Europe’s Terror Subsidies - Wall Street Journal editorial
In March, terrorist Khalid el-Bakraoui blew himself up inside Brussels’ Maelbeek subway station, and 16 people died. Several years earlier, Bakraoui had served time in a Belgian prison for carjacking and armed robbery. When he was released from prison in early 2014, Belgium’s welfare system gave him $28,000 in various benefits, such as unemployment and medical insurance.
Bakraoui is one example in a remarkable story this week by Wall Street Journal reporters Mark Maremont and Valentina Pop, who described how Europe’s generous welfare system has provided standard-of-living subsidies to terrorists who have been murdering Europeans.
Salah Abdeslam and his brother Brahim Abdeslam were two of the perpetrators of the November 2015 attacks across Paris, which killed 130 people. Salah Abdeslam was collecting unemployment benefits until three weeks before the attack. Terrorists have transferred welfare payments to prepaid debit cards used for attacks or run student-loan scams to raise money for their plots. An Islamic State manual titled “How to Survive in the West: A Mujahid Guide” instructs potential jihadists that “if you can claim extra benefits from a government, then do so.”…