Suicide Reversal? Polling the Muslim world

by Daniel Pipes
Thu, 26 Jul 2007

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National Review Online asked a group of experts: "On Tuesday, Pew released a poll indicating that support for suicide bombings is on the decline in the Muslim world, among other things. How encouraging is this poll? What can we do — as a government, as private entities — to use the information constructively?" For all replies, see "Suicide Reversal?"

It is good news if Muslim support for suicide bombings is indeed declining. But it need not have much to do, as the poll takers theorize, with improved personal circumstances. Two other factors likely have more importance.

First, as Muslims themselves (in such countries as Morocco, Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, and Pakistan) become the victims of suicide bombings, they increasingly reject this tactic. The Pew Global Attitudes Project itself noted in June 2006 that this "shift has been especially dramatic in Jordan, likely in response to the devastating terrorist attack in Amman last year; 29 percent of Jordanians view suicide attacks as often or sometimes justified, down from 57 percent in May 2005."

Second, Muslims appear growingly aware that the terroristic ways of Osama bin Laden offer a less successful path to realizing the Islamist goals of imposing the Shari'a and creating a caliphate do than the political, lawful ways of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkey's newly-triumphantly reelected prime minister. Whereas terrorism stimulates its own antibodies and offers no plausible path to power, working through the system is proving successful in such diverse places as Egypt, the Palestinian Authority, Lebanon, Iraq, and Bangladesh, as well as in the West.

Therefore, this survey has more subtle and ambiguous implications than first appear. (July 26, 2007)

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Reader comments on this weblog entry

Title	By	Date
islam just changing tatics ... NOT goals [118 words]	Phil Greend	Aug 31, 2007 23:46
A Fine Dream [312 words]	Rebecca Moulds	Aug 13, 2007 06:02
Subversion and Spawning [189 words]	Brian H	Aug 3, 2007 17:50
Wrong questions [461 words]	Archimedes2	Aug 3, 2007 11:30
the only way is let them taste their own medicine [54 words]	susan	Aug 1, 2007 16:53
Re education/Aid $ tied to reform towards prosperity producing capitalism. [54 words]	infosifter	Aug 1, 2007 07:28
One battle being won, several to go [202 words]	Henrik Ræder Clausen	Jul 30, 2007 15:12
The Gramsci-ization of Islam [365 words]	David W. Lincoln	Jul 30, 2007 10:25
IF ONLY [212 words]	IVAN CHER	Jul 30, 2007 07:46
NOT JUST A "TACTIC [822 words]	Ron Thompson	Jul 29, 2007 17:04
Suicide Reversal? "Working the System" is not tantamount to working against destruction and death ... [78 words]	Paul la Demain	Jul 27, 2007 19:17
↔ "Working the System" [412 words]	Carol Derbis	Jul 28, 2007 16:49
Cultural strategies [141 words]	David W. Lincoln	Jul 27, 2007 10:47
dare we hope...? [50 words]	richard landes	Jul 27, 2007 07:05
A better way to stop IEDs and acts of terror. [24 words]	nacl	Jul 27, 2007 02:35
A change of tactics, not a change of heart [185 words]	Richard B.	Jul 26, 2007 23:21
Suicide Bombing. Why? [40 words]	John R	Jul 26, 2007 20:30
↔ why jihad ??? [69 words]	archies	Sep 1, 2007 02:30
↔ What are the motivations for suicide terrorism? [18 words]	Camilla Mukhammadaminova	Jan 4, 2008 02:33
What difference does it make? [260 words]	Romesh Chander	Jul 26, 2007 17:08

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