Quote Originally Posted by Bill Moore View Post
From the enclose article David kindly posted



This underscores much of the debate in SWJ circles. We have those who believe the reason is failed government, economics, etc. Root causes that we can somehow address, and then the world will be all rainbows and unicorns again.

We have others, closer to my school of thought, that often there are no root causes that we can address. We waste our time and money with our various development programs when they're directed to weaken AQ and other extremists.
In Nigeria, where I come from, Western analysts are all over the place about Boko Haram & how poverty and alienation are its root causes - but when you ask them about local Christians who are even poorer and more alienated (because the power structures the British left behind empowered the Muslims in Northern Nigeria) - they are blank.

I suspect Iraqi Christians and Yazidis would feel the same way as African Christians about the way the Western academic elite has chosen to explain away violent Islamism.

In the Middle East, the West can comfortably ignore religious minorities as they aren't likely ever have any political power (all US presidents do so; whether Republican or Democrat). In Africa, the Christians aren't likely to be politically insignificant, but as far as the West is concerned, Africa is a strategic backwater.

So the liberal narrative of Islamist terrorism is likely to persist - as these movements will never be an existential threat to the West like Hitler & Nazis.