Free Will, Islamic Jihadists, And The Suppression Of Religious Criticism

     Did the Quran and other Islamic religious books drive Muslims to kill so called non believers and infidels, enslave and rape their women and children, and kidnap their male children to turn into fanatical jihadists? This is what ISIS did. But they are not the only Islamic jihadist organization that rapes, kidnaps and kills. There are many Islamic jihadist organizations that worship jihad, death, martyrdom, war, terror and killing. They are in Nigeria, Philippines, Somalia, Thailand, Kashmir, Iran, Egypt, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza, Pakistan, and many more places.
     The discussion rages in the west whether jihadists are Muslims or an aberration of Islam. The jihadists insist they are the practicing the real Islam just as surely as many Muslims in the west insist they are not. But Muslims in the west that insist scrutiny and criticism of Islam is Islamophobic only strengthen the hand of the jihadists. No religion, especially a religion that insists it is the only right and correct religion for the whole world, should be above criticism and scrutiny. Criticizing religion, any and all religions, should not be a death sentence. It should not be grounds for punishment of any sort.
        Criticizing religion is the right of all free human beings. Freedom of religion includes freedom to reject and criticize religion. Persecution or harassment of the people that practice a religion is  wrong and must be vigorously opposed. But shutting down those that criticize a religion must also be opposed. No one, not the followers of a religion or those that criticize any religion followed, should be harassed or persecuted.
          As for the jihadists that eagerly rape, murder and pursue martyrdom, they are individuals that make a choice. Human beings, no matter what they are taught or indoctrinated into, still are the ones that make the choice to kill or not to kill, to rape or not to rape, to enslave or not to enslave, and to harm or not to harm. They may use religion to justify their choices, but it is still they that choose to do good or evil.