Jihad as-Sayf.
The hate that dare not speak its name.
Jihad, which reportedly means "struggle" in Arabic, appears to be an important idea in Islam. Muslims who are engaged in jihad are called mujahideen. Now that jihad in one form or another is reported in worldwide media, a common vocabulary is needed. The so-called Global War on Terror (GWOT) is really the global war on violent jihad.
After reading about jihad in Wikipedia, I learned that Muslim jurists, at least some of them, describe four kinds of Jihad. The first three appear to be protected by the US Constitution. All of the problems in recent history (and for much longer) which relate to Muslim attacks on non-believers appear to come from the fourth kind of jihad, called Jihad as-Sayf, meaning "struggle of the sword."
I propose that we refer to those who attack others for not being Muslims, or for practicing an alternative form of Islam, as mujahideen as-sayf. I believe that to be the precise term in Arabic, the language of the Koran.
To refer to mujahideen as-sayf eliminates the problems inherent in calling such people terrorists or islamofascists. More importantly, it disconnects Jihad as-Sayf from the rest of the Muslim religion. This is especially important in places such as India, where Muslims comprise over 16% of the population, but also in Israel, where Muslims will be a permanent minority forever, and even in the USA, where Muslims are around 0.6% of the population, many of whom are true Americans, not subversives or terrorists.
We no longer have to speak of "moderate" Muslims (the term is meaningless), or engage in sweeping and ultimately dangerous condemnations of an entire world religion. There are those who practice Jihad as-Sayf against nonbelievers, and those are the enemies of world peace. And there are those who don't.
As this web page indicates, the concept of Jihad as-Sayf evolved within the Koran from legitimate self-defense to a call for attacking all nonbelievers, with the purpose of killing them or turning them into dhimmis, religiously defined second-class citzens.
I have posted another page about the four kinds of Jihad.
@libertyrant
PS. Jihad as-Sayf is pronounced JEE HOD OSS SIFE according to the spelling of American English. One who practices it is a MOO JAH HEED OSS SIFE, plural MOO JAH HID DEEN OSS SIFE.
Jihad as-Sayf is sometimes spelled Jihad al-Sayf or called Jihad bis Sayf
Reuben Firestone's book about Jihad can be purchased here.