Issues - Islamic Extremism - United Kingdom

(Washington Times) -- British Prime Minister David Cameron challenged President Obama with some blunt talk on Islamist extremism Tuesday during a gathering of world leaders at the United Nations to develop an international strategy for defeating the Islamic State and other terrorist groups.

Well aware that Mr. Obama shuns the term “Islamist extremists,” the Conservative British prime minister reacted strongly at the meeting when the president, who chaired the session, advised the assembled foreign leaders to avoid profiling Muslims because “violent extremism is not unique to any one faith.”

“Barack, you said it and you’re right — every religion has its extremists,” Mr. Cameron said

“But we have to be frank that the biggest problem we have today is the Islamist extremist violence that has given birth to ISIL, to al-Shabab, to al-Nusra, al Qaeda and so many other groups.”

Mr. Obama has repeatedly faced criticism at home for declining to single out Islamist-based terrorism as a particular threat and insists that all kinds of extremism pose dangers to U.S. interests and Western values.