I’ve been pointing out for years that deradicalization programs are an abysmal failure everywhere they have been implemented. From the Jihad Watch archives:
Gitmo prisoner reveals: Saudi “deradicalization program” is really a jihad training program
11 ex-Gitmo prisoners flee the Saudi “rehabilitation program” and join up with terrorist groups
Jaw-dropper: 25 former Gitmo detainees “return to militancy” despite Saudi rehab program!
Flight 253 jihadist wasn’t cured by Saudi anti-jihad art therapy
Former Guantanamo detainee now top al-Qaeda ideologue — “He was transferred to Saudi Arabia in 2006 where he was placed in a national rehabilitation project.”
Indonesian government admits that its jihadist rehab program is a failure
Malaysia: Muslim cleric active in deradicalization program promotes hatred of non-Muslims
France’s only jihadi “deradicalization” center is closing — it was voluntary, and it was empty
The whole premise of “deradicalization” is that Islam is a religion of peace that jihadis misunderstand, twist, and hijack. Since that is a false premise, and warfare against unbelievers is actually taught in the Qur’an and Sunnah, “deradicalization” focuses on other issues, such as “anger issues” that the jihadi may have, his feelings of “alienation,” and the like.
But since none of that changes what the Qur’an and Sunnah say about warfare against unbelievers, it doesn’t “deradicalize” the jihadi at all.
“Al-Qaeda Member Turned MI6 Spy: ‘Deradicalisation’ of Terrorists Doesn’t Work,” by Kurt Zindulka, Breitbart, February 9, 2020:
A former member of al-Qaeda turned MI6 spy said that there “is no such thing as a rehabilitated jihadist” and that efforts by the British authorities to deradicalise convicted terrorists will not work.
Aimen Dean, who joined the Mujahideen at the age of fifteen and was later recruited into al-Qaeda by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who helped mastermind the September 11th terrorist attacks in New York, said that he doesn’t “believe in deradicalisation”.
The former terrorist, who went on to work as a spy for the British intelligence service MI6, told The Telegraph that Islamist terrorists are “extremely treacherous” and that if they don’t confess and help to do “damage” to their jihadist cause of their own volition like he did, “you can’t trust them.”
“The only way [a jihadist] can demonstrate that they’ve renounced violent extremism is if they have sung like a canary and provided damaging intelligence on the networks that recruited them,” said Dean.
Dean is calling for longer prison sentences for convicted terrorists, as well as “harsher” conditions so that terrorists are unable to “congregate” while imprisoned. He says that the attempts by the British government to deradicalise terrorists “are riddled with naivety and a lack of understanding.”
“Use the deterrent of much longer sentences and make them serve the minimum in its entirety unless they show remorse and co-operation. If you need another Belmarsh, build one,” he suggested.
Following the Streatham and London Bridge terror attacks, both of which were committed by terrorists that were released early from prison, the British government of the is planning to pass emergency, retrospective legislation to end the automatic early release of convicted terrorists. Dozens of Islamist terrorists are set to be released from prison in Britain in the coming months under current laws….
Last week Prime Minister Boris Johnson conceded that “really very few” Islamic terrorists can be rehabilitated.
“I think, looking at the problems we have with re-educating and reclaiming and rehabilitating people who succumb to Islamism, it’s very, very hard, and very tough, and it can happen, but the instances of success are really very few,” said Johnson.
“Deradicalising people is a very, very difficult thing to do… [there is] a big psychological barrier people find it hard to get back over — and that’s why I stress the importance of the custodial option,” he concluded.