The drama in Toulouse is over with the death of Mohammed Merah. One would have wished that Merah could have been captured alive to spill out his murderous and hateful links. However, this is not a strange trail to be tracked. The 23-year-old Merah came to France from Algeria (or could have been born in France to an immigrant family from the North Africa), grew up (in slums?) and educated in Toulouse. During this period he got in touch with propagandists and Al-Qaeda recruiters who are always on hunt to catch the young blood by projecting suffering of Muslims at the hands of Christians and Jewish forces. He was smuggled into Afghanistan (perhaps through Pakistan), got training in the lawless mountainous tribal terrain between Afghanistan and Pakistan, caught in action and jailed but escaped in a mass jail breakout organized by Taliban. Apparently, he managed to get back to France and was under surveillance for some time.
Looking for something familiar in the above trail – occupation of Palestine, undesired wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, uncontrolled access on the internet enjoyed by propagandists to lure young faithful to fight for Al-Qaeda or its splinter groups, availability of unsupervised access in mosques, madrassahs and other places of worship to such groups to exploit the sufferings of Palestinians and other such nations wherein wars have been waged by the West, lawless tribal areas between Afghanistan and Pakistan for training and grooming of terrorists – it’s a vicious cycle going on for years. With the advent of travelling ease and communication facilities this fire is now touching every other household on this planet; are we ready to break this cycle of violence in the name of religion, intolerance and hatred?
MASOOD KHAN
Jubail, Saudi Arabia