Terrorism: after Singapore's First Victim.

Now,I'm sure all of you would have heard about Singaporeans' reactions to the Mumbai attacks, which claimed a Singaporean life. I'm not going to sing the usual rhetoric; and condemn terrorism because Islam is a religion of peace bla bla bla; after all Habib Hassan has already done that. Rather, why don't we take this discussion 1 step forward?

Condemning terrorism, as our scholars always do, perhaps have to do, will not solve anything. I'm not saying they shouldn't come up with statements condemning terrorism, no, what I'm saying is they shouldn't JUST come up with statements condemning terrorism. Like it or not, those statements will not reduce terrorism one bit.

Let's try to understand why these terrorists act as they do. WHAT? UNDERSTAND THE TERRORISTS? Well, we always hear people saying we should understand the homosexuals, not just condemn them, then we can get them back to the right path. So why do we take a different approach when it comes to terrorists?

Look here. Why do these terrorists do what they do? Before 1948 (Formation of Israel) there were no suicide bombings around the world. Now, a suicide bombing is as common as Robbie Keane missing a sitter in front of goal. Before US invaded Afghanistan, there were no suicide bombings in Pakistan. Now, there is one every week. Before the US invaded Iraw, there were no suicide bombings in Iraq, now on average, terrorism kills at least 1 person a day there. Don't all these mean something to the intelligent people?

These terrorists are just doing what they do, because they want to defend the Muslims who are being oppressed every single damn day; in Palestine, in Iraq, in Afghanistan and many other places. They just want to defend Islam.

I'm not for one moment suggesting that they are right: no, what they do is wrong. But we must understand that they THINK they are doing this in the name of ISlam, and their intentions are to defend Islam.

It's very sad when I hear Singapore ustads coming out and say these terrorists' motivations are all political. Definitely, there will be some whose motivations are political, but for the most part, they are motivated by religion; only that they channel their anger in the wrong way. What we need to do is understand this psychology, and try to divert their angst in a manner allowed in Islam. It is very very uninformed, and ignorant for people to just come out and say that all terrorists' motivations are political.

If we could solve Muslim oppression, we could get rid of terrorism, or at least reduce it drastically. For example, I'm absolutely convinced if we can solve the Israeli-Palestinian issue (not an easy task by any means), we can cut down terrorism by half.

Just one Singaporean died, and Singaporeans reacted angrily, and rightly so. For the past 50 years, Palestinians die every single damn day: imagine how Muslims around the world feel. Unfortunately, some of us express our anger in the wrong manner.

This entry is not to exonerate the terrorists, no. I just want to say that our approach in dealing with terrorism, isn't getting anywhere. Sure, you can invade Afgahnistan and kill terrorists, but you cannot kill terrorism that way. In fact, you'll just breed more terrorists. Condemning terrorism as an anti-Islamic act too will not bring us closer to solving his problem. It's high-time we take this campaign terrorism forward by nipping the issue in the bud.