ji·had·ica

Are the Uzbeks Going Global?

[Editor’s note: I am thrilled to introduce Einar Wigen, author of the recent FFI report on the IJU, as a guest contributor. Einar interned at FFI last summer and is currently a a student fellow at the Norwegian Institute for International Affairs (NUPI). A fluent Turkish speaker, Einar specialises in jihadism among the Turkics. Not many people produce world-class research as summer interns, so this guy is really someone to look out for in the future.] The Turkic peoples have until now played a fairly peripheral role in global jihadism. They have not attracted much academic attention, and apart from the 2003 Istanbul bombings and the 2008 American Consulate attacks, operations carried out by Turkics have gained little attention. The Waziristan-based group Islamic Jihad Union (IJU) seems to be trying to change this (as Jihadica has suggested before). The IJU broke off from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan in 2001,

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Einar Wigen June 17, 2009

Virtual safe havens and the war of ideas

Abu Muqawama has a great piece in the New Republic today. Given his very kind words for Will and myself, I am biased, but the article makes an extremely important point about the importance of virtual safe havens. Although I just posted and don’t really have the time to blog, I felt compelled to add a few thoughts. There are at least two more reasons why there ought to be a virtual dimension to the new AfPak strategy. First, the Pashto and Urdu-language part of the jihadi cyberspace is growing rapidly, and very few people are keeping track of it. Those who do rarely know the Arabic sites and vice-versa. No analyst I know has enough Arabic and Pashto to connect the dots (except Mustafa Abu al-Yazid). Second, the Internet infrastructure in Afghanistan and Pakistan is relatively poorly developed compared to the Arab world. This is very worrying, because it

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Thomas Hegghammer March 31, 2009

Back

I have been busy the past two weeks, but the jihadis have been busier. Bin Ladin has issued two audio statements, one proposing practical steps to liberate Palestine and the other about the treacherous government in Somalia. Al-Zawahiri warned against the forthcoming Crusader attack on Sudan, while Mustafa Abu al-Yazid has addressed the people of Pakistan. Abu Umar al-Baghdadi has spoken about the US plan to withdraw from Iraq, but he does not seem to get the same attention from the online community as his colleagues in Afghanistan. Abu Qatada has issued a statement from prison about the decision to extradite him to Jordan. Fatah al-Islam sharia officer Abu Abdallah al-Maqdisi has been taking questions since Monday, but nobody is allowed to ask about Shakir al-Absi or Asad al-Jihad2 (hmm). On the magazine front, Sumud 33  has been out for a little while. Fortunately Sada al-Malahim 8 came out on

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Thomas Hegghammer March 26, 2009

Child Martyrs

[Editor’s note: I am very proud to introduce a new contributor, FFI researcher Qandeel Siddique, who will be covering Urdu-language jihadi websites for Jihadica]. The Pakistani militant group Jaish-e-Mohammad, led by the famous Masood Azhar, has a strong presence on the Urdu-language wing of the jihadi internet. Among its less savory operations is an online jihadi magazine tailored especially for children, entitled Musalman Bachay [Muslim Children]. In the magazine, Masood Azhar and others regale their young readers with anecdotes from personal battles, as well as fictional pieces, centering on the importance of Islam and being a “good Muslim”, and convincing them of the bravery and honor in pursuing the path of jihad. The aim of this magazine is quite evident: to lure young minds into Jaish-e-Mohammad’s ideological fold. This arguably gives meat to JeM’s broader strategy of harnessing support for jihadi missions. The magazine contains articles on religion and combat

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Qandeel Siddique March 11, 2009

New Jihadi Mags Analyze Mumbai, Somali Pirates

Issue 31 of Sada al-Jihad is out, as well as issue 4 of Qadaya Jihadiyya.  In Sada, Ta Ha al-Miqdad argues that the Mumbai attacks demonstrated that Jihadis have a “strategic awareness” because: They hit the commercial center of India at a time of great global economic instability. All of the attacks were from Pakistan, which demonstrated solidarity with the Muslims in India. They sent a message to the chief Crusader allies by taking citizens of those countries hostage and executing them. The attacks widened the scope of the confrontation in Afghanistan to include countries allied with the Crusaders against Muslims (i.e. India). Most important, the attacks were a message to Obama, who wants to pull out of Iraq and concentrate on Af/Pak.  Obama knows he needs peace between Pakistan and India for his strategy to work and the Jihadis have shown they can destroy this peace. In Qadaya Jihadiyya,

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Will McCants December 18, 2008

The Connection Between Sayyid Imam And The Mumbai Attacks

Khalil al-Anani wrote an article two days ago about the ideological connection between Sayyid Imam and the Mumbai attackers.  There are bits I disagree with, but he’s right to highlight the contribution of Sayyid Imam’s earlier works to the attackers and the contribution of his current revision to our understanding of those attacks.  A paraphrastic summary follows:

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Will McCants December 5, 2008

The Denudation Of The Exoneration: Part 8

In part 8, Sayyid Imam continues to hammer al-Qaeda for bringing disaster to the Middle East and for the hypocrisy of its leaders.  He puts forward the odd claim that AQ lied to the U.S. about WMD in Iraq and about AQ ties with Iraq to push the U.S. to invade observes that Iran and Syria have been the primary beneficiaries of AQ’s antics in Iraq notes what any observer of the region already knows but rarely says: bashing the U.S. and Israel and talking about the Palestinian issue is great PR offers an excellent explanation as to why AQ will not get a foothold in the Palestinian territories claims that Bin Laden gave Saudi donations for jihad to Nawaz Sharif in support of his candidacy against Benazir Bhutto Continuing… Z claims that only the mujahids have thrawted the plans of the U.S.  That’s like Gamal Abdel Nasser’s slogan after the

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Will McCants November 28, 2008

The Denudation Of The Exoneration: Part 3

As with Wednesday’s installment, Sayyid Imam saves the good stuff for last.  He obliquely chides Mullah Omar for not turning over Bin Laden to the U.S.  Imam also discloses that Bin Laden was plotting with Pakistani intelligence before 9/11 without the permission of Mullah Omar and alleges that he worked with ISI head Gen. Mahmud Ahmed.  Finally, Imam reveals that Zawahiri did not know of the 9/11 attacks until after they happened.  In all, the picture he paints of Zawahiri is of a man very peripheral to al-Qaeda operations until after 9/11.   At the beginning of today’s installment, Sayyid Imam rebuts several of the principles underpinning the “school of al-Qaeda” and reprises the argument of his last book that even though jihad is a duty, there are conditions that must be met before it can be undertaken.  My paraphrastic translation follows: Muslims are the cause of their own problems,

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Will McCants November 21, 2008

New Issue of Urdu-Language Jihadi Journal

[by Chipotle Mystery]    Issue 3 of Hittin, an Urdu-language Jihadi journal, has been released.  The issue includes: short reports on the Islamic State of Iraq and the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan a eulogy of Mullah Dadullah, a major Taliban commander who was killed in May of 2007 several articles that refer to the Red Mosque incident a collection of quotes from notable jihadi figures (e.g. Mullah Omar, Usama bin Laden, and Zawahiri) that is presented as inspirational advice for leaders an article on “methods” for engaging in jihad by the “Center for the Islamic Studies”   It’s telling that although this issue was published recently, it focuses on events that occurred in the middle of 2007.  There is also older material.  For example, this issue has a fatwa issued by Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai in 2001 that justifies attacks on American soldiers in Afghanistan (he had issued a similar fatwa

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Will McCants November 3, 2008

The Strategic Effects of 9/11, Part 5: The Jihadi Domino Theory

Continuing… Why did al-Qaeda attack the U.S.?  Was it to drive the U.S. out of the Middle East?  Or was it to strike the far enemy for the sake of destroying the near enemy (i.e. regimes in the Arab and Islamic world)? Regardless of the intent of al-Qaeda’s leaders, the sequence of events gives weight to the second possibility, which could also be termed the Domino Scenario. According to a 2007 article by George Friedman, Bin Laden saw a rare opportunity after the fall of the USSR to begin re-establishing the worldwide caliphate.  But, says Friedman, armed groups can’t establish empires.  They can, however, seize a state and use it to begin to establish an empire.  UBL realized that Afghanistan wasn’t the ideal place for this because of its geographical position and its weakness. Based on Zawahiri’s pre-9/11 writings, Friedman believes that UBL wanted to topple local regimes and replace

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Will McCants September 23, 2008
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