Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asserts that she has no problem using the words “radical jihadism” or “radical Islamism” when describing the terrorist threat posed by ISIS, but in December she resisted the term.
“You know, whether you call it radical jihadism or radical Islamism, I think they mean the same thing, I’m happy to say either,” Clinton said Monday in an interview with CNN’s Chris Cuomo.
In December 2015, Clinton defended her decision not to use the term “radical Islam” after the attacks in San Bernardino.
“The problem is that sounds like we’re declaring a war against religion,” she said during an interview with George Stephanopoulos who asked her about the term. “And that to me is number one, wrong.”
“Even though the qualifier radical is there?” asked Stephanopoulos.
“I don’t want to do that, because, number one, it doesn’t do justice to the vast numbers of Muslims in our own country and around the world who are peaceful people,” Clinton said, saying that there are extreme elements in “every religion in the world.”
Clinton added that she was worried that the use of the term “radical Islam” helped create a “clash of civilizations” that helped ISIS recruit more Muslims.
She explained in December that she wanted to send a different message to the Muslim community in the United States.
“If you’re a law-abiding, peace-loving Muslim, you need to be with us against those who are distorting” Islam, Clinton said.
Clinton’s political adjustment on the use of the term “radical Islam” weakens the Republican attack that she refuses to properly identify the terrorist threat, but it adds to the feeling that she will say or do anything to get elected.
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