Raising Islamist Jihadists

"The ministry will open 10 regional centers in various states where the madrassa registration will be offered and those madrassas which will not meet requirements for registration will be closed."

Pakistan's Education Minister Shafqat Mehmood 

 

"[Successive Pakistani governments – both civilian and military – had attempted to reform madrassas but each time ended up surrendering more authority]."

"Even today, several ministries, such as religious affairs, education, interior, and commerce, and law enforcement and counter-terrorism bodies, have been dealing with the madrassa issue separately, making it more complicated."

Amir Tuaseen, Karachi-based analyst, former head, Pakistan Madrassa Education Board

 

"[More than 30,000 madrassas will soon be brought into the] mainstream [fold and overseen by the ministry of education.] An Islamic education will continue to be provided but there will be no hate speech."

Major-General Asif Ghafoor

There’s no exact number of madrassas in Pakistan but estimates put the number in the tens of thousands. They provide food, housing and a religious education to students from around the country. Many teach both male and female students.   AP

 

Religious seminaries in Pakistan have long been seen as contributing to violence and radicalization; their graduates have supplied recruits for the Taliban and other militant groups. In an earlier era, these same madrassas established all over Saudi Arabia with its strict Wahhabi code, furnished students enrolled within with the very same attributes. Students were taught to memorize the Koran, and this is what the curriculum consisted of. Radicalization was rife; it was from one of these madrassas in Saudi Arabia that a radicalized student by the name of Osama bin Laden went on to make terrorism through al-Qaeda a feared phenomenon.

 

Arabic is not the native language of Pakistan, but in the Pakistan-based madrassas it is Arabic that is taught, so that the students can recite all the passages of the Koran in Arabic. It is held that only Arabic can express the sacred scripture as it is meant to be. Pakistan's Islamic schools have long been a concern of the country's government. True, official Pakistan assured the United States and other NATO countries that it could be relied upon as a partner in the 'war against terrorism', while at the same time giving haven to the Afghan Taliban. Osama bin Laden's compound sat in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

 

Now, however, Pakistan, threatened by its own Taliban and violent jihadist Islamist groups has been attempting to control the content of the madrassas which typically teach only the Koran, and aspects from the Koran that glorify jihad. No other subjects taught in modern schools are part of the curriculum; this is a single and singular-faceted education system. They are not unique to Pakistan. Madrassas of this type have been established with Saudi funding all over the world.

The Pakistani Ministry of Education has enacted a requirement for madrassas to register with them in an effort to increase accountability. Islamist political parties resisted the government moves and the largest of the political parties, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, persuaded the government to end the registration requirement. A colonial-era law governing educational groups provides scant oversight of curricula, activities and funding.

The government cited concerns that the old system could undermine counterterrorism efforts and breach international commitments to fight money laundering and financing of terrorism. In Islamabad, anti-government protests emerged: "If the government deviates,the decision won't be made in Parliament, but on the streets" threatened Maulana Fazlur Rehman, chief of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam. In the 1970s there were dozens of madrassas in Pakistan.

 

Pakistani government is juggling with different options to regulate centuries-old madrassa system. One such option is to set up a Imam Hatip schooling system based on the pattern of Turkey, where Islamic schools offer a mix of religious and worldly education.  TRTWORLD

U.S. and Arab funding in the 1980s transformed the madrassas to recruitment centres for Islamic volunteers to fight the Soviet forces in Afghanistan. At present, some 30,000 madrassas operate in Pakistan. Some madrassa teachers endorsed the Al-Qaeda ideology, graduating future Taliban leaders. Following the attacks of September 11, 2001, pressure was exerted on Pakistan to regulate the schools. "The post-9/11 war on terror and events like the 2005 London bombings raised global concerns about the lack of effective madrassa monitoring", explained Abdur Rehman Shah, a madrassa affairs expert with Tongji University in Shanghai.

In 2014, Islamist militants attacked a military-operated school in north-western Pakistan and over 145 people were killed, leading to madrassas observation becoming central to counterterrorism efforts. Raids targeting seminaries suspected of militant links by security agencies followed. The government attempted to curb Islamist parties' influence over seminary boards in 2019. Over 17,500 madrassas enrolled 2.2 million students, according to official data. Poor Pakistani children were given free education, meals and housing.

Pakistan boasts the second-highest number of children not attending schools globally, with 22.8 million children from age 5 to 16 not attending school, representing 44% of the country's young. The country's public education system fails to meet the needs of millions of its children. Supported by private donations, madrassas partially fill the public system gaps. Their education consists largely of Islamic theology and Arabic. Many of the madrassas emphasize doctrinal purity and Islam's defense. 

Administrators of madrassas claim they are unfairly blamed for militancy.

"There are many people who go to liberal schools and are radicalized."

"Terrorism must be curbed, but scapegoating madrassas is not the solution."

Qari Shahid Gul, teacher, Karachi madrassa

As there has long been a concern that the madrassas produce unskilled graduates who espouse intolerant misinterpretations of Islam, many organized attempts have already been made to "modernize" them. TRTWORLD

The Hallucination of Strategic Jihadi Intervention

"It makes perfect sense [to use community safety hubs across the city and more across Canada to try to apprehend violent extremism] because we already have these mechanisms that respond to situations of risk."
"At the heart of it, it's about connecting people to services to reduce the risks that they face, whether it's extremism or something else."
Scott McKean, City of Toronto 

"For a certain proportion of people who are moving into that radicalized space, I think that what the Toronto Police Service is doing will catch and hopefully help to re-engage those people on a different trajectory."
"We're all flying by the seat of our pants right now based on a small number of studies, and growing the knowledge base is so important to getting this right."
Sara Thompson, associate professor, Ryerson University Department of Criminology

"It's an issue that our citizens, our communities, are concerned about and that we recognize is out there. It's no different than the concern that their child may be starting to get into drugs. Maybe they need a mentor to help them navigate what they're going through."
"We don't have all the answers. We're putting what we think is a good initiative forward. We may have to tweak it along the way or make some changes as we move forward, but I think we've done our due diligence."
"I think it has huge potential. Everybody is watching to see what happens."
Det.Sgt.Kelly Gallant, 30-year police veteran, firearms instructor, tactical team member, negotiator

Jack Boland / Toronto Sun / QMI Agency      James Ramer speaks at Police HQ.

Violent radicalization has surfaced as a problem just about everywhere in the world, with Islamist jihad proving to be an attractive provocation in inciting interest among young Muslim men and women eagerly subscribing to the ideology of a reborn Islam, returning to its roots of triumphant coersion through violent conquest; from the 7th Century of its inception to the 21st Century of its reinvention as a barbaric tool of religious conversion.

Canadians in significant numbers have taken to travelling abroad for combat training in the Islamist hotspots of the world -- from North Africa to the Middle East and places in between. Although al-Qaeda had its attractions, impelling Muslim men to make the trek in obeisance to the call to jihad, it took the advent of a caliphate calling itself the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant which proudly and with the aid of social media celebrated its public relations agenda of wanton slaughter through inventive atrocities to rally the minds and hearts of recruits.

Recruits who have involved themselves in terrorist plots, who have been arrested and placed on peace bonds, who have been apprehended from travelling outside Canada to join terrorist groups, or those who have returned to Canada after having received terrorist training and gained experience on the jihadist battlefield championing violent Islamist triumphalist conflict. They will remain the concern of the RCMP. The Toronto Police Service decided it would absorb a counter-extremism function into a standing community safety program to address the problem of emerging jihadists.

Deputy Police chief James Ramer tasked  two officers, Sgt. Donald Locke and Det.Sgt. Kelly Gallant on their return to Canada in 2014, from mentoring women police officers in Kundiz province, Afghanistan to formulate a protocol to address the concerns of Toronto residents recruited into Al Shabab, Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, Islamic State, the Tamil Tigers and the Ku Klux Klan. The team of two initiated their assignment by attending American conferences, by consulting academics, by reading research papers and visiting interventionist programs in countries like Britain.

They concluded through that research that often people became radicalized through their own vulnerable mental health issues, personal identities, or family problems. A program to address similar problems began in Glasgow, Scotland, was picked up by Saskatchewan as a working model, and the Toronto team saw fit to emulate it, extending what had basically been a tool to tackle guns, drugs and gangs into an extended project to encapsulate Islamist terrorism as well.

People at risk were to be identified and intervention to take place at weakly "situation tables" involving police, the city and the United Way community services agencies. Each case was studied and strategies devised to counter addiction, social housing, education, employment and other issues which might be involved in helping to divert people from the alternate paths they choose leading to societal isolation, resentment, crime and radicalization.

Ottawa Citizen     A tourist shot this photo of Michael Zehaf-Bibeau during his attack near Parliament Hill.

"Misfits", "wannabes", "hangers-on", on the cusp of committing to extremism considered to reflect a proportion of those being radicalized were to be identified by members of the associated community; anonymity was guaranteed to community members to give them confidence that coming forward to police to report concerns about extremists would be kept confidential in the process of bringing the cases to the situation tables. Concerned individuals could convey their impressions of radicalization to police without fear of community identification.

"I don't think it's a panacea", doubtfully commented Stephanie Carvin, an assistant professor specializing at Carleton University, School of International Affairs. Equating issues underlying those representative of drugs and gangs with those of extremist Islamist jihadists simplifies the concerns of terrorism by normalizing it into a common stream of criminality, when it is far more than that; a vicious, threatening existential threat, no mere societal non-convention.

Even while cases are initially screened to ensure that any who have committed criminal or terrorist activity are excluded from the program of hoped-for rehabilitation and referred directly to the RCMP for investigation: "We are not going to send somebody like that to the hub", stated Deputy Chief James Ramer reassuringly. Experts are divided on the potential effectiveness of the police program for intervention.

To the present time, although the interventionist team has been in service for well over a year there has been a total of two events they have been involved with, one respecting parents worried their child was fixated on viewing ISIL videos. The outcome of that investigation was the conclusion that mental health issues were involved. The second, the case of a girl missing from home, and found to have crossed at Fort Erie into the United States. In her possession was an Pakistan-bound airline ticket.

Like her gullible counterparts in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, she was en route to meet an utter stranger who had romantically convinced her via social media that she could join him in the jihadist camp to become his wife. Instead, the chagrined young woman was returned by authorities, to the care and custody of her parents.

Postmedia News    Fighters with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant — also known as Daesh — are seen in an undated photo

"So you're basically treating the two populations [drugs and gangs, and jihadist-attracted youth] as being very similar. And it's not a good fit, at least not in a Canadian setting, for violent radicalization."
"This is all a work in progress. We're going to see if it works."
Phil Gurski, former investigator, Public Safety Canada

Molenbeek, Belgium, Jihadi Capital of Europe

"...the most important factor is Belgium's culture of denial. The country's political debate has been dominated by a complacent progressive elite who firmly believes society can be designed and planned. Observers who point to unpleasant truths such as the high incidence of crime among Moroccan youth and violent tendencies in radical Islam are accused of being propagandists of the extreme-right, and are subsequently ignored and ostracized."
"The debate is paralyzed by a paternalistic discourse in which radical Muslim youths are seen, above all, as victims of social and economic exclusion. They in turn internalize this frame of reference, of course, because it arouses sympathy and frees them from taking responsibility for their actions. The former Socialist mayor Philippe Moureax, who governed Molenbeek from 1992 to 2012 as his private fiefdom, perfected this culture of denial and is to a large extent responsible for the current state of affairs in the neighborhood."
"Two journalists had already reported on the presence of radical Islamists in Molenbeek and the danger they posed -- and both became victims of character assassination."     Teun Voten, Belgian cultural anthropologist,former Molenbeek resident

Federica Mogherini, the EU's de facto foreign minister (posing at left with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif) said last year, "Islam belongs in Europe.... I am not afraid to say that political Islam should be part of the picture." Françoise Schepmans (right), mayor of the Molenbeek district of Brussels, received a list with the names and addresses of over 80 suspected Islamic militants living in her area. "What was I supposed to do about them? It is not my job to track possible terrorists," she said. "That is the responsibility of the federal police."

The classic scenario of locking the barn door after the horses have galloped off, is taking place in Europe. Wholly infiltrated by a culture, a heritage and a religion whose values stand in stark contrast to European history, culture and priorities, Europe is swiftly disappearing into the political and social maw of a religion whose primary goal is to eclipse all others and, by the irresistible draw of its theological magnetic field -- just like a black hole against which other space objects have no defense -- capture the world by the energy field of its totalitarian ideology.

Now that Europe has been the beneficiary of years of Muslim immigration from North Africa and the Middle East, the importation of Islamic ideals absorbing society into its orbit is proceeding apace. With the demands for Sharia law, for total recognition and respect for the precepts of Islam which recognizes no man-made laws let alone indigenous customs and values, the gradual take-over of Europe proceeds. And it is joined by a more lethal manifestation of Islam's pathology of conquest, one demanding engagement in jihad through which the vengeance of the spurned has its day.

The West looks on with alarm as the Taliban, al-Shabaab, Hezbollah, Islamic State, and Boko Haram maraud through countries of traditional Islamic heritage but which do not sufficiently genuflect to Islam's purity as it was conceived by the Prophet Mohammad in direct and obedient obeisance to Allah. The assaults and atrocities trigger condemnation and fear at the deadly cost to human life. Resolve to counter the waves of terror harden when the West itself comes under vicious attack as it did in America, France, Spain, Britain and Belgium. Not to mention Indonesia, Mali, Iraq, India.

Finally, a recognition that what has been occurring in the only Western-type democracy in the Middle East, is also afflicting Europe, in another classic: the canary-in-the-mine syndrome. "The threat we are facing in Europe is about the same as what Israel faces", finally admitted Olivier Guitta, managing director of GlobalStrat, international security consultancy. "We have entered an era in which we are going to have to change our way of life and take security very seriously."

In Europe and across the world authorities are looking to once again tighten security at airports, railway stations, government buildings and sites key to civilized life in the wake of the deadly bombings at the airport and subway in Brussels. An increased police and military presence in the public arena; explosive experts, sniffer dogs and plainclothes investigators are now being deployed, while governments warn against travel to Belgium.

Counterterrorism units are being deployed in crowded areas and transit locations worldwide in acknowledgement of the string of terrorism assaults setting Europe as a target. Europe itself must now contemplate the implementation of tougher security levels at airports and at obvious 'soft targets' like shopping malls, similar to what Israel has been living with for years.

A former security director at Israel's Ben-Gurion Airport, Pini Schiff, issued his critique of Belgium's security, classifying the Brussels airport security as "a colossal failure". In Paris and at Gatwick and Heathrow in London, security is at a high alert level. How alert can any country now be to the threat that exists within? In the United Kingdom 27 percent of Muslims claimed sympathy with the Charlie Hebdo attacks; 78 percent support punishment for publication of Mohammed cartoons, with 68 percent supporting arrest and prosecution of anyone who would "insult Islam".

A World Public Opinion survey at the  University of Maryland gives figures of 61 percent of Egyptians, 32 percent of Indonesians, 41 percent of Pakistanis, 38 percent of Moroccans, 83 percent of Palestinians, 62 percent of Jordanians, and 42 percent of Turks endorsing or sympathizing with attacks on Americans or on U.S. groups. In Belgium, 16 percent of young Muslims believe state terrorism is "acceptable" according to a 2013 study, while 12 percent of young Muslims in Britain feel suicide attacks against civilians can be justified.

The Washington Post reported "About 50 to 70 percent of all inmates in prison [in France] are Muslim, though Muslims represent about 12 percent of the country's population". An Anti-Defamation League report in 2015 found that: "An average of 55 percent of Western European Muslims harbored anti-Semitic attitudes. Acceptance of anti-Semitic stereotypes by Muslims in these countries was substantially higher than among the national population in each country."
A 2006 Swedish government report found that 5 percent of its indigenous population held anti-Semitic views, while the number surged too 39 percent amongst adult Muslims. A 2012 study of Germany's burgeoning Turkish population disclosed that 62 percent of Turks in Germany want to  live exclusively among one another. As well, 46 percent express the aspiration that the country become a Muslim majority nation.

The venerable BBC noted that 36 percent of 16- to 24-year-old Muslims believe should a Muslim convert to another religion they should be punished by death. Thirty-five percent of Muslims prefer to send their children to an Islamic school, while 37 percent of 16- to 24-year-olds say they feel that government-funded Islamic schools should be established. Of 16- to 24-year-olds, there is a 74 percent preference for Muslim women to wear the veil, in comparison to 28 percent among those over age 55.

Concerning Concerned Canadian Muslims

• We acknowledge the extraordinary experience of acceptance of Muslims in Canadian society.
• We are committed to countering the impact of the hate-filled ideologies of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Khomeinists and other extremist groups, on Canada.
• We decry the promotion by extremists of 'cultural victimhood' as an insidious tool to attract supporters and lay the groundwork for radicalization.  
• We reject the unfettered use of accusations of "Islamophobia" to inhibit free speech and silence the discussion on Islamist extremism in Canada.
• We urge Canada to enact stronger policy initiatives to contend with extremist ideologies that generate radicalization.
• We support the legislative measures adopted by Canada to protect Canadians from terrorism.
• We unequivocally support Canadian legislation prohibiting forced marriages, female genital mutilation (FGM) and other such loathsome practices.
• We support Canada's continued involvement in the military mission against ISIS.
• We support Canada's listing of the Iranian and Syrian regimes as state sponsors of terror.

Above are the inspiring statements of the collective voice of a coalition calling themselves Muslims Facing Tomorrow. Their website, muslimsfacingtomorrow.com introduces the curious to their mission within Canada as Muslims disturbed beyond complacent isolation from those Muslim-Canadian groups that distinguish themselves by the tactics of divisive and hateful propaganda against those with whom they disagree or who raise their traditional ire.

The full-page advertisement published in Canadian newspapers on Thursday, 30 July 2015 is unequivocal in its support of the current Government of Canada's attempts to protect all Canadians against home-grown terrorism, of Canada's involvement in international efforts to confront radical Islam, and in its rejection of Muslim societies within Canada purporting to speak for Canadian Muslims who accuse those critical of political Islam of "Islamophobia".

Muslims Facing Tomorrow, a coalition of Muslim groups that have formed to counteract the efforts of political Islamists who have much in common with and support groups like Hezbollah and Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood and celebrate Iranian influence in Canada has stated its commitment to advancing the interests of all people regardless of ethnicity, religion, civil status, gender orientation or any other indices that generally tend to set people apart from one another.

This timely, refreshing and vitally critical exposition of an entirely humanist mode of expressing solidarity with all the citizens of Canada with a common interest in advancing human society, human rights and equality among people, sets in perspective a hitherto not fully recognized effort on the part of people dismayed at seeing their religion used as a tool of medieval violence, threatening co-existence even among Muslims whose sect is viewed as that of heretics.

It is beyond reassuring to know that Tarek Fatah, Salim Mansur, Irshad Manji, Nazeem Afshin-Jan and Raheel Reza are not alone in their dedication to defending the religion they know and love while confronting the destabilizing efforts of fanatical Muslims living in Canada and spreading their message of suspicion, hatred, rejection of equality and the opportunity to live in peace with their neighbours. Muslims Facing Tomorrow spurs those on the sidelines to raise their voices in support of Canadian values.

Aligned with them in Muslims Facing Tomorrow is the Coalition of Progressive Canadian Muslim Organizations, Muslim Committee Against Antisemitism, Canadian Thinkers' Forum, Muslim Youth Expressions and Forum for Learning. While Canada is beset in some quarters with the threat of militant Islam, we are fortunate to have among us Canadians who subscribe to the tenets that support their belief that Islam is a religion of peace, rejecting those that seek to assert otherwise.

Canadian Muslims who have accepted Canadian values and who deplore the fanatical Islamism that prevails throughout much of the Middle East, Southeast Asia and North Africa today, have finally raised their voice to inform the Canadian reading public that there are indeed righteous among the faithful whose values are distinctly oriented in opposition to militant, human-rights-abusing Islamism.

Bypassing The Thrills

"Hayat helps the family to become a living positive counter-narrative to the radicalizing environment."
"We provide positive alternatives through the family and strengthen emotional bonds to create a counterforce to pull into the radical milieu. We do not train the families in theological arguments."
"[Discussions with Canadian officials is] still very delicate and it is not clear which agency may take over responsibility and how."
"Canadian officials know that they need to come up with something as they are massively lagging behind European countries in terms of dealing with homegrown radicalization."
Daniel Koelher, counsellor, Hayat group

"Why would the Italian community have to react to Cosa Nostra? Why would it be expected of the German community as a whole to react to a couple people who decide to shave their heads and wear swastikas?"
"The impact is societal. We have to deal with it together. This is not a Muslim community problem in and of itself. Radicalization is a criminal dynamic and it has to be dealt with."
Abdul Souraya, immigration lawyer, co-chair, Calgary Police Services Middle East advisory committee

Well, there's some food for thoughtful argument. There's no argument that Canada needs to address the issue of radically belligerent young Canadians obsessed with jihad and the exciting prospect of travelling abroad to enlist with groups they have come to regard as righteously protective of Islam which just incidentally offers them the opportunity to engage in real-live conflict, not just video games and paint-ball excursions.

Why? asks Mr. Souraya. Well, for starters one is religious-based and extremely sensitive. The other examples given are purely ideological and criminal; there are no population-sensitive toes to step on. One is based on interpretations of sacred writings inherent within a religion and its devotion, the other is indeed societal and criminal. So comparisons are fairly useless and cross the line into the absurd.

Although the problem is obvious and has become more obvious as time goes by in tandem with the deteriorating situations in Muslim countries like Libya, Somalia, Syria and Iraq, there is also the issue of oil-rich countries like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Qatar and the Emirates funding and founding the activities of Al-Qaeda and ISIS (for the Sunni side) and Hezbollah and Hamas (by Iran and Qatar, reflecting Shiite terror-power). Much of this, in fact, is related to Islamist sectarian adversities.

Saudi Arabia got the ball rolling when it established madrassas world-wide to teach impressionable young Muslims of their duties to Islam, with the emphasis on sacrifice and prosetylization, and jihad. But it was the Islamic Republic of Iran with its fiery revolutionary zeal that set the Muslim world on fire with the theological thrust of its hatred of all that existed outside the world of Islam; its contempt for Western decadence and lack of spirituality, Muslim-style.

Mr. Souraya's contention that a world afire with Islamist jihad threatening order and stability in the Middle East, an area that has never fully come to terms with order and stability, to tip it completely over into full-blown dysfunction, as not a Muslim concern only, more or less ignores what has happened whenever a Western power becomes involved in Islamic affairs. The West was forgiven for saving Muslims in Bosnia, but its forays into Afghanistan and Iraq to save Muslims from their own dark dictators was damned as modern-day Crusades.

The spectre of police and security agents in close communion with Muslim leaders in Canada, urging them to be aware, to detect and to pass on to them information relating to the identification of those within their faith who appear to have 'gone over to the dark side', raises the likely enough prospect of Muslims accusing government agencies of spying on them, of oppressing them, of accusing them of dastardly plans to cause havoc within Canada.

The radicalization of Muslims is indeed a Muslim affair; it is from within Islam and among other Muslims who seek to influence ever greater numbers of recruits to violent jihad where the problem lies. Just as physicians are often bidden to heal themselves, calls to the Muslim community to rid themselves of these sinister recruiters from among their midst, and to explain as only they can, to the impressionable that to engage in slaughter and rampages of atrocities runs counter to Islamic values.

Unless it doesn't.

Either way, Canadian authorities have little option but to become involved. To become engaged in an effort to attempt to stem the tide of Islamist recruits into violent Islam. That up to an estimated 300 to 500 Canadian Muslims have left the country for more violent pastures in places of conflict, has its counterpart in their return, some 80 of whom are assumed to have come back to Canada post-conflict, with newfound skills.

In the effort to restrain, detain and defang these converts to Islamist jihad and martyrdom, will the Muslim community rise up in defence of its own, and accuse those involved agencies of abusing their authority and hounding the Islamic community?