Jihad as addiction

From Jessica Stern's editorial today in the New York Times:

While there is no single root cause of terrorism, my interviews with terrorists over the past five years suggest that alienation, perceived humiliation and lack of political and economic opportunities make young men susceptible to extremism. It can evolve easily into violence when government institutions are weak and there is money available to pay for a holy war. America is unlikely to win the hearts and minds of committed terrorists. After some time on the job, it is hard for them to imagine another life. Several described jihad to me as being "addictive."

I don't mean to slam the editorial -- I think she makes many good points -- but the way she uses uses addiction as an explanation for terrorism seems misguided.

It's the familiar narrative of alienation leading people to destructive, addictive behavior, but in this case drugs have been replaced by jihad. Does this really help explain anything? The invocation of a clinical category, complete with the quotations around the word addictive to make it sound more like a case history. (Are the quotations really needed for any other purpose?)