The " Crunch " Factor !

The latest terrorist attack in the German city of Munich left nine people dead - many of them children -and a further twenty-one with survivable injuries.  The killer was eighteen year old Ali Sonboly,  He was a dual nationality German/Iranian with no known contact with Islamic State.

There are claims that he was shouting " Allahu Akbar " which is Arabic for "God is Great "as he sprayed bullets at victims.   This seems to be the main claim that he was an Islamic terrorist.  In the greater number of other killings  claimed by IS the killers have loudly shouted this phrase as their justification for murder.

This scene of carnage was at a McDonalds family restaurant and it seems a bogus advertisement may have attracted an unusually large crowd of young patrons with the offer of free giveaway food coinciding with the exact time the attack took place.  The killer then ended his own life with a gunshot to the head.

When Islamic State began their war on the world they proved to be adept at attracting publicity. Their methods were extreme and repulsive to most people, but they would have had a certain appeal to those desensitized by violent video games and the many in our  midst with extreme psychiatric problems.   They offered a new and violent way to hit back at society.  It is quite possible that those with absolutely no interest in religion are using the Islamic State credo as some sort of badge of honour.

One of the avenues of appeal - is the publicity it ensures.  This Munich attack brings headlines around the world  and this eighteen year old Ali Sonboly has become an instant celebrity.   Had he simply murdered any ordinary Munich citizen it is unlikely that the case would have made it beyond the local newspaper but now he has entered the pantheon that will be constantly mulled over by the great and powerful.

What is so awful is the certainty that we can never mount a certain defence to protect the population against this sort of infamy.  Someone with a concealed weapon can walk into any location with a mass of people and simply start killing.  Sometimes escape is an option, but that seems reserved for dedicated IS cadres.  Many with bizarre psychiatric grievances either expect to be eventually taken down by the police or end their life by their own hand.

Perhaps the nearest replication of the danger spreading across the world is comparison with the long ages when the streets of Ireland were darkened by "the troubles ".   That too was a religious war, but it also masked items of "payback " for civil issues and even the romantic upheavals that endue in all societies.   It served as "cover " for the dormant excesses that a civilized society keeps under control.

The people of Ireland simply had to adjust to a bomb in a public place without the slightest warning.  They had to accept that the religious divide ran deep and there was no such thing as neutrality. It was a religious war and it was also a tribal war - and there was no quarter.  Everybody wanted it to end, but nobody wanted to be the first to give ground.

What we are now seeing is the great religion of Islam at war with itself.  A fanatical breakaway Wahabist movement has emerged out of Saudi Arabia and is determined to force its way of life on the rest of the world at the point of a gun.   The end result so far is massive death and destruction in the Middle East and a tide of refugees last seen when the second world war ended.

It is likely that this IS phenomenon will run its course and be rejected by moderate Islam, but its ability to use the world publicity machine to exploit its successes is drawing in converts and many of these are simply the misfits of society.   When the people with psychiatric illnesses deliver an atrocity in the west, IS is quick to claim the credit.   This seems to bring more weirdos to flock to the IS banner.

It is quite clear that we are not changing our lifestyle.   We live in a dangerous world and today any sound of a shot in a public place sees people take immediate cover.   We are more watchful of our surroundings and others and we now tend to avoid places of evident danger.   Anywhere people are massed is now a danger point.

But we are also pragmatic.   Even a hundred deaths in a city of millions is small compared to the overall risk of accidental death.  What we can't stop we must learn to endure - and that is exactly what is happening in western countries.   The headlines are awful, but when it comes to the crunch very little has actually changed !