Many westerners, including the Bush administration, claim to know what drives terrorists to commit their violent acts. They say that religious fanaticism, poverty and the lack of democracy are at the heart of the matter.
Yet educated researchers into terrorism say the root cause is foreign occupation and military invasion.
If you watch American TV, you will surely side with the idea that too many extreme Muslim male youths are the problem, and that they want to end our way of life.
Yet this doesn't hold when comparing Muslim terrorism with Christian terrorism. No, there's no Christian group like Al Qaeda, but Eric Rudolf is an example of a Christian fundamentalist who turned to terrorism when he set off bombs at abortion clinics.
Like the Muslim terrorists, he bombed and killed non-combatants. He expressed no remorse when convicted of the bombing, and many described him as "a monster." To Rudolf, he was a hero because he was trying to stop the wholesale slaughter of innocent babies.
Shutting down Christian fundamentalist schools, confiscating funding from fundamentalist sponsors, bombing Christian organizations, invading Christian nations, etc. would not solve the problem and would simply fire up more fundamentalists to fight for the cause.
The root issue for the Christian terrorist is abortion.
The root issues for the Muslim terrorist include foreign occupation, military invasion and the killing of Muslims by foreign troops who have attacked that region for decades (Soviets, French, British, U.S., Israel). Many Muslims can just brush it off, like so many Christians can with respect to abortion. But there are some that will fight over the injustice, and that's when we get terrorism.