On second thoughts, the ambiguity could come down in favor or your reading.

Even there, though, it can also mean that by blaming the religion, all those (non-terrorists) who follow that religion are put into the same category with the terrorists. And if you’re going to be attacked for your religion, well, the saying about “sheep and goats” comes to mind… And it absolutely feeds into the paranoid sense that the religion is under attack itself.

But I’ll certainly accept that religion and terror have some linkage. The strength of that linkage, though, is open to debate.

Clearly, being a Muslim is not a necessary condition in becoming a terrorist, nor is it a sufficient condition. But explanation(s) of why, now, Muslims constitute the majority of terrorists needs to be found.

I’m not surprised about this, though: In this context, it stressed that any attempt to link terrorism with any religion is helpful only to the terrorists. Recall that many terrorists themselves explicitly link their actions to their religion. The language in the comunique could be taken to discourage close examination of this issue.

(If one were to suggest, for example, that a close examination of Christian postmillenialist theonomy must be taken off the table in any discussion of the motivations of abortion clinic bombers, one would not (and should not) be taken seriously.)