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Religions adapt to their social environment. As a rule, develop a strong middle-class society in any religious context and you'll produce predominately middle-class values (the desire for stability and security being the top value). When I talk to Muslim friends here in Canada, they often sympathize with groups that violently oppose Israel, but they can never come to defend the actual use of violence. Why? Because they've been socialised as middle-class liberals. This is the key.



Any religious group raised in a primarily poor, war-torn, desperate situation, will be more susceptible to extremism. Why were western European Jews so peaceful for all those centuries, despite systematic discrimination? Maybe because they were well integrated into the European middle-class. It wasn't until after that Holocaust that you see it turn into a militant ideology, i.e., Zionism. There was a need to ensure their security in the form of a state, and this makes perfect logical sense. Why do the most extreme Christians in the US tend to come from the South? Maybe because they tend to be poorer and seeking redemption. Why are there not more anti-US Muslim suicide bombers from very populous Muslim countries like Indonesia, Turkey, or Bangladesh? Because they're not Arab countries and don't have the same investment in the issues in the Middle East. Their beefs tend to be with the leadership of their own countries.



It's all about structure and power-politics masquerading as religious dogma.