The growing use of webcasts and websites by extremists has been highlighted by Ed Husain, a London-born former jihadi who turned his back on militancy.
“There is an unchallenged, unreported Islamist underworld in the UK in which talk of jihad, bombings, stabbings, killings and executions is usual,” he warned recently. “Rhetoric is an indication of a certain mindset and, I think, the prelude to terror.
“In internet chatrooms… the Islamists break news of beheadings in Iraq, the downing of US helicopters and discuss who is next on their agenda of killing and destruction.”
[…]
The EU announced a month ago that it wanted to strengthen its monitoring of militant Islamist websites.
“Terrorists use the internet not only as a means to communicate and spread propaganda, but also to radicalise, recruit and train terrorists, to spread instructions on how to carry out concrete offences and to transfer covert information,” a meeting of ambassadors concluded.
Patrick Mercer, the former Conservative spokesman for homeland security, said of the growing use of the internet by militants:
“This is a much greater threat than people realise. Radicalisation is taking place on a number of different fronts and more people are sympathetic than we dare believe. The only way to penetrate this is by the careful development of intelligence sources and a clear understanding of the radicalisation process.”
Mere på The Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/24/nternet124.xml
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