Discovering the interplay between the news media and acts of terrorism

It will help, but not completely. Unlike Christians, Islams’s religious leaders are more similar to Judaism. In both there is no central body who decides what is right and debates are common.

What this will do reinforce the beliefs that follow his movement’s ideas to prevent those wavering from going down the path of violence. I doubt we’ll see too many muslims that are terrorists that follow his movement any time soon.

It is also a risk to the cleric. Internecine violence has often killed religious leaders that oppose another. Especially true in Pakistan and N.Ireland where despite the press coverage as the Taliban as largely united, the reality is very opposite, and spend as much time fighting each other than attacking the opposition.

In my opinion, every project like this one must be regarded with high respect and value. As long as there are people that are trying to find a peaceful resolution to the conflicts, they must be acknowledged and properly understood.

MFruchtman pointed one very important characteristics of Islam – the variety. It is crucial to understand that inside what may seem as a monolithic religious group there are numerous varieties and most of them have nothing to do with the use of terrorism to achieve religious aims. The fact that ‘they speak the same language’ (despite the fact that intrareligious violence is always bloody – no doubt on this) opens a new prospective for the whole understanding of the situation. The generalization of this kind was one of the most tragic mistakes in the Former Yugoslavia – mostly among the Serbs and also to some extent among Croats: all Muslims were presented as a threat and as extremists so thus made a legitimate target. And as a response, the Muslim population did become more homogenized because of the real threat but the differences never actually diminished.

I’m also not in favor of dreaming about the ‘complete solution’ immediately. The history shows that complete solutions and one-move-answers are extremely rare – just the insignificant number of wars produced swift results, very few documents and resolutions had an immediate impact.

But on the other hand, the ‘policy of small steps’ might lead to the right direction. Sometimes it might look as if it is not moving but the only judgement can come after some time of serial commitment has passed.

On the other side, I think that we gave enough chance to ‘military’ solutions and it did not prove to be as successful – terrorism is still around us and still growing as we try to respond to it with a growing force.

Finally, if you remember (for me the most memorable) scene from The Bloody Sunday – the recruiting of the new IRA members after the massacre and Ivan Cooper’s statement in the press conference that the whirlwind of violence has started – I think that EVERY peaceful civil movement should at least be given a chance. Otherwise, we would never have any changes in the world because of the skeptical attitude – we never know which of the peaceful initiatives would eventually succeed and most of them at the beginning looked as doomed to fail 🙂