Could Syria’s Civil War Create European and American Jihadis?

LONDON â€" Two Belgian mothers, worried for the fate of sons who left home to join Islamist rebels in Syria, reportedly traveled to Turkey this week to urge the authorities there to stem the transit of foreign volunteers heading for the conflict.

The mission by two Moroccan-born women, reported by Belgium’s La Libre, was the latest twist in an issue that has drawn attention since nationwide raids last week on individuals alleged to be involved in a jihadist recruitment drive for the insurgency in Syria.

Hundreds of young European Muslims are believed to have made the journey to join the two-year-old rebellion against the regime of President Bashar Al Assad.

My colleagues James Kanter and Rick Gladstone wrote at the time of the Belgian raids, in which six suspects were detained, that the foreign jihadist element in the insurgency has alarmed Western powers. The West wants to be rid of Mr. Assad but does not want him replaced by “an Islamist militant government or stateless mayhem.”

A further concern, in Belgium and elsewhere, is that young volunteers will return to Europe radicalized by their experiences, posing a potential terrorist threat to their own countries.

It is a threat that is focusing the attention of European counterterrorism agencies.

But there are also concerns that the perceived threat of radicalization is being overstated, and even exploited by the Damascus regime as it seeks to dilute Western support for the rebellion.

Mr. Assad himself said last week that Western support for the Syrian rebels risked backfiring.

“Just as the West financed Al Qaida in Afghanistan in its beginnings, and later paid a heavy price,” he told Syrian state-run television, “today it is supporting it in Syria, Libya and other places and will pay the price later in the heart of Europe and the United States.”

Western counterterrorism officials have acknowledged the threat and European intelligence agencies have reportedly stepped up measures to track recruits.

Gilles de Kerchove, the European Union’s counterterrorism coordinator, told Le Monde that not all the volunteers’ profiles were identical. “There are ideologists, idealists, but also some who just want to show their support for a rebellion that - don’t forget - we support officially.”

Khaled Diab, a self-declared secular pacifist, wrote for the Huffington Post that there was a danger in overestimating a relatively small phenomenon that would draw yet more unwelcome attention to Muslim communities in the West.

“Worrying as this trend may seem, it is important to place it in its proper perspective,” he wrote, “and not allow bigots, racists, Islamophobes, or those with vested interests, including radical Muslims themselves, to blow the situation out of all proportion.”

Evelyne Huytebroeck, a Belgian minister for youth, also cautioned authorities not to overreact until they knew the full extent of the volunteer phenomenon.

She was speaking as the government was due to consider a plan to combat youth radicalization.

According to estimates this month by the International Center for the Study of Radicalization, a partnership of academic institutions based in London, 140 to 600 Europeans have gone to Syria since early 2011, representing 7 percent to 11 percent of the total number of foreign fighters.

It acknowledged rising alarm about European Muslims joining the Syrian rebels.

But it also noted, “The Syrian government has â€" at various times and for different reasons â€" claimed that many fighters that are involved in the current conflict are foreigners. Our numbers do not support this assertion.”

In Belgium, Bahar Kimyongur, a Belgian-born former militant of a Turkish far-left group, has reportedly been involved in the efforts to stem the volunteer tide. La Libre identified him as the initiator of this week’s trip to Turkey by the two unnamed Belgian mothers.

Mr. Kimyongur is spokesman for an organization, the Committee Against Intervention in Syria, which opposes foreign involvement and argues for a peaceful solution.

Some of his public statements, however, have been markedly favorable to the Assad regime in a conflict that he has blamed on a combination of U.S. warmongering and Al Qaeda-led jihadism.