Page 114 - Islam Denounces Terrorism

112 Islam Denounces Terrorism

How Can the Vicious Circle of Radicalism
and Terror Be Broken?

As stated in earlier sections, one concrete fact stands after 13 years
of military operations, from Afghanistan to Libya and from Nigeria to
Iraq; radical terrorist groups have not ceased to exist through military
force, violence and oppression, and to the contrary, they've grown
even stronger.

What is more, all kinds of military operations, including air strikes

and ground operations just lead to more civilian deaths, damage
cities and destroy infrastructure, resulting in mounting fury in the
countries concerned and that fury mostly benefits radical organisa-
tions. Spending billions of dollars on producing people opposing it,
and thus providing human resources for terror organisations, is a most
undesirable state of affairs.

Although killing off the leaders of terror organisations is present-

ed as an effective technique by some military analysts, looked at from
a wider perspective, no results are actually obtained from it at all. The
killing of Osama bin Laden obviously did not spell the end of al-
Qaeda.

Besides, terror organisations are capable of skilfully turning
even these armed attacks against them into propaganda. They portray
the attacks against them as evidence of the so-called righteous nature
of their cause. For that reason, organisations either grow stronger or

continue their activities underground and that makes the military
struggle against them ineffective.

In order to break the spiral of terror, socioeconomic improvements
need to be made and policies such as ensuring the implementation of
democratic processes need to be brought to the fore in regions where
there are terrorist activities. In order for all these things to happen,
however, it is essential to remove the ignorance that lie at the roots of