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Non-Muslims Carried Out More than 90% of All Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Soil
An FBI report shows that only a small percentage of terrorist attacks carried out on U.S. soil between 1980 and 2005 were perpetrated by Muslims.
Princeton University’s Loon Watch compiled the following chart from the FBI’s data (as explained below, this chart is over-simplified … and somewhat inaccurate):
Terrorist Attacks on U.S. Soil by Group, From 1980 to 2005, According to FBI DatabaseAccording to this data, there were more Jewish acts of terrorism within the United States than Islamic (7% vs 6%). These radical Jews committed acts of terrorism in the name of their religion. These were not terrorists who happened to be Jews; rather, they were extremist Jews who committed acts of terrorism based on their religious passions, just like Al-Qaeda and company.
(The chart is misleading in several ways. For example, it labels "Extreme Left Wing Groups" and "Communists", but not "Extreme Right Wing Groups" or "Fascists". It should have either discarded all partisan labels, or included labels for both ends of the spectrum. In addition, "Latinos" is misleading, as Loonwatch is actually referring to Puerto Rican separatist groups, Cuban exile groups and the like. However, as shown below, many of the basic concepts are correct.)
U.S. News and World Report noted in February of this year:
Of the more than 300 American deaths from political violence and mass shootings since 9/11, only 33 have come at the hands of Muslim-Americans, according to the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security. The Muslim-American suspects or perpetrators in these or other attempted attacks fit no demographic profile—only 51 of more than 200 are of Arabic ethnicity. In 2012, all but one of the nine Muslim-American terrorism plots uncovered were halted in early stages. That one, an attempted bombing of a Social Security office in Arizona, caused no casualties.
Wired reported the same month:
Since 9/11, [Charles Kurzman, Professor of Sociology at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, writing for the Triangle Center on Terrorism and National Security] and his team tallies, 33 Americans have died as a result of terrorism launched by their Muslim neighbors. During that period, 180,000 Americans were murdered for reasons unrelated to terrorism. In just the past year, the mass shootings that have captivated America’s attention killed 66 Americans, “twice as many fatalities as from Muslim-American terrorism in all 11 years since 9/11,” notes Kurzman’s team.
Law enforcement, including “informants and undercover agents,” were involved in “almost all of the Muslim-American terrorism plots uncovered in 2012,” the Triangle team finds. That’s in keeping with the FBI’s recent practice of using undercover or double agents to encourage would-be terrorists to act on their violent desires and arresting them when they do — a practice critics say comes perilously close to entrapment. A difference in 2012 observed by Triangle: with the exception of the Arizona attack, all the alleged plots involving U.S. Muslims were “discovered and disrupted at an early stage,” while in the past three years, law enforcement often observed the incubating terror initiatives “after weapons or explosives had already been gathered.”
The sample of Muslim Americans turning to terror is “vanishingly small,” Kurzman tells Danger Room. Measuring the U.S. Muslim population is a famously inexact science, since census data don’t track religion, but rather “country of origin,” which researchers attempt to use as a proxy. There are somewhere between 1.7 million and seven million American Muslims, by most estimates, and Kurzman says he operates off a model that presumes the lower end, a bit over 2 million. That’s less a rate of involvement in terrorism of less than 10 per million, down from a 2003 high of 40 per million, as detailed in the chart above.
Yet the scrutiny by law enforcement and homeland security on American Muslims has not similarly abated. The FBI tracks “geomaps” of areas where Muslims live and work, regardless of their involvement in any crime. The Patriot Act and other post-9/11 restrictions on government surveillance remain in place. The Department of Homeland Security just celebrated its 10th anniversary. In 2011, President Obama ordered the entire federal national-security apparatus to get rid of counterterrorism training material that instructed agents to focus on Islam itself, rather than specific terrorist groups.
Kurzman doesn’t deny that law enforcement plays a role in disrupting and deterring homegrown U.S. Muslim terrorism. His research holds it out as a possible explanation for the decline. But he remains surprised by the disconnect between the scale of the terrorism problem and the scale — and expense — of the government’s response.
“Until public opinion starts to recognize the scale of the problem has been lower than we feared, my sense is that public officials are not going to change their policies,” Kurzman says. “Counterterrorism policies have involved surveillance — not just of Muslim-Americans, but of all Americans, and the fear of terrorism has justified intrusions on American privacy and civil liberties all over the internet and other aspects of our lives. I think the implications here are not just for how we treat a religious minority in the U.S., but also how we treat the rights & liberties of everyone.”
We agree. And so do most Americans. Indeed – as we’ve previously documented – you’re more likely to die from brain-eating parasites, alcoholism, obesity, medical errors, risky sexual behavior or just about anything other than terrorism.
Kurzman told the Young Turks in February that Islamic terrorism “doesn’t even count for 1 percent” of the 180,000 murders in the US since 9/11.
While the Boston marathon bombings were horrific, a top terrorism expert says that the Boston attack was more like Columbine than 9/11, and that the bombers are “murderers not terrorists”. The overwhelming majority of mass shootings were by non-Muslims. (This is true in Europe, as well as in the U.S.)
However you classify them – murder or terrorism – the Boston bombings occurred after all of the statistical analysis set forth above. Moreover, different groups have different agendas about how to classify the perpetrators (For example, liberal Mother Jones and conservative Breitbart disagree on how many of the perpetrators of terror attacks can properly be classified as right wing extremists.)
So we decided to look at the most current statistics for ourselves, to do an objective numerical count not driven by any agenda.
Specifically, we reviewed all of the terrorist attacks on U.S. soil as documented by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START). (2012). Global Terrorism Database, as retrieved from http://www.start.umd.edu/gtd.
The START Global Terrorism Database spans from 1970 through 2012 (and will be updated from year-to-year), and – as of this writing – includes 104,000 terrorist incidents. As such, it is the most comprehensive open-source database open to the public.
We counted up the number of terrorist attacks carried out by Muslims. We excluded attacks by groups which are obviously not Muslims, such as the Ku Klux Klan, Medellin Drug Cartel, Irish Republican Army, Anti-Castro Group, Mormon extremists, Vietnamese Organization to Exterminate Communists and Restore the Nation, Jewish Defense League, May 19 Communist Order, Chicano Liberation Front, Jewish Armed Resistance, American Indian Movement, Gay Liberation Front, Aryan Nation, Jewish Action Movement, National Front for the Liberation of Cuba, or Fourth Reich Skinheads.
We counted attacks by Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Black American Moslems, or anyone who even remotely sounded Muslim … for example anyone from Palestine, Lebanon or any other Arab or Muslim country, or any name including anything sounding remotely Arabic or Indonesian (like “Al” anything or “Jamaat” anything).
If we weren’t sure what the person’s affiliation was, we looked up the name of the group to determine whether it could in any way be connected to Muslims.
Based on our review of the approximately 2,400 terrorist attacks on U.S. soil contained within the START database, we determined that approximately 60 were carried out by Muslims.
In other words, approximately 2.5% of all terrorist attacks on U.S. soil between 1970 and 2012 were carried out by Muslims.* This is a tiny proportion of all attacks.
(We determined that approximately 118 of the terror attacks - or 4.9% - were carried out by Jewish groups such as Jewish Armed Resistance, the Jewish Defense League, Jewish Action Movement, United Jewish Underground and Thunder of Zion. This is almost twice the percentage of Islamic attacks within the United States. In addition, there were approximately 168 attacks - or 7% - by anti-abortion activists, who tend to be Christian. Fuerzas Armadas de Liberacion Nacional - a Puerto Rican paramilitary organization - carried out more than 120 bomb attacks on U.S. targets between 1974 and 1983, and there were some 41 attacks by Cuban exiles, and a number of attacks by other Latin American groups. If we look at worldwide attacks - instead of just attacks on U.S. soil - Sunni Muslims are the main perpetrators of terrorism. However: 1. Muslims are also the main victims of terror attacks worldwide; and 2. the U.S. backs the most radical types of Sunnis over more moderate Muslims and Arab secularists.)
Moreover, another study undertaken by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism – called ”Profiles of Perpetrators of Terrorism in the United States” – found:
Between 1970 and 2011, 32 percent of the perpetrator groups were motivated by ethnonationalist/separatist agendas, 28 percent were motivated by single issues, such as animal rights or opposition to war, and seven percent were motivated by religious beliefs. In addition, 11 percent of the perpetrator groups were classified as extreme right-wing, and 22 percent were categorized as extreme left-wing.
Preliminary findings from PPT-US data between 1970 and 2011 also illustrate a distinct shift in the dominant ideologies of these terrorist groups over time, with the proportion of emerging ethnonationalist/separatist terrorist groups declining and the proportion of religious terrorist groups increasing. However, while terrorist groups with religious ideologies represent 40 percent of all emergent groups from 2000-2011 (two out of five), they only account for seven percent of groups over time.
Similarly, a third study by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism Religion found that religion alone is not a key factor in determining which terrorists want to use weapons of mass destruction:
The available empirical data show that there is not a significant relationship between terrorist organizations’ pursuit of CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear) weapons and the mere possession of a religious ideology, according to a new quantitative study by START researchers Victor Asal, Gary Ackerman and Karl Rethemeyer.
Therefore, Muslims are not more likely than other groups to want to use WMDs.
* The Boston marathon bombing was not included in this analysis, as START has not yet updated its database to include 2013 terrorist attacks. 3 people died in the Boston attack. While tragic, we are confident that non-Musliims killed more than 3 during this same period.
We are not experts in terrorism analysis. We would therefore defer to people like Kurzman on the exact number. However, every quantitative analysis of terrorism in the U.S. we have read shows that the percent of terror attacks carried out by Muslims is far less than 10%.
Postscript: State-sponsored terrorism is beyond the scope of this discussion, and was not included in our statistical analysis. Specifically, the following arguments are beyond the scope of this discussion, as we are focusing solely on non-state terrorism:
- Arguments by University of Michigan Professor Juan Cole that deaths from 20th century wars could be labeled Christian terrorism
- Arguments that our recent use of torture and double tap drone strikes are terrorism
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Dan, how do you explain the US and Europe funds the djihadists in Syria, and did it in Lybia, a state that did not apply Islamic law (but now has it) ? You are the useful idiot, really.
andrew, which USA do you mean? USSA, the idea of USA , per Mr Bush? the elite NWO USA? the FBI CIA DHS NSA usa? how about USA circa 1800?
Same as "the Muslims". Sunnism ? Shiism ? Wahabism ? I like the trolls voting down, but not answering questions :) ANDREEEEEW, WHY THE US HELPED TO IMPLEMENT SHARIA IN LYBIA, WHYYYYYYY... And why the zionist Bernard-Henry Levy said publicly, after having pushed for war in Lybia, that what happened is good for Israel ? Why why why ? Because Israel need islamic terrorism to pursue its expansion and justify all its slaughters of the Palestinians, and the US need terrrorism to justify its imperialism. Simple.
Our extremists are more extreme than your extremists!
Mr. Washington,
First, thank you for all the work you share with us. Your submissions are always thought-provoking. Even though I may disagree with the conclusions, I appreciate the argument.
This article would have been more effective if the study by Loon Watch had been more fully dissected. Lead the reader to your conclusion. As it is written, a skeptic bristles against your argument as an appeal to authority.
Loon Watch may have impeccable credentials, but this audience will not accept poorly constructed rhetoric.
Good luck.
The first thing you have to do for me is define a terrorist attack, that chart is otherwise meaningless. I would also like to see how many of each were charged and convicted. This guy is soiling a great mans name.
Terrorist Attack = Crime committed by non-muslim. Now the article makes sense.
Whoever down arrowed you is a fool. Considering that the Ft Hood shootings were reclassified as workplace violence instead of Sudden Jihad Syndrome, I would say your statement is valid. Agree about Brietbart as well, could not care less what the spoon bangers think.
Banksters along with the MIC carried out 95% of all terrorist attacks on US soil and continue to do so.
DHS: "Come out with your hands up! We need to search your home. There are some muslims running around here, you know, raghead terrorists. ON THE GROUND! We need to protect you. In order to protect you we need to search your home without warrant. You need to do what we say, I SAID HANDS UP!! Don't protest or we will arrest you. We need to take away your guns too, for your safety and everyone elses. Where's your computer, we'll need that for evidence to see what websites you've been visiting. You got any black powder or pressure cookers? Nails? BBs? Food storage? Solar panels? Yes? YOU ARE A THREAT! Listen, do you frequent ZeroHedge? YES? ON THE GROUND! Mind if I just pluck a little hair off you? So, like I was sayin', you know that whole bill of rights thing? Well, FORGET IT! You have no rights. Sorry, it's for the greater good, for your protection and safety. For everyone's safety. Don't you feel safe? By the way, who's this Miranda person you keep talking about? Is that your girlfriend or something? Where is she? WHERE IS SHE?! She's a threat, because she knows you, and you're a threat.
Voice coming over DHS agents radio: "Hey, this guy has a garden! Yeah, he's obviously preparing for something because he doesn't trust the government. This has GUILTY written all over it. Wait, he's got RAIN BARRELS TOO! HOLY SHIT, cuff him.
Citizen: Why do you need to protect me from the muslims?
DHS: Because they are terrorists, all of them, and they hate America.
Citizen: But why are they all terrorists that hate America?
DHS: They hate you for your freedoms. Now come with me, we have a DNA match. Hey, hey, ever want to be famous? Look at the terrorist list tomorrow, HA HA HA HA!
If they hate us for our freedoms, soon they will have no reason to hate us.
funny how every george washington article is about how the usa sucks....and not in a productive self analysing way. the usa sucks the usa is a corrupt country...on and on about how everything in the usa is crap. funny but most of the world still wants to live in th eusa...? every article is meant to make americans get pissed about their own country....but what country is old george from...?
well he is hiding his identity so we cant tell...is he canadian, american, east block wall street hypster..?
he also never puts any critical thought in how the situation could be fixed. every articles sole purpose is to basicly destroy the usa. bring it down. cause its citizens to be pissed or not trust their government....classic bullshit propaganda.
i will take george seriously when we know who he is and what his REAL motivations are.....you know who he really reminds me of. jim cramer on cnbc. was it the rockwell group ? or rock'something' ...big naked short sellers. i get the feeling george has a huge naked short position on and this is one of a dozen identities trying to rock the boat.
but dont take my word for it..just a hint......check out the new york court system for some of the charges filed and ...
Fuck You and Fuck the Mussies you apologist Cocksucker.
Gringo apologist!
Yes, terrorisn is a real threat - from THE U.S. GOVERNMENT. The US government is the biggest terrorist on earth. That pie chart would be more accurate if it had 100% US Government.
Your statement is objectively true:
By Any Measure, the U.S. Is the Largest Sponsor of Terror
Our drone attacks are not terrorism; Obambi said so himself that he agonizes over every decision, and does only the minimum necessary to keep us safe.
Enough with the sarcasm. The power of the US government and the way it uses it does, in fact, make me uneasy. Certainly the last few administrations have not conformed to the warnings of the founders of this republic regarding foreign entanglements, and their actions at home are equally disturbing. That said, how one determines the 'largest sponsor of terror' is so vague as to be meaningless. How many people have died in the US as a result of the US government's actions? How many hvae died in Chicago as a result of the local governments' inactions? Do murders that are not politically inspired count? And if we look worldwide, how many deaths are attributable to US-sponsored terror, and how many are attributable to intraIslamic terror?
Statistics can be used to 'prove' almost anything, and this article falls into that category.
Yeah, totally. Thanks George.
Which do you think is being involved in such applications? The American people, the American Government, or the American Banksters?
Pens,
Holy shit people. You really come out the woodworks don't you. I thought the ignorance on a Yahoo article pertaining to latest DNA hoax was ridiculous. People screaming to hang the wife, the mother, the sons, that they don't have any rights, and why the fuck is she still wearing a rag on her head. I come to Zero to get truth and rationale. Most of the screaming angst against all muslims need to get the fuck off this site and go to yahoo and comment on those articles with like minded people. This here site is for truth, not saliva regurgitated by flies that have been caught in the spider's web. You all are suckers. Flies. This site isn't for sweeping generalizations and racism based on the propaganda that has taken over your brain. Any of you who are screaming against muslims are stupid fucking dupes that have been duped by TPTB. That is exactly how they want you thinking. You are the puppets and you will fullfill their destiny. The fucking CIA is in charge of this operation people, not muslims. The CIA sets up NGOs as fronts for their operations in other countries, then they recruit native people who protest against said countries governments, then they have those people commit "terrorist" acts to destabilize said governments, then said governments calls these "terrorists" "radical Islam terrorists". Even if said "terrorists" aren't radical Islam terrorists and are merely rebelling for their cause against their tyrannical gubmint. Then, when it suits them, the CIA has these "radical Islam terrorists" commit to taking part in a "training exercise" which so happens to be a "training exercise" against America. Then, unknowingly, they are at the scene of the crime and all of a sudden become patsies for some other agenda. The boston bombers were working for the CIA. They weren't receiving welfare, they were getting paid. They were recruited in Chechnya to commit "terror" against Russia and destabilize Russia's efforts to regain Chechnya and the other surrounding countries, georgia etc. Then they were given assylum in America, then they were told to take part in this "training exorcise" in Boston. Then they became patsies.
You people need to get squared (stop being duped and repeating the meme of the three letter words) or we will never get anywhere. George is right. The real terrorists are not muslim "terrorists", they are only manipulated, JUST LIKE YOU DIPWADS, the real terrorists go by the name of Three Letter Acronym.
No matter who shows up on this chart you can bet your bottom silver dollar they were associated with a three letter acronym.
Stop being a fly.
Youtube, or it didn't happen.
Most if not all of the Muslims I have met in America and abroad are family oriented, nice and peaceful people. There are always exceptions in each group of people where there are some bad apples. Those I have met on a very close basis are hardworking, generous and kind so given my direct contact with them, these facts make perfect sense. This includes extensive travel in Paris, London and Amsterdam which have heavy concentrations of Muslim Arabic people.
I expect to be hated for writing this and that will demonstrate the propaganda coming out of the American Media sewers and how it molds little minds.
I mostly agree with you about the actions of the vast majority of Muslims. I only downarrowed you because you expected to be hated, and I wanted to help fulfill your expectations.
That said, how many of the foundational documents of the world's major religions call, repeatedly, for murdering nonbelievers? How many advocate deception when in a position of inferiority (in numbers, that is) and require outright domination when feasible? Compare the Koran (Islam), New Testament (Christianity) and Torah (Judaism). If Buddhists or Hindus have such, what do those documents say?
There is nothing in the New Testament that advocates murder of all nonbelievers. In the Torah, only certain specific groups were singled out for complete extermination. In the Koran? We know the answer to that.
We'd better hope that those nonviolent Muslims of whom you wrote do not become too observant in those musderous aspects of their religion.
How nice, peaceful, or family oriented most Muslim Americans are is irrelevant. What matters is (1) Will they report another Muslim in their community who may be affiliated with violent Jihad? Some will, perhaps more than would in any other country, but all too many just look the other way and pretend not to see anything. (2) Do they send financial support to foreign Islamic terrorists or their front organizations? Given that nearly all major "Islamic Charities" are really just front organizations that support the Palestinians or some other Jihad around the world, this might be a very big problem. (3) If they had anything near a majority, would they vote to impose Islamic rule on the country they live in? This could be the biggest problem with Muslims of all. It is certainly relevant in Europe where their numbers are much greater than in the USA, and their birthrates combined with high rates of immigration and conversion could give them majorities in some places within the next half-century.
Islam is a religion of peace. A piece of leg; a piece of arm; a piece of skull....
By "non-muslims" do you mean the saudi royal family?
Saudi "royal family" are nothing but PUPPETS/SLAVES of the US Government.
Can't believe you would write this tripe those dusty goat fucking cave dwellers want to take over the world and subject us all to their B.S. shria law wake up fool.....maybe with help from the likes of you they can do it before the banksters.....
Good example of how pitiful American journalism is.
Got to love the average vote. GW made people face a different reality that they hated.
The people that voted down...lashing out in denial of their favoured meme, perpetuated by TPTB and MSM...that Muslim = terrorist in waiting, Arab = terrorist in waiting. In the 1930s it was the Jews villified as a group.
Maybe one day China will play the same game as the US TPTB, and villifiy Christians as a group to be auto associated with terrorism/evil. What works for one will work for another.
The US government and the MSM are already villifying Christianity, right here in the US, with their anti-terrorist training documents, poltical correctness, etc. The Chines already persecute Christians in the People's Republic.
If Christians start screaming "death to the Chinese" and set off bombs and shooting people while screaming "Jesus Loves You" then they are likely making the right choice, especially if we remaining christians don't go about killing and imprisoning the perpetrators of such bullshit.
Which category is Timothy Mcveigh and the unibomber in? Others?
In Timmys case does that mean "others" includes the FBI and ATF?
OK city wasn't a terrorist attack. It was an attack on the federal government in retaliation for Waco and Ruby Ridge. It was not intended to terrorize the general populace. That is the case with so many of the things considered terrorist attacks in this idiotic analysis. Look at the attacks made by environmental extremists. Nothing directed at the general populace - it is all directed against specific targets directly connected with something the attackers consider evil. So, too, with pro-life attacks - specifically directed at people directly connected with what the attackers consider evil. Even the Ft. Hood massacre by Major Hasan wasn't a terrorist attack. It was an attack on people specifically identified by the attacker as an enemy. Exploding a bomb among the general public is designed precisely to terrorize a population. It is the definition of terrorism.
Right wing apologist. At least have the balls and stand up for what you believe. You support terrorism. Say it, if you believe it. Relish what you are.
PS. OK day care center might not agree with your defn of terrorism.
Liberal!
Grinch: "You're an idiot"!
Echo: "You're an idiot"!
Grinch: "I'm an idiot"!
Echo: "You're an idiot"!
Grinch: "OK, fine, I'm just going to whisper so that by the time my voice reverberates back to me I won't be able to hear it".
Echo: "You're an idiot"!
Take you left/right ideologies elsewhere, idiot.
SO,
Will the people start acting like a people with a mindset to adapt and bring back what the American people once was?
Re Juan Cole and Christian violence in the 20th century:
Really?
The assertion would be funny if it was not so apalling...
Repeat a lie often enough and people will begin to accept it as truth.
It is always a sweet fruit on the Tree of Truth to find when one comes across a page like this.
http://alcuinbramerton.blogspot.com/
More and more we see the greater of truth tellers, writers, and listeners waking up to the out right corruption and criminality. Some are actually making a difference by stepping up to the plate and speaking their truth. Many thanks and supportive energies to those who speak out against the crashing corrupted empire of dust.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/04/29/obama-administration-official...
Imagine if the criminal at the top of the US pyramid was impeached for his continuing role in the Benghazi cover-up and more, thus putting an immediate halt to the bankster warmonger crimes, and all those billions that are spent on useless endless wars, and all the billions spent on the DHS gestapo, and all the overpay of the criminals that call themselves leaders was all spent on rebuilding everything in America. Imagine all the jobs that could be created if we simply went back to organics, and the proudly Made in the USA mindset. Imagine not sending American kids to war for the banksters any more, and teaching them to grow good foods instead?
Yeah, let's impeach Obama. I'm sure President Biden would clean up all this corruption.
Biden is Obama's insurance policy. No matter how bad he is I don't think anyone could see Biden as better.
Where is JOYFUL? I fully expected a cameo knife in the back.
Not late enough I guess ;-)
Fuck you "george muslim washington"
I call bullshit on GW for this one. when you die from a brain eating parasite, it probably won't blow the legs off of a baby in a stroller.
spend 5 minutes at http://www.barenakedislam.com/ and see if you still feel that Islam is more peaceful than we think.
This article disgusts me
Once could look at the pie chart and use that as justification for opposing the latest immigration bill. Look at all those Latino bad guys!.
I think this article would make more sense if:
1. The whole range of violent acts by type and number were shown
2. Then break down what percentage of each type of violence was perpetrated by each ethnic group
3. Then show what percentage of the population each ethnic group accounts for.
4. Superimpose the whole lot and see which group accounts for an inordinate amount of violence for each type of violence given its share of the population and share of the violence.
So for example (and it is only an example) if Latinos accounted for 60% of killings but only 40% of the population you could draw some conclusions about a problem in their communities.