Responding to the Paris attacks and Muslim youth radicalization
Western
Europe is still reeling from the terrorist attacks that struck Paris on the
evening of Friday 13 November, killing 129 people and injuring over 300 more,
many critically. Political leaders are discussing appropriate responses, to
follow up on France’s initial airstrike against Raqqa, the capital of the
Islamic State that has claimed responsibility for the attacks.
Details are
emerging about the eight gunman who carried out the attacks, all in their 20s
or 30s. They appear to include at least five French citizens, including the
Abdeslam brothers, Salah and Brahim, who lived in the Brussels suburb of
Molenbeek, described by Belgian authorities as a "breeding ground for
jihadists". Two others were born and bred in Paris, the target of their
attacks. Another of the terrorists was a Syrian national who appears to have
arrived in Greece and registered as a refugee in October.
An obvious
question that arises from the above details is the motivation of the eight
young Muslim terrorists. US Secretary of State John Kerry offers an answer:
"They are in fact psychopathic
monsters and there is nothing, nothing civilized about them. So this is not a
case of one civilization pitted against another. This is a battle between
civilization itself and barbarism and fascism. Both at the same time."