ISIS – the self-proclaimed ‘Islamic State of Iraq and Syria’ — dates all the way back to 2006. However, only in the past few years have they been the focus of headlines for their barbaric and brutal actions towards innocent civilians and their radicalisation and indoctrination of citizens of the West. It is assumed that ISIS have unfortunately, yet successfully, recruited over at least 1,500 Britons to fight abroad. But the question many pose is, ‘Why are these ‘normal’ people going over? Is it to fight for Islam and establish a self-proclaimed caliphate or simply because they are lost and in search of an identity? Are they really as ‘Islamic’ as the headlines and propaganda state, or are we just naive enough to swallow the information the media feeds us?.

In recent polls in the USA, 27% of American citizens told the pollsters LifeWay Research that they believed that the actions of ISIS are a true representation of Islamic and Muslim values. What is not known to the majority of non-Muslims is that ISIS ‘cherry-pick’ parts of the Qur’an in order to give a sense of justification to their actions and motives. The mere fact that they ‘cherry-pick’ phrases of the Qur’an undermines the legitimacy of their actions according to Islam.

Although they are great at using professional ‘Islamic terms’ to create their fatwa’s (rules), it does not make their justification any more valid within Islam. Of course, it appears legitimate, but their aim is to indoctrinate vulnerable individuals. Therefore, we should not be quick to swallow the information fed to us uncritically. Nor should we take in all their propaganda as a legitimate ideology of Islam. This is comparable to studying the Nazi’s solely by reading Mein Kampf rather than looking at the Reichstag fire and the abolition of the Treaty of Versailles.

So, what are their motives? Are their motives triggered by Islamic teachings or are they merely retrospective justifications for why they carry out such horrific acts?

Experts have looked into many terrorist cases and have found that it is not religion which is the motivating and sole triggering factor, leading several hundreds and thousands of ‘normal’ practising Muslims over to fight for ISIS. The motivating factors are things such as search of for identity, seeking of adventure (albeit a questionable and disgraceful one) and ultimately, looking for a sense of belonging. Although religion is brought so much into the story, it has in fact been found that those who are the least religious are the most easily radicalised. MI5, Britain’s domestic intelligence agency, has studied hundreds of terrorist biographies and found that they tend to be religious novices. The biographies have a consistent trend of backgrounds with drugs, alcohol and crime. MI5 concluded that a true religious upbringing is actually ‘a protector’ from radicalization, contradicting headlines that tend to say the opposite.

There are 1.6 billion Muslims on Earth. To state that ISIS, made up of a couple thousand, is ‘Islamic’, or the ‘true representation of Islam’, is ridiculous. Yes, in their eyes they see their interpretations as the right interpretation…there is, however, no need to accept this. Otherwise, we might as well hand over the recruiting tool that they most desire – the legitimacy of their organisation.