Islamic State wants us to turn away Syrian refugees
Even before the deadly attacks in Paris last Friday, some hardline ideologues started railing against the influx of Syrian refugees into western countries. They say that Muslim values are incompatible with countries in Europe and North America where they might seek to settle, and that it is dangerous for Muslims from Islamic State-held territory to live alongside non-Muslims in the West.
Nationalist European leaders? Rightwing Republicans? No, those hardliners are members of Islamic State. And whether they know it or not, conservative politicians calling for tighter limits or an outright halt to accepting refugees from Syria are playing right into their hands.
This newest round of refugee panic was sparked after the body of one of the Paris attackers was found near a Syrian passport (of dubious authenticity) that had apparently been used to enter Europe. Since then, more than half of U.S. governors have said they would seek to block Syrian refugees from their states. U.S. Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz said he would introduce legislation to ban Muslim Syrian refugees.
And in Canada, Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall urged Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to back down from his pledge to resettle 25,000 Syrian refugees by the end of the year.
The concern, they insisted, was security. If an Islamic State operative from Syria could sneak into Paris to spread death and terror, who’s to say it couldn’t happen in Saskatoon or Detroit?
But ISIS has been urging Muslims from around the world to settle in its territory, not to leave it for the West. Its propaganda materials tout shopping malls and well-run hospitals in Mosul and Raqqa. Its recruiting efforts, often conducted through social media, encourage disaffected Muslims to find a more meaningful life in the caliphate. Attacks at home are treated as a fallback option if the recruit is unable to travel to the Islamic State.
Emigration, on the other hand, is described as a “dangerous major sin.” A recent article in the Islamic State magazine, Dabiq, warned of the dire consequences of voluntarily leaving the caliphate for the lands of the unbeliever: “If one’s children and grandchildren don’t fall into kufr (unbelief ), they are under the constant threat of fornication, sodomy, drugs and alcohol.”
Elsewhere, that message comes with a harder edge.
The Islamic State has reportedly threatened to confiscate the property of doctors who flee, and has placed improvised explosive devices outside Iraqi cities in its control to stop residents from leaving.
There are two main reasons for this. The first is that the Islamic State project depends on convincing its followers and the world at large that it is a functioning society — the “state” in Islamic State — and that life there is superior to life in the godless West.
If its citizens are risking their lives to flee to the land of the infidel, that illusion falls apart.
The second is that Islamic State wants to eliminate what it calls the “grey zone” of the world, where Muslims and nonMuslims live together.
It wants Muslims to buy into its narra- tive that they can never truly belong in western society and should support the Islamic State instead. When Republican candidates insist that not even Syrian children can be trusted; when they single out Muslims for exclusion; when a petition to keep Syrian refugees from settling in Canada gains more than 34,000 signatures as a mosque is torched in Peterborough, Ont. — all of this reinforces that message.
And that poses a far bigger security threat than the resettlement of more refugees. Muslim youth who constantly hear that they don’t belong in our countries become alienated and unsure of their identity, making them prime targets for radicalization and possible recruitment into violent extremist plots. This will continue to happen among Muslims already in Canada and the U.S. and Europe even if not a single additional refugee moves in.
There was an expression that gained ground after the Sept. 11 attacks. People voiced their determination to live their ordinary lives by saying that if they changed their routines or values out of fear, “the terrorists have already won.” Today, we are again reeling from another set of shocking attacks, and again questioning what we should change to keep ourselves safe.
If we make it harder for the refugees who are fleeing terror to find new homes, and make it easier for them to become alienated from our communities, it doesn’t guarantee a victory for Islamic State. But it can’t help but make it easier for them.
The Islamic State is dependent on convincing its followers, and the world, that it’s a functioning society — the “state” in Islamic State
Stephanie MacLellan is a master’s candidate at the Munk School of Global Affairs.