I’m once again saddened this morning by the recent losses of life in London, Paris, Tehran (that’s in Iran for those who don’t know) and elsewhere.

The two attacks in Iran this morning should be a reminder (or a wake up call for many) to Americans though — most of the Islamic world does NOT consider ISIS to be Islamic, and in fact Muslims are the most common targets of ISIS violence. This violence is typically in Syria or Iraq, but has now moved to Iran too.

What most Americans don’t realize is that Islamic people ABSOLUTELY DO decry ISIS (or Da’esh as they are called pejoratively in most of the Islamic world), but it’s not that they are Muslims criticizing other Muslims. They are rather saying that Da’esh is NOT “Islamic,” and does not deserve to use the religion in their name. They should not be recognized as Islamic, b/c according to almost all Muslims, they do not follow Islam!

ISIS is its own violent, terrorist group, intent on making its own state and gaining autocratic control in a religion of its own making. They have a perverted view of the Islamic religion, (from almost all Islamic perspectives) that is unrecognizable to any sane Muslim.

Here’s one part of the solution to ISIS: the rest of us need to STOP calling them “Islamic terrorists.” The use of the word “Islam” is a validation of the false claims put forward by ISIS, and we hand the terrorists a big “WIN” every time we associate them with the 1.6+ billion Muslims around the world. ISIS both wants to claim they are Islamic, to be recognized by other Muslims, and to link their activities to other Muslims in order to make the West oppose the religion, not just the terrorist group. If they do these things, they win. And we are helping them.

We can best remember those who have been harmed or died in ISIS related attacks by labeling the group correctly — they are “terrorists,” plain and simple. Let’s not continue to help ISIS by laying blame on the people they are most likely to harm.