The world is obsessed with terms like “Radical Islam”, “Islamist Terrorism”, “Islamic Terrorism” etc. when they think of Terrorism or religious fanaticism. Even those who think that they are secular and all, tend to somehow think of Terrorism as something related to the term “Islam”. The reality though is not this.

It is the sect of “Wahhabism” within Islam which is the sole source and recipe of so called “Islamist Terrorism”. Every single muslim terrorist on the crust of the earth is a Wahabi. Be it IS (Islamic State), Al Qaeda, Al Nusra Front, Hamas, Boko Haram, Abu Sayyaf, Taliban, TTP (Tehreek e Taliban Pakistan), Haqqani Network, LeT (Lashkar e Taiba), IM (Indian Mujahideen) or any other muslim terrorist group in the world, all these are Wahabi/Salafi in their sectarian ideolgy. The Wahabis or the Salafis (both are ideologically same sect) do not adhere to that version of Islam which most of the muslims around the world adhere to. Let us understand the muslim sects regarding this.

So as a layman knows it, there are 2 sects within Islam – Sunni and Shia. But Wahhabism is a sub–sect within Sunni Islam. So we can now focus on the Sunnis who make up 90% of all the muslims around the world.

There are two sub-sects within the Sunni Islam – “Sufism” and “Wahhabism”. Now there are also “Salafis” and “Deobandis” who are not basically different from Wahabis but to be realistic they are Wahabis. They just want to evade to be called Wahabis for obvious reasons. But basically a Wahabi is one who doesn’t visit the holy muslim “Dargah” (shrines) considering it to be un-islamic and these Salafis and Deobandis don’t visit shrines. Now Sufis are around 80% of all the Sunnis. Sufis are moderate. They believe in visiting shrines and getting blessings from the saints buried there. Wahabis oppose it. They call it “Bidah”- innovation, which as par them is not Islamic. They say that a muslim should only worship Allah, and these revered muslim saints can’t be venerated, let alone be worshipped. They are so extreme in it that they kill Sufis by bombing the shrines or picking and beheading the Sufis and sometimes bulldozing the shrines and the graves there to ground. It happens everywhere where Muslim terrorists are based be it Pakistan, Arab world or Afghanistan. IS has bombed and bulldozed many Sufi and Shia shrines in Iraq and Syria. In a IS propaganda video a Sufi old man can be seen being beheaded by the IS fighters. IS even attacked one of the most important Sufi shrines of Pakistan – Lal Shahbaz Qalandar Shrine in Sehwan, Pakistan. It was a suicide bombing. Around 100 people were killed.

Wahhabism has its roots in Saudi Arabia. KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) is an officially Wahabi muslim country. The Kingdom has supported the spread of extremist ideology of Wahhabism throughout the world, for a long time. It has spent billions of dollars for opening up Salafi/Wahabi mosques and madarsas (Islamic schools) throughout the world specially the West as they consider the West as their prime enemy ideologically, reason being their free culture and Christian and Jewish faiths. Not just this in fact 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers were Saudi. In its “28 pages” classified report on KSA’s role in 9/11, the US Department of State exposed how direct the involvement of big names of KSA was. Because of the Wahabi factor we see most cruel and inhuman laws and practices being exercised in Saudi Arabia, not seen in any other Islamic country.

But we know the US will do nothing about it because it’s the US-Saudi business nexus that matters most to the White House, not the issue of Terrorism.

The world needs to wake up. One has to identify the problem if he wants the solution. We all keep discussing how bad and cruel the Jihadis are or how bad the situation is and keep crying over the attacks, but nothing we get. We have to acknowledge the Wahabi threat. At least in this regard the world had expected a lot from the current POTUS, but to no use. And please stop using terms “Islamic” or “Islamist” terrorism and thus maligning the image of Islam and 80% of its adherents. Instead use the term “WAHABI TERRORISM” and then only we can start solving the problem.