Terror Trends Bulletin

It is essential that we find out how extensive Nidal Malik Hasan’s ties to other Jihadists went. Of this there can be no doubt.

But we must refrain from entering into a debate on what amounts largely to semantics about whether or not the Fort Hood massacre was an act of “terrorism.”

We need to get away from focusing on the term “terrorism” anyway. Some folks still don’t consider the 1983 Beirut Barracks bombing by Hezbollah which killed 241 Marines, sailors and soldiers an act of terrorism because, by some widely regarded definitions, attacks on combatants cannot be termed “terrorism.”

The Fort Hood massacre and the attack on the Marine Barracks were acts of JIHAD.

The Jihadis themselves don’t refer to themselves as “terrorists.” But they most assuredly refer to themselves as “Jihadis.”

I say let them own that title. If one of them goes out on his own and shoots up a ticket counter at LAX, that is an act of Jihad, just as 9-11 was an act of Jihad.

This was never a war on “terrorism.”

We are at war with the Jihadists. They are waging Jihad against us and that takes many forms:

• Outright military confict (see Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs)

• Insurgency (See Iraq, Afghanistan, Algeria, Thailand, Philippines, Pakistan, India, Somalia, Yemen, and others)

• Terrorism (9-11, Subway bombings in Spain, Bombings in the UK, Mumbai, etc)

• Individual acts of violent Jihad (DC sniper, LAX shooting, perhaps (but not certain) Ft. Hood)

• Financial Jihad (zakat payments to Islamic charities which, by Islamic Shariah law, must fund Jihad, Sharia-Compliant Finance)

•Civilizational Jihad (peaceful methods, such as political influence operations (Muslim Bortherhood fronts such as CAIR, ISNA), mass immigration, lawfare, imposing Islamic customs on the West (insisting we play by their rules))

ALL OF THIS IS JIHAD. JIHAD IS THE KEY. WE SHOULD NOT GET WRAPPED UP IN TRYING TO CLASSIFY IT IN OUR OWN VERNACULAR. ORIENT ON THE ENEMY’S DOCTRINE AND LEARN HOW HE THINKS AND ACTS.

IT’S JIHAD.