By Micah Halpern
I've Been Thinking:
Both the French and Dutch governments issued reports today that hundreds of their citizens have been involved in jihadist activists. Many of them have been trained, fought and died in Syria.
In the case of Amsterdam, one Dutch citizen was even a suicide bomber.
The reports underscore the urgent need for Europe to respond to the changing and wide spread landscape of terror. These governments, as well as the rest of Europe, are trying to create responses which will protect their homes and home turf from the extremism that these jihadists will bring back with them from Syria.
The jihadists return home with battle and weapons experience and training. They are battle hardened and they are even more dedicated to the jihadist cause than they were before joining the fight in Syria.
France says that 700 of their citizens were involved in jihadist activities in 2013. The actual number is probably three times that.
Until now the only tools governments had been using involved intelligence collection. Now the French Ministry of the Interior has announced that they are working on a plan to stem this movement. And Amsterdam has announced that they are cooperating with other governments to try to create a response.
The best response to hate is education. But that is a long term solution.
In the short term Europe needs to breakup jihadist groups, arrest members of jihadists groups and clamp down on individual jihadists.
Micah@MicahHalpern.com
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