Radical groups in Syria have for years waged a slick campaign to recruit Westerners by appealing to their sense of religious duty and by assuring them that despite all evidence to the contrary, war isn’t so tough.
Recruiters have referred to the fight in Syria as “five-star jihad,” with impressionable would-be fighters promised ample accommodations, fine food, money and brides. Some recruitment materials have featured smiling fighters holding kittens.
—Karla Adam, The Washington Post
Adam’s article, entitled Westerners Fighting in Syria Disillusioned With Islamic State But Can’t Come Home, is about disillusioned young Britons fighting in Syria.
Apparently some “experts” studying these young adults say some of them are not hardened jihadists — if they were offered a deradicalization program and were carefully monitored by MI5, they could be a powerful weapon against jihadist recruitment efforts in Muslim neighborhoods.
My guess it would be a hard sell to politicians and the British public. What do you think?
September 13, 2014
If I had anything to do with it, I would not touch them with a barge pole leave alone allow them to return.
I doubt that the public would go along with the idea.
Try whatever to find something that works.
It will be interesting to see what happens.
I’m sure it would be a hard sell.
It would also be entirely sane and sensible.
One would have to be sure that the screening process worked.