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Queen Rania: Muslim Nations Not Doing Enough to Prevent Youth Radicalization

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Author: David Yee
Created: 27 August, 2015
Updated: 16 October, 2022
2 min read

Since the rise of the Islamic State, Queen Rania has been the face of the moderate Muslim nations who are trying to fight the radicalization movement, while remaining faithful to their politics and religious beliefs.

Speaking at a major European business gathering in Jouy-en-Josas, France, Queen Rania stated that moderate Muslim nations are not doing enough to keep the younger generation from radicalizing:

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Speaking before the business leaders, Queen Rania made frank admissions and encouraged solutions to the radicalization problem:

We are facing a time of great peril. Daesh, or the so-called Islamic State, continues to spread its diabolical ideology. Moderate Muslims the world over are not doing enough to win the ideological struggle at the heart of this battle. We're not actively helping Daesh, but we're not actively stopping them either. We can't stand against them until we as Muslims agree on what we stand for. -- Queen Rania, August 26, 2015

Daesh is the term used throughout the moderate, Arabic-speaking world as a derogatory term identifying the Islamic State by its Arabic initials.

To Queen Rania, the greatest threat to the radicalized ideological struggle is the creation of jobs in the moderate Muslim world, a region of the world that suffers from chronic unemployment/underemployment.

Historically, when large sections of the young adult workforce remain unemployed, it becomes the breeding grounds for discontent and revolution, as radicals capitalize on the economic disenfranchisement of the youth, as well as their inherent idealism.

Sadly, the western powers are much more likely to send billions of dollars worth of bombs, hardware, and military aid, and little to nothing in capital development in the areas.

The answers will have to come from within the Middle East, and some form of works program that both builds up infrastructure and creates long-term jobs is essential -- but it will take unprecedented cooperation between nations who have historically distrusted each other.

But, it must be accomplished, as Queen Rania warned:

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Failure is not an option because if we fail in the face of these extremists and if they win, the region will quickly be devastated.