To not understand UK Jihadists?

[Moolin]

I was going to post in the politics section but it looks completely deserted.

I am not trying to start any kind of row/bunfight/trouble.

I want to ask someone to explain a few things. There are aspects of Jihad I don't understand and nor does anyone else I've asked in RL.

How can UK born jihadists, who go to fight in Iraq (I'm thinking of Isis) or Syria, and kill civilians and Iraqi/Syrian nationals, justify what they are doing? Not that killing anyone else is any more justifiable in my eyes but I thought it was the West they deplored, not their fellow Muslims.

Also, If jihadists are killing Iraqi citizens in car bombings etc, how can they deplore the Western military for doing a similar?

I work and live in Qatar. The only people I encounter who verbalise anti western stuff are British passport Mulsims. I am in no way saying that it doesn't happen politically but the only people who post the anti western things on Facebook our say words like hate are definitely British. Actually we were discussing this at the weekend and the qataris were saying that of course Isreal should be inv

Involved in the World Cup bit the British Pakistanis were very against it

Sorry for typos in car

There aren't many majority muslim countries that currently have a stable functioning democracy and a lot of people do feel that it is partly due to the west propping up corrupt regimes that suit their purpose. The situation in Egypt has added to the feeling of disillusionment with the Muslim Brotherhood now being repressed and Sissi taking power. There are questions being asked about whether the west really do care about the populations of those countries at all.

Do Muslims from other Western countries travel abroad to join jihadists, or is it predominantly a UK problem?

Do Muslims from other Western countries travel abroad to join jihadists, or is it predominantly a UK problem?

From as far afield as Australia apparently.

"Muslim extremist", it would seem that the two words have become linked in such a way that when you say one you think of the other.

I don't.

If the sticking up fir the EDL comment was aimed at me - I wasn't.

The EDL are like the muppet show compared to ISIS. Grouping them together is stupid and shouldn't be banded about, which I've seen a couple of times on MN.

Softlysoftlycatchymonkey

Yup!!

Some people can't see the difference between piling up bodies and slaughtering people from fuckwittery.

I suspect it's the old straw argument that doesn't amount to much.

Fuck off vertec

vertec
I think a lot of people in the ME and North Africa would see US foreign policy as the greatest thread to peace in the world. US foreign policy is also expansionist.

Softlysoftlycatchymonkey, good I'm glad you don't.

Don't bother looking up Pat condell on YouTube. He is a cunt.

I watched a pogramme about thisthe filmmaker spoke to parents of young men who had gone abroad to fight, these were ordinary families who had no idea what their son s were up too, there was no etremist views in their household it was quite alarming

Someone linked to that twat on FB.

chaz so would you prefer for the ME to be left to it? Let em fight it out amongst themselves.

Women being stoned to death, whole cities being gassed, FGM, oppression ect....

Yep the ME... Ruined by the U.S and GB

Pat Condell is perhaps a little too forthright for some tastes.

An alternative would be Sam Harris who writes very measuredly about Islam in his books and on his blog. If you really want to understand the peculiar problem of Islam you should read more. His Q&A with Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a good place to start...

www.samharris.org/blog/item/lifting-the-veil-of-islamophobia

It is of course depressingly ironic that so-called "liberal" women on Mumsnet are the first in line to defend an ideology like Islam.

I'm not a liberal Vertec, I'm a communist thank you and resent the implication that I am liberal. I agree there is a certain irony in liberals defending Islam, its bloody "liberal ideology" that has created imperialist capitalist wars.

As for, should we get involved, no we shouldn't. Yes we should let them fight it out, but we won't because of oil.

Softly
Would the House of Saud still be controlling Saudi Arabia without Western support? Would Assad still be in power if Syria wasn't of interest to both Russia and the US?

I am talking about conversations I have had with people from these countries who do feel that the superpowers like Russia and the US are using countries like Iraq and Syria to indirectly continue their long running power struggles with little real thought for the impact on the people who actually live there.

They don't believe that the US or the UK really cares about their human rights only about their own geopolitical interests. Why get rid of Saddam but leave Assad and Mubarak?

I was going to say something, but GoshAnneGorilla at Mon 23-Jun-14 14:15:04 said it so much better than I could.

It is no different to people going off to fight in the Spanish Civil war in the 1930's

Read the rest of it.

It's a little bit more complicated than dismissing them as loons, as the first reply did.

And I'm not Muslim, btw.

I would have expected things to have moved on since the 30s limited

Why?

Did the people who travelled to fight in the Spanish civil war hate their own country of origin and did they openly ask others to visit violence on it?

caruthers
The International Brigades were linked with Communism so some of the members who went to fight saw the fight in Spain as the start of a wider revolutionary movement, including in their country of origin.

So, in answer to your question - yes some of them may well of hated their country of origin and wanted to visit violence on it.

I don't know caruthers. My SIL's English father was in his 20s when he fought in the Spanish Civil War against Franco.

In no particular order, I believe he was motivated by an anger against fascism and the prevailing economic and political situation in Europe at the time and a 20-something's taste for derring-do.

Fighting against Franco and therefore for socialism/communism may have marked him down as an enemy of the British State and a fellow traveller of the Communists who attacked British politicians and institutions in the 20s and 30s.

Unfortunately I'll never know as he has been unavailable for consultation for quite some time.