I suppose that our first reaction is joy and relief that one of the leading terrorism threats has been ended. As someone who appreciates and values pacifism, but have never been able to make a personal commitment to it, I do believe that there are times when violence can only be stopped by violence. In a similar way, Christians were leading participants in the assassination plot against German terrorist, Adolf Hitler.
I don't think it is contradictory also to feel an element of disappointment, even grief, at this death. For all that I think Top had to be defeated, that any person has to be killed to end his career is an indication that we have failed to find a better solution.
Similarly, in the middle ages, when Europe and Asia Minor faced waves of invading Muslim armies, a Christian soldier who killed in battle, even defending the life of a fellow Christian, still had to perform penance for three years. The need for fighting was recognised, but the failure implicit in killing anyone for any purpose was also acknowledged.
This was in stark contrast to the Muslim belief that any soldier who died in battle would go straight to heaven without passing Go.
But I also wonder what has been achieved. Yes, Top is gone, and the leading explosives expert of south-east Asian terror is no longer able to ply his trade. But we must not delude ourselves into thinking that Muslim terrorism is drawing to an end.
Unlike the Communist terrorism of the 1960s and early '70s, the goal of Muslim terror is not easily satisfied. The Baader-Meinhof groups and such were looking for comparatively limited changes: changes in policy, release of certain prisoners, statements and acknowledgements.
Muslim terror has much broader and less achievable goals: the overthrow of all other systems until the world is under Muslim domination.
How do you stop your actions if your goals are non-negotiable and non-achievable? You either abandon the entire project, or you never abandon it. There is little middle ground.
I do not believe that all Muslims are terrorists, of course -- far from it.
But peace-oriented Muslims battle to be heard or to convince their more aggressive neighbours that there is an option withing Islam.
The problem is that people are more likely to change their positions through conversion than through modification of a viewpoint. So it is harder in some ways for a follower of violent Islam to change within Islam than for that person to convert to a different world-view which rejects violence.
Perhaps we Christians need to be more outspoken about the alternatives we can offer.
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