Jihad vs Terrorism
Jihad is an Islamic term used to describe one’s duty towards Islam. Terrorism on the other hand is the act of trying to instill feelings of terror in the general population by acts or deeds.
Jihad as per Islam stands for struggle. This struggle can be to protect one’s country, religion, family, or to save someone else’s life. Jihad can even be one’s struggle to make himself a better human being. This has been called as the greater jihad by some. Terrorism, however, is never to protect. The sole purpose of terrorism is to cause enough harm, pain and agony to someone to make him feel insecure. The word Terrorism would normally be used when referring to systematic episodes of mass destruction or killings. It would not be normally used to petty crimes. It has nothing to do with religion as neither Islam nor any other religion in the world preaches destruction and killings.
Terrorism is often fueled by materialistic or territorial goals generally with no regard to religion whereas a jihad is the struggle in the path of god and has no other goal apart from this.
Terrorism is always directed towards the killing of innocent civilians and may be by way of explosions, attacks, etc, while, jihad is not permitted against innocent.
Both these terms are vastly misused. While politicians the world over have often discredit their political rivals by calling or classifying them as terrorists and their struggles as terrorism, terrorists on the other hand have always tried to justify their acts and deeds by calling and categorizing them as jihad, however, there is no reference in Islam or any other religion where jihad justifies the killing of innocent people or damage to property.
Summary
1. Jihad is the term used to describe one’s duty towards Islam while terrorism is an act committed to instill fear in the population.
2. Jihad need not always be violent however terrorism is always violent.
3. Jihad is always performed for God, while terrorism always has materialistic goals.
4. Terrorism is always directed to harm innocent civilians while Jihad does not permit this.