Why do you think Islam has turned increasingly militant?
I think Islam has been militant from the beginning. Later on, its degreeof militancy fluctuated with a number of factors, one of them being the powerequation with its rivals. Today, Islam lives in the shadow of Western (andlocally in South Asia, Hindu) economic and cultural supremacy, which gives it anincentive for militant opposition to the West. At the same time, itsdemographic strength and access to specific military (guerrilla)instrumentsgive it the self-confidence to transform its dissastisfaction into action.So, we are seeing a peak in Islamic militancy.
There is a view that many of the militant groups are a reaction to the decayin their own societies and that this is because Muslims have turned away fromtheir religion.
I disagree. There has been plenty of decadence in many periods and areasof Muslim history, some of them provoking militant "purification"within the community, others coinciding with aggression against non-Muslims, andothers not accompanied by a vigorous Islamic action in any sense. Also,what Islamic militants call "decadence", and to which theywould react e.g. by killing "apostates", may be somethingentirely different from what outsiders would call decadence, e.g. peacefulcoexistence with non-Muslims can already qualify as treason to Islam, witnessthe murder ofEgyptian president Anwar Sadat for making peace with Israel.
Why is the Quran invoked by the militants for their violent brand ofpolitics?
Because the Quran does contain ample injunctions to hostility and war againstthe unbelievers.
Can the violence also be attributed to suppression of dissent in large partsof the Muslim world?
That suppression of dissent is a tradition instituted by the Prophet himself,who had a number of his critics murdered or executed. It is true that thissuppression of dissent often remained in force when Muslim regimes turnedsecular and then turned against the Islamists themselves, witness Syria'spresident Assad sr.'s bloody oppression of Islamicmilitancy, or Turkey'soutlawing the Islamist party.