ji·had·ica

“The Iran Crisis and Its Effects on the Global Jihad”

How will the Iran debacle affect al-Qaida? This was the question raised yesterday in a short strategic study titled “The Iran Crisis and Its Effects on the Global Jihad by Abu al-Fadl Madi (أبو الفضل ماضي), a Falluja forum member with so-called “great writer” status. He briefly outlined the situation in Iran claiming that the protests mark the end of the second period in Iran’s modern history, with the first ending in 1989. He called the new period the “Termination of the Rule of the Jurisprudent Theory.” He argued that the crisis could alter regional “balances, priorities, and strategies” and the “Global Jihadi Current” cannot ignore these events. He described four possible outcomes of the Iranian protests. The first was the possibility of the regime defeating the opposition by force. He argued that this would increase Ahmadinejad’s power, giving him more leeway to negotiate with the West, but due to

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Scott Sanford June 23, 2009

Weekend Reading: “The Second Foreign Fighter Glut”

Longtime Jihadica friend Clint Watts recently published an article at the Small Wars Journal titled, “Countering Terrorism from the Second Foreign Fighter Glut.” This article is the third in a series he has authored using data from the Sinjar records (Part 1 and Part 2 of the series). He concluded, “The key to success for future CT strategies will be the disruption of terrorist recruitment in foreign fighter source countries using a mixture of cost effective, soft power tactics to engage local, social-familial-religious networks in flashpoint cities – cities that produce a disproportionately high number of foreign fighters with respect to their overall population.” It is a good analysis and is definitely recommended reading.

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Scott Sanford May 29, 2009

Jihadists Study Jihadi Studies

At the risk of seeming omphaloskeptic, I will add a few more observations about jihadists citing western scholars, because this phenomenon taking larger proportions than I expected. Since my last post on the subject, both the Militant Ideology Atlas and the RAND study mentioned by al-Maqdisi have been posted on al-Maqdisi’s own website, Minbar al-Tawhid wa’l-Jihad (MTJ). Maqdisi’s readers can now enjoy the original version, the original executive summary as well as an Arabic summary of both reports. As many of you know, MTJ is the largest online library of jihadi literature, so this means that the CTC and RAND are now part of the official jihadi literary canon. It also means we now know which RAND study al-Maqdisi was referring to in last week’s statement:  Building Moderate Muslim Networks by Angel Rabasa, Cheryl Benard, Lowell Schwartz and Peter Sickle. Since the last post I have also learned that Joas

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Thomas Hegghammer April 29, 2009

Jihad Recollections

We usually don’t cover English language jihadi media here at Jihadica, but the recent release of a new magazine entitled Jihad Recollections (JR) attracted my attention because it is produced by Fursan media and because it is so well done. The magazine fills a gap in the world of jihadi media, as the editorial states: “We have acknowledged that the Arabic Jihadi media have surpassed the English community by light years. Many of our hard working brothers in the English Jihadi community – may Allah reward them with mountains of good deeds – usually limit themselves to translating works rather than developing their own. Henceforth, we have decided to take it upon ourselves to produce the first Jihadi Magazine in English.” It is not quite true that this is the first jihadi magazine in English, but this is indeed the most serious one I have seen. It is seventy pages

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Thomas Hegghammer April 7, 2009

A Unified Strategy towards Germany?

Over the past few months, several German-speaking jihadists have appeared in propaganda videos emanating from Afghanistan and Pakistan. Bekkay Harrach (aka Abu Talha al-Almani), who was recently featured in a production by al-Qaida’s official media arm al-Sahab, is only the most recent example. As described in this article, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and its offshoot, the Islamic Jihadi Union (IJU), also boast Germans in their ranks, and have actively used them in their media productions. Meanwhile, a suicide bomber, believed to be from the Taliban, attacked the German embassy in Kabul on 17 January 2009. All of this has been interpreted  as a sign that Germany is being targeted by al-Qaida. The German focus is indeed intriguing. But what I find even more interesting are the differences between these productions and what they tell us about the landscape of jihadi groups in Afghanistan. Too often, groups like al-Qaida,

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Anne Stenersen February 2, 2009

New Issue of Sada al-Malahim

Al-Qaida in Yemen (AQY) has released the seventh issue of its magazine Sada al-Malahim (SM), adding to the mounting evidence that the group is thriving. The slick 44-page publication contains no less than 30 articles by 23 different pen names. Many of the latter are no doubt invented, but the issue must be the work of a well-run media cell of a certain size. An undated picture on p. 16 showing 20 people training in the desert, as well as note on p. 12 inviting readers to submit questions to the journal’s gmail address, suggest that AQY is not about to collapse any time soon. The front page story, “Gaza under siege by Arab rulers”, is quite interesting. The article hardly mentions Israel and America, but instead lashes out at the Arab regimes and government clerics for facilitating the siege by repressing the mujahidin. “[The rulers] incriminated anyone who merely

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Thomas Hegghammer January 19, 2009

Analyses of U.S. Economic Crisis

Husayn b. Mahmud and Akram Hijazi, two influential voices in the jihadosphere, have opined on the U.S. economic crisis. Husayn, a pundit on Hesbah, argues that the U.S. financial crisis is happening because the U.S. spent too much money fighting wars in the Middle East and too little on domestic projects that would have created jobs and driven demand for materials.  The U.S. is fighting these wars to safeguard oil and oil pipelines but it did not count on the fierce “Jihadi resistance.”  Now it and its allies will pay the price. Akram Hijazi, a Jordanian professor and blogger, takes a different tack.  Rather than argue that U.S. military intervention in the Middle East is the root cause of the crisis, Hijazi asserts that the real cause is America’s unbridled capitalism based on usurious loans that benefit the few at the expense of the many.  The government’s recent intervention will

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Will McCants October 6, 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

Issue 2 of Qadaya Jihadiyya Released

Like last month’s debut, the second issue of Qadaya Jihadiyya is slick.  It also has a lot of interesting material: “Crisis of Terminology” discusses the contentious meanings of “Salafi” and “Jihadi.” The strategic studies section has three articles: “Seven Years After September, Has al-Qaeda Achieved Its Goals?”, “Bin Laden and the Globalization of Jihad,” and “The Effect of the New York and Washington Attacks on Many Youth in Groups in Palestine.” “The Jihadi Media Uncovers the Falseness of the American Empire.”  The article surveys the developments in jihadi media, particularly online, and Western responses. In addition to the article above on Palestinian youth, there is an article on fasting in Gaza.  This, coupled with the pictures of slain Hamas leaders on the last page, indicate that the journal is being produced by someone in the Palestinian territories or Jordan.  Perhaps a younger member of the Qassam Brigades. One final note:

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Will McCants September 22, 2008

The Strategic Effects of 9/11, Part 4: The Strategy of Laudable Terrorism

Continuing… The meaning of “terrorism” is extremely contentious. Terrorism is a type of political violence.  Western researchers say that political violence is of four types: violence between states, state violence against its citizens, violence between individuals, and the violence of citizens against the state. State violence against citizens is of two kinds: violence to compel obedience to laws and extrajudicial violence to compel political opponents to submit. The most common form of violence between citizens is criminal acts that have no political motive.  Other types can be social or political, like ethnic or ideological violence. The violence of citizens against a state can be organized or spontaneous.  The latter may not have political goals.  But organized violence against the state is classified as a rebellion that aims to overthrow the government.  The forms that these rebellions take reflect different strategies. Terrorism and guerrilla warfare are usually used synonymously because they

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Will McCants September 16, 2008
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