Green Jobs for Yemeni Will Thwart al-Qaida

The honorary consul general for Yemen, Abdulhakem Alsadah, says what pushes al-Qaida recruitment in his country is the lack of economic opportunity. Al-Qaeda, apparently, provides lifetime economic security, right up to the moment you scream your final Allahu Akhbar! and go boom--after that you’re Allah’s problem. From the Detroit Free Press:

Abdulhakem Alsadah, hon­orary consul general of Yemen in Michigan, said the help would create jobs in manufac­turing and infrastructure and provide education and social projects.

He said this would provide Yemeni work opportunities in­stead of joining al-Qaida be­cause they are economically and socially desperate, and eventually push the terrorist group out of Yemen.

“We are not asking for any direct military intervention but security cooperation and eco­nomic and social help because we think the problem has to do with the economy,” said Alsa­dah.

hadigah Alasry, 23, of Dearborn, whose parents came to the U.S. from Yemen for work in 1982, said “a coun­try w­ithout opportunity and re­sources like Yemen should con­cern us, not that someone who came out of a school there that did something very stupid.” (“YEMENI FIGHT NEGATIVE IMAGE”).

Actually, this explanation fits in well with the Obama administration’s recalibration of our counterterrorism efforts from a war-footing to a law-enforcement footing. You remember, the approach that was so successful for us from 1993 to 2001.

And since we all know the “root cause” of crime is poverty, ergo the cure for al-Qaeda brand extremism is-- Yemeni midnight basketball!--or whatever game their tall kids play there.

This message about crime and economic opportunity is one the Detroit area is used to hearing. For time out of mind we’ve been told that desperation at a lack of jobs has compelled young men to rape and murder 98-year-old ladies, sell crack, steal cars, burgle houses, wear stupid costumes, and commit drive-by shootings at houses where somebody who “looked at” them lived.

And we’ve always known that message was bullshit, too.

Not only was Umar Farouk Abdulmutal­lab’s pre-al-Qaida existence one of fabulous wealth, “members of radical Islamist terror groups tend to be better off economically and more educated than their demographic cohorts.” (“Most terrorists are privileged terrorists”).

Nobody packs PETN in his shorts to put food on the table. If poverty explained this, we’d see a lot more Haitians joining the cause.

Not that honorary consul Abdulhakem Alsadah doesn’t know this.