Who would want the West to stop Web radicals?
Radicals on the Web open themselves up to refutation which is a good thing and is what usually works in person. The Web should be no different.
In London, student Younes Tsouli used the Internet to spread al-Qaeda propaganda, recruit suicide bombers, and promote Web sites that encouraged the killing of non-Muslims. In person, one could use reason, argument, or discussion to oppose Tsouli.
Fortunately, the Moroccan-born student and two accomplices, one of whom he had never met in person, became the first to be jailed in Britain for inciting terrorism over the Internet. I do think the offense is similar to those nations that prohibit hate speech intended to incite a reaction.
The Internet contributes to spreading extremist propaganda and recruiting sympathizers to Islamist militant causes but so does ordinary speech in Hyde Park and no one wants to censor free speech in traditional discourse sites.
The European Commission urged the EU's 27 states to crack down on militant sites.
A report by New York's police chief in August described the Internet as "the new Afghanistan." U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has stated that potential recruits no longer needed to travel to al-Qaeda camps.
As in so many enterprise examples, jihadists train themselves over the Internet.
Web sites are difficult to censor because they can simply keep moving or Islamists can use chat rooms because of their transitory nature.
Chinese censorship has resulted in clever "work arounds," stated Johnny Ryan, senior researcher at Dublin's Institute of International and European Affairs, and author of the book Countering Militant Islamist Radicalisation on the Internet.
Akil Awan, of the Royal Holloway, University of London, states that it would be morally questionable to censor jihadist Web sites that presented an alternative world view.
He is wrong. People who oppose jihadists, or anyone, have an obligation to denounce what they understand as wrong-headed. The tangible difference between the jihadist, and Web material that is skewed, tendentious, and indoctrinating, is that much of the dross of the Net is harmless.
Jihadists are not harmless, or blameless.
Radical preacher Omar Bakri Mohammed, was banned from Britain after the government ruled that he was not "conducive to the public good." Syrian-born Bakri thought that jailing would be seen as part of a campaign against Islam.
The Islamists should be opposed, directly and consistently, by Western authorities.
He stated:
They should open debate, discussions, dialogue with the Islamists. There is no need to censor. If you think it is bad, why do you not debate it and destroy it in national media?
Bakri stated:
They should open debate, discussions, dialogue with the Islamists. There is no need to censor. If you think it is bad, why do you not debate it and destroy it in national media?
Islamists should be debated in the media.
Bakri claimed that the 09/11 hijackers the "Magnificent 19," has continued to communicate with followers in Britain via Internet chat rooms.
The Royal Holloway's Awan said, adding it is estimated there are more than 5,000 extremist Web sites.
Let them spew their rot. Those who are committed to open and free discourse should engage the Web jihadists.
I only wonder if there are enough Western academics committed to the idea of confronting specious ideas.
And, in the meantime, the serious business of tracking down and eliminating al-Qaeda threats in Iraq continues.
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