After the tragic attack in Paris, a discussion that is ongoing in many Western countries, including Europe and the U.S., has come to the forefront. An issue that is discussed from time to time as a peripheral subject has now made its way to the top of the agenda. This change has two meanings. The West will lean toward one side on this matter. It will have to make a decision and implement it.
What really matters will be the kind of relationship Europe and the rest of the Western world will develop in terms of terrorism, security and liberties. Certainly there will be a change, but it is a matter of debate whether this change will imply a reasonable and rational security strategy or whether negative or positive deeply-rooted structural alterations should be introduced.
Of course, no one can object to France or any other country that feels under threat in completing some wanting points in their duties to protect their citizens' lives and making some regulations regarding it. As you may recall, some 51 citizens were killed in the terrorist attacks that took place in Turkey last October and after that the government enacted a legislation that regulates security measures. Even though I object to some of the articles in that legislation, its security and freedom balance was at an acceptable level, in general. However, it is possible and required for the Jan. 7 incident to force some deeply-rooted alterations in the West. We can only hope these alterations are positive ones.What kind of alterations can we hope for?
Of course, we do not want France and other Western countries to be caught up in a security hysteria similar to the post-9/11 syndrome, which brought about cross-border operations enforced by the Bush doctrine. Another unfavorable change is an inclination toward isolative or discriminative policies against Muslim citizens since it would not be of any help and also lead to the collapse of the EU project with the empowerment of movements such as the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West (PEGIDA) or Le Pen's Front National.
The striking oddness of the latest attack also raised doubts over the possibility that this incident might simply be a provocation. Many reports and articles making certain allegations have caught the eye in Western media. No matter whether it is a provocation or a "natural" attack, the potential political consequences of this incident will surely be considered. Just as the Muslim world is called to look at itself in the mirror, those making these calls should also make the same recommendation to the Western countries as well, if they truly seek consistency.
It should be questioned how the Kuoachi brothers and Coullbaly, who are French citizens, were persuaded to organize such an attack. What kind of negativities could lead to such a violent act? If this is only the case for a few people, maybe it could be considered from a different perspective. However, the participation of thousands of Western citizens in the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham's (ISIS) attacks clearly demonstrates that there is a social problem in these countries. It would be easy to charge Islam for that. However, we have to abstain from attributing the terrorist attacks to a certain nation or a religion. If we do not regard the Bosnian genocide as Orthodox, the Breivik massacre as Protestant, the unjust Iraqi invasion as Evangelist and the Gaza massacres as Jewish, the explanation of these attacks with Islam would be senseless and even lead to the rise of racist behavior.
The West has serious problems in its approach to the Middle East and the Muslims living in their territories. The lack of justice, double standards, obsessions such as the assumption that only a single civilization, the West, deserves respect, and the inconsistencies in their approach to the Middle East, in terms of democracy also help cause great breakages in the Islamic world. Blocking the political means of Ikhwan in Egypt and Hamas in Palestine has led to the collapse of civil politics in those regions and the accumulated energy to be invested in agents promoting violence.
I hope the changes will create solutions to these problems and there are efforts to resolve them in a peaceful way. I do not want to think about the contrary situation because the world needs a Europe that will guide the world in democracy and set an example in terms of multiculturalism.
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