Jihad at Ft. Hood

The massacre by a Muslim soldier of other soldiers at Ft. Hood, Texas was an Islamic militant attack in furtherance of Jihad (Islamic holy war). Although the killer may have been suffering from some mental problems, those who would dismiss this attack as merely the actions of a madman cannot deny the facts: the killer’s statements and writings indicate not only his opposition to the War on Terrorism as a “war against Islam,” but even his support for suicide attacks against the soldiers of non-Muslim states.

Because many jihadis are driven by despair, it would be wrong to focus overly on any despair the killer felt instead of on his ideological beliefs. Indeed, the Ft. Hood killer suggested that to conduct a suicidal attack would not be suicide, which is prohibited by Islam, if it were not motivated by “despair,” meaning that jihad could provide an excuse to commit suicide for one who already had feelings of despair. In short, it is the militant Islamic ideology of jihad that is the sine qua non for suicide attacks.

The Ft. Hood massacre, however, was not an act of terrorism because it was an attack primarily on the military, not innocent civilians, although there were civilians in the area of the attack (See my post, Follow-up on the Definition of Terrorism). That the Ft. Hood attack was not terrorism makes it no less representative of jihad, as it is part of a pattern with al-Qaeda and other terrorists of targeting U.S. military forces (e.g. the bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia in 1995, the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in 2000 and the attack of the Pentagon as part of the September 11, 2001 Attacks), regardless of whether the attack was intended to terrorize innocent civilians.

The Ft. Hood massacre is also part of a pattern of domestic attacks by Muslims, usually operating individually, within the United States. Regardless of whether these attacks are acts of terrorism, they clearly represent acts of Islamic militancy in furtherance of jihad. These attacks began before September 11, but have continued since. They are usually dismissed by the media and other commentators, many liberal politicians and some Islamic leaders as isolated events not related to “terrorism.”

The same tolerance of terrorist and other militant Muslim attacks against Americans abroad before September 11 is being practiced domestically, as each attack is seen in isolation and not as part of a pattern, and dismissed as the acts of those who are insane, instead of recognizing the ideology of militant jihad (See my post, An Attack on Americans Anywhere is an Attack on Us). We ignore these threats at our own peril. We must not make the same mistake here in the United States as we did abroad.