Search: “London”

One thing we have all gotten used to in the post 9/11 era is the question: at any given time how at risk are we from terrorism?  In an effort to answer this query for a nation’s citizenry a number of methods have been proposed. One of the more famous ones was the US Department […]

A man drives a van into a crowd of Muslims near a mosque in London, possibly killing one (although there are reports that a person had earlier suffered a heart attack on that street) and wounding ten.  Others in the vicinity pull the man out of the van and hold him until police arrive.  There […]

I have learned a few things over the years in dealing with both counter-terrorism and countering violent extremism (CVE).  First is that both fields have attracted a lot of interest from a variety of actors: politicians, academics, and self-styled experts.  Secondly is that everyone thinks he or she has THE answer to either preventing terrorism […]

We in Canada are, disturbingly to some, becoming used to this story.  A Canadian travels abroad, to a native land or elsewhere, is picked up by local authorities, placed in jail (often in appalling conditions and sometimes allegedly tortured) and eventually released when the foreign government decides there is no case against him.  He returns […]

A pattern is emerging when it comes to the aftermath of a terrorist attack in the West.  People of all faiths and backgrounds denounce the attack, politicians swear that their nations will not be cowed by fear, candles and late-night vigils abound, and the Eiffel Tower in Paris is lit with the colours of the […]

Terrorists are hateful people, of that there is no doubt.  What they hate varies based on the underlying ideology of the group to which they belong or through which they derive their inspiration and yet there are similarities at times.  Most of them hate society or governments or policies or something else and have concluded […]

In the wake of yet another horrific – but not ‘cowardly’: the terrorists most likely knew they would die in their efforts – attack  in London, UK Prime Minister Theresa May has said ‘enough is enough‘!  She added that there was ‘too much tolerance of extremism’ in her country and that the UK’s counter terrorism […]

There is a famous line in the 1939 classic film The Wizard of Oz where the protagonist Dorothy, who has just  landed in a strange country courtesy of a tornado, looks around and tells her dog Toto “we’re not in Kansas anymore”.  That sentence has been used countless times over the decades and has come […]

Terrorism is sure getting complicated.  The good old days, if I may call them that, were easy by comparison. Terrorists were easy to spot because they tended to chuck bombs or fire weapons at people, the larger the crowd the better.  Then we got to the airline hijacking phase in which most incidents ended relatively […]

I am sure you have all read the stories.  In the aftermath of an arrest of a mass murderer (or a terrorist), neighbours, friends and colleagues are interviewed about what they knew about the suspect.  Here is what they tend to say: I never saw it coming! He was the nicest guy! I can’t believe […]