The West is not to blame for terrorism. Islamist violence is actually the product of a religious ideology openly committed to enveloping the world.
In June, Talha Asmal, a 17-year-old Muslim, became Britain's youngest suicide bomber. In a vehicle packed with explosives, Asmal and three other jihadists attacked Iraqi forces at an oil refinery in the northern town of Baiji. Eleven people were killed.
A few days later, three sisters from the city of Bradford left with their nine children – the youngest only three years old -- for ISIS territory in Syria.
In the wake of these latest recruits to the jihadist cause, and a week before 30 British tourists were slaughtered on a Tunisian beach, Prime Minister David Cameron gave a speech at a security conference in Slovakia. Before a distinguished audience of politicians, academics, military officials and security experts from around the world, Cameron described ISIS as "one of the biggest threats our world has faced."
The reason young British Muslims join ISIS, Cameron claimed, "is ideological. It is an Islamist extremist ideology – one that says the West is bad and democracy is wrong, that women are inferior, that homosexuality is evil. It says religious doctrine trumps the rule of law and the Caliphate trumps nation state, and it justifies violence in asserting itself and achieving its aims."
A growing number of journalists, politicians and Islamist activists, however, argue that growing radicalization and support for ISIS is the consequence of an isolated Muslim community, which feels aggrieved with government policies. Baroness Warsi, for example, a former cabinet minister, told the BBC that the British government was fuelling the problem of radicalization by "disengaging" from Muslim communities.
Islamist groups argue that foreign policy and police scrutiny directly cause extremism. CAGE, an Islamist group that worked with the black-hooded British ISIS executioner, "Jihadi John," has claimed that heavy-handed security services and "long-standing grievances over Western foreign policy" cause young Muslims to turn to violence.
Two of the husbands of the sisters who left for Syria with their children have claimed the British police "actively promoted and encouraged" the radicalization of their wives. They fled to Syria, the husbands claim, because of "oppressive police surveillance."
One official from the Muslim Association of Britain, a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, even argued that government cuts to welfare cultivated support for ISIS.
Others, meanwhile, claim that the government does not do enough. Manzoor Moghal, a Muslim commentator, notes that the families of three British schoolgirls who joined ISIS in February expressed similar criticisms: "On that occasion, the parents and their lawyer took their complaints to Parliament, arguing that the Metropolitan Police had been 'a disgrace' in failing to give sufficient warnings of their daughters' vulnerability to the zealots."
All these critics downplay any individual responsibility for the young British Muslims who embraced jihad. The academic Frank Furedi writes:
"When it was revealed over the weekend that 17-year-old Talha Asmal had become Britain's youngest suicide bomber, many reports suggested that he was a 'victim' of ruthless online groomers. His family described him as
By Samuel Westrop
Samuel Westrop is a Senior Fellow at the Gatestone Institute, and Associate Director at the Institute for Middle Eastern Democracy.