Prof D. Suba Chandran

Let us make a cold calculation on the success and failure stories in our region in terms of politically dealing with an active militant group. Let us not rush towards a political dialogue in the name of a ‘peace process’ or worse in the name of ‘pragmatism’. As a rule, unless the militant groups are defeated militarily or openly willing to take part in the political process without any preconditions, dialogues will only strengthen the former....

Charlie English

It was true that a number of documents from the state-owned Ahmed Baba Institute had indeed been destroyed or stolen, but over the following days and weeks, the tale acquired a delicious twist. Almost all of Timbuktu’s precious manuscripts had been smuggled to safety in a daring rescue operation that a Ford Foundation executive described as “an Indiana Jones moment in real life.”....

Contemporary societies and states, whether in the East or the West, have been facing the dual threat of radicalism and terrorism, mainly perpetrated and justified in the name of religion. The rise and proliferation of these are largely the result of lack of economic, social and political openness at the societal and state levels....

Aadil Ikram Zaki

With each terror attack, there is an increasing intellectual churning in much of the Muslim world with a sizeable majority delinking terror with Islam and a faction within the community acknowledging the misinterpretation of Islam by ISIS and other terror outfits such as Taliban and Al-Qaeda. But ISIS has outdone all other outfits with its successful application of savagery....

Uzay Bulut

There are more than 1,000 ISIS militants in Turkey and the sympathizers must be in the tens of thousands. ISIS militants have organized all across Turkey – in coffee houses, Internet cafes, mosques and cell hideouts. A lot of ISIS militants were arrested – only to be released later....

Kathy Kelly

In one of the burnt-out shells of the shops where raisins, nuts, fabrics, incense and stone pots were traded for hundreds of years, all that was to be found was a box of coke bottles, a sofa and a child nailing wooden sticks together. This is Sa’ada, ground zero of the 20-month Saudi campaign in Yemen, a largely forgotten conflict that has killed more than 10,000, uprooted 3 million...

Rezaul H Laskar

“Online, in talking with like-minded individuals from all over the world, they get a deep sense of belonging and sense of brotherhood. So, it’s not so much that Islamic State is using these environments to radicalise and recruit, although that happens, it’s that these individuals find a ‘home’ in these environments and it’s hard to break away from that bond with others, even if it’s only online,”...

Hamdi Malik

These differences date back to the era of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's leadership over al-Qaeda in Iraq, who believed that legitimacy comes from the battlefield and not from above. The leaders of the two groups also disagree about the priorities of jihad at this stage. Although both share the ultimate goal of establishing the Islamic caliphate throughout the world, al-Qaeda leaders believe that this stage requires striking the distant enemy, namely the West....

Sanchita Bhattacharya

With the incoherence of Western policy and continuing, albeit diminishing, financial and military support pouring into Islamabad, even as Pakistan is ascribed a lead role in the search for a 'solution' in Afghanistan, there has been no decisive disincentive to ISI's continuing subversive activities across the region. Pakistan's footprints of terror are visible across the world, but Islamabad continues to operate with complete impunity....

Jayson Casper

“Salafists consider Sufis to be infidels, so you cannot open a dialogue with those who reject you,” he said. “Meanwhile the Muslim Brotherhood plays with both Salafists and Sufis as it judges where its interests lie. And in any case the law considers them a terrorist organization.” Sufism may well be a tool to spread the values of love and tolerance in a polarized society, but Egyptian Sufis also view their politics through the lens of existential crisis....

The Taliban attack at Mazar-e Sharif’s Camp Shaheen appeared aimed at further undermining Afghanistan’s embattled leaders and security forces. And it delivered another psychological blow to Afghans hoping that this year might finally see government gains against a methodical, years-long Taliban advance. It also served as a reminder that the Taliban, and not the so-called Islamic State (ISIS), still represent the most potent Islamist insurgency threatening Afghanistan....

Azim Zahir

These extremist groups - just like corrupt politicians - have also formed alliances with radical gangs. There has indeed been a phenomenon of what Olivier Roy has called "Islamisation of radicals". Several of these "Islamised radicals" have gone to Syria to fight. And as these gangs also have or had interdependent relations with powerful politicians, they seem to enjoy impunity within the Maldives....

Annie Gowen

By the time their relatives realized they were missing, five families – some with small children – had left their comfortable bungalows and jobs as doctors and businessmen to make the perilous journey to Islamic State-controlled territory in Afghanistan. Authorities believe 19 adults and three children settled in Nangarhar province, on the mountainous border with Pakistan. Their departure has raised alarms about the Islamic State's reach in India as well as growing extremism in Kerala, a southern state with deep ties through migrant workers to the Arab Gulf....

By now you all know what happened in Mardan to a student named Mashal Khan. It doesn’t bear repeating, but I’ll do it anyway: a talented and intellectually honest young man was slaughtered by his fellow students for having said things that were allegedly blasphemous. He was 23. Pakistan was born in the Chinese Year of the Pig, which is deeply funny for many reasons...

Praveen Swami

Four members of Islamist-linked street gangs were arrested following the disappearance, but released after police said there was no evidence to link them to the case. The suspects are now thought to have joined the 200-plus Maldivian jihadists fighting in Syria.....

Akbar Ahmed

After 9/11, the US and its allies identified terrorists living in these very communities and allied with central governments in order to target and destroy them. Too often, however, central governments used the pretext of the war on terror and the substantial levels of military and financial assistance they were receiving from the US to settle scores with the tribes, which they often viewed as uncivilized and backward.....

James A. Lyons

The Obama-Clinton disdain for naming the real enemy allowed them to pretend that the Islamic State (ISIS) was the only problem in Syria and Iraq. Meanwhile, groups with an identical jihad ideology got a pass. Al Qaeda was barely mentioned. Arms continued to flow via Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to a rogues gallery of supposed “moderates” — Jaish al-Islam, Ahrar al-Sham, Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zenki, the Free Idlib Army and the Islamic Front. These jihadists operate mainly in alliance with al Qaeda, but sometimes with ISIS...

Students of computer science, engineering and medicine are increasingly the target of radicalisation by militants who view their technical ability coupled with sharp but uncritical thinking skills as an asset, experts have said....

After killing 47 worshippers at churches in two cities in Egypt a little over a week ago, the terrorist group struck again on Tuesday, this time in the tourist hot spot of southern Sinai....

Dr Raza Khan

Extremism perpetrated and justified on ideological and religious basis has been a key issue of contemporary societies and states. In recent decades, Pakistanis have also been the victim of extremism particularly justified in the name of religion. Understanding and explaining the causes underlying radicalism, extremist movements, groups and individuals has been quite difficult....

Ayse Sahin

"Islam itself is moderate in its nature and never promotes violence. Most Islamic scholars agree on this. And when you turn your back on a country representative of this 'middle way' you leave Europe vulnerable toward the influence of other extreme movements," he said. "Islamophobic sentiments, discrimination provoke radicalism, and radicalism feed the violence-prone far-right. Europe needs brave politicians to break that dangerous cycle,"...

S. Binodkumar Singh

After gaining early momentum in the eastern parts of Afghanistan, Daesh's capabilities and territorial dominance began quickly to wane, both as a result of disproportionate focus by the Afghan and Coalition militaries, and because the group, unlike the Taliban, is not seen as an indigenous entity, and has consequently failed to consolidate local support. Moreover, Daesh's practice of accusing fellow Muslims of apostasy for deviating from its own violent interpretation of Islam does has found few takers in Afghanistan's tribal cultures...

Olivier Roy

Both terrorism and jihad have existed for many years, and forms of “globalised” terror – in which highly symbolic locations or innocent civilians are targeted, with no regard for national borders – go back at least as far as the anarchist movement of the late 19th century. What is unprecedented is the way that terrorists now deliberately pursue their own deaths.....

Perhaps just like the French Paratroopers who learnt much from the Communists and applied the lessons with deadly effect in Algeria, Abu Bakr too learnt things in Camp Bucca and applied it to deadly affect. He certainly learnt how to put people in orange jump suits. When he emerged, he experienced the intensity of asymmetric warfare, he learnt that stuffing bombs inside corpses and dogs were effective, how to create grey zones by dividing Sunnis from Shi’ites.....

Aersh Danish

At this moment, let us understand that Islam, like other Abrahamic religions, is a religion of books. Hence, who reads the books, and how, becomes critical to the manner in which the religion will manifest itself in practice. Texts are nothing without readers, and instead of looking at the words, it would be worthwhile to look at the people who are reading these texts, not just to themselves but also to their followers....