Egypt’s grumpy old jihadists

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Egyptian author Hussam Tammam has an interesting piece in the newly redesigned Carnegie Arab Reform Bulletin about how the 20-30,000 jihadists who have repented and been released from Egypt’s prisons in recent years are faring.

Short answer: not good. It’s hard to find jobs, they are having trouble reintegrating into society, and neither their fellow Islamists nor secular forces seem to trust them.

That said, these are men over 50s, Tammam points out, and they “lack the ability to communicate with members of the young generation who would take up arms in any confrontations with the regime.” He concludes that “there is no reason to fear that released jihadists will reorganize and return to violence.”

One has to wonder what it is that keeps Osama bin Laden (51) and Ayman al-Zawahiri (57) going after all these years.