Muslim Statistics (Terrorism)

This page contains statistics concerning the use of terrorism against non-Muslims. For further statistics of a similar nature, see Persecution and Homosexuals. For statistics covering prejudice against Jews and Muslims, see Antisemitism and Crime & Prejudice.

Economic and Social Conditions

When Muslims and non-Muslims belonging to the same society are faced with the same economic and social conditions, Muslim are sometimes (e.g. as in the following case) infinitely more likely to turn to terrorism than their non-Muslim counterparts.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has thrown together a wide range of disparate groups... All have used more or less the same tactics, and all, with the exception of PFLP, use the same Islamic rhetoric in order to describe the martyr and their mission. There is no commonality between the martyrs, as rich, poor and middle class, young and old, men, women and children, educated and non-educated, have all participated in martyrdom operations... Of the Palestinian society, only Christian Arabs thus far have not taken part in martyrdom operations.

March 2005

Terrorism goes across social and economic lines

The 400 terrorists on whom I’ve collected data were the ones who actually targeted the “far enemy,” the U.S., as opposed to their own governments. I wanted to limit myself for analytical purity to that group, to see if I could identify anything different from other terrorist movements, which were far more nationalistic.

Most people think that terrorism comes from poverty, broken families, ignorance, immaturity, lack of family or occupational responsibilities, weak minds susceptible to brainwashing - the sociopath, the criminals, the religious fanatic, or, in this country, some believe they’re just plain evil.

Taking these perceived root causes in turn, three quarters of my sample came from the upper or middle class. The vast majority—90 percent—came from caring, intact families. Sixty-three percent had gone to college, as compared with the 5-6 percent that’s usual for the third world. These are the best and brightest of their societies in many ways.

Al Qaeda’s members are not the Palestinian fourteen-year- olds we see on the news, but join the jihad at the average age of 26. Three-quarters were professionals or semi- professionals. They are engineers, architects, and civil engineers, mostly scientists. Very few humanities are represented, and quite surprisingly very few had any background in religion. The natural sciences predominate. Bin Laden himself is a civil engineer, Zawahiri is a physician, Mohammed Atta was, of course, an architect; and a few members are military, such as Mohammed Ibrahim Makawi, who is supposedly the head of the military committee.

Far from having no family or job responsibilities, 73 percent were married and the vast majority had children. Those who were not married were usually too young to be married. Only 13 percent were madrassa-trained and most of them come from what I call the Southeast Asian sample, the Jemaah Islamiyya (JI). They had gone to schools headed by Sungkar and Bashir. Sungkar was the head of JI; he died in 1999. His successor, Bashir, is the cleric who is being tried for the Jakarta Marriott bombing of August 2003; he is also suspected of planning the October 2002 Bali bombing.

As a psychiatrist, originally I was looking for any characteristic common to these men. But only four of the 400 men had any hint of a disorder. This is below the worldwide base rate for thought disorders. So they are as healthy as the general population. I didn’t find many personality disorders, which makes sense in that people who are antisocial usually don’t cooperate well enough with others to join groups. This is a well-organized type of terrorism these men are not like Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, loners off planning in the woods. Loners are weeded out early on. Of the nineteen 9-11 terrorists, none had a criminal record. You could almost say that those least likely to cause harm individually are most likely to do so collectively.

At the time they joined jihad, the terrorists were not very religious. They only became religious once they joined the jihad. Seventy percent of my sample joined the jihad while they were living in another country from where they grew up.

December 2004

According to a Rand Corporation report on counter-terrorism, prepared for the Office of the Secretary of Defense (US), terrorists are not particularly impoverished, uneducated, or afflicted by mental disease.

Terrorists are not particularly impoverished, uneducated, or afflicted by mental disease. Demographically, their most important characteristic is normalcy (within their environment). Terrorist leaders actually tend to come from relatively privileged backgrounds. These conclusions are firmly supported by empirical analysis

2009

2011 study finds no link between poverty and support for militant groups, and suggests poorer people are actually less likely to support extremist groups than the more affluent, better educated people.

Spending millions of pounds on development in Pakistan will do nothing to keep young men out of the clutches of the Taliban, according to an extensive survey of Pakistani attitudes towards extremism which will deepen the row over Britain's aid budget.

The study [published by the Social Science Research Network], conducted by researchers from prestigious American universities, found no link between poverty and support for militant groups.

The findings undermine a central pillar of the Conservative government's radical new policy on aid, which will deliver almost £1.4bn to Pakistan over the next five years as part of a strategy to protect Britain from terrorist attack.
. . .
Christine Fair, a South Asia expert at Georgetown University and one of the authors of the new paper, said there was no evidence for such sweeping assertions and that her study of 6,000 people suggested that poorer Pakistanis were actually less likely to support extremist groups than more affluent, better educated people.

"The terrorism literature has long held that poverty does not explain terrorism," she told The Daily Telegraph.

"Yet despite what would be a fairly robust body of literature, both the British government and the American government, have put together this canard that we can buy our way out of terrorism by investing in education and so forth. We simply don't find this."

May 2011

More than 45% of people convicted of Al Qaeda-associated terrorist offences in the UK have attended university/higher education institutions, or studied/achieved vocational or further education qualifications.

England's universities have become a breeding ground for extremism and terrorist recruitment, according to a disturbing [2011] government report.

Officials have identified 40 English universities where ‘there may be particular risk of radicalisation or recruitment on campus’.

A soon to be published Whitehall report – seen by the Daily Mail – will point to a string of examples of students going on to commit terrorist acts against this country or overseas.

Alarmingly the Prevent review says that ‘more than 30 per cent of people convicted for Al Qaeda-associated terrorist offences in the UK... are known to have attended university or a higher education institution.

‘Another 15 per cent studied or achieved a vocational or further education qualification. About 10 per cent of the sample were students at the time when they were charged or the incident for which they were convicted took place.’
. . .
The universities which have given places to fanatics include some of our most prestigious institutions.

The report will say that terrorists who have attended English universities include Taimour Abdulwahab al-Abdaly, the Stockholm suicide bomber who had a BSc in sports therapy from the University of Luton, now the University of Bedfordshire.

The alleged Detroit underpants bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, studied mechanical engineering at University College London between 2005 and 2008.

Two of the fanatics convicted of the transatlantic liquid bomb plot – ringleader Abdulla Ahmed Ali and Assad Sarwar – attended City and Brunel Universities respectively.
. . .
Ten of the 11 Pakistani nationals seized on suspicion of plotting an atrocity in the North-West in 2009 had student visas.

The alleged ringleader of this plot – Abid Naseer – was a computer studies student at Liverpool John Moores University.

June 2011

2/3 of UK terror suspects are from middle-class backgrounds, 1/2 are married (some have children), and 90% can be categorized as ‘sociable’ people with a high number of friends.

Two-thirds of British terror suspects are from middle-class backgrounds and those who become suicide bombers are often highly educated, a classified MI5 document reveals.

The paper, marked ‘Secret: UK Eyes Only’, also debunks the myths that terrorists and suicide bombers are ‘loners’ and ‘psychopaths’.

Instead, the security service says that 90 per cent of them can be categorised as ‘sociable’ and have a high number of friends.
. . .
While the report says that Western foreign policy and the perception that ‘Islam is under siege’ plays a role, they are not the main cause.

Instead, the four causes of radicalisation are:

• ‘Trauma’, such as the death of a loved one: Ten per cent of terror suspects became radicalised after a life trauma, says the report.
• ‘Migration’: A third of all extremists ‘migrated to Britain alone’.
•  ‘Criminal activity’: Two-thirds of the sample had criminal records.
• ‘Prison’: Muslim prisoners who are not religious are often radicalised in prison. The report identified 60 known Islamist extremists operating in British jails.

The study says that the ‘mean age’ at which a Muslim becomes radicalised is 21.6 years, while anyone between the ages of 16 and 32 is regarded as vulnerable.

The report added: ‘Where data is available, two-thirds came from middle or upper-middle-class backgrounds, showing there is no simplistic relationship between poverty and involvement in Islamist extremism.’

The study also found that half of the suspects it surveyed were married and some had children.

‘This indicates that having commitments to a spouse and children did not necessarily restrain these individuals from becoming involved in activity that may have resulted in lengthy imprisonment, if not death.’

The report adds: ‘The vast majority (90 per cent of those on whom we have data) are described as sociable, with a number of friends. Our data thus tends to contradict commonly held stereotypes of terrorists being “mad”, psychopathic or evil.

‘It also challenges the theory that individuals who turn to radical or extremist networks are those who are unable to make friends in normal life.’

October 2011

Compared with the world's Muslim population as a whole, Muslim terrorists are disproportionately from a higher education, higher income background.

Most global jihadis are not illiterates raised in poor slums, but from well-off families and with advanced education degrees.

“Most of the danger comes from us,” said Majid Nawaz, founder of Khudi, at a seminar titled ‘Muslims and the Modern World The State of the Muslim Ummah’. Young people being educated at “elite” schools and colleges were joining the extremists, he said.

“Terrorists are not just from slums – statistically, a disproportionate number of global jihadis come from a higher education background,” said Nawaz, who was formerly a member of the Hizbut Tahrir (HT). He quit the group to found Khudi, which works to counter extremism.

May 2012

Low-income countries are less affected by terrorism than lower middle-income countries

The [Global Terrorism] index [produced by the Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP)] is the first index to rank countries on the impact of terrorism. It is based on data from the Global Terrorism Database, which is collected by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), headquartered at the University of Maryland.

The index scores 158 countries over the last 10 years and takes into account factors like number of terrorist incidents, fatalities, injuries and property damage. Other findings of the report show that low-income countries are less affected by terrorism than lower middle- income countries, indicating that poverty is not necessarily a main cause of terrorism.

December 2012

Social exclusion does not seem to be a factor in fostering fundamentalism.

Against the idea that fundamentalism is a reaction to exclusion by the host society, [a study by Ruud Koopmans from the WZB Berlin Social Science Center finds] the lowest levels of fundamentalism in Germany, where Muslims enjoy fewer religious rights than in any of the other five [European] countries. But even among German Muslims fundamentalist attitudes are widespread...

December 2013

Worldwide

Sunni Muslim terrorists committed more than 70% (8,886) of the 12,533 terrorist murders in 2011. Note that the figure of 8,886 only covers the deaths caused by Sunni (i.e. orthodox) Muslim terrorists. Therefore, considering that the total figure includes deaths caused by Shi'ite Muslim terrorists, The Religion Of Peace's count of 9,015 dead bodies in 2011 is very conservative.

Sunni Muslim terrorists committed “about 70 percent” of the 12,533 terrorist murders in the world last year, according to a report by the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC).

The information comes from the 2011 NCTC Report on Terrorism, which is based on information available as of March 12, 2012.

“Sunni extremists accounted for the greatest number of terrorist attacks and fatalities for the third consecutive year,” the report says. “More than 5,700 incidents were attributed to Sunni extremists, accounting for nearly 56 percent of all attacks and about 70 percent of all fatalities.”

The report says that in 2011, a total of 10,283 terrorism attacks across the world killed 12,533 people. Terrorism also is blamed for 25,903 injuries and 5,554 kidnappings.

According to NCTC, of the 12,533 terrorism-related deaths worldwide, 8,886 were perpetrated by “Sunni extremists,” 1,926 by “secular/political/anarchist” groups, 1,519 by “unknown” factions, 170 by a category described as “other”, and 77 by “Neo-Nazi/Fascist/White Supremacist” groups.

CNSNews.com asked NCTC if it could break down the fatality and incident statistics by religious groups other than Sunni Muslims.

Carl Kropf, a spokesman at NCTC, told CNSNews.com that the “only portrayal” NCTC has of terrorism perpetrators in 2011 is what is found in the report.

“We don’t break it down any further than that,” he said. “I thought it was a pretty good treatment of how it is not just Sunni extremists, but there are other elements that conduct attacks, and those are captured as best we can.”

The report showed that the number of terrorism-related fatalities “decreased by 5 percent” from 13,193 in 2010 to 12,533 in 2011, while the number of attacks dropped 12 percent from 11,641 in 2010 to 10,283 last year.

“More than half [6,418] of the people killed in 2011 were civilians and 755 were children,” the report noted.

Coming second after civilians were police: NCTC found that terrorism was responsible for the deaths of 2,423 law enforcement officers, followed by military security forces (1,389), and government representatives (768).

“Muslims continued to bear the brunt of terrorism, while attacks targeting Christians dropped nearly 45 percent from a five-year high in 2010,” stated NCTC.

“In cases where the religious affiliation of terrorism casualties could be determined, Muslims suffered between 82 and 97 percent of terrorism-related fatalities over the past five years,” added the report.

Countries with Muslim majorities such as Afghanistan “suffered the largest number of fatalities overall (in 2011) with 3,245 deaths, followed by Iraqis (2,958), Pakistanis (2,038), Somalis (1,013), and Nigerians (590).”

Al-Qaida (AQ) and its affiliates, considered to be Sunni extremists, were “responsible for at least 688 attacks that resulted in almost 2,000 deaths,” the report showed.

The Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, also comprised of Sunni extremists, “conducted over 800 attacks that resulted in nearly 1,900 deaths,” NCTC said.

According to the report, the second largest category of terrorism perpetrators in 2011 after Sunni extremists was “secular, political, and anarchist groups,” which were primarily identified as Marxist, communist sympathizers.

“Secular, political, and anarchist groups were the next largest category of perpetrators, conducting 2,283 attacks with 1,926 fatalities, a drop of 5 percent and 9 percent, respectively, from 2010,” stated NCTC.

The most active of the secular, political, and anarchist groups in 2011 included the FARC (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia FARC (377 attacks); the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) (351 attacks); the New People’s Army/Communist Party of the Philippines (NPA-CPP) (102 attacks); and the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) in Turkey (48 attacks). added the agency.

The U.S. State Department’s 2011 Country Report on Terrorism describes FARC as a fighting “in support of Marxist goals” and being “heavily involved in narcotics production and trafficking.”

The NCTC did not provide the exact number of deaths from FARC-related attacks. Most of the attacks and deaths related to terrorism that occurred across the world in 2011 involved armed conflict and bombings, according to the report.

There were 5,895 terrorism-related armed attacks resulting in 4,290 deaths that year and 6,724 bombings causing 4,150 fatalities.

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) “were the most frequently used and the deadliest weapon employed,” the report said.

The National Counterterrorism Center was created in 2004 to ensure, in part, that U.S. government agencies have appropriate access to and receive the intelligence necessary to accomplish their assigned missions.

There were 6,354 deaths from 3,747 IEDs in 2011.

August 2012

More than 95 percent of all suicide bombing attacks conducted worldwide are carried out by Muslim extremists.

March 2007

The top ten nations for terrorist attacks, as listed by the Global Terrorism Index (GTI), produced by the Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) and based on data from the Global Terrorism Database, which is collected and collated by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START), headquartered at the University of Maryland. As you can see, all ten of these nations listed below, are nations facing Islamic terrorism.

In the decade since 9/11, fatalities from terrorist attacks have increased by 195 per cent, incidents by 460 per cent and injuries by 224 per cent.
. . .

Since 2002, only 6 per cent of all [terrorism-related] fatalities have been terrorists, highlighting the effectiveness of terrorism.
. . .

Private citizens and property are the most common targets of terrorism while the military is targeted in only four per cent of the attacks.

December 2012

In Lebanon, just 2% report some or a lot of confidence in bin Laden, and in Turkey only 7% do so.

In Morocco, just 26% of the public now say they have a lot or some confidence in bin Laden, down sharply from 49% in May 2003. In Indonesia, the public is now about evenly split, with 35% saying they place at least some confidence in bin Laden and 37% saying they have little or none; that represents a major shift since 2003, when 58% expressed confidence in bin Laden.

In Pakistan, however, a narrow majority (51%) places some measure of confidence in bin Laden, a slight increase from 45% in 2003. And in Jordan, support for the Al Qaeda leader has risen over the last two years from 55% to a current 60%, including 25% who say they have a lot of confidence in him. Unsurprisingly, support for bin Laden in non-Muslim countries is measured in the small single digits.

July 2005

The survey shows both hopeful and troubling signs with respect to Muslim support for terrorism and the viability of democracy in Muslim countries. In Jordan, Pakistan and Indonesia, there have been substantial declines in the percentages saying suicide bombings and other forms of violence against civilian targets can be justified to defend Islam against its enemies. The shift has been especially dramatic in Jordan, likely in response to the devastating terrorist attack in Amman last year; 29% of Jordanians view suicide attacks as often or sometimes justified, down from 57% in May 2005.

Confidence in Osama bin Laden also has fallen in most Muslim countries in recent years. This is especially the case in Jordan, where just 24% express at least some confidence in bin Laden now, compared with 60% a year ago. A sizable number of Pakistanis (38%) continue to say they have at least some confidence in the al Qaeda leader to do the right thing regarding world affairs, but significantly fewer do so now than in May 2005 (51%). However, Nigeria's Muslims represent a conspicuous exception to this trend; 61% of Nigeria's Muslims say they have at least some confidence in bin Laden, up from 44% in 2003.

The belief that terrorism is justifiable in the defense of Islam, while less extensive than in previous surveys, still has a sizable number of adherents. Among Nigeria's Muslim population, for instance, nearly half (46%) feel that suicide bombings can be justified often or sometimes in the defense of Islam. Even among Europe's Muslim minorities, roughly one-in-seven in France, Spain, and Great Britain feel that suicide bombings against civilian targets can at least sometimes be justified to defend Islam against its enemies.

June 2006

"Who Speaks for Islam"

Dalia Mogahed and John Esposito co-authored the book "Who Speaks for Islam" which grew out of a survey conducted by the Gallup polling agency and released in 2008. The authors claim only 7 percent of the world's Muslims are "political radicals" who believe the 9/11 attacks were completely justified. Yet another 29.6 percent think the 9/11 attacks were partially or in some way justified. This takes the total world-wide percentage of Muslims who think the mass-slaughter of innocent non-Muslim (and some Muslim) civilians on 9/11 was either completely, partially or some way justified, up to 36.6 percent, or almost 4 out of every 10 Muslim.

In that article, she and Esposito wrote: "Respondents who said 9/11 was justified (4 or 5 on the same scale) are classified as radical." In the book they wrote two years later, they redefined "radical" to comprise a much smaller group--only the Fives. But in her luncheon remarks, Mogahed admitted that many of the "moderates" she and Esposito celebrated really aren't so moderate after all.

MOGAHED: I can't off the top of my head [recall the data], but we are going to be putting some of those findings in our [updated] book and our website.

To clarify a couple of things about the book--the book is not a hard-covered polling report. The book is a book about the modern Muslim world that used its polling to inform its analysis. So that's important: It's meant for a general audience, and it's not meant to be a polling report. One very important reason why is because Gallup is selling subscriptions to its data. We are a for-profit company; we are not Pew. We are Gallup. So this isn't about .  .  . it was not meant for the data to be free since we paid $20 million to collect [the data] .  .  . that we paid all on our own. So just to clarify that  .  .  .  

So, how did we come up with the word "politically radicalized" that we unfortunately used in the book? Here's why: because people who were Fives, people who said 9/11 was justified, looked distinctly different from the Fours  .  .  .  At first, before we had enough data to do sort of a cluster analysis, we lumped the Fours and Fives together because that was our best judgment.

QUESTIONER: And what percent was that?

MOGAHED: I seriously don't remember but I think it was in the range of 7 to 8 percent [actually, 6.5 percent].

QUESTIONER: So it's seven Fours and seven Fives?

MOGAHED: Yes, we lumped these two and did our analysis. When we had enough data to really see when things broke away, here's what we found: Fives looked very different from the Fours, and Ones through Fours looked similar. [Mogahed then explained that, on another question, concerning suicide bombing, respondents who said 9/11 was only partially justified clustered with those who said it wasn't justified at all.] And so the Fives looked very different; they broke, they clustered away, and Ones through Fours clustered together. And that is how we decided to break them apart and decided how we were to define "politically radicalized" for our research.

Yes, we can say that a Four is not that moderate .  .  . I don't know. .  .  .You are writing a book, you are trying to come up with terminology people can understand. .  .  . You know, maybe it wasn't the most technically accurate way of doing this, but this is how we made our cluster-based analysis.

So, there it is--the smoking gun. Mogahed publicly admitted they knew certain people weren't moderates but they still termed them so. She and Esposito cooked the books and dumbed down the text. Apparently, by the authors' own test, there are not 91 million radicals in Muslim societies but almost twice that number. They must have shrieked in horror to find their original estimate on the high side of assessments made by scholars, such as Daniel Pipes, whom Esposito routinely denounces as Islamophobes. To paraphrase Mogahed, maybe it wasn't the most technically accurate way of doing this, but their neat solution seems to have been to redefine 78 million people off the rolls of radicals.

The cover-up is even worse. The full data from the 9/11 question show that, in addition to the 13.5 percent, there is another 23.1 percent of respondents--300 million Muslims--who told pollsters the attacks were in some way justified. Esposito and Mogahed don't utter a word about the vast sea of intolerance in which the radicals operate.

And then there is the more fundamental fraud of using the 9/11 question as the measure of "who is a radical." Amazing as it sounds, according to Esposito and Mogahed, the proper term for a Muslim who hates America, wants to impose Sharia law, supports suicide bombing, and opposes equal rights for women but does not "completely" justify 9/11 is . . . "moderate."

May 2008

Western World

Peter Neumann, a Professor of Security Studies at King’s College in London, said it was “not surprising” that the terrorist-in-waiting had sympathized with groups on the far-left.

“Converts are often on the look-out for something to which they can dedicate themselves, and they like to experiment with radical environments. They seek out a strong ideology that gives them meaning and structure,” Neumann said.

“In Norway, converting to Islam is probably one of the most rebellious things you can do,” he added.

Neumann further noted that western converts, aside from women who converted when marrying Muslim men, were overrepresented among jihadists.

July 2012

European Union terrorism experts believe around 500 Europeans have fought against pro-Assad forces in Syria.

June 2013

Several hundred westerners including Italians have been captured fighting alongside rebels seeking to overthrow president Bashar al-Assad, government sources told Adnkronos on Tuesday.

"We are holding 300 westerners, of whom six or seven are Italian, according to the information I have. They are all converts to Islam," the source said.

June 2013

Arab World

In the Muslim world, then, we celebrate what we call the martyr-bombers [i.e. suicide-bombers]. To us they are heroes defending the things we hold sacred. Polls in the Middle East show 75% of people in favour of martyr-bombings.

August 2001

49.9% of Arab Muslims Support Osama Bin Laden

September 2006 in an Al-Jazeera Arabic poll involving 41260 participants

According to an al-Jazeera poll, "moderate Islam" is just an impractical and outdated theory in the Arab world.

While watching this debate on al-Jazeera between pro-Jihad scholar Nader Al Tamimi and Muslim advocate for non-violence Jawdat Said, hosted by Dr. Faisal al-Qassem.

Leading up to the show, Faisal asked his viewers to respond to an online poll. The question was, Do you believe that a non-violent Islam is an impractical, outdated theory? Sixty-five percent of the respondents said Yes, only 35% said No.

Jawdat Said spoke first. He based his argument for a peaceful Islam on his understanding of human psychology and the Quran...Faisal then gave the microphone to Nader Al Tamimi. Like a steamroller squishing a mouse, he demolished the arguments of Jawdat Said. "Praise be to Allah who gave Jihad as the most powerful weapon in the Muslim arsenal. Jihad brought Islam from Arabia to the Levant, and then to Iraq, North Africa, and as far as Spain. Jihad is a two-edged sword; it enables the weak to conquer new territory, and then protects Islam in that territory.

September 2010

Afghanistan

In Afghanistan, meanwhile, in the decade since September 9, 2001 - the killing of Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud by al-Qaeda suicide bombers - a total of 736 suicide attacks have killed 3,755 people, the India-based Institute of Conflict Management and its South Asia Terrorism Portal report.

September 2011

'We have evidence that the Taliban have been recruiting children aged 11 to 17 to carry out a range of activities, from armed combat to smuggling of weapons across the Pakistan-Afghan border and planting IEDs (improvised explosive devices),' Dee Brillenburg Wurth, a child rights adviser with the UN in Afghanistan, told the IRIN news website.

On the eve of the Muslim festival Eid-ul Fitr in August, President Hamid Karzai pardoned 20 children, some as young as 7, who were groomed by the Taliban to become suicide bombers.

'Our mullah told us that when we perform the suicide attack, everyone around us dies, but we would stay alive,' 9-year-old Ghulam Farooq said.

A senior Afghan intelligence official said up to 60 per cent of the suicide attacks are by minors.

Authorities arrested about 100 underage would-be bombers this year, said Lutfullah Mashal, spokesman for the National Directorate of Security.

November 2011

Attacks with makeshift bombs hit a record high of more than 16,000 in Afghanistan in the past year, and the increasing harm they cause to Afghan civilians indicates insurgents may lack strong leadership, military officials say.

The number of improvised explosive devices that were cleared or detonated rose to 16,554 from 15,225, an increase of 9%, according to data obtained by USA TODAY. In 2009, total IED "events," as they are known, came to 9,304.
. . .

The number of Afghans killed or wounded by IEDs jumped 10% in 2011, compared with 2010, according to figures released by the military command in Kabul. The bombs account for 60% of all civilian casualties, which totaled more than 4,000 killed or wounded in 2011. Insurgents caused more than 85% of those casualties.

January 2012

A string of bigger and more complex suicide attacks by insurgents in Afghanistan have pushed civilian deaths to their highest level in a decade a United Nations report says.

The number of civilians killed in the conflict rose eight per cent last year to reach 3,021 – with more than three-quarters caused by attacks from the Taliban-led insurgency.

The findings that on average more than eight Afghans a day are being killed are at odds with Nato assessments that violence is falling.

Deaths from suicide attacks rose more than 80 per cent to 431 over the year.
. . .

Women and children were increasingly caught up in the violence, accounting for 30 per cent of deaths in the last half of the year.

February 2012

In five months last year, Afghan soldiers [not the Taliban, but "allies"] shot 14 Australians, four of whom died while others suffered serious wounds.

February 2012

of the 60 international troops killed this year, one in five has died at the hands of Afghan forces.

March 2012

An Afghan soldier shot to death a 22-year-old Marine at an outpost in southwestern Afghanistan last month in a previously undisclosed case of apparent Afghan treachery that marked at least the seventh killing of an American military member by his supposed ally in the past six weeks, Marine officials said.

March 2012

Lotfullah Mashal, a National Directorate of Intelligence spokesman, said closing schools was part of the Taliban's spring offensive.
. . .
As many as 550 schools affecting 300,000 pupils have been shut down in 11 provinces where the Taliban has a robust presence, the Ministry of Education said. The insurgents threaten schools partly because they do not support the government curriculum.

June 2012

The Taliban have raised about $400 million last year from sources that included donations, taxing local economies and extorting money from such targets as drug dealers, cell phone operators and aid projects, according to a UN report on the militant Islamist group released on Tuesday.

The report to the UN Security Council by the sanctions monitoring team said that about $275 million of that income reached Taliban leadership and the rest was collected, spent or misappropriated at the local level.
. . .
The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force estimated that between $100 million and $155 million of the Taliban’s income was spent mounting attacks in 2011, while the rest maintained the insurgency, according to the UN report.

“Since 2006 the Taliban have managed to finance an ever-increasing number of attacks, reflecting a year-on-year increase in income,” the UN report said.

September 2012

Australia

MORE than 100 extremists capable of violent radicalism are entrenched in western Sydney, a Muslim cleric claimed last night.

A western Sydney imam has revealed his losing battle turning young Muslim extremists back from the brink of terrorism.

Exposing the scale of the problem, moderate imam Afroz Ali said he was losing the battle to turn 120 extremists at this Lakemba-based organisation back from the brink.

Imam Afroz left the federal government-backed National Imam's Consultative Forum in April in no doubt how worried Australia should be about the young radicals.

"We have had a program for the last seven years now in which we have had 240 people who were considered to be moving in a direction which may have led them to violent radicalisation - to terrorism," Imam Afroz told the national forum.

"What we have found is, of the 240 people, 120, exactly half of them, are people who have changed their thinking, their mindset. That is something that I don't necessarily share too widely in public, but I am happy to share it here."

His warning to the forum, made up of over 20 imams from every state and territory, was recorded and will be broadcast tonight on Channel 7's Today Tonight.

Imam Afroz, who runs the Al-Ghazzali Centre for Islamic Sciences & Human Development, could not be contacted for comment last night.

But Sydney-based Maajid Nawaz, himself a former radical who spent 13 years inside Hizb ut-Tahrir, the fanatical global Islamist political movement, said it demonstrated the extent of the problem.

He said he did not consider it a success that there were still 120 young radicals potentially headed for terrorism.

"I find it astonishing we've got one centre that has 240 radicals," Mr Mawaz told Today Tonight

"If 120 can become violent in one Islamic centre, that tells me the scale of the problem. It's massive because that's only one centre."

That is on top of the hundreds of followers who follow Hizb ut-Tahrir, Sheik Feiz Mohammed, the Global Islamic Youth Centre at Liverpool and Auburn's Bukhari House Bookshop and prayer hall in western Sydney.

Mr Mawaz had offered to debate Muslim leaders at a public meeting organised by the TV program but was told they did not want to further alienate the extremists.

June 2013

Belgium

85% [of Muslim youths] say they will raise their children in the Muslim faith. This in itself would not be a bad thing (on the contrary), except for the fact that 48% of Antwerp’s Muslim youths are convinced that the Quran should be taken literally and 21% readily admit that they have already heard their imam preach a hate sermon. In addition, 21% of the young Antwerp Muslims say that they find it “problematic” that the majority of Antwerp’s citizens are non-Muslims, while less than half (47%) do not regard this as a problem.

December 2005

Canada

A newly released survey suggests a large number of Muslims living in Canada will not disown Al-Qaida.

The study, conducted by the MacDonald Laurier Institute, found 65% of Muslims questioned said they would “repudiate absolutely” the terrorist organization, while 35% would not do so.

“From a security perspective, it is difficult to know if a 65% rate of repudiation (of Al-Qaida) is re-assuring or a 35% failure to repudiate troubling,” wrote study authors Christian Leuprecht, associate professor of the Royal Military College of Canada and Conrad Winn, Carleton University professor and president of COMPAS, a public opinion research firm.
. . .

The report also states support for extremism is just as high among Muslims born in Canada, or other Western countries, as it is among those hailing from oppressive dictatorships.

November 2011

China

The far western region of Xinjiang is home to a simmering rebellion against Chinese rule by some members of the Muslim Uighur population, who resent Chinese restrictions on their culture and religion. Unrest in Xinjiang has killed more than 100 people in the past year, prompting authorities to toughen their stance.

March 2014

Germany

More than a third [of Turkish Germans] insisted that if it serves the Islamic community, they are ready to use violence against nonbelievers. Almost 40 percent said that Zionism, the European Union and the United States threaten Islam."

July 2005

Germany's top security official says authorities are tracking about 1,000 Islamic radicals in the country with possible links to terrorism. Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich told Bild newspaper's Monday edition that of those, 128 have been identified as having the potential to commit attacks, and 20 have trained in terrorist camps.

September 2011

Nearly every fourth non-German Muslim rejects integration, questions western values and tends to accept violence, according to a study commissioned by the German Interior Ministry and released late Thursday morning.
. . .

There are currently around four million Muslims living in Germany, of which nearly half are German citizens.

The survey also showed that among the 14 to 32-year-olds there exists a "subgroup" of religious extremists who hold anti-western views and are reportedly prepared to use violence.

This group amounts to about 15 percent of Muslims with German citizenship and about 24 percent for Muslims who are not German.

March 2012

Every single terrorist known to German authorities has had contact with Muslim groups.

Security officials have said all terrorists known to German authorities have had contact with Salafist groups.

April 2012

Indonesia

The survey, based on 1,200 respondents across Indonesia’s 33 provinces, showed 11.2 percent believed suicide bombings were justifiable on occasion while 0.5 percent said the method could always be justified to defend Islam from its enemies.

The survey also revealed that 8 percent support masterminds of past suicide bombings, including Noordin M. Top, the most wanted terror suspect in Indonesia, who authorities say is an expert in recruiting young suicide bombers among the country’s impoverished masses.

July 2006

43.5 percent of Indonesian Muslims (approximately 87 million) ready to wage war for their faith

Up to 1.3 percent of Indonesian Muslims nationwide admit using violence against people or objects they consider contradictory to their beliefs, a survey found, with more than 40 percent ready to wage war for their faith.

Acts of violence in the survey on religion and violence by the Center for Islamic and Social Studies (PPIM) ranged from 0.1 percent of respondents admitting their involvement in demolishing or arson of churches constructed without official permits, to 1.3 percent who committed "intimidation" against those they considered had blasphemed Islam.

The survey spanned 1,200 Muslims in 30 of the country's 33 provinces.

"The percentage looks very small but it is very high in its real figure when you note that 85 percent, or 200 million, of the country's 230 million population are Muslims," PPIM researcher Jajat Burhanudin said Thursday during the release of the results.
. . .
The survey, conducted from 2001 to March 2006, found 43.5 percent of respondents were ready to wage war on threatening non-Muslim groups, 40 percent would use violence against those blaspheming Islam and 14.7 percent would tear down churches without official permits.

"This condition has helped terrorists easily recruit new comrades and makes the country a fertile ground for sectarian radicalism," Jajat said.

He added that a simultaneous study on the reasons for the results found Islamic teaching and Islamism made the most significant contributions to violent behavior, both in the domestic and public spheres.

"The more Muslims give their support for certain Islamic teachings legitimizing the use of violence, the more violence will happen."

He noted that between 30 percent and 58 percent approved of amputation of the left hand for thieves and the stoning to death of rapists, as well as other tenets of sharia law, and opposed the election of non-Muslims for president.

July 2006

July 2006 global Pew survey found that among Muslims, a quarter of Jordanians, a third of Indonesians, 38% of Pakistanis and 61% of Nigerians all expressed confidence in the mass murderer who founded al-Qaida.

January 2007

About 1.8 million of Indonesia's 246 million people have potential links to terrorism, according to the country's anti-terror chief.

"The number is this. More or less 1.8 million people take part in terrorist networks," said Ansyaad Mbai., who heads Indonesia's National Anti-Terrorism Agency, or BNPT, speaking during a panel discussion in Jakarta on Tuesday.

Indonesia, world's most populous Muslim country, is combating Al-Qaeda linked terrorists whose most notorious attack was in Bali in 2002 when 200 people died in an attack by the Jemaah Islamiyah terror group. The country is also fighting a separatist movement in the Aceh region of northern Sumatra.

October 2011

Under Aceh’s Islamic law, the sale of alcohol is banned across the province and gamblers are punished by caning.

The law was imposed in 2001 as part of special autonomy granted by the central government to pacify a clamor for independence in the province on the northern tip of Sumatra.

The separatist conflict killed an estimated 15,000 people, mostly civilians, before it ended with the signing of a peace pact between the government and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) in 2005.

June 2012

In the case of West Papua, which has like Aceh been the center of a separatist movement, it is reported that the Indonesian security forces are actively persecuting Christians... also in the Maluku Islands in 2000-2002, where many Indonesian soldiers cooperated with the Islamist militant group Laskar Jihad's campaign against Christian Melanesians that killed up to 10,000 Christians.

June 2012

Iraq

Millions of Iraqis believe that suicide attacks against British troops are justified, a secret military poll commissioned by senior officers has revealed.

The poll, undertaken for the Ministry of Defence and seen by The Sunday Telegraph, shows that up to 65 per cent of Iraqi citizens support attacks and fewer than one per cent think Allied military involvement is helping to improve security in their country.
. . .
Under the heading "Justification for Violent Attacks", the new poll shows that 65 per cent of people in Maysan province - one of the four provinces under British control - believe that attacks against coalition forces are justified.

The report states that for Iraq as a whole, 45 per cent of people feel attacks are justified. In Basra, the proportion is reduced to 25 per cent.

October 2005

The [Tamil] Tigers [a Marxist-Leninist group whose members are from Hindu families but who are adamantly opposed to religion] have carried out only two confirmed suicide attacks since the beginning of 2002. Although they perhaps remain the leading single organizer of suicide attacks (77 in total), there have been more suicide attacks by various Iraqi groups in 2005 (where more than 400 attacks killed more than 2,000 people) than in the entire history of the Tigers.

2006

Note that al-Qaeda is a Sunni organization which is why the highly Shi'ite and Kurdish Iraq has such a strong disapproval of the organization.

Overall 94 percent have an unfavorable view of al Qaeda, with 82 percent expressing a very unfavorable view. Of all organizations and individuals assessed in this poll, it received the most negative ratings. The Shias and Kurds show similarly intense levels of opposition, with 95 percent and 93 percent respectively saying they have very unfavorable views. The Sunnis are also quite negative, but with less intensity. Seventy-seven percent express an unfavorable view, but only 38 percent are very unfavorable. Twenty-three percent express a favorable view (5% very).

September 2006

Support for attacks against US-led forces has increased sharply to 61 percent

September 2006

79 percent of Iraqis say that the US is having a negative influence on the situation in Iraq, with just 14 percent saying that it is having a positive influence. Views are especially negative among the Sunnis (96% negative), and the Shias (87% negative). However, a plurality of Kurds (48%) say that the US is having a positive influence, while just 34 percent say it is having a negative influence.

September 2006

A large majority of Iraqis—71%—say they would like the Iraqi government to ask for US-led forces to be withdrawn from Iraq within a year or less. Given four options, 37 percent take the position that they would like US-led forces withdrawn “within six months,” while another 34 percent opt for “gradually withdraw[ing] US-led forces according to a one-year timeline.

September 2006

A majority of Iraqis (61%) still believe that ousting Saddam Hussein was worth the hardships they might have suffered, however this is down sharply from the 77 percent who said this in January.

September 2006

But a month-long investigation by The Independent, culling four Arabic-language newspapers, official Iraqi statistics, two Beirut news agencies and Western reports, shows that an incredible 1,121 Muslim suicide bombers have blown themselves up in Iraq. This is a very conservative figure and - given the propensity of the authorities (and of journalists) to report only those suicide bombings that kill dozens of people - the true estimate may be double this number.
. . .
Suicide bombers in Iraq have killed at least 13,000 men, women and children - our most conservative estimate gives a total figure of 13,132 - and wounded a minimum of 16,112 people. If we include the dead and wounded in the mass stampede at the Baghdad Tigris river bridge in the summer of 2005 - caused by fear of suicide bombers - the figures rise to 14,132 and 16,612 respectively. Again, it must be emphasised that these statistics are minimums. For 529 of the suicide bombings in Iraq, no figures for wounded are available. Where wounded have been listed in news reports as "several", we have made no addition to the figures. And the number of critically injured who later died remains unknown.

March 2008

The year 2010 was the worst year to date for the Christian community in Iraq, it has been revealed by the organization for human rights in Iraq, Hammurabi. Many Christians were forced to leave the country in fear of killings and violence of all kinds. The death toll among Christians over the past seven years, according to Hammurabi exceeds 822 people. 629 of them were murdered for being part of the Christian minority.
. . .
Among the Christian victims of 2010 there are 33 children, 25 elderly and 14 religious. In 2010 Hammurabi recorded 92 cases of Christians killed and 47 wounded, 68 in Baghdad, 23 in Mosul and one in Erbil.

July 2011

The corrupt Lancet journal this week announced that 108,624 Iraqis were killed during the Iraq War not 655,000 as they previously reported.
. . .

CNN reported:

Suicide bombers are responsible for killing more than 12,000 Iraqi civilians and wounding more than 30,000 since the war began, according to study released by the British medical journal Lancet.

The study found that 1,003 documented suicide bombings accounted for 12,284 of 108,624 Iraqi civilian deaths, 11% of those killed between March 20, 2003, and December 31, 2010. It also found such attacks accounted for 30,644 -- or 26% -- of the 117,165 documented cases of Iraqi civilians wounded within the same period.

"Suicide bombers in Iraq use suicide bombs strategically as cost-effective, precise, highly destructive weapons," said the study, which was published Saturday.

. . .

The Iraqi government reported in 2009 that 85,000 Iraqis were killed between 2004 and 2008.

September 2011

Iraq, suicide bombers have killed more than 12,000 civilians and wounded more than 30,000 since the war began in 2003, according to study released by the British medical journal Lancet. The study found that 1,003 documented suicide bombings accounted for 12,284 of 108,624 Iraqi civilian deaths, 11% of those killed between March 20, 2003, and December 31, 2010. During the same period from 2003 to 2010, 79 documented suicide bomb attacks were responsible for the deaths of 200 coalition troops, the study found.

September 2011

At least 54 Iraqi churches have been bombed and at least 905 Christians killed in various acts of violence since the U.S. invasion toppled Hussein in 2003

December 2011

The UN special envoy for Iraq, Martin Kobler, says terrorist attacks and communal violence in Iraq killed a total of 613 civilians in the first three months of 2012.
. . .
"This is slightly less than civilian casualties last year," Kobler noted.

April 2012

The violence [that killed 82 people], the worst in more than three weeks, hit 15 cities across the country and left 270 people wounded on Thursday, just days before the Eid festival that is set to begin on Sunday.

The attacks brought the number of dead nationwide over the course of Ramadan, which began on July 18, to 404, according to an AFP tally. There has been at least one bombing or shooting on every day of the holy month but one.
. . .

Official figures put the number of people killed in attacks in July at 325, the highest monthly death toll since August 2010.

August 2012

Al-Qaeda's front group in Iraq has claimed responsibility for carrying out 163 attacks, the vast majority of which targeted security forces, across the country in less than a month. In a statement posted on jihadist Internet forums on Tuesday, the Islamic State of Iraqi (ISI) said it carried out the attacks between June 21 and July 19, in the north, south and center of the country.

August 2012

The latest figures said that 182 civilians, 95 soldiers and 88 policemen had been killed in attacks in September, up from a total of 164 in August. Sixty-four insurgents were killed over the same period. September's attacks also wounded a further 683 people, of which 453 were civilians, 120 soldiers and 110 police.

October 2012

More than 2,600 people have died in a surge in unrest so far this year, according to AFP figures based on security and medical sources. Iraq has faced years of attacks by militants, but analysts say widespread discontent among members of its Sunni Arab minority, which the Shiite-led government has failed to address, has driven the spike in unrest this year. Sunday was the fourth day in a row in which more than 30 people were killed in attacks, and an average of 26 people have died per day in unrest in Iraq over the first two weeks of July.

July 2013

Iran

The vast majority of Iran's Turkish, Saudi and Pakistani neighbors want the United States to accept a nuclear Iran, according to a new poll of the Muslim world.

Saudi Arabia and other governments in the region are officially opposed to a nuclear-armed Iran, but two-thirds of Pakistanis, one-third of Saudis and more than one-fifth of Turks support the idea, shows a series of polls released on June 14 by Terror Free Tomorrow, a nonprofit and non-partisan organization. Large numbers of people surveyed were undecided, sponsors said.

A plurality of people from the countries polled, including a two-thirds majority in Pakistan, favor the United States and other countries accepting a nuclear Iran if diplomatic efforts to halt Tehran's program fail instead of resorting to military strikes.

"Popular opinion in the region seems to defy conventional wisdom. It may be unprecedented for people of different countries to be willing to accept nuclear weapons by a neighboring nation," Ken Ballen, president of Terror Free Tomorrow, wrote in the report's executive summary.

The report warned that "despite a deep historical enmity between Iran's Persian Shia population and its ethnically diverse Arab, Turkish and Pakistani Sunni neighbors," their acceptance of nuclear-armed Iran "shows that the radical Islamist propaganda, which portrays the West as the enemy of Islam is gaining dangerous ground."

June 2006

Israel and Palestine

26 percent of Palestinians consider the Sept. 11 attacks consistent with Islamic law.

October 2001

[According to a new opinion poll released by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) in Ramallah] 75% of Palestinians support the suicide bombing of the Maxim restaurant in Haifa in which 23 people were killed.

October 2003

Fifty-nine percent of Palestinians believe that Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad should continue their armed struggle against Israel even if Israel leaves all of the West Bank and Gaza, including East Jerusalem, and a Palestinian state is created
. . .

The poll also examined Israeli and Palestinian attitudes towards the US and towards terrorism.

Nintey-six percent of Israeli Jews say the people who piloted the planes on September 11 were terrorists, while 37 percent of Palestinians share that view.
. . .

Forty-two percent of Palestinians and 61 percent of Israeli-Arabs stated that they support the people who are attacking Americans in Iraq. Zero percent of Israeli Jews said they did.

October 2003

How do you feel towards suicide bombing operations against Israeli civilians? Do you support them, or oppose them?

Strongly support 22.4
Somewhat support 33.8
Somewhat oppose 24.3
Strongly oppose 16.4

No answer 3.1

February 2006

After Cpl. Gilad Shalit was abducted by Hamas terrorists last summer, a poll conducted by the Jerusalem Media and Communications Center revealed that 77.2% of Palestinians supported the kidnapping, while 66.8% said they would back additional such attacks.

More than six out of 10 Palestinians also said they were in favor of firing Kassam rockets at Israeli towns and cities.

January 2007

1/3 of Palestinians effectively support the slaughter of Jewish children.

One-third of Palestinians support the attack in Itamar in March, in which an Israeli family of five [including a 3 month old baby] was murdered while 63 percent opposed it, according to a Hebrew University poll released on Wednesday.

The survey was conducted by Prof. Yaacov Shamir of the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace and the Department of Communication and Journalism at the Hebrew University, and Prof. Khalil Shikaki, Director of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR).

April 2011

6 in 10 Palestinians reject 2-state solution, and 7 in 10 agree with hadith quoted in Hamas Charter about the need to kill Jews hiding behind stones and trees.

Only one in three Palestinians (34 percent) accepts two states for two peoples as the solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to an intensive, face-to-face survey in Arabic of 1,010 Palestinian adults in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip completed this week by American pollster Stanley Greenberg.

The poll, which has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points, was conducted in partnership with the Beit Sahour-based Palestinian Center for Public Opinion and sponsored by the Israel Project, an international nonprofit organization that provides journalists and leaders with information about the Middle East.

Respondents were asked about US President Barack Obama’s statement that “there should be two states: Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people and Israel as the homeland for the Jewish people.”

Just 34% said they accepted that concept, while 61% rejected it.

Sixty-six percent said the Palestinians’ real goal should be to start with a two-state solution but then move to it all being one Palestinian state.

Asked about the fate of Jerusalem, 92% said it should be the capital of Palestine, 1% said the capital of Israel, 3% the capital of both, and 4% a neutral international city.

Seventy-two percent backed denying the thousands of years of Jewish history in Jerusalem, 62% supported kidnapping IDF soldiers and holding them hostage, and 53% were in favor or teaching songs about hating Jews in Palestinian schools.

When given a quote from the Hamas Charter about the need for battalions from the Arab and Islamic world to defeat the Jews, 80% agreed. Seventy-three percent agreed with a quote from the charter (and a hadith, or tradition ascribed to the prophet Muhammad) about the need to kill Jews hiding behind stones and trees.

But only 45% said they believed in the charter’s statement that the only solution to the Palestinian problem was jihad.

The survey’s more positive findings included that only 22% supported firing rockets at Israeli cities and citizens and that two-thirds preferred diplomatic engagement over violent “resistance.”

Among Palestinians in general 65% preferred talks and 20% violence. In the West Bank it was 69-28%, and in Gaza, 59- 32%.

July 2011

Tens of thousands of Hamas supporters, waving the militant movement's green flags and honking car horns in celebration, marked the 24th anniversary of the founding of Gaza's ruling group, Wednesday.
. . .

Hamas' Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades boasted killing 1,365 Israelis since it was founded, as well as injuring over 6,411 Israelis in various terror attacks.

According to the group's military wing, over 11,000 rockets were fired at Israel and it has so far executed 1,117 terror attacks.

The number of fatalities among Hamas terror operatives stands at 1,848.

December 2011

Hamas’ missile and rocket war on southern Israel is 11 years old today (Tuesday), 12,500 rockets later. More than 40 people have been killed, thousands have been wounded and property damage and economic losses has been immeasurable.

Since the beginning of 2012, terrorists from Hamas-controlled Gaza have attacked Israel with 269 rockets and missiles – a rate of more than two a day, according to the IDF.

April 2012

As of May 2011, the PA spent NIS 18 million ($4.5 million) per month on compensating Palestinian inmates in Israeli prisons and a further NIS 26 million ($6.5 million) on payments to families of suicide bombers. In all, such payments cost the PA some 6 percent of its overall budget, Israel’s Channel 2 news reported on Monday night, citing documentation signed by Fayyad.

The PA also makes payments to Israeli Arabs jailed for security offenses against Israel, the report said.

Starting in 2003, Palestinian law mandated the dispensation of a monthly salary of NIS 1,000 ($250) to security detainees sentenced to up to five years in prison. The longer the sentence, the higher the pay. An inmate serving a life sentence was paid NIS 4,000 ($1,000) per month.

An amendment of the law in January 2011 enacted by Fayyad increased the salaries by up to 300%, Channel 2 reported.

A prisoner sentenced up to three years in prison now receives a base salary of NIS 1,400 per month, and for 3-5 years that rate increases to NIS 2,000, the report said. A NIS 300 bonus is added for a wife, and NIS 50 per child.

According to the Channel 2 report, the PA-funded salaries are an equal opportunity benefit; members of Fatah, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad all receive them.

Prisoners’ salaries also increase based on how many years they have served. Abdullah Barghouti, a Hamas bomb-maker who was sentenced in 2004 to 67 life terms for orchestrating the killings of 67 Israelis, receives a monthly stipend of NIS 4,000. In less than a year that figure will rise to NIS 6,000 ($1,500).

Another major Hamas terrorist figure, Abbas al-Sayyeed, convicted of planning the 2002 Park Hotel massacre, in which 30 Israeli civilians were killed as they sat down for a Passover meal, is paid NIS 12,000 ($3,000) per month.

September 2012

Missiles or shells [from Gaza] have hit [Israel] at a rate of almost two a day.
. . .
“Since the beginning of 2012, more than 505 rockets fired from Gaza hit Israel, including over 45 during October alone,” the IDF stated Wednesday.

October 2012

Italy

Radicalised Italian converts to Islam like 20-year-old Giuliano Delnevo, who allegedly died in Syria fighting alongside rebels, have been under close surveillance for some time, anti-terrorism sources told Adnkronos.

"There are several dozen such individuals," the sources said.

"They are generally Muslim converts who use the internet to spread propaganda and communicate with other fundamentalists. "In some cases, they decide to take direct action and join jihadist fighters."

Most of the jihadists in Italy who are being monitored by secret services are Muslim immigrants from North Africa and have been to Syria at lest once to fight alongside rebels forces, according to sources cited by Il Giornale daily.

June 2013

Kenya

Bookings of holidays to Kenya have fallen by nearly 60 per cent since last year, according to new research.

A report, by Hayes & Jarvis, the tour operator, shows how recent civil unrest and the ongoing threat of piracy have affected visitor numbers.

At least six people were killed in Nairobi earlier this month in a series of explosions, while the Foreign Office currently advises against all but essential travel to parts of the country within 60km of the border with Somalia, due to several recent kidnappings.

March 2012

Lebanon

The survey showed near-identical numbers as an earlier survey, published by As-Safir on March 2. That survey showed 70.9 percent support for Hizbullah operations to capture Israeli soldiers.
. . .
The survey showed 87 percent support for Hizbullah's retaliatory attacks on northern Israel.

July 2006

Netherlands

Muslim population: 945,000 or 5.8%

December 2005

The Centrum voor Radicalisme en Extremisme Studies (CRES) is being hosted by the University of Amsterdam (UvA) and will bring together researchers from various universities to advance the study of religious radicalisation in the Netherlands.

Researcher Frank Buijs of UvA's Institute of Migration and Ethnic Studies decided there was a need for the new academic centre while he was researching radicalisation of Moroccan youth on behalf of the Ministry for Immigration and Integration.

The study found 40 percent of the Moroccan youth in the Netherlands reject western values and democracy. Six to seven percent are prepared to use force to defend Islam.

The majority are opposed to freedom of speech for offensive statements, particularly criticism of Islam. Buijs is the first director of CRES, which will provide information to people who come into contact with radicalism as part of their work.

June 2006

Nigeria

A survey published in December found that 44% of Nigerian Muslims believe suicide bombing attacks are "often" or "sometimes" acceptable. Only 28% said they were never justified.
. . .
And the July 2006 global Pew survey found that among Muslims, a quarter of Jordanians, a third of Indonesians, 38% of Pakistanis and 61% of Nigerians all expressed confidence in the mass murderer who founded al-Qaida.

January 2007

More than 300 Christians were martyred last year in Nigeria, though the actual number is believed to be double or triple that number. The total is probably greater in North Korea, but impossible to confirm due to its isolation. Since 2009 the extreme Islamic group Boko Haram has destroyed more than 50 churches and killed 10 pastors in Nigeria.

January 2012

Nigeria's president, Goodluck Jonathan, confirmed this month that Boko Haram has secret backers among government and security officials. The movement's violent campaign to impose a strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law on Africa's most populous nation claimed more than 500 lives last year. Almost a quarter of the national budget, around $6bn (£3.9bn), was allocated to the security forces to check Boko Haram's growing threat.

January 2012

Boko Haram, whose name means "Western education is sacrilege" in the local Hausa language, is responsible for at least 510 killings last year alone, according to an AP count. So far [in the 21 days of] this year, the group has been blamed for at least 219 killings, according to an AP count.

January 2012

Over 5,000 school children in northern Nigeria are now at home after Boko Haram Islamic militants destroyed their schools in their campaign to impose Islamic Sharia law in the country. The Nation newspaper of Nigeria citing a Human Rights Watch, HRW, report released earlier this week, said since the beginning of 2012, at least 12 schools have been destroyed in the city of Maiduguri, capital of the north eastern Borno State, the heartland of the insurgency.

March 2012

"Nigeria may face famine by the end of this year, because most of the small-scale farmers and big-time farmers in the north are threatened by the Boko Haram attacks", the report reads referring to the Islamist militant group whose attacks have left at least 1,200 people dead since 2009. According to NEMA, over the past three years "more than 65% of such farmers have already migrated to the southern parts of Nigeria, fearing that the insecurity to both lives and property, including their farmlands and livestock".

March 2012

THE Boko Haram sect has killed 2,800 people since 2009, the Human Rights Watch, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), has said.
. . .

The group said in the first nine months of 2012 alone, more than 815 people died in some 275 suspected attacks by the group – more than in all of 2010 and 2011 attacks combined.

HRW lamented that five days of clashes between the group and armed forces left more than 800 people dead in July 2009 and precipitated further violence.

October 2012

Authorities blame Boko Haram, a homegrown Islamist rebel movement with ties to Al Qaeda, for more than 750 deaths in 2012. The militants have obliterated churches, schools, government offices, security forces, media houses, market places and communications infrastructure.

Their methods are growing more and more gruesome by the year. Early in 2012, coordinated bombings of government and security offices in Kano killed nearly 200 people in a single afternoon. More recently, in a northern college town, militants went door to door, interviewing individuals and executing dozens who gave the wrong answers.

December 2012

More than 780 people have been killed in Boko Haram attacks so far this year, according to an Associated Press count

December 2012

Norway

Majority of Norway's imams boycotted a Muslim-organized anti-terrorism protest march

Most of Norway's top politicians, but very few Imams participated in Saturday's Muslim torchlight protest march in Oslo against violence and terrorism.

Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik was disappointed over the fact that most Imams boycotted the protest march.

- They say they are against violence and murders. Why don't they join us here in this protest, Bondevik said to NRK during the march.

A group of Muslim leaders in Norway had wanted to disassociate themselves from violence and terrorism, and had organized the torchlight march through downtown Oslo to mark their stand. However, another group had opposed the march.

The background for the march is a statement by the spokesman for the Islamic Council In Norway, Zahid Mukhtar, who earlier commented on the murder of the Ducth film maker Theo van Gogh.

Mukhtar said on a nationwide TV discussion program that he could understand that Muslims had been provoced by van Gogh's latest film, and that he could understand why someone murdered him.

December 2004

Pakistan

Nearly two thirds of people in Pakistan hold favourable views of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and 86 per cent approve of President Pervez Musharraf, according to a survey by a major American organisation.

Nearly half of those interviewed said suicide bombings against Israelis and, in Iraq, against Americans and other Westerners are justified.

The report by the Washington-based Pew Global Attitudes Project survey found that 65 per cent favoured Osama and that pluralities of 47 per cent believed Palestinian suicide attacks on Israelis were justified. Forty-six per cent thought attacks on Westerners in Iraq were justified.

The Pew Research Centre is a non-profit and non-governmental organisation, which specialises in opinion surveys. Its reports are widely respected in Washington’s academic circles.

Pakistan was one of four Muslim-majority countries in the survey, which also included Turkey, Jordan and Morocco, the governments of all of which have strong ties with the US.

Pew, the polling organisation questioned 1220 people in Pakistan’s urban areas, 1000 nationwide in four Moroccan cities and about 1000 each nationwide in Turkey and Jordan between February 19 and March 3.

The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Pew also conducted polls during the same period in the United States, Britain, France, Germany and Russia.

March 2004

A majority of Pakistanis surveyed in a poll appeared to be aggrieved over the death of Osama bin Laden, with 51 per cent describing their emotions as "grief" though one-third said they were unconcerned by the incident.

The nationwide study was released by Gilani Foundation and carried out by Gallup Pakistan, the Pakistani affiliate of Gallup International. The poll covered 2,530 men and women in the rural and urban areas.

The poll was conducted among 2,530 men and women representatives of the adult population of Pakistan. They were distributed in the rural and urban areas of various provinces and districts and comprised a cross-section of various education, income, age and linguistic backgrounds.

May 2011

Ten years down the road since the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the subsequent war on terror launched by the United States, Pakistan seems to have been turned into the suicide bombing capital of the world, with the country’s security forces, especially the army and the police, often being targeted by lethal human bombs.

In 303 suicide attacks carried out in almost every nook and corner of Pakistan 4,808 people were killed and 10,149 others injured in the decade to September 11, 2011, according to Ministry of Interior data.

Statistically speaking, that staggering death toll means that on average, suicide bombers have killed 480 people and injured 1,014 others every year across Pakistan since September 11, 2011 - though, post-9/11, the phenomenon first struck in 2002. Likewise, Pakistan has suffered an average 30 suicide bombings every year of the decade, or four attacks a month.
. . .
Suicide bombers actually came to Pakistan in force in 2002. The first attack of its kind occurred on March 16 that year, when a suicide bomber blew himself up in a church in Islamabad, killing five people and injuring 40 others.

Fifteen people died and 35 others were injured on May 8 that year when a bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into a bus near the Sheraton Hotel in Karachi. Those killed in the attack included nine French engineers and five Pakistanis technicians who were working on a naval project. The attacks placed Pakistan on the world map of countries marred by suicide bombings.
. . .
The next year, in 2003, a total of 70 people were killed and 114 injured in three suicide attacks, two targeting the president, General Pervez Musharraf in December and one targeting former prime minister Shaukat Aziz in June.

In 2004, 91 people were killed and 393 injured in seven incidents. The death doll in 2005 was 86 people killed and 219 injured in four strikes, while 161 people were killed and 352 injured in seven attacks in 2006.

The following year saw an unprecedented rise in suicide attacks, in the wake of the army's gory Operation Silence against fanatical Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) clerics and their followers in the heart of Islamabad. A record number of 766 people were killed and 1,677 injured in 56 attacks in 2007.

The perilous trend of suicide strikes targeting the Pakistani security forces touched alarming heights that year, averaging more than one hit a week as the military establishment lost control of extremist jihadi networks and the leaders it had nurtured to advance its agenda in Afghanistan and India.
. . .
The number of suicide bombings multiplied further next year - in 2008 - killing 895 people and injuring 1873 in 60 such incidents. There were 78 suicide attacks in 2009, killing 951 people and wounding 2,361. The ugly phenomenon peaked in 2010, when 1,172 people were killed and 2,204 injured in 51 such incidents.

It seems to be on the decline, with 601 people killed and 842 others injured in 36 incidents this year to the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, compared to the lives of 857 Pakistanis lost in who had lost their lives in 41 incidents between January 1, 2010 and September 11, 2010.

In a grim monthly break-down of the suicide bomb statistics for 2011, 45 people were killed in four incidents, 39 people were killed in three suicide attacks in February, 127 more lost their lives in six suicide attacks in March; another 65 were killed in April, 154 people lost their lives at the hands of human bombs in five such incidents in May, 66 more Pakistanis perished in four attacks in June, 11 people were killed in three attacks in July, and 71 Pakistanis lost their lives in four suicide bombings in August. This month 24 people have killed so far in one suicide attack in Quetta on September 7.
. . .

TTP [Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan] is believed to have at least 2,000 trained suicide bombers across the country. "Our ulemas [Muslim legal scholars] have termed suicide attacks as an elite form of jihad," says TTP spokesperson Azam Tariq. "Fidayeen is a sophisticated weapon of the mujahideen; our enemies have no idea how to counter these lethal bombers. Suicide attacks have made the mujahideen invincible".

September 2011

Nineteen thousand Pakistani civilians have been killed in terrorist attacks since 2003.

October 2011

The ANP leader Senator Haji Muhammad Adeel Saturday said that education system has been destroyed by non other than our own Muslim brothers in Pakistan as militants destroyed over 5000 schools in five years period.

December 2011

An estimate of terrorist incidents in Pakistan this year [2011], four thousand nearly killed. Three thousand less than last year. However, in the year two thousand eleven less than last year’s terrorist incidents, according to analysts.

January 2012

Bombings blamed on Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked networks have killed more than 4,900 people since 2007.

April 2012

At least 3,898 people, including 1,705 civilians, 485 security forces personnel and 1,708 terrorists, have lost their lives in terrorist violence in the country during the first seven months of the year. The months of June and July proved to be the most fatal for civilians and January for the security forces personnel.

According to the data available with this scribe on fatalities in terrorist violence in the country during the first seven months of year 2012, June and July recorded the highest fatalities with 367 and 363 killings respectively of civilians and security forces personnel. 496 terrorists were also killed in the two months. At least 117 security forces personnel were killed in the month of January alone.

In the year 2011, a total of 6,303 persons were killed in similar incidents. At least 4,009 persons were killed in the first seven months of 2011 as compared to 3,898 killings in 2012, registering a slight decline in the trend. According to the data, at least 42,824 persons, including the terrorists, have lost their lives in terrorism-related incidents in the country since 2003.

In the ongoing war against terrorism, the armed forces have so far lost the equivalent of two full brigades. Among those killed were one three-star and a couple of two-star generals. At least 3,097 personnel had been killed and 721 others permanently disabled. Pakistan has suffered the colossal financial losses of more than $68 billion (Rs 5036.8 billion) in the so-called war on terror since 2001. The cost of the war was estimated at $2.669 billion in fiscal year 2001-02. The cost jumped to $3.98 billion (Rs 238.6 billion) by year 2005-6. The financial cost then surged to $13.56 billion (Rs 1136.4 billion) by fiscal year 2009-10. The amount has been continuously rising and has gone up to $17.83 billion (Rs 1528 billion) in the running year.

August 2012

Pakistan witnesses a suicide bombing attack on every 6th day on average.

August 2012

Contrary to claims often made by apologists, a study found areas hardest hit by Islamic terrorism get less coverage in the media.

The areas hard-hit by terrorism in Pakistan receive the lowest coverage by electronic media, concluded a study conducted by a media development organization, InterMedia, listing Fata, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan as the worst affected but out of TV screens.

In contrast, target killing in Karachi gets the maximum coverage meaning thereby the electronic media is urban-centric and politicised.

According to the study based on monitoring from January to March this year, the print media has relatively covered the conflict far better than the electronic media. However, both have done only event reporting and in-depth coverage of the conflicts is a rare phenomenon.

The study has found that 60% of terrorism-related stories have been reported from Fata and KP alone. Among them, 32% of terrorism related news was related to Fata. The KP follows with 28%, Balochistan 24%, Punjab 8%, Islamabad 6%, Gilgit-Baltistan 2% and Kashmir 1%.

Going by the print media coverage, Fata appeared in terrorism-related stories as many as 161 times during three-month period under examination whereas TV channels flashed only 17 stories from the tribal region.

From KP, print media reported as many as 143 terrorism incidents whereas electronic media gave space to 51 occurrences only. Most of the reported acts of terrorism comprised of bombing incidents carried out by militants.

The print media reported as many as 123 such incidents from Balochistan from January to March this year but on TV, the number of related news items was only 15. Most of the terrorism reported from Balochistan mentioned target killing, armed fighting and skirmishes.

August 2012

Since mid-1980s, more than 20,000 Shia Muslims, thousands of Sunni Sufi (Barelvi) Muslims, hundreds of Ahmadis, Christians and Hindus have been killed in Pakistan by Takfiri Deobandi terrorists sponsored by Jihadist-minded generals of Pakistan Army.

According to an estimate, at least 30 per cent of the 20,000 Shias killed are children or minors (age 18 or below). This makes their number at least 6,000.

November 2012

Suspected Taliban militants bombed four boys’ schools in Pakistan’s northwestern tribal belt on Thursday, officials said, in the latest attack by militants on government educational institutions.

No one was injured in the pre-dawn blasts in Mohmand tribal district, where officials said Taliban attacks have now destroyed more than 100 schools.
. . .
“All the four schools were completely destroyed, the number of schools destroyed in Mohmand is now more than 100,” Ali said.

Extremist militants opposed to co-education have destroyed hundreds of schools, mostly for girls, in northwest Pakistan in recent years.

February 2013

Philippines

Since 9/11 [2001], ASG (Abu Sayyaf Group) has been involved in hundreds of kidnappings, largely victimizing the local populations of the southern Philippines.

November 2004

The rebels have waged a bloody insurgency for self-rule in the southern Mindanao region, the homeland of minority Muslims in the predominantly Roman Catholic Philippines. The conflict has killed more than 120,000 people in nearly four decades.

October 2011

Russia

The pan-Islamic terrorists in Chechnya and the innumerable organised Chechen crime mafia groups operating in Chechnya and outside have never been short of funds. It is believed that their main sources of funding are:
. . .
4. Hostage-taking for ransom: In 1997-1998, more than 60 Chechen groupings kidnapped a total of 1,094 people for ransom, and in 1999, 270. The number of hostages kidnapped for ransom still remaining in captivity is estimated to be more than 1,500. No estimate of the total ransom payments received is available.

December 2002

Saudi Arabia

Almost half of all Saudis said in a poll conducted last year that they have a favorable view of Osama bin Laden's sermons and rhetoric
. . .

The poll involved interviews with more than 15,000 Saudis and was overseen by Nawaf Obaid, a Saudi national security consultant.
. . .
He noted that less than a third of Saudis polled had a positive opinion of militant clerics, although government-appointed religious figures did better.
. . .

The margin of error was plus or minus three percentage points.

November 2003

Somalia

A United Nations report published on Wednesday said that Somali pirates received about 170 million dollars in ransoms in 2011, up from 110 million the previous year, with some of the money channeled into the world’s legal financial system.

The average ransom demanded to free a ship and crew stood at five million dollars and 10 million dollars for a tanker, the UN Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) told the UN Security Council during a debate on piracy off the coast of Somalia.
. . .

UNODC, which works with countries fighting piracy, said there are currently 1,116 young Somali men being prosecuted for piracy by courts in 20 countries around the world. He said another 688 pirates are being prosecuted in African countries like Kenya, Somalia, Seychelles, Tanzania and Mauritius.

February 2012

Al-Shabaab pays for weapons and fighters with the £800,000 a month it earns from charcoal sales and exports, now banned under a British-sponsored UN Security Council resolution adopted at the London Conference on Somalia in February.

The business has become the group’s “most lucrative source of income”, according to the UN Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea.

But the UN has since April been buying 52 tonnes of charcoal a week for the kitchens of peacekeeping forces in Mogadishu, and one Somalia expert said it was “highly unlikely” that the deal was “not at least indirectly benefiting” the terrorists.

September 2012

Sudan

The Southern rebellion against the Northern domination lasted half a century -- from 1955 until 2005, with only an eleven year break between 1972 and 1983. In the brutal campaign to Arabize and Islamize the African Christian/traditionalist South, the leaders of the Arab Muslim North killed almost 3 million and ethnically cleansed 4 million more (nearly 80% of the population.)

July 2011

Syria

The Christian community in Syria has been hit by a series of kidnappings and brutal murders; 100 Christians have now been killed since the anti-government unrest ["Arab Spring"] began.

January 2012

Thailand

Five years of the renewed insurgency in four southern border provinces has seen thousands of children orphaned, a senior social development and human security official said on Thursday.

Suparerk Hongpakdi, director of the Office of Women and Family Affairs, said since the violence flared anew in January 2004 Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala and then parts of Songkhla a total of 2,897 children have been orphaned.

The number of orphans had increased sharply from 1,425 in January 2007 to 2,897 at the end of June, showing that the violence had intensified in the last 30 months, he said.

Mr Suparerk said southern unrest has left 542 women widows in Pattani, 502 in Yala, 439 in Narathiwat and 69 in Songkhla.

February 2009

Muslim insurgency that has killed at least 4,500 people since 2004 in Thailand's three southernmost provinces, a region of dense jungles and rubber plantations just a few hours' drive from world-class beach resorts. Contained within a far-flung fringe of Thailand, the conflict gets scant attention from international media. And yet the death toll it has brought over just seven years exceeds the casualties in Northern Ireland's three decades of troubles.

June 2011

Amnesty International called on Muslim guerrillas in Thailand’s southernmost provinces to stop targeting civilians, saying Tuesday that noncombatants accounted for two-thirds of the nearly 5,000 deaths reported in the conflict since insurgents took up arms in 2004.
. . .

At least 4,766 people have died and 7,808 have been injured since attacks began nearly eight years ago, Amnesty said. While some civilians have been inadvertently killed by Thai security forces, the rights group blamed insurgents for most of the attacks, saying they had been carried out to spread terror through both Buddhist and Muslim communities.
. . .

Amnesty’s report on the conflict, released Tuesday, surveyed the cases of 66 people killed in insurgent attacks and found that 59 percent of the victims were Muslims.

September 2011

Eight years ago yesterday, Islamic insurgents launched a surprise raid on an armoury in Narathiwat and stole 413 firearms, most of them M16 assault rifles. That daring raid on Jan 4, 2004 marked the start of a renewed insurgency by a new breed of hardcore militants which, sadly, has dragged on till today with no sign of abating, whether in terms of intensity or ruthlessness.

Latest statistics complied by the Isra news agency show that the war has so far claimed a total of 5,243 lives and injured 8,941 people. The death toll includes 4,215 ordinary citizens, 351 soldiers, 280 policemen, 148 teachers and educational personnel, seven Buddhist monks and 242 suspected insurgents. The violent conflict has also produced 2,295 widows and 4,455 orphans.

Financially, the government has spent more than 161 billion baht in the restive deep South for military operations and on development projects over the past eight years. Of this staggering expenditure, about 70% was spent on military operations to tame the insurgency.

Other interesting facts gleaned from the statistics are as follows: There were more than 12,000 violent incidents during the past eight years, averaging 2.7 incidents on any single day. Of that total, 2,265 incidents were bombings. Of the more than 1,600 weapons seized by the insurgents, only 500 have been recovered.

The military earlier claimed that the situation in the deep South had improved somewhat, with fewer violent incidents. But the latest statistics tell a different story. Last year alone, a total of 535 people were killed and 1,049 injured from 671 violent incidents, compared with 521 killed and 941 injured in 652 incidents in 2010.

January 2012

Thailand is fighting against more than 3,000 Muslim militants waging a shadowy insurgency in the deep south that has claimed thousands of lives, army chief General Prayut Chan-O-Cha said
. . .
"There are about 300 of leader rank, 3,000 operators and about 10,000 supporters," the general said, adding that their numbers had fallen due to arrests.

April 2012

United Arab Emirates

Here are a few key findings on the UAE from a 2004 poll conducted by Zogby International:

-- 73% of UAE citizens had a negative view of the United States; only 14% had a favorable view.

-- Only 5% of UAE citizens felt that "democracy" was an "extremely important" reason for the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction was cited by 16%. "Oil" and "domination of the Muslim world" were the main reasons offered by UAE citizens for our invasion of Iraq.

-- 81% of UAE citizens felt Iraq was worse off after the war. Only 4% said it was better off without Saddam.

-- Asked to identify their "most admired" world leaders, 18% of UAE citizens chose Osama bin Laden. "No one" finished first with 22%.

-- When asked how they viewed themselves, only 19% said they identified first and foremost as citizens of the United Arab Emirates, while 66% said they saw themselves as "Muslims" first.

February 2006

United Kingdom

ONE in eight British Muslims back al-Qaeda-style terror strikes on the United States and almost half said they might consider becoming a suicide bomber if they lived as a Palestinian, according to a new poll.

An overwhelming 80 per cent said Britain and the US should not have launched the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

Attacks on the US by al-Qaeda or other groups were viewed as justified by 13 per cent of the 500 British Muslims questioned. Another 15 per cent said they did not know whether such attacks were wrong or right.
. . .
One of Britain’s most radical Muslim leaders said he believed the majority of Muslims in the UK supported al-Qaeda-style terror attacks on the US.

Sheikh Omar Bakri Muhammad, who heads the London-based group Al-Muhajiroun, said British Muslims were afraid to voice their real feelings about the coalition war in Iraq.

"Since the introduction of the new anti-terrorism laws, Muslims are terrified to speak their minds," he said.

March 2004

13% of British Muslims think that the four men who carried out the London Tube and bus bombings of July 7, 2005, should be regarded as “martyrs”

7% agree that suicide attacks on civilians in the UK can be justified in some circumstances, rising to 16 per cent for a military target

16% of British Muslims say that while the attacks may have been wrong, the cause was right

2% would be proud if a family member decided to join al-Qaeda. Sixteen per cent would be “indifferent”

56% of British Muslims believe that the Government is not doing enough to fight extremism, more than the 49 per cent of the whole population who agree

50% think the intelligence services have the right to infiltrate Muslim organisations to gather information about their activities and the way they obtain funding

65% of British Muslims say that their community needs to do more to integrate properly with British society

35% say that they would feel proud if a close family member joined the police

July 2006

[From NOP Research, broadcast by Channel 4-TV] Forty-five percent say 9/11 was a conspiracy by the American and Israeli governments. This figure is more than twice as high as those who say it was not a conspiracy. Tragically, almost one in four British Muslims believe that last year's 7/7 attacks on London were justified because of British support for the U.S.-led war on terror.

When asked, "Is Britain my country or their country?" only one in four say it is. Thirty percent of British Muslims would prefer to live under Sharia (Islamic religious) law than under British law. According to the report, "Half of those who express a preference for living under Sharia law say that, given the choice, they would move to a country governed by those laws."

Twenty-eight percent hope for the U.K. one day to become a fundamentalist Islamic state. This comports with last year's Daily Telegraph newspaper survey that found one-third of British Muslims believe that Western society is decadent and immoral and that Muslims should seek to end it.

August 2006

The fact that, as the BBC News 24 is reporting, all 21 of those arrested this morning in connection with the airline terror plot were British-born is going to produce yet more soul-searching about the state of integration in Britain.

Forty-five percent are convinced that 9/11 was an American/Israeli conspiracy—and that number rises to 51 percent among Muslims aged 18-24. Thirty percent would rather live under sharia rather than British law and 28 percent would like Britain to become an Islamic state. Eleven percent have firmly decided that British foreign policy justified the July 7th bombings, and 31 percent of young Muslims agree with this idea. Sadly, this is no rogue poll. Other surveys have come up with very similar results.

These numbers demonstrate how imbecilic it is to argue that if only Tony Blair hadn’t allied himself with George W. Bush in the war on terror there would be no problem. So, if changing British foreign policy—or to be more frank, appeasement—won’t work, then what will? This is where pretty much everyone in Britain is stumped. A good place to start might be ceasing to tolerate people wandering around London boasting “We’re all Hezbollah now.

August 2006

Muslim population: 1.6 million (2.8%)

December 2005

However, 11 percent said they believed further attacks against the U.S. by al-Qaida or similar groups would be justified, and 8 percent said such attacks would be justified against Britain.

As reported by the Associated Press, the survey asked: "President Bush and Tony Blair say that the war against terrorism is not a war against Islam. Do you agree or disagree?"

Seventy percent said they disagreed, 20 percent said they agreed and 10 percent said they didn't know.

Asked whether they believed the U.S. and its allies were justified in blaming the Sept. 11 attacks on al-Qaida, 17 percent answered 'yes' while 56 percent replied 'no.'

Also, 64 percent said al-Qaida should not have been blamed for the October bombings on Bali that killed 192 people and similar terrorist attacks.

Yet 44 percent said attacks by al-Qaida or similar groups are justified because Muslims are being killed by the U.S. or allies using American-made weapons. Forty-six percent said such attacks were not justified. The survey question did not say where Muslims were being killed.

December 2002

According to a new poll of British Muslims, 37% of the 500 adults surveyed viewed Anglo-Jewry as "a legitimate target as part of the struggle for justice in the Middle East."

More than half believed British Jews exerted too much influence over foreign policy.

46% believe "the Jewish community in Britain is in league with the Freemasons to control the media and politics," a conspiracy theory Board of Deputies director-general Jon Benjamin found "completely bizarre."

More than a quarter of 18- to 24-year-olds said they agreed with the views of jailed hate preacher Abu Hamza.

February 2006

Almost a quarter of British Muslims say the 7/7 bombings can be justified because of the Government's support for the war on terror, according to an opinion poll.

And nearly half of those polled, or 45 per cent, believe the 9/11 attacks on New York were a conspiracy between the United States and Israel. The survey, for a Channel 4 Dispatches documentary to be screened tonight, found Muslims under 24 were twice as likely to justify the 7/7 attacks as those aged over 45. It found 24 per cent either agreed or tended to agree that the 7/7 bombings were justified, although 48 per cent said they "strongly disagreed".

A third of those questioned said they would rather live under Sharia law in the UK than British law.

The survey also reveals concerns among Muslims about Britain's moral standards, with 40 per cent saying it is a country of bad moral behaviour.

August 2006

Muslims who see the 7/7 bombing attacks in London as justified on balance: 6 percent.

· Who feel sympathy for the “feelings and motives” of those who carried out the 7/7 attacks: 24 percent.

· Understand “why some people behave in that way”: 56 percent.

· Disagree with Tony Blair’s description of the ideology of the London bombers as “perverted and poisonous”: 26 percent.

· Feel not loyal towards Britain: 16 percent.

· Agree that “Western society is decadent and immoral and that Muslims should seek to bring it to an end”: 32 percent willing to use non-violent means and (as noted above) 1 percent willing to use violence “if necessary.” Just 56 percent of Muslims agree with the statement that “Western society may not be perfect but Muslims should live with it and not seek to bring it to an end.”

· Agree that “British political leaders don’t mean it when they talk about equality. They regard the lives of white British people as more valuable than the lives of British Muslims”: 52 percent.

· Dismiss political party leaders as insincere when saying “they respect Islam and want to co-operate with Britain’s Muslim communities”: 50 percent.

· Doubt that anyone charged with and tried for the 7/7 attacks would receive a fair trial: 44 percent.

· Would not inform about a Muslim religious leader “trying to ‘radicalise’ young Muslims by preaching hatred against the West”: 10 percent.

· Do not think people have a duty to go to the police if they “see something in the community that makes them feel suspicious”: 14 percent.

· Believe other Muslims would be reluctant to go to the police “about anything they see that makes them suspicious”: 41 percent.

· Would inform the police if they believed that knew about the possible planning of a terrorist attack: 73 percent. (In this case, the Daily Telegraph did not make available the negative percentage.)

Another opinion poll, this one commissioned by Sky News and carried out by Communicate Research (which interviewed 462 UK-based Muslims by telephone) found similar results:

· Muslims who agree with what the London suicide bombers did: 2 percent.

· Who believe there is a Koranic justification for the bombings: 5 percent.

· Disagree with the statement that “Muslim clerics who preach violence against the West are out of touch with mainstream Muslim opinion”: 46 percent.

· Think of themselves as Muslim first and British second: 46 percent. Another 42 percent do not differentiate between the identities. A mere 12 percent see themselves as British first and Muslim second.

July 2005

The special poll based on a survey of 500 British Muslims found that a clear majority want Islamic law introduced into this country in civil cases relating to their own community. Some 61 per cent wanted Islamic courts - operating on sharia principles – "so long as the penalties did not contravene British law". A major part of civil cases in this country deal with family disputes such as divorce, custody and inheritance. The poll also found a high level of religious observance with just over half saying they pray five times a day, every day - although women are shown to be more devout than men. The poll reveals that 88 per cent want to see schools and workplaces in Britain accommodating Muslim prayer times as part of their normal working day.

September 2005

A new poll says about a quarter of British Muslims sympathise with the motives of the London bombers, if not their methods.

And the survey in London's Daily Telegraph shows one-third of British Muslims believe Western society is immoral. The poll asked Muslims if they felt the July the 7th suicide attacks in which 56 peopled died were justified, and six per cent said they were.

71 per cent said they weren't justified at all, and 11 per cent said they weren't justified on balance.

But asked whether they had sympathy with the feelings and motives of the four British Muslim bombers, 13 per cent said they had a lot of sympathy and another 11 per cent had a little.

July 2005

In the poll, carried out two weeks after the raid, Muslims were also asked: "Do you think it is right or wrong for the police to act to pre-empt potential terrorist attacks, even if the intelligence, information and warnings may turn out to be wrong?" Thirty-one per cent said it was right and 57% said it was wrong. This view contrasts sharply with that held by the general public. When the same question was asked of a representative sample of all adults, 74% said the police were right to act and 17% said they were wrong.

October 2006

Abu Hamza is a British Muslim Cleric now serving a 7 year sentence for incitement to hatred

Muslims in Britain oppose Shiekh Abu Hamza's views by a factor of two-to-one; however, among the age group 18-24, the figures are reversed, and two out of three who expressed an opinion agree with his views (27% supporting his views, 14% disagreeing with them).

December 2005

The poll found that 63% of all Britons had a favourable opinion of Muslims, down slightly from 67% in 2004, suggesting last year's London bombings did not trigger a significant rise in prejudice. Attitudes in Britain were more positive than in the US, Germany and Spain (where the popularity of Muslims has plummeted to 29%), and about the same as in France.

Less than a third of British non-Muslims said they viewed Muslims as violent, significantly fewer than non-Muslims in Spain (60%), Germany (52%), the US (45%) and France (41%).

By contrast, the poll found that British Muslims represented a "notable exception" in Europe, with far more negative views of westerners than Islamic minorities elsewhere on the continent. A significant majority viewed western populations as selfish, arrogant, greedy and immoral. Just over half said westerners were violent. While the overwhelming majority of European Muslims said westerners were respectful of women, fewer than half British Muslims agreed. Another startling result found that only 32% of Muslims in Britain had a favourable opinion of Jews, compared with 71% of French Muslims.

June 2006

Extremist literature being sold in 25% of UK mosques

Books calling for the beheading of lapsed Muslims, ordering women to remain indoors and forbidding interfaith marriage are being sold inside some of Britain's leading mosques, according to research seen by The Times....

Extremist literature, including passages supporting the stoning of adulterers and waging violent jihad, was also found on sale at many other mosques regarded as mainstream institutions.

The researchers found hardline material at a quarter of the 100 mosques visited during the project.

The report said: "On the one hand, the results were reassuring: in only a minority of institutions – approximately 25 per cent – was radical material found.

"What is more worrying is that these are among the best-funded and most dynamic institutions in Muslim Britain – some of which are held up as mainstream bodies. Many of the institutions featured here have been endowed with official recognition."

October 2007

A third of Muslim university students believe killing in the name of religion can be justified, a survey has revealed. A study on the attitudes of students has found that 28 per cent said killing could be justified if the religion was under attack and another four per cent supported killing in order to "promote and preserve" the religion.

July 2008

More than two-thirds of Islamic terrorism offences or suicide attacks in the UK, commited by British Muslims of foreign extraction.

More than two-thirds of Islamism-related terrorism offences or suicide attacks in the UK over the last 10 years were perpetrated by British citizens, according to a report published.

Some 69% of such incidents from 1999 to 2009 were carried out by Britons, the study by think-tank The Centre for Social Cohesion found.

Almost half (46%) were committed by individuals of a south central Asian ancestry, while the second and third most frequent regions of origin were eastern Africa (16%) and northern Africa (13%).

Some 48% of the 127 Islamism-related terrorism offences or suicide attacks, collectively referred to as Islamism related offences (IROs), were committed by individuals living in London, the report found.

The next two most common regions were the West Midlands (13%) and Yorkshire and the Humber (9%).

Nearly a third of individuals who committed IROs (32%) had a direct link to one or more proscribed organisations, the two most prevalent being al-Muhajiroun (15%) and al Qaida (14.5%), the report found.

Seven of the UK’s eight major bomb plot cells contained individual members with direct links to al Qaida - only the failed London bombers of July 21 2005 lacked undisputed evidence of direct contact with any proscribed organisation.

Just under a third (31%) of all individuals who committed IROs attended one or more terrorist training camps, the most common location being Pakistan. Seven of the eight major bomb plot cells contained members who attended terrorist training camps.

More than two-thirds (68%) of IROs were committed by those aged below 30.

The most common status was unemployed (35%) - but 42% were perpetrated by individuals either in employment (32%) or full-time education (10%).

The report concludes: “Al Qaida and al Qaida-inspired terrorism remains the biggest threat to the UK’s national security.

”The Security Service estimates that over 2,000 people in the UK pose a terrorist threat and in March 2005 it was estimated that there were up to 200 al Qaida-trained operatives in the UK.

”The British-based threat does not only affect the UK: a number of British Muslims have been convicted in foreign courts or have fought for (or trained with) terrorist or extremist Islamist groups abroad.”

July 2010

[According to the “Statistics on Terrorism Arrests and Outcomes Great Britain”, Home Office, 26 November 2009] In total there have been 1,661 arrests since the 9/11 attacks. Yesterday’s figures show there are 143 terrorist prisoners held in jails in Britain, including 139 in England and Wales. More than three quarters are British, 13 per cent African, 4 per cent of Middle East nationality and 3 per cent of Asian nationality. Almost 92 per cent of terrorist-related prisoners describe themselves as Muslim, five are Buddhist and one a Pagan.

November 2009

MOST Islamic terrorists convicted in Britain spend less than three and a half years in prison, a shock report has revealed.

A third go free after no more than 16 months. And Britain is now a “hub for the development of terrorists”, the survey found.

Seven out of 10 Islamic fanatics are “home-grown” British nationals, according to the Henry Jackson Society.

The think-tank analysed 138 Islamic terror convictions from 1999 to 2010.

It found 54 per cent of the terrorists were given sentences of between one and nine years – and that those defendants spent a maximum of three and a half years in jail.

Incredibly, eight of them avoided prison altogether. The report gave examples of soft justice including the case of Mohammed Kabashi who was sentenced to nine years for helping the failed 21/7 London bombers but walked out of jail after just two years and three months.

Hook-handed preacher Abu Hamza was jailed seven years for soliciting murder.

He would have been freed after two years and two months but remains in custody because he is facing other charges in the US.

In a forward to the report Lord Carlile, the Government’s former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, said: “The evidence reveals the UK to be something of a hub for the development of terrorists who export their activities to other countries.”

July 2011

At least 200 potential terrorists are actively planning suicide attacks while living freely in Britain, intelligence chiefs have warned ministers.

A senior intelligence source has revealed that the figure is a "conservative" estimate of the threat facing the country from UK-based Islamist suicide bombers.

The would-be killers are among 2,000 extremists who the security services have said are based in Britain and actively planning terrorist activity of some kind.

October 2011

Up to 50 British “volunteers”, including white Christian converts and British-Somali men, have been recruited to fight for Al Shabaab, the al-Qaeda inspired Somali terrorist group.
. . .
Al-Shabaab has managed to generate tens of thousands of pounds in funding through the UK-based Somali population which is estimated at 250,000.

February 2012

Data released by UK Home Office on Thursday revealed that as many as 2,419 people have been arrested for terrorism-related offences since September 11, 2001. A break up revealed that as many as 56 of them were Indians. Of the remaining persons arrested for terrorism related offences, the frequent self-declared nationalities were Algeria (152), Pakistan (125), Iraq (115), Afghanistan (74), Iran (63), Turkey (45) and Somalia (44). There were 249 persons arrested for terrorism-related offences in 2012/13, up from 206 in 2011/12. Forty-two per cent of terrorism arrests in 2012/13 resulted in a charge.

In 2012-13, 105 people arrested for terrorism offences were charged, though only 37 of those charges were for terror-related offences.

The other 68 were charged under other legislation, Home Office figures show.

In all, 249 arrests were made - up 21% on the previous year and the most since 2005-06, when there were 284.

As at 31 March 2013, there were 121 terrorist/extremist prisoners in Great Britain, either on remand or following conviction.

In total 102 prisoners were terrorism-related, of whom 64 were in custody for offences under terrorism legislation, 33 for terrorism-related offences not under terrorism legislation and a further 5 were held in relation to deportations and extraditions.

Eighteen prisoners were classified as domestic extremists/separatists, 13 of whom were in custody following conviction.
. . .
The nationalities of the 121 terrorist/extremist prisoners in Great Britain were spread over 15 countries.

Ninety were recorded as being UK nationals, 11 were from the African continent (including 4 from Somalia and 2 from each of Algeria and Morocco), 5 were from non-UK European countries, 11 were from Asian countries (including 6 from Bangladesh) and 2 were from the Middle East (1 from Jordan and 1 from Kuwait).

In terms of the self-declared religions of the 103 terrorism-related and historic prisoners, 100 defined themselves as Muslim.

The most frequent principal charges for persons convicted since 11 September 2001 under terrorism legislation were preparation for terrorist acts (26% of persons convicted), collection of information useful for a terrorism act (16%), failing to comply with an examination at a port or border controls (10%), possession of an article for terrorist purposes (9%).

September 2013

United States

At least thirty [domestic Muslim terrorist attacks] thwarted nationwide since 9/11

May 2010

42 failed terrorist attacks since 9/11

A review of 42 attempted and thwarted terror plots since 9/11 found 16, or 38 percent, included at least talk of attacking Jewish targets. Of the 16, at least seven cases included charges relating to attacks on Jewish targets.

March 2012

Muslims represent about 1% of the American population, yet constitute more than 80% of terror convictions.

More than 80 percent of all convictions tied to international terrorist groups and homegrown terrorism since 9/11 involve defendants driven by a radical Islamist agenda, a review of Department of Justice statistics shows.

Though Muslims represent about 1 percent of the American population, they constitute defendants in 186 of the 228 cases DOJ lists.

On Thursday, the House Homeland Security Committee holds its first hearing into radicalization among Muslim Americans. Critics have taken issue with the focus on one religious minority, but the DOJ list shows that radical Islamists are disproportionately involved in terror-related crimes.

Al-Qaida is involved in the largest number of prosecutions, representing 30 percent of the 228 terror cases involving an identified group. Hizballah-affiliated defendants are involved in 10.5 percent of the cases and Hamas is part of 9 percent. Pakistani-based Lashkar-e-Tayyiba was involved in 6.5 percent of the cases.

The Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka and the Colombian FARC lead the non-Islamist terrorist groups, combining for 14 percent of the total.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism analysis involved reviewing the Justice Department's list of more than 400 successful terrorism-related prosecutions from Sept. 11, 2001, through March 18, 2010. Those cases that demonstrated defendants with a clear Islamist agenda were placed in that category, while those without a clear tie to radical Islam were excluded. In some cases, defendants with Arabic-sounding names were excluded from the Islamist category, because no definitive tie could be made.

To see the individual case listings, and those which were considered Islamist in nature, click here. To see a separate rundown of more than 30 terror-related prosecution activity in 2010 alone, click here.

March 2011

One in four younger U.S. Muslims said in a poll that suicide bombings to defend their religion are acceptable at least in some circumstances, though most Muslim Americans overwhelmingly reject the tactic and are critical of Islamic extremism and al-Qaida.

The survey by the Pew Research Center, one of the most exhaustive ever of the country's Muslims, revealed a community that in many ways blends comfortably into society. Its largely mainstream members express nearly as much happiness with their lives and communities as the general public does, show a broad willingness to adopt American customs, and have income and education levels similar to others in the U.S.

Even so, the survey revealed noteworthy pockets of discontent.

While nearly 80 percent of U.S. Muslims say suicide bombings of civilians to defend Islam can not be justified, 13 percent say they can be, at least rarely.

That sentiment is strongest among those younger than 30. Two percent of them say it can often be justified, 13 percent say sometimes and 11 percent say rarely.

May 2007

In a survey of newly naturalized citizens, 90 percent of Muslim immigrants said that if there were a conflict between the United States and their country of origin, they would be inclined to support their country of origin, said John Fonte of the Hudson Institute.

September 2004

More than one-third of American Muslims believe that the U.S. war on terrorism is really a war on Islam, according to survey information released yesterday by researchers at Georgetown University.

Thirty-eight percent of American Muslims polled said they believe the U.S.-led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and the tensions with Iran and Syria, reflect a foreign policy that is targeting Islamic countries and Muslims themselves.

An additional 33 percent of Muslims interviewed said they believe the United States is fighting a war on terrorism, and 29 percent said they were not sure.

October 2004

Poll of attendees of a convention of the Islamic Society of North America:

1. Are you a U.S. Citizen? (If no, then don’t fill out survey.)

Yes: 307
No: 0

2. Do you consider yourself to be a Muslim first, an American first, or both equally?

Muslim first: 214
American first: 4
Both equally: 86
Undecided: 3

3. Is the American government at war with the religion of Islam?

Yes: 208
No: 79
Undecided: 20

4. Can a good Muslim be a good American?

Yes: 292
No: 11
Undecided: 4

5. Did Muslims hijack planes and fly them into buildings on 9/11?

Yes: 117
No: 139
Undecided: 51

6. Did the U.S. government have advance knowledge of the 9/11 attacks, and allow the attacks to occur?

Yes: 200
No: 70
Undecided: 37

7. Did the U.S. government organize the 9/11 attacks?

Yes: 106
No: 151
Undecided: 50

8. Are the tapes of Osama Bin Laden, claiming responsibility for the 9/11 attacks and threatening future attacks, real or fake?

Real: 126
Fake: 129
Undecided: 52

9. Did Muslims commit the July 2005 train and bus bombings in London?

Yes: 140
No: 104
Undecided: 63

10. The Canadian government says it stopped a plot by Canadian Muslims in June 2006 to attack targets in Canada. Do you believe there was a real plot by Muslims?

Yes: 61
No: 202
Undecided: 44

11. The British government says it stopped a plot by British Muslims in August 2006 to bomb planes flying to America. Do you believe there was a real plot by Muslims?

Yes: 66
No: 191
Undecided: 50

12. Is Al Qaeda a real organization, operated by Muslims who are trying to attack America?

Yes: 149
No: 109
Undecided: 49

13. Is Al Qaeda attacking America because Al Qaeda hates American freedoms?

Yes: 17
No: 269
Undecided: 21

14. Is Al Qaeda attacking America because Al Qaeda hates American involvement in the Muslim world?

Yes: 228
No: 54
Undecided: 25

15. Is it justifiable for the U.S. government to do any of the following in an attempt to prevent terrorist attacks in America:

a. taking religion and ethnicity into account as one factor when deciding whom to interview and search at airports?

Yes: 37
No: 258
Undecided: 12

b. monitoring activities at American mosques?

Yes: 43
No: 255
Undecided: 9

. . .

25. Was America justified in invading Afghanistan after 9/11?

Yes: 51
No: 248
Undecided: 8

26. Is violence by Muslims against American civilians acceptable, in retaliation for the American government’s actions in the Muslim world?

Yes: 23
No: 274
Undecided: 10

27. Is violence by Muslims against the American military overseas acceptable, in retaliation for the American government’s actions in the Muslim world?

Yes: 134
No: 154
Undecided: 19

28. Is violence by Muslims against the American military in the U.S. acceptable, in retaliation for the American government’s actions in the Muslim world?

Yes: 73
No: 211
Undecided: 23

29. Is violence by Muslims against American government officials acceptable, in retaliation for the American government’s actions in the Muslim world?

Yes: 51
No: 231
Undecided: 25

September 2006

Sixty percent of people arrested for Islamic terrorist activities between January 2009 and April 2011 were American citizens, according to a new report from Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. The study of 104 people who were arrested included U.S. and non-U.S. citizens living in America or abroad.

The report, "Analyzing the Islamic Extremist Phenomenon in the United States: A Study of Recent Activity," was authored by Joan Neuhaus Schaan, fellow in homeland security at the Baker Institute. Jessica Phillips, an intern with the Baker Institute's homeland security and terrorism program, provided research support for the study.

Using data from international and U.S. news reports, general Internet media, public records and official court documents, the researchers set out in November 2010 to analyze information on the status of Islamic extremism in the United States. They also looked at some of the unanswered questions raised by U.S. Rep. Peter King's Committee on Homeland Security hearing, "The Extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community and That Community's Response." King, R-N.Y., and chair of the committee, held the hearing March 10, 2011.

"Providing policymakers this data can allow for a factual discussion and diminish rhetoric," Neuhaus Schaan said. "Consequently, policy can be crafted to address current and future needs in the face of change and adaptation by those determined to bring harm to the United States."

Other key findings from the report include:

• Of the 104 people arrested for Islamic extremist activities between January 2009 and April 2011, half were born in the U.S., 22 percent were naturalized citizens and 7 percent were dual citizens.

• Of the 104, 5 percent entered the U.S. on a visa.

• Sixty-three percent of converts had a known prior criminal record.

• Of the 14 American converts with a prior criminal history, at least 55 percent had converted to Islam in prison.

• Ninety-two 92 percent were male.

• Sixty-four percent were 30 years old or younger.

• Sixty-six percent had traveled or were in the process of traveling to the Middle East, Somalia, South Asia or the Balkans.

• Of the 104, 70 percent had an association or were attempting an association with an internationally recognized terrorist organization; al-Qaida and its associated branches were cited most.

• Of the 29 persons with no known association to a group, 11 had been active on terrorist-related chat rooms and websites.

• Overall, 38 percent had been involved in this Internet activity.

• Only 10 of the 104 are what the authors would consider "lone wolves"; most in the cohort had ties to others in the group or to an organization.

Information on birthplaces and conversion to Islam was available for 77 of the 104 people arrested. The data revealed that 60 percent of the group was born outside the U.S. Of the 31 U.S.-born persons where religion of origin could be determined , 14 were born into Muslim families and 17 converted to Islam.

"The Internet and prison conversion are the two biggest new trends that policymakers need to look at more closely," Neuhaus Schaan said. "We've seen a major change in how people become associated with extremist groups in the past 20 years, and we need to adapt."

The report concludes that approximately two-thirds of those involved in extremist activity are men under the age of 34, and no single, all-encompassing profile can be made of the analysis group of 104. Neuhaus Schaan said that the Baker Institute will continue to compile data and issue an updated report annually.

November 2011

A new report by the office of director of national intelligence shows about 1-in-4 [Guantánamo Bay] detainees, transferred to other countries by the end of last year, are either confirmed or suspected of returning to the battlefield.

March 2012

National security officials on Monday reported that the number of “confirmed” cases in which former detainees previously held at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, engaged in terrorist or insurgent activity after their transfer had risen to 95 from 81 – out of the 599 prisoners released – from October 2010 to December 2011.
. . .
Of the 95 currently listed as “confirmed” as having engaged in terrorist activity after their transfer, 12 are dead and 28 are back in some country’s custody, while 55 are not in custody, the report said. Of the 72 “suspected” former detainees, 2 are dead, 26 are in custody, and 44 are not in custody.

March 2012

A recent report by the House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security states that there are hundreds, perhaps even thousands, people he described as "Iranian and Hezbollah terrorists" in the United States.
. . .

A law enforcement official said that the New York Police Department, whose monitoring of Muslim communities has prompted political controversy, believes that between 200 and 300 Hezbollah sympathizers live in New York City. Between 10 and 20 of those are relatives of Hezbollah leaders or fighters who were killed in action, said the official.
. . .

A preliminary Homeland Security report said that pinpointing the number of Hezbollah operatives inside the United States was difficult because of the group's operational security. The report nonetheless cited the estimates of "some officials" that the group "likely" has "several thousand sympathetic donors" in the United States as well as "hundreds" of operatives.

April 2012

With the bombing attempt by Adel Daoud, ‘’’at least 52 publicly known, Islamist-inspired terrorist plots have been thwarted since 9/11.’’’
. . .
With this most recent plot, ‘’’at least 43 of the 52 thwarted terrorist plots could be considered homegrown’’’—planned by American citizens, legal permanent residents, or visitors radicalized predominately in the U.S.

September 2012

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