27% OF YOUNG FRENCH MUSLIMS (1.62 MILLION) BACK THE ISLAMIC STATE, POLL FINDS

27% of Young French Muslims (1.62 million) back the Islamic State, poll find

Posted on November 1, 2014 by Admin

French, German and British “people” participated in an EU survey and was asked of their favorable or unfavorable opinion for the Islamic State, conducted in July 2014. The question posed, was:

Q: From what you know, please, tell me if you have a very favorable, somewhat favorable, somewhat unfavorable or very unfavorable opinion of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant otherwise known as ISIS?

France came out with the largest number of supporters for the Islamic State.

Only 31% of French Muslims responding to the survey stated they had “very unfavorable” opinions of the Islamic State while another 31% was “somewhat unfavorable” towards the Islamic state which indicates some level of support. The rest responded to various degrees of approval, meaning a positive leaning towards the Islamic State. The headline of the actual article, “15% of French people back ISIS militants, poll finds”, published by the Russian news outlet RT is somewhat misleading and does not explain in clear details how they arrived at these numbers.

We have included the original RT headline below.

RT has added the response “somewhat unfavorable” within the rejection percentage of the Islamic state while the question is actually in the positive and should be in the approval column. For example, we can’t state that a woman is “somewhat pregnant” and add this into a “not pergnant” category. She is either pregnant or not pregnant, whether the pregnancy is in early or late stages. In the same way it’s not accurate to put a response of “somewhat unfavorable” to indicate a total rejection of the Islamic state when the response indicates an approval, even if it disagrees to some methods utilized by the Islamic state.

The RT poll would tell us that in Germany 54% of total number of Muslims surveyed had very unfavorable (disapproval) opinions of the Islamic State, while 44% of British Muslims surveyed had an unfavorable opinion for the Islamic State.

The Muslim population in Germany is an estimated 4,119,000 people [5%, 2010], meaning 46% or 1,895,000 support the Islamic State and terrorism while the Britain’s official Muslim population is 2,786,635 [4.4%, 2011] meaning 56% or 1,560,000 support the Islamic State and terrorism to various degrees.

France, having the highest percentage of support for the Islamic State reveal worry some figures. The Muslim population in France is supposedly 5 to 6 million people [INED/INSEE study in October 2010]. The survey would translate to roughly 1.62 million young Muslims in France who support the Islamic State’s extreme and brutal terrorism to various degrees.

This can hardly be argued to be a small issue.

All-in-all, these three countries alone have around 6,905,000 people living in their society who support beheadings, invasions, torture, rape, slavery and terrorism. Perhaps it is time for their politicians to start taking these problems very serious and do something about this issue.

To see the actual results collected from the survey see the original paper linked below.

ICM Research: New EU Members Survey – CATI Fieldwork : 11th-13th July 2014

15% of French people back ISIS militants, poll finds
Published time: August 18, 2014 15:05

A fighter of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) holds an ISIL flag and a weapon on a street in the city of Mosul, June 23, 2014. (Reuters)

A fighter of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) holds an ISIL flag and a weapon on a street in the city of Mosul, June 23, 2014. (Reuters)

Up to 15 percent of French people said they have a positive attitude toward the Islamic State, formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. The share of ISIS supporters is largest among France’s younger generation, a new poll says.

Twice as many French people expressed a positive reaction to Islamic State (IS) militants than in Britain, where the number of people favorably disposed to the IS stands at 7 percent, and Germany, where a meager 2 percent of the respondents sided with the IS, according to a poll carried out in July among 1,000 people aged over 15 years (over 18 in Britain) in each country. The poll was conducted by ICM Research for the Russian news agency Rossiya Segodnya.

[Chart from original RT article]

The Islamic State is a jihadist group, widely regarded as a terrorist organization and designated as such by the US, the UK, Saudi Arabia and several other countries.

It aspires to bring much of the Muslim-inhabited regions of the world under its direct political control, beginning with territory in the Levant region, which includes Jordan, Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Cyprus, and southern Turkey. In the past few months, IS militants have seized a number of towns in Iraq and Syria.

In France, the share of IS supporters is the largest among people aged between 18 and 24, and it is the smallest among those aged over 45. The largest share of IS opponents is composed of people aged 45 to 54.

“This is not a result of sympathy of a significant number of French people for this extremist terrorist organization,” Yury Rubinsky, the head of the Center of French Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Rossiya Segodnya. “This is simply a manifestation of the country’s accumulated potential rejection of the existing system as a whole. This is a form of rejection of the elites, a form of protest.”

The French government said in late July it was ready to welcome Christians fleeing the area of Iraq controlled by IS fighters, saying it was “outraged” by their persecution.

“France is outraged by these abuses, which it condemns with the utmost firmness,” Laurent Fabius, France’s foreign minister, and Bernard Cazeneuve, the interior minister, said in a joint statement. “We are providing aid to displaced people fleeing from the threats of Islamic state and who have sought refuge in Kurdistan.”

A militant Islamist fighter uses a mobile to film his fellow fighters taking part in a military parade (Reuters)

A militant Islamist fighter uses a mobile to film his fellow fighters taking part in a military parade (Reuters)

In Britain, the only two-digit number of IS supporters – 11 percent – is to be found among people aged between 35 and 44, and in Germany among young people of 16 and 17 years old – 10 percent, the same poll found. No Germans between 55 and 64 years old back the IS and an overwhelming majority of German people in this age group denounce it. In Britain, the largest number of IS opponents – 70 percent – is to be found among seniors over 65.

Among the three countries, France, whose population numbers 68 million people, has the largest Muslim community (7.5 percent), whereas the UK’s Muslim population is 5 percent and that of Germany is 4.6 percent, according to a Pew Research study published in January 2011.

Earlier this year the British press cited Birmingham MP Khalid Mahmood as saying that at least 1,500 British nationals are likely to have been recruited by IS extremists to fight in Iraq and Syria. Then-Foreign Secretary William Hague earlier this year claimed that around 400 young British nationals have gone to the Middle East to join the fighting.

Through the same ICM research poll, respondents were asked which of the statements is closer to their viewpoint, that instability in Iraq is a result of the military intervention in that country, or that it is a result of Iraq’s political development. Around one-third named the military intervention as the main factor of instability, while 41 percent of French, 47 percent of British and 59 percent of German people said it was a result of national politics.

The largest percentage of those blaming the instability in Iraq on the military intervention is to be found among French people aged between 18 and 24, and the smallest percentage among Germany’s youngest generation. The other variant, that instability stems from national politics, was least popular among French people aged 18 to 24, where 25 percent of the respondents chose it, and most popular with Germany’s teens, of whom 66 percent chose that option.

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