Another blow to the “poverty-causes-terrorism” angle. And, as with the case of the MIT jihadist, it underscores how little attention is given to the question of who our own educational institutions may be equipping with knowledge they can later use to attack us.
“They are engineering ‘jihad’,” by Robin David for Times News Network, August 22:
AHMEDABAD: Many of those accused of planning and executing the serial blasts of Ahmedabad do not come from stereotypical backgrounds generally associated with terrorists – uneducated men from poor families. They are educated men with some form of technical training.
While this may surprise many, a recent study by two scholars from Oxford University says this is only part of a larger international trend. They have found that over the years, those with engineering degrees are over-represented in Islamic terror organisation.
Among the SIMI men Safdar Nagori is a mechanical engineer. Although, the man behind the ‘Indian Mujahideen’ terror email Abdul Subhan Qureshi alias Taufique is considered a computer whiz. Iqbal Shaikh holds an ITI diploma in electrical engineering while Gyasuddin Ansari has an ITI diploma in radio technology.
Sociologists Diego Gambetta and Steffen Hertog compiled a list of 404 members of violent Islamist groups.