...and the poor shall commit jihad

As has been pointed out here the case for poverty causing jihad is specious at best, outright false at worst.  The evidence that being poor and having nothing to lose makes one strap on a bomb really doesn't exist, most jihadists have been from well-off families or were themselves accomplished in their fields of engineering, medicine or digital technology.  Obviously you cannot be poor and attain degree status, yet the media and the White House continues to tell us that if we just keep giving them money(jizya) then everything will be OK, and that if we pull them out of their financial crisis, the attacks will stop.

With the evidence piling up that money will not stop jihad, can we expect the Western wallet to slam shut?  Doubtful.


From The Economist Dec 16

“EXTREMELY poor societies…provide optimal breeding grounds for disease, terrorism and conflict.” So said Barack Obama, arguing in favour of more development aid to poor countries. Mr Obama is not alone in regarding economic development as a weapon against terrorism. Hillary Clinton, America’s secretary of state, has called development “an integral part of America’s national security policy”. The idea that poverty could be associated with terrorism is not implausible. If acts of terror are committed by people with little to lose, then it is reasonable to expect them to be carried out disproportionately by poor, ill-educated people with dismal economic prospects.

We have given Pakistan hundreds of millions of dollars in an effort to end the poverty which causes jihad.  Can it be shown this money has had any positive effect in combating Islamism? 

(...)the ranks of high-profile terrorism suspects also boast plenty of middle-class, well-educated people. The would-be Times Square bomber, Faisal Shehzad, boasts an MBA and is the son of a senior Pakistani air-force officer. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who stands accused of lighting a makeshift bomb on a transatlantic flight in the so-called “underwear plot”, had a degree from University College, London, and is the son of a rich Nigerian banker. The suspected suicide-bomber in this week’s attacks in Stockholm had a degree from a British university. Are well-heeled terrorists representative or are they exceptions to the rule?

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