WASHINGTON (Sputnik) – The slaughter of 49 people in a night club in Orlando in the US state of Florida is another expression of the growing problem of mass violence in American society that cannot solely be attributed to Islamic extremism, NSA whistleblower Mark Klein told Sputnik.
“This problem of mass violence in America is obviously deeply-rooted, with many tentacles, and only fools… would blame it all on radical Islamic terrorism,” Klein said on Monday. “Many of these incidents had nothing to do with foreign terrorism but rather relate to psychologically disturbed youth, racist attitudes which go way back in the United States and Christian fundamentalism.”
Although the killer, Omar Mateen, the 29-year-old New York-born son of Afghan immigrants had declared allegiance to Daesh, Klein pointed out that other recent horrific mass shootings within the United States had different motivations.
He noted Dylann Storm Roof who killed nine African-American churchgoers at a Bible Study Charleston in South Carolina was a white racist and Robert Lewis Deer who shot dead three people at a Colorado Planned Parenthood center in 2015 was a product of Protestant fundamentalism.
“With regard to those cases in which the perpetrators of the crimes have stated Islamic fundamentalist sympathies, one might say their horrible crimes are a mirror reflection of US. policy of drone assassinations… These crimes feed on each other in an apparently endless cycle,” Klein argued.
Klein said he expected the cycle of mass killings provoked by different trigger-motivations to continue for the foreseeable future.
“I don't have any quick-fix policy solutions, because there aren't any,” he concluded.
The FBI investigation into Mateen has reportedly included a thorough review of his activity on social media, where he professed support for a host of different extremists groups. Mateen was previously investigated by the FBI in 2013 due to inflammatory comments he made to co-workers.
