Search: “islamic state”

Now that everyone and his uncle has had a chance to comment on the nuclear accord reached with Iran, it’s my turn. (Full disclosure: I was an Iranian analyst in the Canadian intelligence community for twenty years and was even fluent in Farsi at one point – alas no more!) There is no question Iran […]

As US officials and others struggle to understand why Mohammod Youssuf Abdulazeez shot and killed five Marines in Tennessee before he himself was shot to death by police, we are left with the usual potential suspects.  He had mental issues (depression).  His father was a radical (he was once on a US terrorist watch list). […]

When most people think about terrorism, they probably have some pre-set notions of what it looks like.  Terrorists are from disadvantaged backgrounds.  They are marginalised.  They have mental health issues.  They are inherently violent people. All these preconceptions are wrong.  Or at least they are not very good at predicting who becomes a terrorist and […]

Further to my earlier post on when Egypt would learn from its historic mistakes in dealing with terrorism and violence, I now turn my attention to Turkey.  According to news sources, the Turkish government may invade along a 70-mile stretch of its border with Syria to establish a 20-mile buffer zone (see article here) Given […]

Tackling terrorism is not easy.  There are a lot of tools, some soft and some hard and some in between.  Relying on any one in particular is unlikely to work. For the record, I am not soft on terrorism or terrorists.  When our government agencies identify individuals who subscribe to a violent ideology and who […]

Religion can be a wonderful thing.  It is a source of comfort and meaning for billions and can inspire people to the loftiest heights. And it can be used to impose the worst human impulses. I came across this story in Sunday’s New York Times (see full story here).  The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – a […]

Remember John Kerry?  He’s the guy who ran against George W. Bush in the 2004 Presidential election.  Like most campaigns, this one had its controversies – like Swift Boat –  perhaps none greater than when Kerry said that the US had to get to a point where terrorism was not the primary focus of society […]

It must appear to most people in Canada that terrorism is a daily scourge.  If you take a global snapshot that is undeniably true.  Over the last few weeks we have seen attacks in France, Tunisia, Kuwait, Yemen and the inevitable – and sadly too frequent – violence in Syria, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan. And […]

Remember the good old days when terrorism was a rare thing?  Yes, sometimes people got hurt or even killed, but the more frequent incident was an airplane hijacking or a nuisance bomb.  And then the inevitable claim of responsibility would come from the PLO or the ALF or the FLQ in the form of a […]

It is not uncommon for inaccurate information to be held as accepted wisdom where no amount of data will convince people otherwise. Examples of this would include the conviction that crime rates are soaring (they have actually been plummeting for years) or that e-cigarettes are ok (there is no data yet suggesting that they are […]