Reply With Quote
Lazy ass.
Because you're the dumbass making blanket statements.
Lazy ass.
Well done
http://bigstory.ap.org/9f94ff7f1e294118956b049a51548b33'Islam for Dummies': IS recruits have poor grasp of faith
By AYA BATRAWY, PAISLEY DODDS and LORI HINNANT
Aug. 15, 2016 4:13 PM EDT
The jihadi employment form asked the recruits, on a scale of 1 to 3, to rate their knowledge of Islam. And the Islamic State applicants, herded into a hangar somewhere at the Syria-Turkey border, turned out to be overwhelmingly ignorant.
The extremist group could hardly have hoped for better.
At the height of Islamic State's drive for foot soldiers in 2013 and 2014, typical recruits included the group of Frenchmen who went bar-hopping with their recruiter back home, the recent European convert who now hesitantly describes himself as gay, and two Britons who ordered "The Koran for Dummies" and "Islam for Dummies"from Amazon to prepare for jihad abroad. Their intake process complete, they were grouped in safe houses as a stream of Islamic State imams came in to indoctrinate them, according to court testimony and interviews by The Associated Press.
"I realized that I was in the wrong place when they began to ask me questions on these forms like 'when you die, who should we call?'" said the 32-year-old European recruit, speaking to the AP on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. He said he thought he was joining a group to fight President Bashar Assad and help Syrians, not the Islamic State.
The European, whose boyish demeanor makes him appear far younger than his age, went to Syria in 2014. He said new recruits were shown IS propaganda videos on Islam, and the visiting imams repeatedly praised martyrdom. Far from home, unschooled in religion, having severed family ties and turned over electronic devices, most were in little position to judge.
An AP analysis of thousands of leaked Islamic State do ents reveals most of its recruits from its earliest days came with only the most basic knowledge of Islam. A little more than 3,000 of these do ents included the recruits' knowledge of Shariah, the system that interprets into law verses from the Quran and "hadith" — the sayings and actions of the Prophet Muhammad.
According to the do ents, which were acquired by the Syrian opposition site Zaman al-Wasl and shared with the AP, 70 percent of recruits were listed as having just "basic" knowledge of Shariah — the lowest possible choice. Around 24 percent were categorized as having an "intermediate" knowledge, with just 5 percent considered advanced students of Islam. Five recruits were listed as having memorized the Quran.
The findings address one of the most troubling questions about IS recruitment in the United States and Europe: Are disaffected people who understand Shariah more prone to radicalization? Or are those with little knowledge of Islam more susceptible to the group's radical ideas that promote violence?
The do ents suggest the latter. The group preys on this religious ignorance, allowing extremists to impose a brand of Islam constructed to suit its goal of maximum territorial expansion and carnage as soon as recruits come under its sway.
Islamic State's most notorious new supporters appear to have an equally tenuous link with religion. Mohamed Lahouaiyej Bouhlel, who killed 85 people by plowing a truck into a Bastille Day crowd in Nice, France, was described by family and neighbors as indifferent to religion, volatile and prone to drinking sprees, with a bent for salsa dancing and a reported male lover.
Unlike Omar Mateen, the Orlando attacker, Bouhlel did not make a public declaration of allegiance to Islamic State, much less prove he had direct ties to extremists in the war zone. Still, the group was quick to claim both as foot soldiers.
___
The AP analyzed the IS entry form do ents of around 4,030 foreign recruits who crossed into Syria when the group was rapidly expanding and seizing territory in Iraq and Syria in 2013 and 2014. At that time, the CIA estimated the extremist group had between 20,000 and 31,500 fighters across Iraq and Syria.
Among the do ents were forms for nine of 10 young men from the eastern French city of Strasbourg, all recruited by a man named Mourad Fares. One of them, Karim Mohammad-Aggad, described barhopping in Germany with Fares. He told investigators that IS recruiters used "smooth talk" to persuade him.
He'd traveled with his younger brother and friends to Syria in late 2013. Two died in Syria, and within a few months, seven returned to France and were arrested. Mohammad-Aggad's brother, 23-year-old Foued, returned to Paris and was one of the three men who stormed the Bataclan in a night of attacks Nov. 13 that killed 130 people.
"My religious beliefs had nothing to do with my departure," Karim Mohammad-Aggad told the court, before being sentenced to nine years in prison. "Islam was used to trap me like a wolf," he said.
IS data shows Karim and his brother Foued were among eight in the Strasbourg group listed as having "basic" knowledge of Sharia.
Expressing a common sentiment shared by many Europeans of North African descent, Mohammed-Aggad told the court he felt like an immigrant in Algeria and "a dirty Arab" in France. After just a few months in Syria, he said he left IS because he was treated by the extremists as an "apostate" — someone who had renounced his religion.
When pressed by the judge on his knowledge of Shariah and how the IS group implements it, Mohammad-Aggad, a former gas station attendant, appeared dumbfounded, saying repeatedly: "I don't have the knowledge to answer the question."
One of his co-defendants, Radouane Taher, was also pressed by the judge on whether beheadings carried out by the IS group conformed to Islamic law.
He couldn't say for sure, answering: "I don't have the credentials."
That's where Amazon comes in.
The trial of longtime friends Mohammed Ahmed and Yusuf Sarwar, from the British city of Birmingham, revealed the 22-year-olds had ordered "The Koran for Dummies" and "Islam for Dummies" books in preparation for their trip to join extremists in Syria. They were arrested on their return to Britain and convicted in 2014 of terrorism offenses.
Patrick Skinner, a former CIA case officer with extensive experience with Mideast extremist organizations, said some people claim allegiance to IS out of religious belief, but that most who join, including those from the West, are people "reaching for a sense of belonging, a sense of notoriety, a sense of excitement."
"Religion is an afterthought," said Skinner, who is also director of special projects at security consultancy the Soufan Group.
Those who truly crave religious immersion would go to Al-Azhar in Cairo, he added, referring to the thousand-year-old seat of learning for Shariah and Quranic studies.
In its recent English language magazine Dabiq, dedicated largely to bolstering its own Muslim credentials, Islamic State dismissed Al-Azhar as part of an "approach to subdue Muslims through appeasement," with the West.
Mohammed Abdelfadel, an Islamic scholar who heads a German-language unit at Al-Azhar that tracks Islamic State propaganda and statements, said the group spews superficial notions about what is "halal and haram," or what is permissible and forbidden in Islam. He says the group's propaganda videos lionize IS fighters as masculine, strong martyrs going to heaven for the sake of God — counter to Islamic laws that forbid terrorism, the murder of non-combatants in war, the imposition of Islam on non-Muslims and other criminal activity.
____
The recruits' Shariah knowledge is important because IS not only needs soldiers and suicide bombers, but administrators and Shariah officials to oversee its local courts and judges, who in turn promote IS ideology.
It also matters because those who've claimed advanced knowledge in Shariah on the IS entry do ents were less likely to want to become suicide bombers, according to a study by the U.S. military's Combating Terrorism Center, an academic ins ution at the United States Military Academy.
"If martyrdom is seen as the highest religious calling, then a reasonable expectation would be that the people with the most knowledge about Islamic law (Shariah) would desire to carry out these operations with greater frequency," said the report.
However, despite the religious justification that IS uses for suicide missions, "those with the most religious knowledge within the organization itself are the least likely to volunteer to be suicide bombers," the study found.
Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan said a close look at the IS group's top commanders shows that many had no religious credentials but, instead, they once held senior positions under Saddam Hussein's secular Baathist government.
Ramadan teaches Islamic Studies at Oxford and has written numerous books on Islam and the integration of Muslims in Europe. He says Muslim scholars must demonstrate that what IS teaches is wrong.
"The people who are doing this are not experiencing martyrdom, they are criminals. They are killing innocent people. Nothing in Islam, nothing ever can justify the killing of innocent people, never, ever."
The gay European recruit said he converted to Islam because he was interested in the culture and it was easy.
"It only required one prayer and no prior understanding of Islam," he said. "There was no hierarchy and it was all about living a good life."
As a convert with almost no knowledge in Islam, he says he was easy prey.
"People like me were tricked into something that they didn't understand. I never meant to end up with IS."
Last edited by Splits; 08-16-2016 at 08:45 AM.
Radical cleric Anjem Choudary guilty of inviting IS support
One of the UK's most notorious radical clerics has been convicted of inviting others to support the so-called Islamic State, it can now be reported.
Police said Anjem Choudary, 49, had stayed "just within the law" for years, but was arrested in 2014 after pledging allegiance to the militant group.
Many people tried for serious terror offences were influenced by his lectures and speeches, police said.
Choudary was convicted alongside confidant Mohammed Mizanur Rahman.
Counter-terrorism chiefs have spent almost 20 years trying to bring Choudary, a father of five, to trial, blaming him, and the proscribed organisations which he helped to run, for radicalising young men and women.
Both men were charged with one offence of inviting support for IS - which is contrary to section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000 - between 29 June 2014 and 6 March 2015.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-37098751
Why is this here?
Suicide mass murder. Figured he must have been Radical Islamic Terrorist
You are only capable of seeing your own side. Im atheist, but I can imagine how they see it. Your perception of what is an atrocity and who it is done for is not the only one. Us retaliation to 911 was straight barbaric, disastrous and deadly to this day for every party involved, that's without even getting into pre911 atrocities. In X amount of months, another leak will come out and we'll find out that in the past year hundreds of drone strikes have killed upwards of 100 civilians, is that an atrocity or not? Is it their fault for being there? Those 160 children killed in Pakistan alone, 2006-2011, should have wised up and left the country?
The jihadists kill 10 people in a shooting and make sure everyone seed and they get their "credit". The US bombs whoever they want from far away and hides behind national security and media mouthpieces about collateral damage. Your collateral damage is their atrocity, if you choose not to see it that's your problem.
is america using drone strikes with religious motivations in the name of jesus?
do they intentionally seek out innocent civilians?
intent is lost on these people -- false equivalence
Oh, well that makes me feel better about the Iraqi invasion
I would venture to say that the victims and the majority of their fellow citizens believe the answer to both of those questions is "yes".
Politicians constantly talk about the US as a "Christian Nation". Bush said God told him to invade Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the top US Generals said "As a Christian, I believe that there is a spiritual war that is continuous as articulated in the Bible. It is not confined to the war of terrorism".
The sheer volume of innocents killed in our freedom bombs and the inevitable "collateral damage" they cause would lead them to infer that, if not intentionally attacking civilians, at the minimum complete disregard for them. Add in "signature strikes", repeated bombing of wedding parties and hostpitals, "double tap" strikes, yeah, I could see how they would think we target innocents.
Last edited by Splits; 08-17-2016 at 09:43 AM.
What's the intent of Islam that scares you?
Bush was also adamant that we were not at war with Islam or any religion
The current strikes are not religious motivation, but the war in Iraq was a clear Judeo-Christian assault on a soverign Muslim nation with no just cause.
Do you think he should have made it a war against Islam?
It would have wiped out their motive!
Learn the difference between Islam and Islamism. #notAll
I'm not sure you're telling that to the right people.
Absolutely not. I never even implied this
No, it wouldn't. It would have been disastrous and made everybody less safeIt would have wiped out their motive!
Why does it matter to you?
Well then what do you think should be done about Islam? You clearly think it's a problem.
It should be reformed so it doesnt produce such large number of Islamists
and what is anyone gonna do if they don't reform it to your standards? Start another Islamist Justice Warrior thread?
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
