Is Religious Affiliation linked to Terrorism?

It is not a ridiculous claim to say that the extreme concentration of terror attacks are in majority-Muslim countries. After the Charlie Hebdo attack, a Paris imam visited the scene and condemned the murders. He said; "These victims are martyrs, and I shall pray for them with all my heart." The imam, named as Hassen Chalghoumi, then went on to say that 95% of victims of terrorism are in fact Muslim.

His statement is not the first time that someone has voiced this opinion. In 2011, a report by the US government's National Counter-Terrorism Center, said; "In cases where the religious affiliation of terrorism casualties could be determined, Muslims suffered between 82 and 97% of terrorism-related fatalities over the past five years."

However, this report did not determine in what proportion of cases it had been possible to ascertain this information nor whether these cases were representative of the others. US based team, the Global Terrorism Database, compiles terrorism statistics also but does not determine religions of people killed or injured. GTD's Erin Miller said that between 2004 and 2013 about half of all the terrorist attacks, and 60% of fatalities due to terrorist attacks , took place in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan - all of which host a majority Muslim population.

95% of terrorism victims being Muslim can be doubted, however Miller says that "it's not out of the realm of possibility." 

Terrorism is not a scorecard. Most people think of terrorist attacks such as the recent incident in Paris with Charlie Hebdo, 9/11, the 7/7 London tube and bus bombs or the Madrid train bombs. The overall number of deadly terrorist attacks in France, the US, UK and Spain is incredibly low by international standards.

Between 2004-2013, the UK suffered 400 terrorist attacks, mostly in Northern Ireland and mostly non-lethal. The US came under 131 attacks, fewer than 20 of which were lethal. France suffered 47. Whilst not belittling the devastation these attacks have had on these countries, when compared to Iraq which suffered 12,000 attacks, 8,000 of which were lethal, it does seem that Chalghoumi may have a point.

Miller says; "It's tempting for many people to try and turn it into almost a scorecard, trying to figure out which religious groups are more violent than others, and boil it down to this grossly oversimplified keeping of score, like it's a football game...This is a mistake. Most terrorist attacks are rooted in geopolitics. Religion is certainly a part of them, but it is not the only part."