Free Essays - PhDessay. We will write a custom Research Paper on Islamic and Christian Religion and Terrorism specifically for you! For example, Dutch Islamic schools outperform comparison schools in improving student non-cognitive skills on three dimensions: reflections, skills, and civic attitudes and essay on islam and terrorism a positive effect on student cognitive outcomes after controlling for student socio-economic background Dronkers, Quran, Also in the Quran that are many instances of the Prophet Muhammad speaking about prohibit soldiers from harming women and childrenadvising them to not betray, do not be excessive, do not kill a newborn child, essay on islam and terrorism. The Madrassah Challenge: Militancy and Religious Education in Pakistan By Christine Fair. In this way, the desire to proliferate specific theological views and beliefs is, to some extent, present in any mainstream religious community. It is also clear that religious terrorists primarily fight social-political phenomena and trends.
Christianity
Terrorism is a very vast and the most discussed topic in the contemporary world of global politics. There were times when people would say that we do not follow politics or we do essay on islam and terrorism get involved in politics. But now I think no one can run away from it, it is a part of everybody's lives, it is a part of our lives - so we better start living with it. Terrorism is an old phenomena it over the time took different shapes. Today terrorism has taken a very complicated and dangerous form. Islam is a religion and a complete essay on islam and terrorism of life and totally appose terrorism. In current scenarios the basic reason of terrorism is not Islam but international politics and national interest of the nations of the world.
And world powers use it as a supportive pillars. This is now days at the top of the international agenda. That is because those who emerge and carry out acts of terrorism in the name of Islam. And those who criticize these actsrepresent a tiny minority in the world of Islam, essay on islam and terrorism. Failing to understand Islam which is religion of peace and justice hey make it a tool of terrorism, essay on islam and terrorism. In fact from the last few centuries Muslim have been said to be responsible for violence by western forces and their allies, essay on islam and terrorism. And on the other hand Islam And on the other hand Islam rejects to respond to violence with violence. In fact Islam suggest to respond to evil with goodness. Order custom essay Islam and Terrorism with free plagiarism report.
Islam What Does "Islam" Mean? The word "Islam" itself means "Submission to Allah. The religion of Islam is not named after a person as in the case of "Christianity" which was named after Jesus Christ, essay on islam and terrorism, "Buddhism" after Gutama Buddha"Marxism" after Karl Marx, and "Confucianism" after Confucius. Similarly, Islam is not named after a tribe like "Judaism" after the tribe of Judah and "Hinduism" after the Hindus. The Arabic word "Islam" means the submission or surrender of one's will to the will of the only true god worthy of worship, "Allah". Muslim Anyone who does indeed submit to the will of Allah as required by Islam is termed a "Muslim," which means one who has submitted to the will of Allah. Many people in the West have developed the sad misinformed trend of calling Islam "Muhammadenism" and it's followers "Muhammadins.
No Muslim has ever called his religion "Muhammadenism" or called himself a "Muhammadin. Islam teaches us that this life is a life of worship. We are placed on this earth in order to worship Allah and obey His command. During this earthly life we are subjected to a series of trials. We have the option of enduring these trials and conforming to certain laws, essay on islam and terrorism, and our reward will be great in the next life, or we may decline to endure these trials and choose to not conform to the law, then we will be made to regret it in the next life. Unlike some other religions which claim that God entered in a covenant with a certain group of people and that this group is genetically better than all other human beings, or closer to God, Islam on the other hand teaches that no color, race, tribe, or lineage is better than any other.
We have created you from a male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that you may know one another. the noblest among you in the sight of Allah is the most God-fearing. Allah is The Knower, The Aware. To bear witness that there is no entity worthy of worship except Allah God alone, and that Muhammad pbuh was His messenger. This establishes obedience to God Almighty alone. To perform five prescribed prayers to God every day according to a specific prescribed method and at specific prescribed times, essay on islam and terrorism. This continually reminds us to bear God in mind in all actions, either before or after any given prayer. To pay two and a half percent 2.
This is the basic concept, the actual calculation is a little more complex. To fast the month of Ramadhan from the Islamic Lunar calendar every year from sun rise until sunset. This involves not eating, drinking, or having marital relations, from sun rise until sun set. To perform a pilgrimage to Makkah in the Arabian Peninsula once in a Muslim's lifetime if it is financially possible and their health permits. During this period, Muslims come from all over the world to join together for six days in a prescribed set of acts of worship. All Muslim men are mandated to wear the same garment which was designed to be very plain, simple, and cheap to obtain.
Rouse the believers to the fight, if there are twenty amongst you, patient and perseveringthey will vanquish two hundred; if a hundred, they will vanquish a thousand of the unbelievers; for these are a people without understanding. Acts of unlawful violence and war. Terrorism is not a new phenomena, its is as old as creation of man. It came into existence when for the first time in the history of mankind someone intimidated others to gain his purpose. With the passage of time advancement in essay on islam and terrorism methods and essay on islam and terrorism made terrorism more complicated and artful. Terrorism is defined as a mean of extending intimidation in a systematic way by governments, groups or individuals to gain various political, essay on islam and terrorism, religious and ideological objectives.
The experts on terrorism agree that terrorism is a structure mode to spread violence and terrify people with purpose of gaining political, ideological and religious aims. There are four elements of terrorism: Violence, force Psychological effects and anticipated reaction Terrorist are those group of people who commits acts of violence to produce fear, or harass or weaken or embarrass government security forces. There are about 30 organization essay on islam and terrorism in terrorist activities throughout the essay on islam and terrorism. Al-Qaeda is the main network of terrorist according to American think tank. Al-Qaeda After expulsion from Saudi Arabia, Osama essay on islam and terrorism Laden leader of Al-Qaeda established headquarters for al-Qaeda in Khartoum, essay on islam and terrorism, Sudan.
The first actions of al-Qaeda against American interests were attacks on U. servicemen in Somalia. Osama Bin Laden is on the American Federal Bureau of Investigation's list of FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives for his possible involvement with the circa bombings of the United States Embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya. Some terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah have limited their acts to localized regions of the Middle East, while others, notably Al-Qaeda, have an international scope for their terrorist activities. Bombings An increasingly popular tactic used by terrorists is suicide bombing. This tactic is used against civilians, soldiers, and government officials of the regimes the terrorists oppose.
The use of suicide bombers is seen by many Muslims as contradictory to Islam's teachings;weasel words however, groups who support its use often refer to such attacks as "martyrdom perations" and the suicide-bombers who commit them as "martyrs" Arabic: shuhada, plural of "shahid". The bombers, and their sympathizers often believe that suicide bombers, as martyrs to essay on islam and terrorism cause of jihad against the enemy, will receive the rewards of paradise for their actions. Suicide attack A suicide attack also known as suicide bombing is an attack intended to kill essay on islam and terrorism and inflict widespread damage, while the attacker intends to die as well in the process.
During the last two decades in particular, the concept of "Islamic terror" has been often discussed. In the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks on targets in New York and Washington which caused the death of thousands of innocent civilians, essay on islam and terrorism, this concept has once again returned to the essay on islam and terrorism of the international agenda. Even though the hijackers have Muslim identities, the terror they perpetrated cannot be labeled "Islamic terror", essay on islam and terrorism as it would not be called "Jewish terror" if the perpetrators were Jews or "Christian terror" if they were Christians.
In fact, the aggressors can commit such violence only with the intention of attacking religion itself. It may well be that they carried out this violence to present religion as evil in the eyes of people, to divorce people from religion and to generate hatred and reaction against pious people, essay on islam and terrorism. Consequently, every attack having a "religious" facade on American citizens or other innocent people is actually an attack made against religion. All the three Theistic religions command love, mercy and peace. Terror, on the other hand, is the opposite of religion; it is cruel, merciless and it demands bloodshed and misery. This being the case, essay on islam and terrorism looking for the essay on islam and terrorism of a terrorist act, its origins should be sought in disbelief rather than in religion.
People with a fascist, communist, racist or materialist outlook on life should be suspected as potential perpetrators. The name or the identity of the triggerman is not important. If he can kill innocent people without blinking an eye, whatever his label is, then he is a disbeliever, not a believer. He is a murderer with no fear of God, whose main ambition is to shed blood and to give harm. How we can say that Islam and Muslim are terrorist? In current scenario Muslims are the only victim of terrorism because they face terrorist activities on daily bases and also face world criticism. They are all anti-Muslims and make different prapogenda against muslim because some elements are against and oppose the progress and development of these muslim countries and want to engage them in such activities.
Even as they said some muslim liberations parties as terrorist parties as they called hamas in palastine, hizbullah in lebenon, mujahidin moment in Kashmir and true Afghanistan islamist moments and many other moments as terrorist moments if they are terrorist moment then what is Israel done in palistaine, black waters in Pakistan, raw in Kashmir, fbi, and cia in Afghanistan ,Iraq, and Pakistan and also some other muslim countries. On the one side they said that they work for human rights and freedom and on the other hand they called liberation moments as terrorist moment if they claim on islam and muslims then muslimalso claim that the non muslims state are also terrorist!
Islam is that religion who forbid people to harm even animal and than how a follower of islam other humans like him? They are many other form of terrorism like cyber terrorism, bio terrorism, reginol terrorism, chemical terrorism and mostly muslim countries are unfamiliar with these terms then why west emphasizes that muslim are terrorist why they cannot blame on other form of terrorism the reason is that they only against islam and muslim? For this reason, "Islamic terror" is quite a erroneous concept which contradicts Islam's message. That is because, the religion of Islam can by no means concur with terror.
On the contrary, Muslims are responsible for preventing terrorist acts and bringing peace and justice to the world. Islam, a religion of mercy, does not permit terrorism. In the Quran, God has said: God does not forbid you from showing kindness and dealing justly with those who have not fought you about religion and have not driven you out of your homes. God loves just dealers. In response to the September 11,attacks on the WTC and Pentagon, the U. invaded Afghanistan in October to dismantle al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Al-Qaeda's infrastructure in the country was destroyed and their military commander, Muhammed Atef, was killed.
Abu Zubaydah, another top operative, was captured in Pakistan. Bin Essay on islam and terrorism and al-Zawahiri, however, escaped and are presumed alive. They release audio and video messages to the Arab media from time to time. In March the U. widened the war on terrorism by invading Iraq and deposing Saddam Hussein and his Baath party see Iraq profile.
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Much of the content of this religion focuses on controlling and fighting against ones desires, and as such Muslims can then also physically exert in an attempt to worship Allah. This physical exertion is not necessary performed in a violent fashion. However, it is this physical or combative jihad , which receives so much criticism and publicity. However, the understanding of the physical jihad is widely misunderstood and narrowly represented by a small minority of practices among fundamentalist fringe groups. Background of Islam The very name Islam comes from the Arabic root word 'salama' which is directly translated as the word peace. Islam is a religion that is generally based upon individuals achieving peace and peaceful ways through the submission and the continual practice of what is perceived to the will of Allah God.
The central concept that defines the belief system is rooted in a pacifist perspective. If such a religion is based on the notion of peace, then it is hard to reconcile how perceptions to the contrary could perpetuate. However, in almost every cultural group , there are always fringe groups that skew the basic tenets that are practices by most. Islam, a religion of mercy, does not permit terrorism. In the Quran, God has said: God does not forbid you from showing kindness and dealing justly with those who have not fought you about religion and have not driven you out of your homes. God loves just dealers. Quran, Also in the Quran that are many instances of the Prophet Muhammad speaking about prohibit soldiers from harming women and children , advising them to not betray, do not be excessive, do not kill a newborn child.
There is even mention of the humane and ethical treatment of animals and how animals too deserve minimal amounts of respect and fair treatment. Stereotypical Perceptions of Islam Islam is not and necessarily an Arab religion, rather it's a religion of over a billion people worldwide that represent a wide range of cultures. The vast majority of them are not directly involved in any terrorist activities nor do they show their support for those that do. However, a particular image of the Islamic terrorist has been formed in the West and, at best this image is the result of a very narrow focus on extreme sects within the broader religious context. However it should be also noted that similar perceptions also exist for many other religions as well.
For example, the Catholic Church could be perceived as tolerant to such practices as child molesting and homosexuality and such misrepresentations and oversimplifications are common in most cultural groups. However, the perceptions of the Islamic terrorist have also been fueled by tragic events such as the attack on September 11th on the twin towers in New York. There have been other instances of terrorism Furthermore, media channels have also contributed to portraying the Islamic groups in a negative fashion without balancing these acts with a broader perspective or any sense of context. Many media channels have furthered these stereotypes by portraying these bombers as 'Islamists' or 'Jihadists', as though they were sanctioned by Islam or Islamic leaders who have the authority to speak on behalf of Muslims.
The actions of a few fanatical groups who happen to have Muslim countries that are political, economically, and socially unstable need not necessarily be the representatives of the Islamic culture. This trend is not a new phenomenon however. Much of the recent hostility towards Islam, especially from American Christian Evangelical groups, derives from a long historical perspective Kidd, Many Christians over the course of history have long sought to convert the Muslim world to their faith. soil that occurred or were stopped on the planned day of attack. Thus the threat of terrorism from Islamic groups is significantly skewed in regards to the actual risks that are involved.
Public Opinion Polls While many studies point to the important role public opinion plays in creating an environment in which terrorist groups can flourish, relatively few works have explored survey data to measure support for terrorism among general publics Wilke, Findings from the Pew Global Attitudes survey on attitudes toward suicide bombing and civilian attacks and other measures of support for terrorism offer some revealing perspectives on this question; most notably, the survey finds that terrorism is not a monolithic concept -- support for terrorist activity depends importantly on its type and on the location in which it occurs Wilke, Figure 1- Attitudes towards Terrorism by Location and Over Time Wilke, The attitudes toward terrorism as a legitimate tool to be used for social and political ambitions is heavily dependent on the local, social, and religious conditions that act to foster the legitimacy of terrorism.
For example, Moroccans overwhelmingly disapprove of suicide bombings against civilians, but, among respondents in the six predominantly Muslim countries surveyed, they are the most likely to see it as a justifiable tactic against Americans and other westerners in Iraq Wilke, However, there are significant variations that appear in countries that also have similar religious beliefs which suggest there is much more to the equation than the contributions of religion alone Figure 2 - Support for Osama bin Laden in Extreme Groups Wilke, A later and more comprehensive survey challenged many notions that believe that Islam is correlated with radicalism and violence. Furthermore, the radical Muslims gave political, not religious, reasons for condoning the attacks, the poll showed which indicates that the rationales for terrorism are more rooted in something other than religion.
Other studies have also illustrated disparities in an unjustifiable general perception of Islamic terrorism. For example, after the death of Osama Bin Laden the perceptions of Islamic people in general took a noticeable negative turn. There was a lot of news coverage and a lot of discussion about Islam and Muslims and Muslim Americans," said Erik Nisbet, communication professor. Figure 3 - Perceptions of Islamic Believers after the Death of Bin Laden Shelnutt, Islam in the Media Despite the explosion of media coverage and publications on Islam and…. Works Cited AFP. Major survey challenges Western perceptions of Islam. The Perception of Islam and Muslims in the Media and the Responsibility of European Muslims Towards the Media. pdf Kidd, T. Decentralization and a market orientation were the key attributes of Islamic schooling up to that time Coulson, ; Durrant, , p.
The Sunni-Shia distinction Religious tradition is often complicated. Much of Sunni Islam is decentralized whereas Shia Islam is essentially centralized. This distinction has important implications. On the other hand, Shia Militias seldom attack their co-religionists, largely because Shia central authorities Ayatollahs must authorize such violent acts. Islamic traditionalism versus fundamentalism The divide between Islamic traditionalism and fundamentalism is central to the schooling and terrorism story. Fundamentalism rejects these established theological practices and often goes against the theological consensus of the traditionalist interpretations, called the ijma.
Traditionalists view family and civic values as highly salient, while these commitments tend to be weaker for fundamentalists. Fundamentalism lacks mass appeal, but in societies where socio-economic and political vacuums exist, fundamentalism has gained legitimacy. Almost all major Sunni terrorist organizations identify their ideology as fundamentalist Salafism or Wahhabism. In the theological sense, Sunni fundamentalism confronts the theological consensus of traditionalist Muslim scholars and jurists. The majority of Islamic fundamentalists do not practice violence yet the correlation between fundamentalism and violence is strong.
We now focus on the possibility that quality Islamic instruction could moderate the trail to terror for Sunni fundamentalists that form the majority. Quality instruction grounded in an authentic understanding of Islamic tradition, culture, and values Growing numbers of new converts to Islam have suddenly joined jihad. Ten to 25 percent of terrorists are Western converts to Islam, including approximately 30 percent of American jihadists, a remarkably high percentage given their very small numbers Roy, ; New America, While most life-long Muslims have received a substantial amount of religious instruction in their mosques and schools, converts to Islam lack depth to their Islamic training due to a general lack of exposure to quality Islamic instruction.
This article defines quality Islamic instruction as grounded in an authentic understanding of Islamic tradition, culture, and values. For example, Dutch Islamic schools outperform comparison schools in improving student non-cognitive skills on three dimensions: reflections, skills, and civic attitudes and have a positive effect on student cognitive outcomes after controlling for student socio-economic background Dronkers, A lack of quality religious instruction grounded in an authentic understanding of Islamic tradition, culture, and values appears to contribute to terrorist activity. Most Western terror recruiters and the individuals who commit terror are less likely to know classical Arabic or be trained in traditional Islamic sciences2 and thus lack the authority to issue a fatwa3 Kareem, ; Oakford, In lieu of quality Islamic instruction, the typical Islamic consumer may not be able to distinguish between the opportunity cost of choosing the religious signal from a traditionalist who opposes terrorism over that of a fundamentalist who condones or encourages it.
The traditional public schools are often large, bureaucratic, and lack religious and other values. Hence, they leave 2 Traditional Islamic sciences include Islamic jurisprudence and its methodology primarily based on the Quran and the traditions of the prophet of Islam. Islamic sciences differ from western sciences as the former are laid around revealed Islamic texts and spirituality. Worship forms the core of the former while for the latter acquiring material knowledge is the main motivation. In Western democracies, a fatwa is often a non-binding Islamic verdict issued by an influential religious authority.
Western Islam seeks to be in accord with modernity. Almost all Western mosques welcome Muslims of both genders. The challenge for Islam, however, is that new converts to the faith and the current generation of Muslims coming of age in the West often lack access to quality instruction to communicate the theological depth, diversity, traditions, and values of Islam. The social and purposive needs of Muslims, especially if they are young or converts to the religion, may be better addressed through private schools of choice, as market oriented organizations are better at dispensing incentives to individuals to prompt them to contribute activity to collective enterprises Clark and Wilson, Under school choice systems, consumers are able to maximize their religious, spiritual and cultural utility by their choice of a school for their child.
Role of independent religious schools Limited local access to quality religious instruction creates a bad market for the potential Islamic consumer. The problem concerning religious extremism and Islam, we contend, can be thought of as an example of market failure. The market for Islamic religious instruction in most parts of the world arguably is suffering from a lack of four key market components: 1 quality options, 2 variation in theological instruction, 3 operational autonomy from the state, and 4 competition among religious institutions based on observable outcomes. Increases in the delivery of education specifically through government schooling reduces the variance in Islamic theological instruction by reducing the size of the market for religious schools.
Consequently, fundamentalism gains influence in the absence of local quality options, as we have seen recently in Iran, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. In most nation-states, religious schools operate entirely in the private sector, with no subsidies and little involvement from government. Some countries, from the Middle East to Great Britain, provide faith based religious instruction in government-run public schools. For political reasons such as regime maintenance, these governments influence the instruction in religious schools. Religious schools might be more apt to promote civic values as they cater to the spiritual development of the soul and encourage stronger family ties. Wolf , p. As private schools, we contend that religious schools are best accountable to consumers in the form of parents and not to the government.
Chubb and Moe develop the likely superiority of consumer rather than state driven schooling. They argue that institutional reform is the key to better schools and an indirect control of the schools through markets and parental choice is the best hope for educational effectiveness. Dronkers shows that Dutch Islamic schools not only have a positive value added for student achievement after controlling for socio-economic background, but also the schools do well on non-cognitive measures. Abernathy notes that increased competition due to school choice affected the voting behavior for the state of New Jersey.
Basford and Traeger have shown Somali students adapted to civic values and expressed a greater acceptance of American society in the ethnocentric charter schools in Minneapolis, consistent with similar findings for Somalis in the private school choice environment of Sweden Mohme, Catholic schooling in the U. Catholic schools enroll growing number of non-Catholic and minority students McDonald, and produce equal or better civic outcomes than traditional public schools Wolf, ; Berner, are likely to contribute towards the common good in a similar fashion to the relatively older Catholic schools.
We argue this holds for Islamic schools in the cultural West. In contrast, state control or state influence in religious schools has a history of promoting intolerance when compared to decentralized and privately administered religious schools. There are far fewer fighters in the Syrian and Iraqi battlefields from India, which is home to the third- largest population of Muslims,4 than from other Muslim and Western countries. Concerning the ongoing wars in Iraq and Syria, calculations5 for number of foreign fighters per million people by the International Centre for the Study of Radicalization and Political Violence do not list India.
Conditions differ where the state regulates religious schools to promote particular religious schooling for regime support. html 6 Islamic schools, mostly prevalent in parts of Asia and Africa. A potential explanation is the existence of state-independent madrasas in India, which provide the Muslims with stakes in the system and thus reduce radicalization and terrorism. In summary, observers may be incorrect in ascribing the trail to terror to Islamic religious schools. The assumption that public schools promote tolerance and private religious schools promote intolerance should be empirically tested. An important arena in which to test this claim is regarding the most intolerant of acts: terrorism in the cultural West.
Islamic schools operating independently in choice-based educational markets need to please parents, who, after all, do not want their children to become terrorists. State support for authentic Islamic religious schools in the West could provide the instruction for young Muslims truer to the Muslim faith and less critical of the West because it would be transparent and subject to public scrutiny. are governed independently of local mosques. Independent religious schools, supported by the state, could be a highly effective anti- terrorism vehicle in the cultural West. We think that the evidence from terrorist activities to date provide empirical support for our claim.
Data This section describes the data sources for testing if religious and specifically Islamic schooling is associated with successful cases of homegrown terror or not. The views by Robert Pape at the University of Chicago, Thomas Hegghammer at the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment, Diego Gambetta at European University Institute, Joshua Freilich at The City University of New York and Brent Smith at the University of Arkansas were constructive. Databases like The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism START at the University of Maryland were also searched to see if they collected information on the educational background of terrorists. Freilich et al. Mueller included individual case studies which helped us trace the history of western terrorists.
Internet searches were used to fill some data gaps. To the best of our knowledge, our database is the first to codify information on all levels and types of schooling of western terrorists. We then used the database to test the claim that private religious schooling promotes terrorist activity. Research Design The study is based on collecting the high school profile of individuals raised in the West who successfully committed acts of terror on the western soil. The article does not delve into questions of foreign and domestic politics or religion and ideology since they have been studied elsewhere, as described in the framing sections above. This study focuses on the single vital question of the association between private education and extreme intolerance in the form of terrorism.
We focus our research on the U. because: 1 It does not share a border with countries that directly suffer terror or insurgency, so terrorist infiltration is of little concern Laqueur, have few obvious motivations to commit acts of terrorism. Indeed, Francis Fukuyama , in The End of History and the Last Man, claimed there existed a consensus that the West had discovered the formula for societal success. All countries, according to Fukuyama, would soon evolve toward the model of capitalist democracy common in North American, Europe, the much of Asia. Until quite recently, with the notable exception of the IRA and Basque separatists in Spain, domestic terrorism was almost non-existent in the west.
To the best of our knowledge, no prior research has examined systematically the educational background of Western born terrorists. As a preliminary analysis, we focus only on the high school level of education, recording attendance at public or private schools. Data for schooling of all the terrorists at all levels from K is not available. A lack of control variables measuring non-schooling factors that could influence terrorist activity means that our analysis is merely exploratory and not causal. Although even a single act of terror is a regrettable horror, 8 We have thus excluded South Asia, China, Russia, Middle East, South East Asia and Northern Africa and other regions. Future associations between private schooling and terrorist activity might be different should additional acts take place that diverge from the pattern we describe here.
The terrorists analyzed in this paper are limited to those born and raised in the U. We limit our study to right-wing terrorists because Jihadist ideology is a politically conservative form of extremism Lee, For example, Ismaaiyl Brinsley9 may have been inspired by Black Lives Matter but we exclude his case because BLM does not advocate violence and is not politically conservative. Naveed Afzal Haq clearly committed an act of terror but his prior actions include arrest for public exposure and other behaviors that suggest mental illness, and not right- wing ideology, motivated him to commit terror. Finally, we exclude cases such as Alton Nolen in Oklahoma where the possible terrorist was accused but never legally charged with a terror-linked crime.
born and raised ideologically motivated Muslim terrorists, certainly not compared to Europe. But are private Islamic schools associated with the few terrorists who have emerged from the American Muslim community over the past 16 years? That is our question here. Muslim committing terrorism due to attending private Islamic schools. Then we compare that likelihood of having attended a private high school, given that a person is an American Muslim, with the likelihood of them having been privately educated, given that they committed a terrorist act. Results We conduct separate analyses of explicitly jihadist terrorists table 1 A and non-jihadist right-wing terrorists table 1 B. Out of the twelve profiles of jihadist terrorists, we could collect educational data on only seven.
For the thirty-three profiles of right-wing non-jihadist terrorists, we could collect educational data for only fifteen. All seven jihadist individuals are males who attended public schools. Of the fifteen right-wing non-jihadist terrorists for which we were able to obtain data, eleven attended public schools, three attended private schools, and one was homeschooled. In , private Islamic schools in the U. enrolled 35, students National Center for Education Statistics, a. A total of 4, students were enrolled in Islamic high schools that year, representing just. end at grade 8 Keyworth, Since approximately ten percent of high school students in the U. Given that a U.
born adult is a Muslim, there is a 3 percent chance that he attended a private school. born adult is a Muslim terrorist, there is a 0 percent chance that he attended a private high school. Thus, although the actual educational histories of seven Muslim terrorists do not support the claim that private Islamic schools encourage people to commit terrorist acts, they also do not necessarily support the claim that private Islamic schools discourage people from becoming terrorists. It is possible that the main reason why no U. Muslim terrorists have been privately educated is because so few U. Muslims attend private Islamic schools. The evidence regarding non-jihadist right-wing terrorists is similarly inconclusive.
Given that a person is a U. born adult, there is a 10 percent chance that he attended a private high school. born adult is a right-wing terrorist, there is a 20 percent chance that he attended a private high school. Although private school attendance is associated with a higher likelihood of having committed a right-wing terrorist act, with only 15 cases to draw from, this preliminary analysis is only suggestive of such a link. Conclusion and Policy Implications With limited data, this analysis indicates that there is lack of empirical basis to claim that religious and specifically Islamic schooling in the United States is associated with homegrown terrorism. Among the U. There is an interesting historical analogy, in that in the 19th and early 20th Century American Catholic schools were seen as divisive to the polity.
The same could be true of Muslim schools in the U. Greater access to religious schooling may benefit the society and religious schooling may moderate the frequency of acts of terror in the West. A key recommendation for policy makers is to encourage decentralized and private school choice and evaluation of Islamic schools based on measurable outcomes. This recommendation is especially acute as Muslim nations suffer from bad governance, unpopular regimes, restless and uneducated youth Hackett et al. Decentralized and private religious schooling could moderate the causal link between hate and violence in the form of terrorism. Local quality Islamic education and the higher education of Imams of mosques in U.
universities may also promote tolerance among Muslims. A lack of quality local schooling options in the Middle East have increased the role of Saudi Salafi and Wahhabi Islam funded by petrodollars. A market oriented approach to Islamic schooling can increase adherence to the traditional approach to Islam and weaken fundamentalism. Government can aide this process through greater access to private religious schools. An alternate approach is to also provide religious instruction in existing public schools; this may increase the plurality of public education that may add to creating democratic citizens Berner, In many cases it could be possible that the marginal terrorist can be brought back to sanity if his or her spiritual and social needs can be met through religious schooling.
but also in some of the not so affluent Islamic schools in India which Hindu students self-select into for educational needs Al Jazeera English, This shows that the market produces more options for diversity and acceptance by choice. The schools created for the disadvantaged minorities in a free-market would be open to everyone. The decision to create a school for minorities would again be based on consumer demand and not regime goals that might be antithetical to political tolerance. We acknowledge that some findings of terrorists having attended religious private schools goes against our hypothesis that market and plural education is better than a statist approach to education.
However, as mere attendance at a public school does not make one a democratic citizen, mere attendance at a religious school does not make one a fundamentalist or terrorist. Further research is need for the few cases where terrorists attended religious schools to see if religious values were in fact translated to these individuals at the schools. Additionally, researchers need to examine if terrorists built a socio-religious identity due to their religious schooling that then led them strike at their fellow citizens with terrorism. We hypothesize they did not. This study aims to encourage further research into the education profiles of people who commit violence and, secondly, calls for evaluation and proper design of Islamic curriculum in schools which can cater to the social and spiritual needs of Muslims.
Independent researchers, child psychologists, trained religious instructors and sociologists should build upon the pioneering work of Jaap Dronkers in this field. To support such research, government agencies should produce more detailed and comprehensive databases regarding the backgrounds of people who commit terrorist acts. We think there is good reason to believe that providing increased access to modern Islamic schooling in the U. would address the spiritual and religious needs of Muslim students. Providing people with a stake in society through a system of school choice can be a way to moderate any inclination towards terrorism. We look forward to more research on this vital topic. School choice and the future of American democracy.
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