What's Motivating European Youth to Join IS?

[georgephillip]

France was among the most brutal colonial occupiers during the 19th and 20th centuries, and now the French are reaping what they have sown across the Maghreb:
"The danger of ISIS fighters returning to Europe has already been felt in France, and a recent headline in France’s leading newspaper, Le Monde, even publicly asks what the Islamic State is capable of in Europe.4

"A current example of this danger can be found in the case of Mehdi Nemmouche, a 29-year-old French citizen and second-generation immigrant, who was arrested for killing three people at the Jewish Museum in Brussels in May of this year. It is believed that he fought for ISIS in Syria in 2013.

"Nemmouche grew up in Roubaix, a city in northeastern France with a substantial immigrant population and limited economic opportunity.

"His profile was by no means unusual.

"An immigrant mother reported that she and her family live in 'another France' where they experience a lower economic level and an immigrant typecast due to their physical characteristics that mark them as outsiders.5

"If one is perceived to be both Muslim and immigrant, there is a compound effect that carries a stigma resulting in an entire array of lower life chances."

Syria Comment Archives What Motivates European Youth to Join ISIS by Loretta Bass - Syria Comment

 

[High_Gravity]

Their not really "European" as much as they are Muslim.

 

[georgephillip]

Their not really "European" as much as they are Muslim.

But they have been born and raised in Europe, yet they are subject to the same level of discrimination as Blacks and Hispanics in this country. It would appear the same economic class in both countries benefits from this discrimination?

 

[High_Gravity]

Their not really "European" as much as they are Muslim.

But they have been born and raised in Europe, yet they are subject to the same level of discrimination as Blacks and Hispanics in this country. It would appear the same economic class in both countries benefits from this discrimination?

These people don't see themselves as Europeans in the classical sense, they see themselves as Muslims first and their religion is priority for them. I don't see Black and Hispanic Americans flocking to ISIS in droves, this is a totally different situation this is a religious and cultural issue.

 

[Moonglow]

They want a sense of value, and want to be part of something they think is of value and appreciation

 

[Moonglow]

You gotta get kids interested in something to keep them from being idle and learning bad traits...

 

[georgephillip]

These people don't see themselves as Europeans in the classical sense, they see themselves as Muslims first and their religion is priority for them. I

They also are Westernized second-generation immigrants who have grown up as second-class citizens based on physical characteristics like skin color and ethnicity. In short, the way they've been treated all their lives has pushed them to embrace their religion.
Syria Comment Archives What Motivates European Youth to Join ISIS by Loretta Bass - Syria Comment

 

[georgephillip]

You gotta get kids interested in something to keep them from being idle and learning bad traits...

Along with giving them reasons to believe their talents and values are respected and valued at least as much as their white-skinned peers:
"The reasons for ISIS’s recruiting successes are likely as varied as the recruits themselves, including youth unemployment and globalization itself.

"But clearly many European recruits are pushed toward joining ISIS by their failure to be assimilated, accepted, and respected by their adoptive countries.

"The challenge for Europe going forward will be to change its treatment of immigrants even as it rightfully recognizes the danger some within those ranks pose."
Syria Comment Archives What Motivates European Youth to Join ISIS by Loretta Bass - Syria Comment

 

[Moonglow]

Now you see why the USA is the most desired place to live...........freedom of religion and the ability to assimilate into American culture............

 

[georgephillip]

"Policies such as these are both examples and symbols of hostility toward immigrants that inform a whole range of treatment and outcomes, from missed educational opportunities and joblessness to discrimination in housing.

"The result is that second-generation immigrants growing up culturally similar to their local French, British, or German neighbors come to inhabit a translocal space where their identities are defined not by their own assimilation or even varied immigrant roots but the expectations of the majority population treating them like a generic Muslim 'other.'

"As an example, the Brighton, England 19-year-old black youth, Ibrahim Kamara, the son of an immigrant from Sierra Leone, joined ISIS in February 2014.10

"His biography illustrates a path to recruitment that could have been diverted. He endured a childhood punctuated with racial abuse and name calling in the white-majority residential area where his mother rented their home.

"A product of public schools, Ibrahim struggled at school and failed from his computer engineering program in 2013.

"He then switched to an easier course of study that would lead to fewer career opportunities. It was in this context that he became radicalized in his local neighborhood and through ISIS internet recruitment materials.

"Ibrahim was killed in Syria in late September.

"His bewildered mother learned of his death on Facebook."
Syria Comment Archives What Motivates European Youth to Join ISIS by Loretta Bass - Syria Comment