After the recent terror attempt on Christmas Day President Barack Obama boldly said that U.S. intelligence officials had "sufficient" information to uncover and disrupt the plot to blow up Flight 253 over Detroit but "failed to connect the dots."

This terror attempt by the Nigerian Muslim Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab raised several concerns in addition to the above mentioned president's concern about a failure of the US system to connect the dots. There is no single doubt that this event among many others such as the Fort Hood Massacre point to a serious problem in connecting the data together. However, the question that MUST be raised in this context is, have we only failed to connect the dots or have we actually failed to see them to begin with?

Since Sep 11 and in fact before it we failed miserably to see several clear dots and threats that could have changed our approach to the problem of radical Islam and enhanced our capabilities to fight it. 

Some of the dots that we failed to see include the following:

1-     We failed to see that in most approved Islamic Sharia books Jihad is predominantly taught in a violent manner. We lived in our dreams and imaginations that Jihad is a peaceful concept instead of doing our homework to learn how it is defined by mainstream Islamic books and media in the Arab and Muslim world. We obviously failed to confront the reality of the problem until the reality confronted us.

2-    We could not see that the problem of terrorism is clearly linked to a religious ideology. Our political correctness made us unable to see the most apparent thing which is that when thousands of terror attacks and suicide bombings are conducted predominantly by dedicated and devout Muslims who belong to different economical and educational levels, it is imperative to think in the ideology as the number one cause for the problem.

3-    We did not recognize that in the present, Sharia Law that allows stoning of women until death for adultery and encourages promoting wars against Non Muslims to spread Islam is not only violent and inhumane, but also carries a major threat to the future of our civilizations.

4-    We were unable to see the clear link between teaching violence in mainstream Islamic jurisprudence books and the development of a violent mind that can ultimately lead to terrorism and barbarism.

5-    We kept talking about moderate and radical Islam without setting parameters to define the terminology that we use.  This made us support some radical Islamic groups, organizations, and individuals thinking that they are 'moderates'. 

6-    We failed to comprehend that the lack of a strong reaction in the Muslim street against the terrorists is indicative of a serious cultural problem that encourages and supports radical Islam.

7-    We failed to see that allowing radicals who clearly express sympathy and support for our enemy in our military - such as the case of Nidal Hasan, who committed the Fort Hood massacre, is a form of insanity.

8-    We could not realize that carrying a US passport or having US citizenship does not grant immunity from becoming radicalized.

9-    We could not figure out that Muslims killing one another in extremely barbaric manner in Iraq and Afghanistan cannot be due to or explained by the presence of an Arab Israeli conflict or by the US foreign policy in the Middle East. We failed to ask the basic question: Why Muslims kill one another in such barbaric way?

10- We failed to see that disrespect for the  life of non-Muslims as currently taught in many mainstream Islamic jurisprudence books is one if not the main underlying factor behind terrorism. We simply could not see that the barbarism practiced by radical Islam has its roots in what we call "moderate Islam" or Sharia Laws.  

In brief, our failure to defeat radical Islam is not simply a failure in connecting the dots and is primarily a failure to see these dots.