Poverty leads to hopelessness. Which leads to being easy prey for manipulation, which leads to be susceptible to an ideology, which leads otherwise normal human beings to commit atrocities. Islam is associated with acts of terror because the Middle East is rife with poverty. Just look anywhere in the world where options are spare and life is hard and you'll see easy comparisons.
Why are so many South and Central American youth involved in narco organizations? Surely so many young men don't grow up hating their community and wishing for a life of horrific violence? Of course not, but lack of opportunity makes them susceptible to the 'get rich' ideology and so scores of young men die for their patrones every month. Same thing with the communist agitators in Russia, working for their political leaders, same thing with the Shining Path, the Nazi party, the IRA, etc. etc. Islam is a flavor that's on the rise for many reasons. It's foreign, it's religious and not political - which is less common in the West since the Enlightenment, they speak a strange language, cook with strange spices, wear strange clothes, write with strange letters, etc.
The leaders of ISIS and al Qaeda et. al use religion, a powerful tool as we all know, to warp young men into shrapnel. They're headed by yet more petty tyrants in a long line of cruel men, bent on power in this life, by convincing others of the glory in the next one. You play into their hands by focusing on the message and on the not the people directing it.
I'd encourage some of you taking the opposite tack to check out books written by IC members that don't carry titles like Islam Will Kill Us All.
The Master Plan by Brian Fishman is great.
Salafi-Jihadism: The History of an Idea by Shiraz Maher is also a fascinating read. Islamic inspired terrorism is a much more complicated subject than a young man shouting Allahu Akbar.