Can religious fundamentalism reform for the benefit of public health?

Abstract

Currently the issue of Islamist extremism is extremely topical and I was struck recently by the relevance to clinical practice. In the month during which this article was written I received clinical guidance regarding statutory reporting for the practice of female genital mutilation; and a reminder from my employers to complete Prevent Training — a core pillar of the government’s de-radicalisation response to the threat of terrorism. It felt timely, therefore, to read two books I had recently purchased. The first is written by Robert Dreyfuss, who has written extensively on US foreign affairs as the Middle East Intelligence director of the Executive Intelligence Review , the flagship journal of the Lyndon LaRouche movement.1 The second book is written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a woman of Somalian heritage who fled from an arranged marriage to the Netherlands, served as a member of the Dutch parliament, and then obtained asylum in the US following the murder by an Islamist terrorist of her colleague on a film regarding the oppression of women under Islam.2 Dreyfuss’s core assertion is that more than a century of Western involvement (initially through the British Empire and latterly by the US) has caused deep resentment among certain sectors of the Middle East that has significantly contributed to the international spread of Islamist terrorism. He presents the readership with recommendations for the US ‘to turn down the heat’ , to ‘lower the political temperature underneath the Islamist movement’. 1 Dreyfuss does not underestimate the scale of the task and his recommendations may seem unrealistic to many. For example, he recommends a UN settlement to end the Palestinian–Israeli conflict that guarantees justice for the Palestinians through an independent Palestinian state that is geographically and economically viable, tied to withdrawal of illegal Israeli settlements and an Israeli return …