In a recent article on Congressional Quarterly (sorry for the long quote below, but it requires an account to access), Eileen Sullivan reports that the US is looking to the Europeans for advice on dealing with radical Muslims and Muslim populations in general.
This doesn’t make much sense to me. If you watch much of the news lately, or better, read Mark Steyn’s book “America Alone,” you get the sense that the Europeans have less of a handle on their Muslim populations that the US does.
The most obvious example of that is Ms. Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She’s from Holland!
There are other examples ranging from so-called “honor killings,” to car bombs. I don’t think the Europeans have any great advantage over the US on treating immigrant populations well, or understanding religious minorities.
Here’s the whole article:
CQ HOMELAND SECURITY - INTELLIGENCE June 26, 2007 - 8:39 p.m. U.S. Looks Across Pond in Addressing Home-Grown Terrorist Threat By Eileen Sullivan, CQ Staff The Dutch government has reduced the potential for Islamic radicalization in its country by including Dutch Muslims in the civic process, removing radical sites from the Internet and training Muslim religious leaders in the Netherlands instead of importing imams from other nations.
U.S. lawmakers hope to learn from Europe’s experience with Islamic radicalization, as America faces an increasing threat of homegrown terrorism, evidenced most recently in plots to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey and New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. Officials have been working to penetrate such sleeper cells and curb the radicalization process in local communities and prisons, but experts say the nation has a ways to go.
Lidewijde Ongering, the Dutch deputy national coordinator for counterterrorism, is scheduled to share his country’s counter-radicalization tactics before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Wednesday. This will be the fifth hearing the committee has held on radicalization in a year. Lawmakers will also hear recommendations for integrating - as opposed to alienating - Muslim Americans into American life, according to copies of advanced testimony obtained by Congressional Quarterly.
Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joseph I. Lieberman said the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks showed Americans it only takes a handful of terrorists to carry out a massive attack, and the recent plots against Fort Dix and JFK Airport show that homegrown terrorists do not need to meet with an al Qaeda operative or attend training camps to be radicalized.
“They can now become fully radicalized as members of virtual networks just sitting at their computers,” Lieberman, I-Conn., said in an e-mail to Congressional Quarterly. “That’s why it is important to understand how people become radicalized; so we can counter that process before it turns into action.”
The Netherlands created its counterterrorism office after the Madrid train bombings in 2004. Since then, Ongering says it has broken up several terrorist networks and disrupted jihad-recruiting initiatives. Today the threat in the Netherlands is “limited,” whereas previously the government viewed the threat as “substantial.”
One tactic the Dutch have employed to prevent radicalization is integrating more Muslims into Dutch society. Ongering says this includes paying more attention to issues young Muslims face in the Netherlands and encouraging Muslims to participate more in society and politics.
The Chicago Council on Global Affairs’ task force on Muslim American Civic and Political Engagement suggests a more unified, national effort of integration and inclusion. After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Americans - not knowing much about Islam - identified Muslim Americans with the terrorists, prompting deep suspicion and doubt, according to the task force’s recent report on strengthening the civic and political integration of Muslim Americans.
Experts say a better understanding of Islam, including the multiple internal debates within the religion, could help Americans embrace Muslims in their communities and prevent the alienation that could prompt a young Muslim American to latch on to jihadist ideals.
But in some instances, there are differences between the homegrown problem in Europe and the one in America. The Muslim American community is mostly middle class, whereas the European communities consist largely of unskilled laborers, according to forensic psychiatrist Marc Sageman, who is also scheduled to testify Wednesday. Because many Muslim Europeans are unemployed, they are able to fill their days with talking about jihad, he said.
“One cannot underestimate the importance of boredom in an idle population, which drives young people to seek the thrill of participating [in] a clandestine operation,” Sageman’s prepared testimony says.
An important step in reducing radicalization is taking the glory out of the fight, he adds. “There is nothing more glorious than to go against men and women in uniform from the only remaining superpower. We need to demilitarize this fight against terrorists and turn it over to law enforcement.”
Sageman says one way to reduce the glory to common criminality is to resist the urge to hold major press conferences announcing another “major victory” in the war on terror, because it elevates those alleged in the plots as heroes.
“All of these considerations are important as we seek ways to combat violent extremism directly and to curb its growth by improving outreach efforts to our Muslim neighbors, and by promoting the inclusion of all resident Muslims in the peaceful and tolerant fabric of American life,” the committee’s ranking Republican, Susan Collins of Maine, said in her prepared opening statement for Wednesday’s hearing. Eileen Sullivan can be reached at esullivan@cq.com.
