I appeared on a Google Hangout to discuss online radicalization:




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Labels: Internet, Radicalization, Social-Media

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The Roots of Radicalization

I appeared on Al Jazeera English's The Stream to discuss radicalization with Haris Tarin and Mubin Shaikh. 


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The Utility of Lone Wolves, Or Lack Thereof

The death of Osama bin Laden came and went, and nary a midnight howl was heard from the lone wolf terrorists of the American jihadist movement.

Now the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attack has come and gone, and the lone wolves again stayed in their lairs.

What can we conclude from this?

There's no question that the phenomenon of lone wolf terrorism kills. In the United States, 17 Americans have died in acts of "individual jihad" by Al Qaeda sympathizers. We have also seen a number of near misses, from the jihadist movement and others, such as the averted Martin Luther King Day bombing attempt carried out in Spokane by a white supremacist.

If there were any doubts that lone wolves can be deadly, they were dispelled by Anders Breivik, the Norwegian anti-Muslim crusader who in July killed 69 young people in a coordinated attack using guns and a car bomb.

But there's a difference between being deadly and being the Number One threat to U.S. national security. Lone wolves are perhaps the most likely form of terrorist attack, and the most common, but not the most existentially important issue in the world of challenges this country faces.

The failure of lone wolf jihadists to strike at important moments, such as the 9/11 anniversary or after the death of bin Laden, keenly illustrates the current limitations of the "individual jihad" movement endorsed by such al Qaeda ideologues as Abu Musab Al Suri and Anwar Awlaki. The individual jihad has also been encouraged by Al Qaeda's central command, including in a video released earlier this year.

But the major events (or rather non-events) of this year illustrate that the methodology of individual jihad is neither strategic nor tactical in its current form. If individual jihadists can't be relied on to act when the stakes are obviously high, such as the death of bin Laden or the most-watched anniversary of 9/11, they probably can't achieve meaningful goals for Al Qaeda and its supporters.

How useful would U.S. drones be if they only fired missiles at random intervals and couldn't be directed to the right place at the right time? Individual jihadists have not demonstrated their ability to target and act with timely strategic or tactical intent.

Again, I want to stress, that doesn't mean they aren't dangerous. They have killed before and will kill again, and Brevik has demonstrated that the lone wolves of today can carry out attacks on a scale previously unimagined.

But the lone wolves have repeatedly highlighted their weaknesses, including the aforementioned failure to act when they can have the most impact and a failure to follow the guidelines Al Qaeda has laid out for them.

What we are left with is a series of radicalized but ultimately weak individuals who usually fail in their efforts to carry out even modest attacks on U.S. soil, and who create no synergy with other Al Qaeda ventures or communications.

Their efforts often seem to casual observers to be motivated more by mental illness than ideology. Their inadequacy inspires more contempt than fear. Their failure to show up when people are most afraid of them diminishes their impact when they eventually get around to acting.

So what real threat does the lone wolf jihadist present to America? There are three ways that they can cause significant damage going forward:

1) Al Qaeda might figure out the right approach to make the lone wolves conform more closely to its priorities. We've seen distinct efforts to accomplish this, including the As-Sahab video linked above and recent issues of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Pensinsula's Inspire magazine. So far, it hasn't been working all that well, but Al Qaeda will continue to adapt its approach.

2) Lone wolves may follow the example of Anders Breivik and become more ambitious and effective in their attacks, magnifying the impact of their efforts. This is the biggest concern, in my opinion, and we need to closely monitor the impact of that event.

3) The U.S. may choose to take a counterproductive approach to dealing with the legitimate threat of lone wolf terrorism by overemphasizing its prevalence or its relationship to mainstream Islam.

On the last point, I will refer back to some of my previous comments about "countering violent extremism" initiatives.

Al Qaeda has always been most effective when it could manipulate us into taking actions which reinforce its worldview. The most obvious risks are an excessive emphasis on lone wolves as being representative of American Muslims in general or a concerted government effort to create "acceptable" forms of Islam in the United States through counterradicalization programs that delve too deeply into religion at the expense of focusing preventing on acts of violence through law enforcement and disrupting nodes of radical activity.

For more about American jihadists and lone wolf terrorism, check out J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, on sale everywhere.

Labels: Abu-Musab-Al-Suri, Al-Qaeda, Anwar-Awlaki, CVE, homegrown-terrorism, individual-jihad, lone-wolf, Radicalization

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Hyping The Terrorist Internet: The "You Name It" Problem

As most readers know, I have a healthy respect for the dangers of terrorist use of the Internet. But at the same time, I think U.S. media and policymakers tend to oversell the impact and uniqueness of how Al Qaeda and its admirers and adherents use the Web.

While reading Counterstrike: The Untold Story of America's Secret Campaign Against Al Qaeda it occurred to me that this is the "You Name It" Problem.

"General Abizaid was the Centcom commander and he essentially felt like we were losing daily, not just the broader battle of ideas, but we were losing the war in Iraq and Afghanistan because the way the terrorists dominate in either putting out beheadings or you just name it," said a counterterrorism official involved in the discussions.

A paragraph or two later, Abaizaid is quoted directly:

Yet when you looked at the enemy, the enemy was moving in the cyberspace world in a way that allowed them to recruit, train, organize, equip, proselytize, educate -- you name it! -- conduct intelligence operations.

"Recruit, train, organize, equip, proselytize, educate -- you name it! -- conduct intelligence operations" is actually just "recruit, train, equip and conduct intelligence operations" when you remove redundancies. Serious, yes, but a shorter list.

Meanwhile, the phrase "you name it" is designed to invoke all manner of mysterious goings-on that we are encouraged not to actually name, so that they can remain mysterious.

The vast majority of work and activity taking place on extremist forums is the same activity that extremist networks engage in offline. The Internet is a magnifier and accelerator, as it is in other aspects of life, but it has not, for the most part, fundamentally changed the work of extremism.

Some things are easier, like exposing people to various sorts of training manuals in dangerous techniques. Other things are harder, like ensuring that recruits are actually competent to perform dangerous techniques. Inspire magazine is a terrorist magazine just like dozens of its predecessors. It's not something fundamentally new, it's just being distributed more efficiently and at lower cost.

We need to be concerned about the ways that Internet use expands the reach and speed of terrorist organizations, but we also need to stay grounded, understand the basics and describe them in clear and concrete ways.

During a recent conversation about the Internet as a "driver" of radical activities, I pointed out that terrorists used printed newsletters and magazines before there was an Internet. Yet no one talks about the role of paper in driving extremist activities.

The Internet is an important tool, but it's just a tool. We should be talking about WHAT extremists are doing online, rather than marveling at the fact they are doing it ONLINE.

For more about Internet radicalization, check out J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, on sale everywhere.

Labels: CVE, Domestic-Extremism, Internet, Jihadist-Forums, Radicalization

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

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Finding A Way Forward For CVE

I recently came across an interesting discussion on an extremist Internet forum about a particular brand of ideology and whether it had outlived its usefulness. The discussion continued for more than 130 pages (when rendered as a PDF), and it was a fascinating look at how extremist ideologies can decay and even collapse.

As I've said before, I am not a fan of the idea of government policies for Countering Violent Extremism (CVE). But I recognize the desire for such strategies and approaches, and I continue to think about the issue in an effort to find ways to contribute something positive rather than complain from the sidelines.

With this recent example in mind, I went back and revisited the Obama administration's new "strategy" for fighting violent extremism. I found myself thinking about goals and end states for counterradicalization programs. Part of the problem I have with the President's plan and others I have encountered has to do with their goals.

WRONG CVE GOALS

1. Make good citizens
2. Instill values
3. Create community or government partners
4. Actively address or remove grievances
5. Change underlying beliefs

I outlined most of my objections to these goals in a previous post and one before that. The short version is that I think it's devilishly difficult to tell people how to think, especially when those people are already suspicious of you. The goals above smack of social engineering and manipulation. Manipulation is what the bad guys do. It shouldn't be what we do, even if it was likely to work, which it's not.

That doesn't mean we have to sit idly by and ignore centers of radicalization, such as online forums, groups within communities, or within formal terrorist and extremist networks here and abroad. We just need goals that are more realistic and that reflect what actually happens when people abandon violent extremism. To that end, I suggest that we want would-be violent extremists to arrive at the following end-states:

RIGHT GOALS – The Five Ds

1. Discouraged
2. Disillusioned
3. Divided
4. Doubt-filled
5. Directionless

Discouraged means that would-be extremists believe they cannot achieve the goal of promoting or institutionalizing their ideology. Most -- but not all -- people will be reluctant to take action if they believe that action is pointless or purely symbolic.

Disillusioned means that they have lost faith in specific leaders and co-ideologists whom would-be extremists see as failing to live up to the ideals they espouse. It's important to keep in mind that while violent ideologies seem negative to those of us on the outside looking in, adherents seem themselves as idealists and utopians. A disillusioned idealist creates powerful negative energy within a community.

Divided is an obviously desirable trait. The more disagreement and paranoia fester within a group of people, the less capable that group is of collective action. There are multiple lines of disagreement that can be opened and aggravated by strategic government policies and disruptive psychological operations.

Doubt is one of the most powerful emotions we can experience as humans, and it saps the will to take dramatic or extreme action. Doubt can apply very broadly within extremist communities -- it can mean doubt about particular elements of the ideology, doubts about co-ideologists' sincerity or intelligence, doubts about the pragmatism of the movement's goals, or doubts about the safety of forums in which extremist conversations are held. Doubt is an element of the first three goals, and can also be a goal unto itself. The important thing to remember is that there is great utility in planting seeds of doubt that deter action, as opposed to trying to uproot an entire existing worldview and replace it with a new one.

Directionlessness is the final piece of the puzzle. Even if extremists manage to overcome the first four Ds to  remain committed and unified, differences over strategic direction can render them paralyzed. This is a particularly tricky area for government to meddle in -- namely because there is always a risk of pushing individuals or the collective into a specific direction. I suspect it is better to look at directionlessness as a barometer for success rather than as a tactical goal.

Aside from the considerations I have written about previously, this approach has a couple of specific advantages. All other considerations aside, it's simply easier to destroy than it is to create. And most CVE discussions are about creating positive communities by targeting people who have not yet been radicalized rather than disrupting extremist communities as they exist.

Perhaps more importantly, the Five Ds approach is not exclusive to Muslim radicalization. For all that people talk about not singling Muslims out for corrective actions, the fact is that the President's CVE prescription and most others I have encountered target Muslims very specifically and call for tactics of engagement which cannot realistically be applied to, say, white supremacists or pedophiliac religious cults.

Remember that online conversation I mentioned at the top, the one that got me thinking about this again? It was found on a white supremacist forum. Disruption has the potential to work with any kind of extremism, and it's essential that any CVE policy we undertake be flexible enough to deal with threats from all quarters.

For more about radicalization and American jihadists, check out J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, on sale everywhere.

Labels: CVE, Domestic-Extremism, Radicalization

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

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White House Strategy On Violent Extremism: Full Of Sound And Muted Fury

The first thing that leaps out at you when you read the strategy to "prevent violent extremism" rolled out by the White House yesterday is the extraordinarily high ratio of words to ideas. In a document with only eight pages of text, one finds very little content.

There are very few action verbs to be found, and absolutely no research cited in support of the documents many underlying assumptions.

The concept of fighting the radicalization of Americans at the "idea" level has grabbed Washington by the throat, and there is precious little prospect that it will loosen its grip any time soon. At virtually every level of government, people and teams have been tasked to battling radicalization.

The White House document reflects much of the conversation about radicalization inside the Beltway. Everyone urgently believes that something has to be done, but no one is quite sure exactly what. And the current bipartisan philosophy of American government emphasizes immediate action over considered strategy in any given situation.

What little remains after deleting the torrent of unfocused rumination runs into many of the problems I have previously identified with counter-radicalization at the government level. To its credit, the White House strategy document acknowledges several of these issues. Unfortunately, its response is to soldier on anyway.

There are a handful of basic proposals here.

One section calls for "Enhancing Federal Engagement with and Support to Local Communities that May be Targeted by Violent Extremists. "Targeted" here means "targeted for recruitment," which should have been clearer. This section makes no mention of the word "Muslim," which was a deliberate but misleading choice by the White House which I will address later on.

Under this heading, the White House lays out a very broad range of possible problems in communities which should be addressed under the theory that they somehow contribute to radicalization. These include "jobs, education, health, and civil rights."

There is no evidence that the first three factors substantially contribute to radicalization. If I am understanding the document correctly, the idea is that engaging at-risk communities with these services is important because it means those communities are not ONLY interacting with the government as the subject of investigations. In other words, the federal government should be Nurturing Mother, in addition to its roles as Disciplinarian Father and Watchful Big Brother.

Another section calls for "building expertise" in preventing violent extremism. I would be interested to know who has such expertise, because there aren't many successful initiatives in this space to which one can point. The bright spot in this section is the following sentence:

Misinformation about the threat and dynamics of radicalization to violence can harm our security by sending local stakeholders in the wrong direction and unnecessarily creating tensions with potential community partners. We also are working to support and expand community oriented policing efforts by our state, local, and tribal partners, and to assist them in enhancing cultural proficiency and other foundations for effective community engagement

That is jargonese for "no more Walid Shoebats and Robert Spencers training law enforcement," which is a good, if obvious, move.

Under the heading "Countering Violent Extremist Propaganda While Promoting Our Ideals," the White House puts forth a fairly confused set of principles which don't seem to move the needle much. Again, the obvious point is the most successful here -- continuing to communicate through government messaging that the U.S. is not at war with Islam. Of course, that theme has been a constant element of our messaging for a decade now, and yet it still finds plenty of traction for reasons that are the subject of another analysis on another day.

Promises to focus on communicating "clearly about al-Qa’ida’s destructive and bankrupt ideology" presume that government understands this ideology well and how it contributes to violence by extremists, which is a pretty questionable presumption.

Under the guiding principles, a series of bold-face statements really begin to get into the weeds of concepts that don't work and/or are likely to become political hot potatoes. For instance, there is an assertion (expanding on the element noted above) that providing social services to communities can help prevent radicalization. Ask Norway how that approach is working out for them. And I repeat, there is absolutely no hard evidence to suggest jobs, health care or education are statistically significant factors in radicalization. What studies do exist suggest just the opposite -- that these issues have no meaningful impact on the problem.

The principles also touch on the question of civil liberties and civil rights. Unlike the aforementioned, there is some support for this as a factor in radicalization based on what radicals tell us in their own words. I explore this more fully in my book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam. Unfortunately, this issue isn't as cut and dried as one might hope. Civil rights are sometimes part of the fabric of what leads someone to violence, but not always, and how radicals perceive their civil rights in America does not always correspond to the reality of their civil rights. This is also a topic for more detailed discussion another day.

The guiding principles end with some uplifting talk about what should not be considered part of the violent extremism paradigm. The statements as formulated are correct (i.e., opposing U.S. policy doesn't make you a violent extremist), but they also smack of artificial limitations on how we should talk about this issue, which are probably not helpful. While opposing U.S. policies doesn't make you a violent extremist, most violent extremists do oppose U.S. policy, so it's not exactly a non-issue here.

All of these points are orbiting a central problem with the approach outlined in the White House strategy, which is that it is focused on the poorly defined problem of "violent extremism" rather than the clearly defined problem of "violence by extremists."

While it might appealing to fight the "ism" as the perceived source of the "ist," we're talking (to some extent) about the same distinction the Obama Administration made between a war on terrorism and a war against terrorists. The administration chose the "ist" over the "ism" in that calculation, and the same general principle applies here.

Stopping those who attempt to commit violence is an achievable goal. Stopping the ideas that fuel violence is not. If Al Qaeda's ideology is "bankrupt," it will collapse in the free market of ideas and become even more isolated on the fringes of society than it already is.

Our role as a society is to hold the line responsibly until that collapse in complete and avoid playing the role of "enemy of Islam" that Al Qaeda has written out for us.

On that front, a final note: The White House sought to stress that the principles in this document are not focused primarily on Muslims but can be applied to all sorts of violent extremism. I am hard-pressed to see how this strategy of engagement and community relations could be applied to white supremacists or the sovereign citizen movement. And Al Qaeda ideology is the only ideology discussed in the report.

The report explicitly states that efforts to fight extremism should not isolate communities as targets of government scrutiny. If that's really the goal, the White House should try to produce a product in this space that isn't transparently targeting Muslim extremism above all else.

Or even better, they can make the credible, non-religious, non-bigoted case for why Al Qaeda-related extremism deserves a special focus compared to other forms of extremism (primarily their emphasis on mass casualty attacks).

Make the case and be blunt about it. There's more than a whiff of hypocrisy in this document, and that smell easily ruins the bouquet.

For more about the radicalization of Americans, check out J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, on sale everywhere.

Labels: Counterterrorism, CVE, Domestic-Extremism, President-Obama, Radicalization, White-House

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Internet Provides Terrorists With Tools -- Just Like Everyone Else

Last week, I attended a National Counterterrorism Center conference on "The Changing Face of Al Qa'ida." I was honored to take part in a panel on Internet radicalization with some great thinkers in this space, Will McCants and Daveed Gartentstein-Ross, as well as Scott Carpenter, head of Google Ideas, who made a persuasive case for that project, although I continue to have some reservations and look forward to further conversations. What follows is an abridged and edited version of my talk.

Terrorists use the Internet in many of the same ways that everyone else uses it – to communicate, collaborate and achieve critical mass.

Jihadists in the U.S. began using email to distribute propaganda as soon as it became available. They replaced paper newsletters such as Al Hussam, published out of Boston, with e-mailed newsletters like the Islam Report, by Kifah Jayyousi with the American Islamic Group in Florida. Al Hussam later went online as well both in email and Web page form. These were just practical decisions. It cost about $1,000 a month to publish Al Hussam on paper. It cost virtually nothing to email Islam Report.

Jihadis switched to digital video fairly early as well, for similar reasons. It was much cheaper and easier to distribute files on video than on videotape. Prior to 9/11 most of these initiatives were extensions of the earlier formats – basically the same newsletter or video in digital form.

The rise of the Web and social media have made it possible for people with all sorts of fringe interests to find community where they never could before, whether it's fans of low-rated TV shows, people with unusual sexual fetishes or people who are fascinated by jihad.

Since 9/11, use of the Interent in general and by jihadists specifically has increasingly been about relationships. Many or even most of the relationships people institute online will remain online forever. But some people will make connections that lead to real-life interactions.

The jihadist Web is of greatest concern to us when relationships established online become relationships in the real world with real-world consequences. There is a tremendous amount of radical activity online. Very little of that activity will translate into real-world threats. But the volume of activity gives us a great (albeit imperfect) view on the temperature and interests of the movement.

The Internet is also seen, correctly, as an incubator for incipient radicalism and a transmission channel for jihadist and Al Qaeda propaganda. These are important factors, but not as important as the relationships. Relationships forged online have led to attempted terrorist attacks and violent radical activity in a number of cases (including Zach Chesser, "Jihad Jane" Colleen LaRose and Faisal Shahzad).

In contrast, despite a constant flow of specific threats generated on the forums, there is not a single case known to the open-source world where a scheme developed on the forum evolved into an operational success. It is extraordinarily rare for such conversations to become operational at all, even as failures.

One area of obvious concern is Al Qaeda's Inspire magazine, which urges American Muslims to take up arms at home and carry out attacks under the concept known as "individual jihad." This message has been reinforced by messages from American Al Qaeda member Adam Gadahn.

With some notable exceptions, the individual jihad has mostly resulted in embarrassing failures. Recent events in Norway may serve to spur additional efforts on this front, as Anders Breivik has now demonstrated that a single person can successfully mount a spectacular terrorist attack.

Although Inspire has been touted as a new initiative by Al Qaeda, it is in reality an old-style jihadist propaganda magazine, albeit with a few new twists. Most notable is the addition of direct instructions on how to carry out terrorist attacks, which have not traditionally been combined with propaganda pieces.

Last week we saw the first case of someone directly following the instructions in Inspire, former U.S. soldier Nasser Abdo. He won't be the last. It's important to continue monitoring the continued evolution of Inspire, while avoiding hyperbolic comments about its alleged power (which Inspire's editors routinely republish).

We're seeing social media increasingly used by jihadists, but a similar dynamic applies. Social media is not necessarily a source of radicalization but a way to make connections and build toward offline relationships.

For instance, Khalid Abdul Latif, who was plotting an attack on a military installation in Seattle, uploaded propaganda videos to YouTube expounding on his views. There is no evidence his videos managed to radicalize anyone, although they provided a significant service to prosecutors. Only a handful of people even saw his videos prior to his arrest.

Fan pages centered around jihadist/terrorist groups on Facebook have, to some extent, succeeded in establishing a wider reach, but these pages also expose users to potential negative action in a more substantial way than the forums.

For practical purposes, we should be thinking about violent radicalization as a problem set that has to do more to do with violence and less to do with talk, beliefs and attitudes. We can't control or regulate how people think. We can interdict them when they start to move toward violent action.

For more about American jihadists, including a chapter devoted to their use of the Internet, check out J.M. Berger's new book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go to War in the Name of Islam, on sale everywhere.

Labels: Jihadist-Forums, Radicalization, Social-Media

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

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Congressional Hearing on Muslim Radicalization Poses Challenges

On Thursday, U.S. Rep. Pete King will convene a hearing to explore why a small but growing number of American Muslims are turning to violent extremism, often in the form of terrorism on U.S. soil.

There's no question that this is an important issue, if not a new one. American Muslims have been taking up the banner of military jihad for more than 30 years, since two Americans took part in a terrorist attack on the Grand Mosque in Mecca.

Since then uncounted numbers of Americans have fought or terrorized in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bosnia, Chechnya, Somalia, Yemen and on U.S. soil. They are literally uncounted -- until September 11, no one in the U.S. government kept track of them in an organized way.

I documented scores of cases for my book, Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go To War In The Name Of Islam, and glimpsed many more that I could not document. Even using the most aggressive estimate, the number of Americans who have ever taken up arms in the name of Islam is certainly far less than one half of 1 percent of the total American Muslim population.

But because of the gravity of their acts, this small group has had a disproportionately large impact on American views of Islam. U.S. citizens aided in the first World Trade Center bombing, the 1998 East African embassy bombings and September 11, among many others.

With a caveat for inadequate data, it's pretty clear that the number of Americans attracted to violent Islamic extremism has risen meaningfully over the past few years. But that increase is likely less than most people think. During the 1980s and 1990s, substantial numbers of Americans took part in acts of military jihad; many more were involved in such causes financially and rhetorically.

American involvement in jihadist movements was once considered too sensitive for the FBI to investigate, due to concerns over religious freedom. But since September 11, the gloves are off and anything involving military jihad is considered a high-priority threat to homeland security. Activities that were once ignored are now studied by government officials, academics and the press.

So while today's extremists are likely more numerous on a linear basis, they are exponentially more visible, thanks to heightened scrutiny from the government and jihadists' enthusiastic embrace of the Internet, where radical talk that was once private is now on display for anyone to see.

All of this history lies behind Thursday's hearing, which has generated a storm of criticism from both Muslim Americans and terrorism hawks.

Since last year, when a proposal to build an Islamic Center near Ground Zero touched off a firestorm of controversy, the national dialogue on Islam and extremism has become increasingly poisonous. Prominent American authority figures used language that equated Muslims -- all Muslims, not just extremists -- to America's historical military enemies. The most visible example was likely 2012 presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, who compared Muslims to Nazis and World War II Japan.

On the other side of the spectrum, American Muslim activists, most visibly represented by the Council on American-Islamic Relations, and some of their allies from the left side of the political spectrum, responded to news of the radicalization hearing with their own brand of hyperbole, making clearly specious comparisons between King's one-day, subpoena-free hearing and the ugly excesses of McCarthyism, or even the internment of 110,000 Japanese-Americans during World War II.

These wildly opposing viewpoints find common ground in the minds of those American Muslims most at risk for violent radicalization. The long history of American jihadism tells us that the single most common and important assumption made by those who carry out violence is the existence of a literal war against Islam and Muslims that requires a warlike response.

Individuals on the edge of radicalization have a selective interpretation of the world, but that vision can be bolstered by real-world facts. When prominent political figures and leaders of the Muslim community make mutually affirming statements that validate the idea of a U.S. war against Islam, it's not hard to understand why some people believe it.

And the same Christian politicians and Muslim activists are more than happy to blame each other for using words that incite violence while ignoring the impact of their own statements.

Online extremists and jihadist recruiters take all of these words and run with them, spinning an ever-more convincing narrative about America's war on Islam. This leads to more extremism, which leads to violence, which leads to even more inflammatory public rhetoric, which leads to still more extremism.

None of this in any way justifies or rationalizes violence and terrorism. We can acknowledge the factors that lead to radicalization without deeming those factors legitimate or reasonable. Actions that are inexcusable do not have to be incomprehensible.

Thursday's hearing will overseen by Congressman Pete King, who has a history of contentious debate with American Muslim organizations. However, King notably refuted Gingrich's Nazi comparison last year.

That's important, because there's a distinction in this conversation. Religious freedom is one of America's most important principles, and that includes the freedom to criticize any religion, or parts of a religion, or the adherents of a religion. Americans are not obliged to like Islam or to like any particular tenet of Islam, just as no one is obliged to like Catholic views on abortion or Mormon views on polygamy.

But applying the rhetoric of war is a very different can of worms, especially when it comes from people in government and politics. It's unreasonable for American political leaders to tell Muslims "you are the enemy" and then blame them for believing it. Such statements ultimately empower Al Qaeda, which has always wanted its war with America to encompass all Muslims.

The overreaching grievances of activists and organizations like CAIR are similarly counterproductive, sending a wildly disproportionate message that Muslims are victims of extraordinary U.S. persecution, then professing disbelief and disavowal when some Muslims take violent action because they believe they are persecuted.

Thursday's hearing looks to be steering a middle path between these two divisive poles, or at least it's trying to. King has gotten heat from both Muslim activist organizations and the most vocal critics of those organizations. That means he's probably doing something right.

This is an important topic, and it deserves to be aired in a public forum. Nevertheless, the outcome of the hearings and the ultimate benefit or cost will not become clear until the gavel falls at the end of the day Thursday.

In a forum like this, it's very difficult to accomplish something positive and all too easy to accomplish something negative. An errant sound bite can echo for months or years.

Which leads us to the one certainty that participants in the hearing should hold close to their hearts: The worst thing that anyone says on Thursday will be the one thing that everyone remembers.

J.M. Berger is author of the forthcoming book, "Jihad Joe: Americans Who Go To War In The Name Of Islam," the first comprehensive look at the phenomenon of American jihadists from the 1970s to the present. The book will be released in May. Pre-orders are available now.

Labels: American-Al-Qaeda, American-Jihadists, American-Terrorists, Jihad-Joe, Peter-King, Radicalization

Views expressed on INTELWIRE are those of the author alone.

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