In 2017, President Donald Trump made his first foreign trip as commander in chief of the United States to Saudi Arabia. That nation plays a critical role in US foreign policy, and is integral in the fight to combat violent extremism largely emanating from the Middle East. In his keynote address at the Arab-Islamic American Summit in Riyadh, Trump said, “I chose to make my first foreign visit a trip to the heart of the Muslim world,” to promote a unified position between the US and the Muslim world to stand against transnational extremism. As I watched the speech live on my flight as I was crossing the Atlantic Ocean from an international conference where I presented in Prague on how Western communities can remain resilient against violent extremism, I couldn’t help but think about some of the insights I presented from my presentation, new original research from my doctoral dissertation and particularly my own personal experience as a third-generation Black American Muslim.

The largest terrorist attack in Somali history occurred on Saturday, October 14, 2017, in the capital city of Mogadishu with at least 400 deaths and and hundreds of injured. No group at present has claimed credit for the attack, but based off past terrorist events inside the country, Al Shabaab, the East Africa based terrorist organization likely are the perpetrators. President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo declared three days of mourning and joined thousands of others who responded by donating blood at area hospitals.

In the aftermath of 2017 Charlottesville violence, white American evangelical Christians have been forced to confront their position on the extremist element within their communities: radicalized white Christian males.

A joint intelligence bulletin by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security found that white supremacist extremists were responsible for 49 homicides in 29 attacks from 2000 to 2016—more than any other domestic extremist movement.