Identifying Danger

"The signs could be they're not going to school, they're feeling isolated, their understanding of geopolitics is not what we would say is the standard. And that's where positive intervention could be, 'Let's get someone, [possibly] a political science university teacher, to maybe put things in context."
"It could be just someone who is being curious. We don't want to stigmatize anybody. There's no one-size-fits-all indicator."
Sgt. Renu Dash, acting director, RCMP federal policing public engagement team

A recently released federal government report said about 130 people with Canadian ties were suspected of being involved in terrorist activities abroad, including about 30 in Syria. Photograph by: Getty Images, Postmedia News

Authorities have reached the conclusion that one-on-one interventions should become an integral part of counter-terrorism strategy within Canada. To identify potential jihadists and make an effort to expose them to other modes of thought and attitudes other than those they've picked up online or through the efforts of home-grown recruiters, or those travelling to Canada to speak alluringly of the obligation to prove devotion to Islam by accepting the personal need to respect the call to jihad.

Key questions and concerns remain: The criteria to be used when determining who should be targeted for intervention? Will the federal policing agency be able to obtain enough cooperation from community leaders and others of influence in the target community? How to overcome suspicion and the aversion of those who resist being labelled within their community as "spies"?

A report issued in the last week on the terrorism threat to Canada indicated that there was an awareness of roughly 130 radicalized individuals with ties to Canada suspected of involvement in terrorist activities abroad, with about 30 of those individuals actively engaged in jihadist activities in Syria. The report stated that most "extremist travellers" choose to believe that conflict is justified on moral or religious grounds. Now there's a startling revelation.

The report explained that the RCMP is heading a High Risk Travel Case Management Group, aligned with several government agencies in a concerted attempt to identify extremist 'travellers', to disrupt their travel plans and/or terrorist activities. An intervention program is in the development stages to address the incidence of those demonstrating signals of involvement in violent extremism but not yet engaged.

Public safety officials, according to Sgt. Dash, are studying, as an example, the Berlin EXIT program originally designed to address assistance to German citizens resolved to exit the neo-Nazi movement. A few years earlier the EXIT group had created another program based on the original in support of (?) families of radicalized Muslims. In essence, a reversal of the Palestinian Fatah and Hamas concept of rewarding families of extremists whose violence results in the deaths of Israelis.

According to experts a number of "diagnostic tools" have been developed internationally for the purpose of assessing where someone falls on the "spectrum of dangerousness", with no consensus yet reached on which of those tools represents the best option. According to a report by the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence in London, young people wearing "radical" garments were referred for intervention: "People were not sure what to look for and so they erred on the side of caution."

"Sixteen, 17-year-olds don't really listen to their parents they're a little suspicious of teachers, they may be suspicious of imams; they may not be suspicious of a youth worker associated with their mosque who is in the know", explained Lorne Dawson, a sociology professor and expert on radicalization at the University of Waterloo, stressing the importance of selecting mentors capable of gaining the trust of the intervention targets.

He does foresee a problem, however if such potential mentors view being seen working with authorities as inimical to their reputation within the community: "Are these kinds of people going to be willing to work with government or will they say, 'Hey man, if I work with you the RCMP, I lose my cred", pointed out Professor Dawson.

Just so; and that can be interpreted as the Muslim community itself seeing no need for them to be involved in a prevention strategy; a barrier between good citizenship, law and order, and closing the ranks of the Muslim community. And to that, a legitimate question arises: to whom do these citizens of Canada proffer their loyalties?