Both #terrorism & anti-terrorism are structured as a Lovecraftian cult, with a herd of clueless outer circle cultists and an inner circle that thinks it understands the cult’s actual purpose - which is not the advertised purpose.
That the cult’s apocalyptic predictions are bullshit doesn’t matter very much to the outer circle cultists because, before they realize it, they’ll be eaten by the unfathomable Old Ones who were pulling the strings all along, under motives unconceivable to beings in this plane of existence. The inner circle believe they have everything under control but they will be eaten too - they just don’t know it yet.