Why do European youth join Daesh? Loyalty motivators (7)

Dr Mahmud Abdullah

Several attempts are made to justify the presence of Europeans within the ranks of jihadist groups. Some people say by joining jihadist groups, the Europeans search for a form of modernity, but a conservative one. Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek goes for this justification. He says the type of modernity available in Europe does not allow those who join the jihadist groups to express their Islamic identity the way they like. If they do, he says, these Europeans are always subject to sarcasm, arrest and humiliation. The woman who wears the Islamic headgear (known in Arabic by the name hijab), he says, is always criticized by her peers who describe the hijab as a symbol of male oppression. Whether this is true or false, the expression of the Islamic identity can sometimes cause those who make this expression prone to death at the hands of racist groups. The 9/11 attacks turned Muslims into a bunch of suspects.

Some of those who join the jihadist groups do this because they want to escape the materialism and individualism that control everything in Europe to the spirituality of the Muslim nation. The “nation” as a term contains both meanings, namely the meaning of the nation as a group of people which, of course, contrasts individualism as a concept. The same term is more abstract than tangible, which means that it carries some spiritual connotations, at least for those Europeans who want to escape materialism in their life.

When it appeared for the first time in the first half of the 20th century, socialism promised to found a utopic society where there are none of the mistakes of capitalism. By joining jihadist groups, European Muslims are apparently searching for a similar utopia (37).

In joining jihadist groups, some Europeans also rebel against European demigods, such as nationalism, science and traditionalism, things that appeared with modernity. They revolt against the class struggle and all forms of Christian abidance. All these traditional means at one point cease to be able to give some Europeans the meanings they can find in the new religion.

Those who take to jihad describe the European society as one that fills them with worry. Every European works only to serve his or her self-interests. This is an existence where the other almost has no presence (38).

Europeans who turn to jihad view Christianity as a weak religion that asks its adherents to turn the other cheek to those who slap them on the right cheek. This does not make Christianity a religion they can boast of (39). This to a great extent goes hand in hand with Friedrich Nietzsche’s view of Christianity. This proves that Daesh and Nazism have similarities. Nietzsche’s opposition to Christian tolerance is to a great extent similar to the Salafist conception of Islam. This conception views Islam as a strong religion where there is no room for loving enemies or adversaries.

By joining jihadist groups, some Europeans try to prove loyalty to the new religion. In France, for example, migrants live in the same neighborhoods and have ill feelings toward the society that alienated them. They view themselves as the victims of this society. Sometimes these migrants look at those who convert to Islam with distrust. Other times, they laugh at what they view as their shallow understanding of the Islamic religion.

Most of those converting to Islam in Europe do not know Arabic. They turn to jihad to prove to their peers that their piety is not a fake one. To these people, jihad is evidence that they are ready to sacrifice themselves in a challenge to those who are born Muslims (40).

Sympathy also plays a big role in European Muslims’ turn to jihad. Those joining jihadist groups are deeply sympathetic with the oppressed and the deprived in poor European neighborhoods. They are drawn in to the second generation of migrants who fill poor and deprived neighborhoods and this plays a big role in their conversion (41).

Joining jihad is not restricted to the poor. Some of those belonging to the middle class join jihadist groups too. They do not care about what happens in the world of business. The poor are usually in continual protest against the corruption of the political elite.

The rich join jihadist groups too. British woman Aqsa Mahmood who left her moderately conservative family and then travelled to Syria to join Daesh and become one of its female leaders is a good case in point. Mahmood became the head of Daesh’s female police force.

Age plays a role here. Most of those who travelled to Syria to join jihadist groups were between the ages of 18 and 29. Some of them were between 15 and 17 years age too and others were in their thirties. This means that those joining jihad in Syria are much younger than those who travelled to Afghanistan in the past to join jihad there. Most of those who travelled to Afghanistan were between 25 and 35 years of age. Most of those who travelled to Syria were men. The wives of most of those men travelled voluntarily with them too (42).

This means that a percentage of those joining Daesh were teenagers who wanted to live in a utopic society that does not have many of the ills of the European society.

Europeans who join jihad justify their presence in Syria by claiming that the Islamic nation is under attack, whether it is in Bosnia; Syria; Myanmar, or Mali. They try to portray ongoing wars in these spots as a struggle between the camp of piety and the camp of sacrilege (43).

The same Europeans also say that they want to found an Islamic state. Male and female jihadists do not only reject the Western culture and its policies, but also want to see Islamic law in control of everything. They want to found an Islamic caliphate (44).

Nonetheless, American-Pakistani academic Akbar Ahmed has a third view. He says marginalized people usually rebel when they believe that their conservative values are in danger as realities keep changing.

European Muslims who are ready to join jihad are usually second and third generation migrants whose parents and grandparents arrived from the Middle East or south Asia. These are generations, Ahmed believes, that are easy to influence because most of them suffer the loss of the cultural identity of their grandparents. They, at the same time, do not integrate into the countries where they live, even as they are citizens of these countries (45).

Ahmed thinks that most of the Muslims who entered Europe, not the US, were workers who arrived in the light of agreements between European states and their countries to bridge a work force gap in these European states after World War II. Some of them travelled to England, like in the case of the Pakistanis. Some of them travelled to Germany, like in the case of the Turks. Some of them travelled to Belgium, like in the case of the Moroccans.

With time, however, these migrants and their children suffered problems that caused them not to integrate into the societies where they settled. They lived in suffering in neighborhoods economically deprived. They were deprived of education and work (46).

This second and third generation of migrants does not suffer financial poverty only. It also suffers the lack of terms of reference. Most of this youth cannot find answers to the questions they are asked. They cannot establish links with the religious scholars who arrive in their communities either.

Most of these scholars do not understand the new generation of Muslims. They do not know a lot about either the European history or culture. They do not speak the language of the host country. This is why most of the youth who approach them to get advice, cannot benefit from them (47).

The presence of a new generation of Muslims makes it necessary for religious scholars to receive training in means of communicating with this generation. There is a need for school curricula in schools in Arab and predominantly Muslim states to change. There is a need for change in the way the new generation of migrants in the European continent is dealt with. This change should ensure that educational and religious institutions are capable of communicating properly with this new generation. This communication cannot happen unless those leading educational and religious institution in European states have understanding of the local culture and history and the daily problems the migrants face.

Those living in Europe see a wide gap between the prevalent liberal discourse in the states of the continent and the real situation on the ground. At the time this discourse preaches freedom, tolerance and human rights, European governments turn a blind eye to violence against the poor, minorities and blacks, both inside and outside their countries.