Look, its not about religion - its about an intepretation of religion.
All the terrorists bent on attacking global western targets come from or are highly influenced by the Salafi/Wahabi schools of thought. It all stems from Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan, where Afghanistan became a dumping ground for Islamic extremists. They were sent by their pro-American governments to support American interests. While there they obviously came in contacts with each other - JI, Abu Sayyaf etc all met with the highly Wahabi/Salafist Arabs who were fighting and establish philosophical common grounds when it came to how to engage Islamic revolutions in their respective countries. Thats why Algeria became such a shiathole in 90's even though everyone is Maliki - because those whackos got new ideas from the Wahabis that its ok to kill civilians and even Muslim civilians because they have been "corrupted".
To say its the whole religion is retarded. Traditional South Asian Islam is very different from Arab Islam - it has a lot of Sufi mysticism mixed in it, and Muslims and Hindus would cohabit shrines of several mystics. The history of Islam in South Asia was different because in most cases the Mughal rulers were quite tolerant (except for a few, especially Aurangzeb who was unquestionably a zealot who forced conversions). Southeast Asian Islam comes from Arab sailors and wasn't brought by force, and it mixes elements of animism and even Hinduism, sort of even producing IslamLite in a way. Its all comes from those farking Wahabis who farked everything up. Pakistan was not an Islamic state prior to the 70's. Alcohol and gambling were legal, cabarets and casinos operated freely and openly. It all really changed in the late 70's and 80's, with the entire Afghan operations. The Saudis (rich off all the oil money coming from the oil crisis)along with the CIA and ISI, funded the growth and of madressas all over throughout the country. Zia in turn supported the Islamisation of society for his own personal power and his beliefs. The curriculum was heavily Wahabi, which is the most rigid and retarded interpretation of the religion that I have ever come across. People don't realize that madressas have been the primary source of education in the subcontinent for Muslims for over 300 years, yet they only started producing terrorists in the last 20 years - the connection is obvious. Even Kashmir - it was hardly as violent in the 30 years following independance, but as soon the Afghan war end trouble begins. There were obviously a multitude of factors at play there (demographics, india not investing enough money in the economy, pakistan exploiting the situation), but the main jihadi component comes into play after this entire Afghanistan situation. Majority of global "Islamic" terrorists suscribe to the Wahabist ideologies. And the influx of this ideology affected not only regular people, but also religious groups who started becoming far more rigid, and even took upon an Arabization of Urdu (even when the language is much closer to Farsi in reality).
What we're seeing now in the London bombings and this plot is the exportation of this Wahabi/Salafist ideology through the internet. However, the problem also lies in the fact that the Saudis have been funding mosques worldwide ever since the oil crisis, and like IMF funding, it comes with conditions as to how the mosque leans in terms of its religious and political slant. Its this ideology that has permeated the young minds of a few Muslims, and it causing the most grief to people everywhere.
Now my understanding is that even if Saudi Arabia has stopped funding everything after 9/11, those informal institutions and networks it created that spread Wahabi thought, are very much alive. All the alliances created between fellow mujahadeen are very much alive. And thanks to the internet, they have an even larger audience, attracting confused, disconnected and generally crazy people to become foot soldiers in the war that they want to rage. Its not reforming Islam that has be done - its the weeding out of this backward, anti-modernist and highly dogmatic and rigid interpretation - hell I think perversion is a better term - of Islam.
Disclaimer:
I'm not blaming the US for creating this mess - they pursued a policy, and unfortunately it had side-effects and blowback, but thats how realpolitik is. But to simply say "Its the religion, stupid" is beyond retarded. Like any pheonomenon, Islamic terrorism is complex and its origins cannot be reduced to something as general as religion or culture, but must be examined through a historical lens.
