When prodigal jihadis come home: Brender

Good piece by Natalie Brender on the issue of returning jihadis. Never easy, and touchy, but other countries have embraced finding such counter-narratives as one means to reduce potential future jihadis. I witnessed one of the UK initiatives in this area; while I cannot judge the results, the approach was interesting and appeared to engage youth at risk and have merit:

One means of creating “counter-narratives” about Islam and militant politics is by drawing on the credibility of those who once embraced those ideas and now renounce them. To this end, the brief [U.S.-based Council on Foreign Relations] urges, efforts at countering violent extremism should include “[e]ducating Muslim thought leaders in mosques and on university campuses through workshops and testimonies from former radicals about why Islamist hardliners threaten Muslim communities.”

Such efforts must originate within Muslim communities; they will not succeed if viewed as propaganda by Western governments. But Western governments can help by providing resources to enable Muslim-led counter-extremism activities to succeed. For that reason, Canada’s government, and Canadians, should keep an open mind to the possibility that some fighters returning to this country might now be ex-jihadists ready to support the anti-extremist cause.

When prodigal jihadis come home: Brender | Toronto Star.