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Cameron: Islamic Extremist Ideology, Not Injustice or Poverty, Is the Root Cause of the Threat Facing Britain
(Independent-UK) British Prime Minister David Cameron on Monday set out the government's five-year strategy for tackling extremist ideology: "What we are fighting, in Islamist extremism, is an ideology. It is an extreme doctrine....At its furthest end it seeks to destroy nation-states to invent its own barbaric realm. And it often backs violence to achieve this aim - mostly violence against fellow Muslims - who don't subscribe to its sick worldview." "Certain intolerant ideas...create a climate in which extremists can flourish:...that Jews exercise malevolent power; or that Western powers, in concert with Israel, are deliberately humiliating Muslims." "Some argue it's because of historic injustices and recent wars, or because of poverty and hardship. This argument, what I call the grievance justification, must be challenged." "When they say that these are wronged Muslims getting revenge on their Western wrongdoers, let's remind them: from Kosovo to Somalia, countries like Britain have stepped in to save Muslim people from massacres - it's groups like ISIL, al-Qaeda and Boko Haram that are the ones murdering Muslims." "Others might say: it's because terrorists are driven to their actions by poverty. But that ignores the fact that many of these terrorists have had the full advantages of prosperous families or a Western university education." "We've got to show that if you say 'yes I condemn terror - but the Kuffar [non-Muslims] are inferior,' or 'violence in London isn't justified, but suicide bombs in Israel are a different matter' - then you too are part of the problem. Unwittingly or not, and in a lot of cases it's not unwittingly, you are providing succor to those who want to commit, or get others to commit to, violence."