Interesting, though bigotry and knee-jerk attacks at THE OTHER is not the exclusive domain of Islamists: Ultimately, this is an intra-Muslim struggle for power and control wrapped in a debate over what it means to be a Muslim in todays world and what the boundaries of justifiable action are. Defining those factors is one tool that can be used to gain power; attacks against the West and its interests, meant to force Westerners to pull out of Muslim lands or to attack Muslims and enforce the jihadist narrative, are another. This issue undermines efforts by moderate and progressive Muslims to advance the notion of freedoms based on an Islamic ethos. The ongoing intra-Muslim debate gives extremists ample ideological and, by extension, geopolitical space to exploit. The jihadist enterprise deliberately targets non-Muslims, in particular the West, in part as a means to gain ground within the Muslim milieu. This strategy also sucks the Western world into what is essentially a Muslim civil war in order to tackle the security threats posed by Islamist militant actors.
Posted on: Mon, 12 Jan 2015 09:04:55 +0000
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