Articles

rss url="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/terrorism/rss" link="true" number="10" date="true" author="true" [] Al -Quaeda's Number 3 killed Dozens of reports from the CIA, ISI (the Pakistani CIA), the Afghan government, and the radical islamic interweb have confirmed that Mustafa abu al-Yazid, otherwiser known as Sheikh Saeed al-Masri, the head of the Afghan al-Quaeda organization was killed by a predator drone missle strike last month. Reports like this came in August 2008, that a predator drone killed Mustafa, but the cyber-chatter of radical jihadists seems to confirm that the man deemed "number 3" in the al-Quaeda organization, is in fact dead. This marks a change of power, from the old, expeirenced militants like Osama and Mustafa, to a new age of radical, naive extremists. Mustafa was in his 50's when al-Quaeda was founded, and become a great friend to the Afghani Taliban in the late 80s. When Osama bin Laden and his organization relocated to Taliban terrority, Mustafa was there to ease the tension, and supply economic and military support for the budding terrorist group. With this cornerstone of al-Quaeda gone, many say that the strength of the islamist movement has been weakened. On the contrary, Scheurer, a prominent critic of Americas foreign policy, thinks that the recent Israeli raid on the Gaza strip relief convoys will bolster al-Quaeda back to the same strenght it held with Mustafa. This time with a dangerous new generation oif militarists in his place [] What caused 9/11? Dozens of theories exist that try to explain the attack on the World Trade Centers. Some cite poverty, failed states, madrasas, Saudi Arabia, the clash of civilizations, and so on and so forth as the main causes. But there are several more plausibe theories. These include American foreign policy, relgious fervor, the mistakes of th CIA, and most importantly, a clash within Islam between the extremist minority, and the peaceful majority. The authour argues that a clash withi Islam an isolation of the extremists has le us to the attack on 9/11, while the other theories are mere details. The extremists view themselves as the "saviors" of Islam, it's protectors and holy warrior. They believe they alone know what is right, and that the 1.1 billion other Muslims have no idea what is going on in the world. The attacks of 9/11 were not a sign of a rise in terrorism, but a sign of weakness and decline. Only our disastorous expedtition into Iraq and Afghanistan has motivated the Muslim world against us. [] Article: Barack Obama Confronts 21st Century Nuclear Security Barack Obama recently has taken three steps towards securing nuclear safety and reducing nuclear terrorism one the U.S. and other countries. One of these steps was putting into action a plan to secure all lose and vulnerable nuclear weapons and material within the next 4 years. This would be a big step in reducing the threat of global nuclear terrorism. The Next step towards nuclear security was unveiled at the G-8 summit in Italy. President Obama Revealed his plan to hold a Nuclear Security Summit in 2010 to discuss with other top countries the means of obtaining and containing nuclear materials, preventing nuclear terrorism, and fight the smuggling of nuclear materials. This would better help the G-8 group to prepare and prevent nuclear terrorism in the future. The final step towards global nuclear safety was the institution of now called Resolution 1887, which is a call for separate states to support and uphold the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. This would gather up more support for nuclear safety, eventually ensuring nuclear global safety. [] The Roots of Terrorism Many have debated the roots of modern terrorism. I can’t blame them, it’s a popular topic. But speculations have come to the conclusion that the true roots of terrorism have almost very little to do with the western world. No, this sometimes considered radical stance states that the roots are internal, dealing with government and religion, rather than outside suppression. First of all, most countries that produce some of the largest number of terrorists have almost no rights of democracy in their lives. Not to mention that up to 60-70% of Muslims are illiterate, meaning that they cannot necessarily get the insight for proper evaluation. The other internal cause of terrorism is suppression of politics. Most of Pakistan, unlike India, has not been into industrialization, and still many farmers and peasants are practically owned by landlords, who use them pretty much for labor on the extremely cheap. Also, quite large portions of the Pakistanians are poor and rural, and the only thing in their way of advancement is the elite class and the privileged. This causes frustration, and this unfortunately sometimes leads to people leaning towards extremist ideals. Whether their parents or they went towards extremist ideals, it is a practice of hatred towards some and the glorification of others. Their anger fuels their rage, and sometimes tricks them into doing things that most likely they would never think of doing. As this article and my summary state, the roots of terrorism are internal, and we can only give them the tools to fix it. They still have to have the drive to do it themselves.