Quora Answer: Should Europe Forgive Their Citizens Who Joined ISIS?

The following is my answer to a Quora question: “Why should Europe forgive their citizens who joined ISIS?”

What is there to forgive?  We are not dealing with sins, but crimes against the state, and against humanity.  There is either amnesty or prosecution.  And there is no place for amnesty in this case, because it does not address the problem.  These people have betrayed their countries, their families, their communities and their religion in supporting an extremist exclusivist interpretation of a heretical sect of Islam.  Any person who can justify genocide, oppression and terror in the name of their version of the Divine cannot be trusted, and can never be absolved of the magnitude of their betrayal because they are inconvenienced by the defeat of the very entity they supported.  I do not buy the excuse that they were brainwashed or mistaken.  These things only take hold because there is something in their hearts that incline them towards this.

If they hold more than one citizenship, they should be stripped of their citizenship.  If they are to be taken back, they should be tried.  Their assets should be seized.  They should either be executed, or detained until their natural death.  This is not about forgiveness or revenge, but for the benefit of civilisation.  A cancer is never accommodated, or allowed to infect.  A cancerous organism is quarantined and excised.