Jihad: Who's joining, and why?

CSMonitor reported In Tuesday's edition, a report in this space looked at the origins and goals of Islamist militancy, and of Al Qaeda in particular. This briefing explores how the movement is evolving at a time of concern about terror cells in Western cities such as London.

• Is the global jihad spreading to Europe?
  It seems clear that this is happening.
• Who is joining the jihad?
• Is the same thing happening in America?
• Are new groups emerging as Al Qaeda franchises, such as in Egypt?
• Are the goals of jihadists changing?
• What's Al Qaeda's view of democracy movements in muslim countries?
  Al Qaeda is against democracy as most in the West would understand it. What it wants is the replacement of existing authoritarian regimes with religious states. These would impose a rigid view of the Koran on citizens. In Al Qaeda's view, Western democratic ideas stand in the way of God's will on earth.

  Far be it from me to say for certain what God really wants, but the Islamists say that the Koran is a literal translation of His words, and Surat aal-E-Imran, 3 (Qur'an 3:3) says It is He Who sent down to thee (step by step), in truth, the Book, confirming what went before it; and He sent down the Law (of Moses) and the Gospel (of Jesus) before this, as a guide to mankind, and He sent down the criterion (of judgment between right and wrong)., and if I remember correctly what Jesus said, it is Jesus who would return to reign on earth, and I don't believe He plans to blow up innocent individuals on the way.

  Al Qaeda ideologue Ayman al-Zawahiri and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - the self-proclaimed mastermind of Al Qaeda in Iraq - have attacked democracy as a "trick" to deny Muslims the full flowering of Islam.
• If the U.S. left the Middle East, would militants focus their attacks on Shiites?
• The Islamist extremists whose rage the world is feeling today are primarily Sunni Muslims. In Iraq, which was ruled and dominated by a Sunni minority since the British created the country in the early 20th century, Sunni extremists are already targeting the ruling Shiite majority. Those extremists see the Shiites as impure and have no compunction about targeting Shiite civilians. For some scholars of Islam, the US, in replacing a Sunni regime with a Shiite-dominated one, faces unforeseen challenges as the shift in power is worked out. Some see wider dangers as its neighbors jockey for influence: What happens if turmoil in the new Iraq leads to an open confrontation between a Shiite-dominated Iran and the Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia?

  Such as the confrontation between the Sunnis that ran Iraq when it attacked the Shiites that controlled Iran, but this time with Iran having nuclear weapons?

• Is a backlash against jihadism building from within Islam?