How did these Islamists gain such a purchase? After the 9/11 attacks, America’s security state expanded in size and scope. Abroad, the Bush administration launched the “Global War on Terror”, and invaded Afghanistan to eliminate the Al Qaeda culprits. At home, the focus became on eradicating the ideological justification for murdering thousands of Americans. As the government developed an understanding of Jihad, and Islamist ideology, two narratives emerged. The first was that we were battling a set of ideas; and the second was that it was that the criminal justice system could cleanly delineate between extreme speech and violent violations of rights, on a case-by-case basis.
Had neoconservatives persisted, America may have rolled its tanks into Saudi Arabia — where the money, men, and ideas came from. Instead, we made a mess of Iraq, entering under false pretences that Sadam Hussein had his finger on the button of weapons of mass destruction. Foreign policy misadventures there, and in Libya and Syria, led Americans to grow sceptical of their mission to “make the world safe for democracy”. Meanwhile, the criminal justice system accrued extra powers with the PATRIOT Act, and turned the panoptical lens of the intelligence agencies on American citizens. The checks and balances inherent in an actual war were dissolved, and rights were taken away that still have not been restored.
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This disbelief in the “regime change” by the American military, and scepticism of the scope of state surveillance, coincided with the rise of Wokeness and its predecessor, political correctness. Under President Obama, use of the term “radical Islam” was abandoned, with Obama saying “It makes Muslim-Americans feel like their government is betraying them. It betrays the very values America stands for”. In speeches, Obama sought to distinguish Islam from “those who distort Islam”, and said that “leaders like myself reject the notion that terrorists like ISIL genuinely represent Islam”. Addressing the Islamic Society of Baltimore, President Obama said:
“So let’s start with this fact: For more than a thousand years, people have been drawn to Islam’s message of peace. And the very word itself, Islam, comes from salam — peace. The standard greeting is as-salamu alaykum — peace be upon you. And like so many faiths, Islam is rooted in a commitment to compassion and mercy and justice and charity. Whoever wants to enter paradise, the Prophet Muhammad taught, “let him treat people the way he would love to be treated.” For Christians like myself, I’m assuming that sounds familiar. …
Here’s another fact: Islam has always been part of America. Starting in colonial times, many of the slaves brought here from Africa were Muslim. And even in their bondage, some kept their faith alive. A few even won their freedom and became known to many Americans. And when enshrining the freedom of religion in our Constitution and our Bill of Rights, our Founders meant what they said when they said it applied to all religions. …
Generations of Muslim Americans helped to build our nation. … We shouldn’t play into terrorist propaganda. And we can’t suggest that Islam itself is at the root of the problem. That betrays our values. It alienates Muslim Americans.”
In an effort to not offend religious minorities, and in the hopes of preventing the further alienation and radicalisation of American Muslims, the Obama administration was unwilling to acknowledge Islam as the primary source of global terrorism. This contaminated the procedures of state departments. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) employee Philip Haney revealed to The Hill that, before the failed Christmas Day flight bombing by Nigerian Islamist Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, DHS superiors had ordered him “to delete or modify several hundred records of individuals tied to designated Islamist terror groups like Hamas from the important federal database, the Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS).” This enforced ignorance hobbled America’s ability to monitor and prevent acts of Islamist terror.
In 2016, the outgoing administration disbanded the DHS’ National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (Nseers), which required citizens from 24 Muslim-majority countries to provide a photograph and fingerprints to enter the United States, and attend in-person interviews with DHS agents at scheduled intervals during their stay. Obama had already ceased Nseers operations in his first term, in 2011. The move was a premeditated effort to prevent the Trump administration from implementing a plan to “Bar the Entry of Potential Terrorists,” after then-candidate Trump promised a halt to all “Muslim immigration” into the United States. President Elect Trump promised to reinstate the travel ban from high-risk Islamist nations, and extend it to those in Gaza during the ongoing Israel/Hamas war. As of yet, no announcement has been made about reorienting the DHS to focus on thwarting Islamist plots.
America has a veritable rainforest of over 400 government agencies, but not one is dedicated to preventing Islamist terrorism. Of course, DHS initiatives like the National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS) and Community Awareness Briefings (CABs) have the monitoring of Islamism in their remit. But the DHS’ priorities have been drawn to more politically convenient issues for progressives in recent years. The priority became “White Supremacists,” ignoring the actual real and growing threat of radical Islam.
Of course, DHS initiatives like the National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS) and Community Awareness Briefings (CABs) have the monitoring of Islamism in their remit. But the DHS’ priorities have been drawn to more politically convenient issues for progressives in recent years. The priority became “White Supremacists,” ignoring the actual real and growing threat of radical Islam.
In 2021, Rep. Jamie Raskin questioned the DHS on how its Office for Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) and Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) divisions might better “shift domestic terrorism resources away from communities of color to right-wing groups that have shown a far greater propensity to commit acts of terrorism”. He was told that “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists, including white supremacists, likely will remain the most lethal DVE threat in the United States.” Raskin did not ask any questions about Islamic extremists being a priority for the DVE. Instead, he asked how “how you are ensuring that CP3 will not disproportionately invest resources in Muslim communities and other communities of colors that were the usual targets of CVE programs.”
As a result, in CP3’s 2024 report to Congress, none of the 1,172 cases opened in the TVTP Grant Program cite Islamism or political Islam as an ideological factor.
More attention is paid to “Animal Rights”, “Incel”, and “Islamophobic” violence than the primary ideology responsible for acts of terror around the world.
(Rep. Raskin also appears to think this surveillance is only “illegal” or unwarranted when conducted on Muslim immigrants and non-White Americans, whereas it is completely justified when done to suspected “White supremacists” — a label Raskin applies liberally to President Trump’s supporters.)
Likewise, the FBI were criticised by Republicans on the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government in 2023, after whistleblower Kyle Seraphin revealed the FBI’s Richmond Field Office issued a memorandum targeting “radical-traditionalist Catholics”, and advising agents to infiltrate Catholic churches as a form of “threat mitigation.” Sources cited included the Southern Poverty Law Center, Salon, and The Atlantic — outlets polluted by radical progressivism in recent years. There have been precisely zero Catholic terror attacks in America. Why are intelligence agencies demonising law-abiding Christians, while remaining wilfully blind to the Jihadists plotting intifada within the United States?
While the media urges us to focus on “white supremacy”, or the psychological problems, marital status, and employment difficulties of terror suspects, I see the hidden hand of a weakened global Islamist network. Iran has its back up against the wall, and so sows the seed of instability against its strengthening Western neighbours. The Biden administration withdrew Trump’s UN letters which imposed sanctions on Tehran, and unfroze $10 billion in “humanitarian” aid to Iran in 2023 — enabling them to allocate an identical share of their budget to sponsoring global terrorism. After October 7th, the administration again extended the waiver in November; and again in March 2024, after an Iranian-backed drone strike killed three U.S. servicemen in Jordan. As the incoming Trump administration looks to revive the Abraham Accords, and render Iran a pariah state in the Arab world, Ayatollah Khamenei may be doing all he can to finance Islamist groups and dormant Jihadists across the West.
While the media urges us to focus on “white supremacy”, or the psychological problems, marital status, and employment difficulties of terror suspects, I see the hidden hand of a weakened global Islamist network. Iran has its back up against the wall, and so sows the seed of instability against its strengthening Western neighbours.
As UAE journalist Amjad Taha has warned, Islamists will exploit America’s generous principle of freedom of speech and religion, guaranteed under the First Amendment, to convert mosques, madrassas, and military chaplains into radicalisation vectors. The Founding Fathers envisioned Constitutional rights as a compromise to settle the disputes between Christian denominations that the Puritan settlers had fled from in England. They did not envision a time in which political Islam would be advanced through Da’wah — a programme of ideological conquest through conversion and the legitimising of violence against non-believers.
As the Trump administration prepares to retake the most powerful office in the world, I urge them to consider this immutable fact: we are at war. Not just in a kinetic war with Islamists: it is in an ideological war. This war is not with the nearly two billion Muslims of the world, but rather with the ideology within the Islamic world that wants to destroy the West. This ideology is Islamism — something which Arab states like Saudi Arabia and the UAE have been wise enough to recognise. Islamism divides the world in two parts: dar al islam (peace) and dar al harb (war). According to radical Islam, if one is not Muslim and in the house of peace, one is out of the house and subject to war. This ideology has killed more Muslims than any other, hence their concern. This ideology seeks to replace existing governments, and replace them with the rule of seventh century Sharia Law, administered by the architects of a Caliphate. Jihadist groups use subversive means to recruit and indoctrinate American citizens of immigrant heritage, create sleeper agents, and activate them to commit terror attacks when Islamist nations are weakened by American and its allies. However, the rainforest of American bureaucracy seems to do all it can to deny that this war is going on. It refuses to draw the distinction between al Islam and al harb, because human rights have made bigotry and racism the worst possible crimes in the West. But, as Hasan believed, the U.S. “is [waging] a war on Islam.” If one’s enemies are already fighting, refusing to acknowledge the war has started is equivalent to a surrender.
To prosecute this war we need to identify the people and the organizations that are committed to this ideology. In our information-gathering we have identified many of them, and even destroyed some: al Qaeda and Isis, and we’ve gone after Boko Haram and Shabab in Somalia. We’ve engaged with our allies, such as Israel in their fight against Hamas. In fact, we must lean into the example set by Israel who alone among Western-styled nations understands the threat posed by radical Islam. Just as the Fathers fought the slavers of Tripoli and Algiers in the First Barbary War, the second Trump administration must allow no quarter for the Muslim Brotherhood and their acolytes in America.
The first priority for the Trump administration to disarm the terror threat posed by Islamists is to ban the Muslim Brotherhood, and any affiliated organisation, from operating in America. Their designation as a terrorist group is long overdue. This should have been done in 2004, when Khaled Sheikh Mohammed admitted that he had masterminded 9/11 after attending the Brotherhood’s training camps. President Trump promised Egypt’s President al-Sisi he would in 2019, but uncooperative Pentagon and DHS staff ensured that did not happen. Doing so now will defang the dragon of Da’wah, and prevent failed states like Iran from subverting America’s democratic, high-trust society. They must also leverage diplomatic pressure on NATO allies, like the UK, to do the same. If paired with reinstating sanctions on Iran, this could become an ideological and financial pincer-movement, which starves the global Islamist network of funds and room to manoeuvre.
The first priority for the Trump administration to disarm the terror threat posed by Islamists is to ban the Muslim Brotherhood, and any affiliated organisation, from operating in America. Their designation as a terrorist group is long overdue. This should have been done in 2004, when Khaled Sheikh Mohammed admitted that he had masterminded 9/11 after attending the Brotherhood’s training camps.
Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have already begun work in the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). They will meet resistance from entrenched bureaucrats in their ambition to cut at least $1 trillion in federal spending, starting 2026. Representatives have been dispatched to tame unruly agencies, including the Treasury Department, the Internal Revenue Service, and the Department of Homeland Security. If they want to make headway, they should start first with the intelligence agencies whose DEI policies and misplaced priorities allow Islamists like Jabbar to fly under their radar. The combined budget of discretionary spending on federal departments ($910 billion) and the Defense Department ($751 billion) is 6.6% of GDP. Depriving the DEI departments of funds will stop America’s disarmament against the Islamist threat. Given the CRS Director is a position appointed by the President, the Trump Administration must install someone who is prepared to defund them. They must also fire any personnel unwilling to comply with President Trump’s agenda. The FBI may have pre-emptively closed its DEI office, but the DEI agenda is endemic to the institution. Musk will meet resistance, and the heads of each department — DHS, CRS, DOJ — must remove all obstacles from his righteous path.
However, to fully extract the poison of Woke identity politics from American institutions, the Trump administration will also need to do the unpopular but necessary work of revisiting Title X of the Civil Rights Act (1964), and the Hate Crimes Prevention Act (2009). This legislation is cited as the pretext for why the CRS exists and engages with Islamist groups, to foster “Partnerships with Muslim Americans”. The short-term bad press will be worth the long-term security of American citizens. Doing so will invite accusations of seeking to “divide Americans” and “marginalise communities”. But America cannot be a cohesive and coherent country if its citizens are balkanised into ethnic silos, with self-appointed “community leaders” who insert themselves into crises and promote further appeasement of Islamism to prevent terror attacks. As Mount Rushmore’s Teddy Roosevelt said, “There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism.” Making one’s American national identity primary means fewer Muslim Americans will be drawn into Da’wah.
After my friend, Theo van Gogh, was murdered, and a fatwa issued against my life, I fled the Netherlands to make America my home. This wonderful country has welcomed me, and made me a beneficiary of its peace and prosperity. I cannot bear to see it subverted from within by the same Islamist ideology which has ruined Somalia and ravaged Europe. The second Trump administration has a fighting chance to win this war — if only it has the courage to acknowledge it is happening, and end its intelligence agencies cowardly surrender to political correctness.
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