At last week’s meeting of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism And Responses to Terrorism, DHS Science and Technology Directorate Undersecretary Reginald Brothers announced the completion of a department-wide Countering Violent Extremism strategy.
By Dr. Doron Pely
Looking at the recent wave of attacks in Israel, one of the most prominent common denominators is that most perpetrators were not affiliated with an organized group and they chose their targets on the basis of “Target of Most Loathing” criteria.
The United States has a problem with violent extremism. We are seeing an accelerating trend in the occurrence of violence driven by extremist ideology. Our current approaches to this problem are insufficient; new solutions are needed. Enter the University of Southern California Safe Communities Institute (SCI).
After the shooting at a movie theater in Lafayette, Louisiana, there is a desire to neatly categorize an attack and define why someone would commit such a heinous act. The challenge, however, is that legal terms like “hate crime” and “terrorism” belie a deeper truth: these kinds of actions are instances of homegrown violent extremism.
The proposed Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) Act of 2015 (H.R. 2899) could benefit from a bit more study and debate. The bill would create a CVE Office within DHS, filling a hole that should not exist in DHS. It was not always this way.
The House Homeland Security Committee held a hearing on what the federal government is doing to counter terrorism; the Committee also passed the Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) Act of 2015. Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) is yet another acronym in the fight against terrorism and perhaps another chance to get it right.
Last week, there was yet another ideologically motivated attack in America, complete with a manifesto and racist, symbol-laden photos posted to the Internet. The shooting at the Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston is a textbook example of homegrown violent extremism (HVE).
On Wednesday, a shooter entered the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, killing 9 people who had gathered for Bible study. The FBI has classified the attack as a “hate crime.” Why has this horrific attack been immediately characterized as a hate crime and not as an act of terrorism?
By Dr. Doron Pely
Those following the evolution and expansion of ISIS over the past few years find themselves often bewildered by the pace and rate of success demonstrated by a supposedly young, inexperienced band of ideologues. Yet, the similarity is uncanny between what is happening now with ISIS and what happened 1,400 years ago, as Mohammad founded Islam and set about consolidating and expanding the power and reach of the new religion.
The United States faces a range of terrorist threats. Foreign terrorist organizations pose a grave threat to U.S. security, but even as we are looking outside American borders, we must not forget the persistent threat from homegrown violent extremism. Security Debrief contributor Dr. Erroll Southers recently gave a TedX Talk on this ongoing threat from domestic terrorism.
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