The ongoing refusal to take Jihadists at their word is reaching absurd levels. Thus, NYT editors recommend that Putin pay more attention to what they deem"root causes" of the latest Jihadist attack, i.e.,"the underlying inequities that feed militancy, including poverty, joblessness and official corruption." That ignores mountains of research demonstrating that poverty has nothing to do with terror. Jihadist goals do. Writing from Pakistan Syed Saleem Shahzad spells them out:

Well-placed contacts within jihadi circles confirm to Asia Times Online that the attackers were in all probability from the North Caucasus, but add that they could have been trained in Pakistan as part of a broad plan that al-Qaeda has been working on for many years - to stir unrest across Central Asia. The insiders who spoke to Asia Times Online point out that Monday's attack could signal a new salvo in this battle. The last metro attacks in Moscow were in 2004, when 40 people were killed in two separate incidents.

The al-Qaeda vision is to use the separatist struggle in Chechnya as a rallying point for a broader fight against Russia and its allies in Central Asia. In this new war it is envisaged that Chechens will be joined by, among others, ethnic communities of Uzbeks, Uyghurs and Tajiks under one front to establish an Islamic emirate of Khurasan.

As top al-Qaeda ideologues see it, the map of ancient Khurasan (comprising the present Central Asian republics, parts of Afghanistan, parts of Iran and parts of Pakistan) would be revived. Victory here would then lead to the"end-of-time battles" in the Middle East.

It appears that the training may have been done in Pakistan:

Asia Times Online has written how control of all foreign fighters in North Waziristan and South Waziristan was generally in the hands of Arabs, who are astute and trained commanders. (See The Pakistani road to German terror) For example, Abu Nasir commands the Uyghurs and Pakistanis; Abu Akash looks after the Uzbeks and Tajiks while Abu Hanifah takes care of Turkish Kurds, Bosnians and Chechens.

After 2007, foreign fighters began to arrive in Pakistan in increasing numbers as al-Qaeda had consolidated its position in the tribal border areas. Most of the jihadis came from Turkey, where there are large Chechen and Uzbek communities.

After mid-2009, the fighters were able to travel through Iran as al-Qaeda struck a deal with the Iranian Jundallah militant group to allow them transit through restive Sistan-Balochistan province in the southwest. The fighters were also able to return via the same route.

Conceivably, this was the route taken by Monday's suicide bombers after receiving training in the al-Qaeda camps that dot the border areas.

So, neither poverty nor emptying part of Jerusalem of Jews would make any difference. Jihadists have their own agenda and the sooner the rest of the world to come to terms with that fact the better.