The government says as many as 130 Canadians are believed to be fighting and dying for extremist groups abroad, or involved in terrorist-related activities. Several have already died on foreign battlefields. More than 100 U.S. citizens are also fighting in Syria and Iraq.
Clearly, foreign fighters are the fuel that is powering the ISIL killing machine, and if the battle against the militant group is to be won, Canada and its western allies must urgently find out what could possibly have gone wrong to create a generation of young people that finds common cause with ISIL.
It goes without saying that the overwhelming majority of Muslims in Canada and elsewhere are distressed by the atrocities that ISIL is committing in their name. They are in despair not only because their religion is being subverted in the most cynical way for political ends, but also because groups like ISIL, and what they stand for, threaten the dreams Muslims had for themselves and their children when they left their homelands for a better life in countries like Canada. The big question is what Muslims can really do, beyond the expected condemnation of the atrocities, to stem the tide of potential beheaders to Iraq and Syria. And equally important, what can society at large do to help.
Many of those who are attracted to groups like al- Qaida, Al Shabab or lately ISIL are said to be angry, disenchanted young Muslims seeking to act out their frustrations. Others may be impressionable young people who frequent the Internet looking for some meaning in their lives, and become easy prey for extremists who preach hate. But more troubling is the number of upwardly-mobile young Muslims who give it all up for ISIL and its ilk.
No doubt Muslim communities have an important role to play in identifying potential extremists and sounding the alarm, and many have become good at it. But the new wave of recruits, often described as lone wolves, are difficult to snare. Recent reports show that many of the Canadians who went abroad to fight never left trails. Often, the first time their families, friends or congregation members learn about their flight is when they get phone calls from some desert outpost, telling them of the defection. These people are so disciplined, and so adept at keeping their anger and disenchantment to themselves, no one has any clue what they are up to until it is too late.
There is little doubt that many, many Muslims feel, rightly or wrongly, that the western world is against them, and they have no outlet to express themselves. Unfortunately for all of us, a number of them are finding dangerous ways and means to let off steam. It helps no one that they are a small minority. And it really doesn’t matter whether others think the anger is justified or not. What matters is that the anger is real, and we must try to engage it. In Canada and elsewhere, we must find the courage as a society — not just Muslims — to engage in some honest and uncomfortable conversations about what’s behind the anger, and why so many young men take this dangerous path. Next week: Dealing with the anger.