Global initiatives: Counter-messaging strategies key to fighting terror, say experts
Joint government-community approach best to combat youth radicalisation
Joint government-community approach best to combat youth radicalisation. PHOTO: FOREIGN AFFAIRS
LAHORE:
Recent attacks in Pakistan and around the world have spurred government and other initiatives here and in the United States aimed at combatting extremism through counter-messaging strategies.
Suicide bombings at two Christian churches here in mid-March and the massive attack that killed 132 children and 9 adults at the Peshawar Army Public School in December are painful reminders of the threat of extremism and the need to counter the ideology behind it.
As young people continue to fall victim to a dangerous combination of hate speech, propaganda and patriotism worldwide, providing an alternate message has never been more crucial.
Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi, chairman of the Pakistan Ulema Council and a former government adviser, said while ulema have taken an active role, the government should do more to prevent radicalisation and not shift the entire burden onto the clergy. He said anti-sectarian and anti-hate curriculums should be included in school syllabi, and the government should also hold seminars across the province and make use of news media to spread these messages.
Ashrafi said Ulema Councils throughout the country have been holding three-day workshops for imams, as well as madrassa teachers and students, to promote peace and interfaith harmony, already reaching 6,000 students. He said the workshops address counter-propaganda narratives and discussion of what constitutes jihad and terrorism.
Leading Sunni cleric Raghib Naeemi suggested that the government should also hold workshops to sensitise imams to the current volatile security scenario prevailing in the country. He asserted that while the government has offered three-day workshops for 450 mosques around Punjab under the Auqaf Department, there are at least 3,000 mosques in Lahore alone.
Working with the support of a European NGO, Naeemi, leader of Jamia Naeemia, said the organisation has reached about 200 imams so far in two-day workshops titled “Islam is a religion of peace.”
“We are countering this [extremist] narrative by offering … a narrative of tolerance,” he said. Imams receive instruction on how to deliver sermons with positive messages, as well as guidance for engaging their congregations in positive ways.
“Every imam should take a training course, whether sponsored by a government or non-government [entity]. We have to change the mindset.”
In the United States, related concerns have been taken up at the highest levels, with President Barack Obama convening a White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism in February at which he emphasised the need for counter-messaging.
“We have to confront the warped ideologies espoused by terrorists … [and] acknowledge that groups like al Qaeda and ISIL are deliberately targeting their propaganda to Muslim communities, particularly Muslim youth.” Referring specifically to the Peshawar attack, Obama said, “Pakistan’s Taliban has mounted a long campaign of violence against the Pakistani people that now tragically includes the massacre of … schoolchildren and their teachers.”
The president also urged community involvement. “Muslim communities, including scholars and clerics … have a responsibility to push back” with programmes to defend young people from the grasp of extremist ideologies. Details of a joint government initiative on combatting youth radicalisation involving the Justice Department, FBI and other agencies were first made public about six months ago. Three pilot programmes in Boston, Los Angeles and Minneapolis “foster partnerships between local government[s], law enforcement, mayor’s offices, the private sector, local service providers [and] academia,” according information released at the summit.
“Any hope of ensuring security against terrorism … rests in the ability to diminish the appeal of terrorism and dissuade young people from joining them in the first place,” said an official working on the initiative. He said its chief aim is to help communities recognise budding extremism and root it out “before it grows into a real threat.”
In Pakistan, Rana Sanaullah, former law minister, said the government is working closely with religious leaders to address the problem of hate speech and radicalisation. However, he added, the ulema should be responsible for sensitising imams of the different sects to a counter-narrative of terrorist propaganda; and that the message of peace and harmony will soon be included in public education syllabi for the first through tenth grades.
Peter Jacob, executive director of the Centre for Social Justice in Lahore, said the government has now moved toward a hands-on approach. “We are recovering from a dysfunctional state to be a state that is learning to deal with such a thorny issue” by limiting the number and use of loudspeakers at mosques, filing police reports against hate mongers and controlling spread of hate literature. However, Jacob cautioned that the government needs to ensure that it doesn’t arrest people who are not involved in such activity.
Matthew Levitt, a former FBI counter-terrorism analyst, observed that “there’s no one model for how you get radicalised, and there’s no one model for how you address the issue.” He cited two factors that lead people to become radicalised. “One is environmental conditions – local grievances, things particular to them that are upsetting them, creating conditions that are so overwhelming that they have a cognitive opening to dangerous ideas. And then, [there is] ideology – those dangerous ideas.” Naeemi said the driving forces behind youth radicalisation are easy to recognize. “The exploitation of [the poor] and the less-educated are the greatest causes because it’s easier to bring them in,” he said. “Government is not fulfilling its duty, so we are covering that gap within society.”
On the community level in Lahore, Chanan Development Association co-director Shehzad Khan said since 2004 the group has been holding workshops and presenting theatre performances on pressing social issues – engaging over 1,000 young people from around the province in the last two years.
Public opinion has changed significantly since the Peshawar attack, he said. “I don’t see anyone openly supporting the Taliban as it was few years back.”
Beginning the conversation about averting radicalisation early and maintaining consistent dialogue is key, according to the US official.
“Well-informed and well-equipped families, communities, and local institutions represent the best long-term defence against violent extremist ideology, because they are best-positioned to do something about it before it manifests itself in violence.” (Joint reporting project between The Express Tribune and the international centre for journalists, ICFJ)
Published in The Express Tribune, April 11th, 2015.
Recent attacks in Pakistan and around the world have spurred government and other initiatives here and in the United States aimed at combatting extremism through counter-messaging strategies.
Suicide bombings at two Christian churches here in mid-March and the massive attack that killed 132 children and 9 adults at the Peshawar Army Public School in December are painful reminders of the threat of extremism and the need to counter the ideology behind it.
As young people continue to fall victim to a dangerous combination of hate speech, propaganda and patriotism worldwide, providing an alternate message has never been more crucial.
Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi, chairman of the Pakistan Ulema Council and a former government adviser, said while ulema have taken an active role, the government should do more to prevent radicalisation and not shift the entire burden onto the clergy. He said anti-sectarian and anti-hate curriculums should be included in school syllabi, and the government should also hold seminars across the province and make use of news media to spread these messages.
Ashrafi said Ulema Councils throughout the country have been holding three-day workshops for imams, as well as madrassa teachers and students, to promote peace and interfaith harmony, already reaching 6,000 students. He said the workshops address counter-propaganda narratives and discussion of what constitutes jihad and terrorism.
Leading Sunni cleric Raghib Naeemi suggested that the government should also hold workshops to sensitise imams to the current volatile security scenario prevailing in the country. He asserted that while the government has offered three-day workshops for 450 mosques around Punjab under the Auqaf Department, there are at least 3,000 mosques in Lahore alone.
Working with the support of a European NGO, Naeemi, leader of Jamia Naeemia, said the organisation has reached about 200 imams so far in two-day workshops titled “Islam is a religion of peace.”
“We are countering this [extremist] narrative by offering … a narrative of tolerance,” he said. Imams receive instruction on how to deliver sermons with positive messages, as well as guidance for engaging their congregations in positive ways.
“Every imam should take a training course, whether sponsored by a government or non-government [entity]. We have to change the mindset.”
In the United States, related concerns have been taken up at the highest levels, with President Barack Obama convening a White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism in February at which he emphasised the need for counter-messaging.
“We have to confront the warped ideologies espoused by terrorists … [and] acknowledge that groups like al Qaeda and ISIL are deliberately targeting their propaganda to Muslim communities, particularly Muslim youth.” Referring specifically to the Peshawar attack, Obama said, “Pakistan’s Taliban has mounted a long campaign of violence against the Pakistani people that now tragically includes the massacre of … schoolchildren and their teachers.”
The president also urged community involvement. “Muslim communities, including scholars and clerics … have a responsibility to push back” with programmes to defend young people from the grasp of extremist ideologies. Details of a joint government initiative on combatting youth radicalisation involving the Justice Department, FBI and other agencies were first made public about six months ago. Three pilot programmes in Boston, Los Angeles and Minneapolis “foster partnerships between local government[s], law enforcement, mayor’s offices, the private sector, local service providers [and] academia,” according information released at the summit.
“Any hope of ensuring security against terrorism … rests in the ability to diminish the appeal of terrorism and dissuade young people from joining them in the first place,” said an official working on the initiative. He said its chief aim is to help communities recognise budding extremism and root it out “before it grows into a real threat.”
In Pakistan, Rana Sanaullah, former law minister, said the government is working closely with religious leaders to address the problem of hate speech and radicalisation. However, he added, the ulema should be responsible for sensitising imams of the different sects to a counter-narrative of terrorist propaganda; and that the message of peace and harmony will soon be included in public education syllabi for the first through tenth grades.
Peter Jacob, executive director of the Centre for Social Justice in Lahore, said the government has now moved toward a hands-on approach. “We are recovering from a dysfunctional state to be a state that is learning to deal with such a thorny issue” by limiting the number and use of loudspeakers at mosques, filing police reports against hate mongers and controlling spread of hate literature. However, Jacob cautioned that the government needs to ensure that it doesn’t arrest people who are not involved in such activity.
Matthew Levitt, a former FBI counter-terrorism analyst, observed that “there’s no one model for how you get radicalised, and there’s no one model for how you address the issue.” He cited two factors that lead people to become radicalised. “One is environmental conditions – local grievances, things particular to them that are upsetting them, creating conditions that are so overwhelming that they have a cognitive opening to dangerous ideas. And then, [there is] ideology – those dangerous ideas.” Naeemi said the driving forces behind youth radicalisation are easy to recognize. “The exploitation of [the poor] and the less-educated are the greatest causes because it’s easier to bring them in,” he said. “Government is not fulfilling its duty, so we are covering that gap within society.”
On the community level in Lahore, Chanan Development Association co-director Shehzad Khan said since 2004 the group has been holding workshops and presenting theatre performances on pressing social issues – engaging over 1,000 young people from around the province in the last two years.
Public opinion has changed significantly since the Peshawar attack, he said. “I don’t see anyone openly supporting the Taliban as it was few years back.”
Beginning the conversation about averting radicalisation early and maintaining consistent dialogue is key, according to the US official.
“Well-informed and well-equipped families, communities, and local institutions represent the best long-term defence against violent extremist ideology, because they are best-positioned to do something about it before it manifests itself in violence.” (Joint reporting project between The Express Tribune and the international centre for journalists, ICFJ)
Published in The Express Tribune, April 11th, 2015.