No, it is that most such "discussions of root causes" have the character of apologetics for the offenders, or, to put it another way, become just one more verse of "Officer Krupke" (West Side Story).
I will discuss root causes: Islam was once a triumphant religion, having conquered North Africa, the Iberian Peninsula, most of the Middle East, a wide swathe of Central Asia through to the Pacific Rim, and, with the Turks, finally Constantinople. It was, for a time, a high civilization, with splendid cities and learned scholars. However, after the Middle Ages, it fell into decline, and was rapidly surpassed by the West. Now, how could Allah have let this happen? For some, this is a very pointed question, and the answer is that the current world order is evil, an evil visited upon Islam due to infidelity (failure to follow shari'ah faithfully), and therefore we, as the topmost power, are the Great Satan, and the Muslim world must return to purity, win the favor of Allah, and overturn the evil world order.
This deluded construct is the center of the terrorist phenomenon in the Islamic world. It is particularly acute among Arabs because at its civilizational height, Islam was dominated by Arabs, and they, even more than the Turks, lost glory....... |
