De-radicalisation — action needed

The battle against “de-radicalisation” is proving long and complicated, as it has to effect a widespread cultural change.

The battle is based on long-, medium- and short-term strategies.

Talk about the need to promptly confront radicalisation has been heard a lot, but concrete steps on the ground are really few.

Radicalisation is the adoption by an individual of sweeping changes or of radical political views.

A person with radical views never gives one the chance to predict what his/her target could be or when he/she may attack, or how. Nonetheless, there are signs that point at the presence of radical thoughts. The main difficulty is to bring these thoughts to the surface and deal with them.

In this context, it is important not to overestimate the fear of radicalisation, but not to underestimate it either.

Some five years ago, a TV channel broadcast an interesting series called “Factory of death”.

The images were showing a Salafist wedding party in Irbid, where two Salafist leaders shown in the video were arrested; they were later sentenced to 18 months in jail.

The question is, can such sentence be issued for something a person has in mind, and if yes, is that a viable solution to a serious problem such as radicalisation?

The fight against radicalisation may be a long and difficult endeavour, but it is important to at least study the objectives of any strategy to tackle it.

If a strategy is to succeed, it needs the right people to produce it and run the whole process. Such people should be courageous, face intimidation, have a clear vision and an effective agenda that starts a cultural revolution and attains enlightenment.

At the same time, it is important to accept that the tools of the past cannot solve the problems of the present or the challenges of the future, and to realise that the original tools used to radicalise are unchanged.

It is time to stop thinking that extremist groups can be contained by moderate groups, for, the problem is ideological.

It is also time to stop repeating that we need to contain radicalisation, and get to perform some actual action to do so.

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