How much of a threat do terrorists pose to Ottawa?

2014/06/23 Leave a comment

Wark’s comments appear to be the most sensible of those cited:

So, has Iran reached a violent tipping point with Canada? Is Ottawa sufficiently fortified? How concerned should we be?

Experts interviewed this week conclude this: Hezbollah is an important threat, but the probability of an Iranian-Hezbollah hit on the capital is low. If the aim was to strike against the West, there are other higher-value targets outside Canada.

“Canada is by and large off the political radar screens of most of these groups. It’s hard to see al-Qaida affiliates or terrorist movements abroad turning their sights on Ottawa specifically,” says Wesley Wark, a national security expert at the University of Ottawa.

“But a Canadian urban centre might be the bullseye of some disaffected Canadian who went the route of jihad and had the means to try violence. We’ve been there before in terms of the so-called Toronto 18 plot.”

How much of a threat do terrorists pose to Ottawa? | Ottawa Citizen.

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Chris Selley: Stripping jihadis’ citizenship feels good. But what good does it do?

2014/06/21 1 Comment

Another good column by Chris Selley on citizenship revocation (see his earlier Actually, my citizenship is a right | National Post). Quite funny in places too, but his fundamental point is serious:

But that only leads us to the biggest question, which is why we would want to banish terrorists at all — not in our guts which is understandable but as policy. British terrorism suspects recently stripped of their citizenship are currently at large in Sudan, Kenya, Somalia, Afghanistan and other places that could certainly use fewer terrorism suspects rather than more. Home Secretary Theresa May has denaturalized and deported at least one British citizen over the advice of her own security officials, who would have much preferred to keep an eye on him.

FOX News types pitch a fit whenever a former Guantanamo detainee pops up on the frontlines — as many have. They went nuts when it emerged the Americans released Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi from custody in Iraq in 2009, only to have to deal with him now as leader of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.

You can’t keep people in custody forever. Sometimes you have to make tough choices and cross your fingers. But why would we deliberately choose to set ostensibly dangerous people loose in the Middle East? No doubt it would give some of us a cheap thrill. But Chris Alexander is not Minister of Cheap Thrills.

National Post | Chris Selley: Stripping jihadis’ citizenship feels good. But what good does it do?

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Made-in-Canada terror is real – and its being ignored – The Globe and Mail

2014/06/12 Leave a comment

Somewhat alarmist, and understating the work that has been done and continues to be done. I would not consider Public Safety, RCMP and CSIS activities as indifference; one can debate whether we are doing enough and the right things.

UK in its 2003 Prevent strategy over reached and was trimmed back in 2011. Community engagement and messaging became more important, and was largely successful in maintaining cross-community support post the Rigby killing.

Similarly in Canada, the relationships built up by the RCMP, CSIS and likely other police forces within affected communities are helping identify potential threats.

All plays into the revocation debate within C-24, as seen in Sheryl Saperia’s reference to this article in Wednesday’s hearing.

What might be the consequences of our continued indifference?

Inaction emboldens those seeking to radicalize our citizens to continue operating with impunity. The pipelines shipping our citizens to these jihadi hot spots become increasingly entrenched and more difficult to disrupt.

Another real possibility is the return of these citizens to Canada after their participation in foreign conflicts. They come back with a “postsecondary” degree in extremism, trained by hard-core foreign jihadists in real battlefield situations, posing a real terrorism threat.

There is a circularity to that threat: Radicalization leads to individuals travelling abroad, which then leads to … radicalization? Simply put, our inaction is potentially creating conditions for an even more potent and dangerous form of radicalization and recruitment than we are currently experiencing.

We will no longer simply need to be concerned about outsiders radicalizing and recruiting Canadians to go abroad and fight. Instead, the recruiters would be Canadians who have fought abroad: Credibility and a powerful narrative, their own experiences, would be shared with a much larger pool of friends, acquaintances and community members than an outside recruiter could ever hope to reach. We are already starting to see this unfold as individuals from Western states who have gone abroad to fight are increasingly using social media to relay their experiences to others.

Made-in-Canada terror is real – and its being ignored – The Globe and Mail.

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Suicide bomber killed in Iraq part of wider jihadi base in Calgary

2014/06/06 1 Comment

More on home-grown radicalization, the most recent case being Salman Ashrafi:

Calgary is earning a reputation as a breeding ground for jihadi fighters.

The Muslim convert Damian Clairmont, who later took the name Mustafa al-Gharib, was killed while fighting with Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda-affiliated rebel group in Syria whose membership is made up largely of European, Australian and North American extremists.

Clairmont was also raised in Calgary, as were as many as two dozen other young men who, according to sources, have travelled to Syria to join rebel extremist groups to wage jihad in the last two years…..

“He might have been around certain charismatic preachers in the community that might not have had his best interests in mind,” he added.

It’s a thought shared by Soharwardy, the Calgary imam, who has received death threats for speaking out about this topic, but feels compelled to in order to stop men in his city from killing and dying on jihadi missions abroad.

“It is impossible for me to think the intelligence people do not know who is radicalizing Muslim youth. It is going on undercover; it is going on openly sometimes,” he said.

“The thing is they are recruiting Muslims to go and fight in Syria and getting them killed. It is horrible.… What is the Canadian government doing? Nothing. I mean this guy died, many, many … people died from our country. For what?”

While theoretical, given that both Clairmont and Ashrafi are dead, it is interesting to see how C-24 revocation provisions would apply in each case.

Clairmont was born in Canada and likely had no dual citizenship. Asrafi moved to Canada when he was in Grade 5 or 6, became naturalized but also has Pakistani citizenship.

Clairmont would keep his Canadian citizenship; Ashrafi would lose it even though he spent most of his childhood and early adulthood in Canada.

Easy to understand why most lawyers argue that this kind of different treatment would not be ruled Charter compliant.

Suicide bomber killed in Iraq part of wider jihadi base in Calgary – Canada – CBC News.

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Toronto man convicted on terrorism charge – Mohamed Hersi Case

2014/06/02 Leave a comment

Update on the Hersi case (see earlier Toronto man told undercover officer it was ‘God’s Will’ for him join terror-group Al-Shabab, trial hears):

A university graduate, Mr. Hersi had been working as a security guard downtown. And that was where the undercover officer went, on the pretext that he was a consultant conducting opinion surveys of security guards….

The officer testified that Mr. Hersi confided much – including that he knew a Toronto man who had previously joined al-Shabab. They also discussed an English-language al-Qaeda propaganda article that was making the rounds at the time: “How to Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom.”

Mr. Hersi relayed that he was planning to join al-Shabab, the officer testified. During testimony, the accused denied this, saying he simply wanted to live in a Muslim country.

Searches of Mr. Hersi’s laptop revealed downloads of The U.S. Navy Seal Sniper Training Syllabus and The Anarchist Cookbook.

He now faces up to 10 years in prison.

In light of the Governments proposed measures on revocation for those convicted of terrorism in C-24 Citizenship Act revisions, this may provide an early case. He was convicted in a Canadian court and is likely a dual national (he was born in Somalia although raised and educated in Canada for most of his life).

So would the Government choose to strip him of his Canadian citizenship and send him to Somalia (where he would likely not have to serve jail time) or have him serve out his term in a Canadian jail?

Ironic situation: being convicted of intending to travel to Somalia to commit terrorism; ending up there following revocation.

Toronto man convicted on terrorism charge – The Globe and Mail.

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ICYMI – Debate: Is al-Qaeda a global terror threat or a local military menace? – The Globe and Mail

2014/06/02 Leave a comment

Globe debate on Al-Qaeda and whether its strength today. Arguing for it being weaker is J.M. Berger:

Al-Qaeda has not abandoned terrorism, but it has adopted a default position of encouraging “lone wolf” attacks by non-networked supporters in the West. While this obviously represents an ongoing problem, individual actors do not represent the same magnitude of threat that manifested itself on September 11, nor do they require al-Qaeda to spend its own resources.

Holding territory is an inherently local activity, which has focused the resources of many jihadists on the countries where they dwell, rather than on attacking the U.S. homeland. Even al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula — widely held to be the most dangerous al-Qaeda threat to the West — has attempted only a handful of attacks on the U.S. homeland. Each of the plots that have become public knowledge were lightly staffed and funded on a shoestring budget. AQAP’s resources are instead overwhelmingly devoted to battling the government of Yemen, where it is based.

For the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross argues the contrary:

But we should be cautious about repeating past mistakes, and prematurely penning the obituary of al-Qaeda’s senior leadership.

For their own part, al-Qaeda insiders reject the characterization that the group has become decentralized. Abu Sulayman al-Muhajir, an al-Qaeda official currently in Syria with its official affiliate, the Nusra Front, recently spoke at length about al-Qaeda’s bureaucracy. He described system known as aqalim – regionalization — wherein a different leader oversees each of the geographic locations where the group operates, but is subordinate through an oath of bayat (fealty) to al-Qaeda emir Ayman al-Zawahiri. One senior al-Qaeda official, known as the masul aqalim, is responsible for overseeing all the affiliates operating in different regions, coordinating with the regional emirs. Rather than disparate groups connected by little more than “loose ideology,” Abu Sulayman described a group with bureaucratic direction. His account appears more credible than that of The New York Times.

Debate: Is al-Qaeda a global terror threat or a local military menace? – The Globe and Mail.

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Toronto man told undercover officer it was ‘God’s Will’ for him join terror-group Al-Shabab, trial hears | National Post

2014/03/27 Leave a comment

Revealing words on how the extremist mind thinks:

“Here everything is anti-prayer, anti-Islam … even if it’s a tyrannical place, it’s better than Canada,” he said. “I want to live in a place that’s better than this.” Somalia was better than Canada, he said, “because you can live in a place where there’s Islamic law.”

In his rambling conversations, he decried what he considered Canada’s hostility to his faith, claiming that “all non-Muslims hate Islam.” But he appeared to display intolerance himself, saying that “talking to a non-Muslim about morality and shit, they don’t even know what morality is, Christians.”

He also complained that “brothers” at Toronto’s Salahedin mosque had been arrested on security certificates (used to deport foreign nationals deemed threats to Canada’s security), and said nobody cared because only Muslims were affected. Asked how he knew, he said, “My imam talks about it.”

“It’s pretty tyrannical,” he said.

Given that Hersi was born in Somalia, he would, if convicted, likely be someone the Government would consider for revocation under the proposed provisions of the Citizenship Act.

Toronto man told undercover officer it was ‘God’s Will’ for him join terror-group Al-Shabab, trial hears | National Post.

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Convert one woman, you convert an entire family: Unveiling the rise in female terrorism around the globe

2013/09/29 Leave a comment

On women and terrorism. While still mainly a phenomenon of young men, not limited to them. The article has a broader perspective than Muslim terrorists, mentioning early Russian anarchists, Germany’s Baader-Meinhoff gang, the IRA, Basque ETA, Tamil Tigresses etc.

Convert one woman, you convert an entire family: Unveiling the rise in female terrorism around the globe.

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Does Education Decrease Terrorism? « The Dish

2013/09/13 Leave a comment

The Dish has been doing a series on the links between education and terrorism. While there are no simple and consistent patterns here,  a large number of the radicalized do appear to be relatively well-educated, although there are some notable exceptions. The example cited pertains to the Palestinian territories, where employment opportunities are limited. Still doesn’t answer the question why some turn to terrorism, some do not. Correlation is not causation.

Does Education Decrease Terrorism? « The Dish.

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Stephen Harper’s search for the root causes of terrorism – Capital Read, Inkless Wells – Macleans.ca

2013/04/21 Leave a comment

Ongoing government work on the root causes of terrorism.

Stephen Harper’s search for the root causes of terrorism – Capital Read, Inkless Wells – Macleans.ca.

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