Types of terrorism: From the Red Brigades to Al Qaeda, from the Palestinian Brigade to ISIS

Abstract

It is necessary to link the phenomenon of terrorism to the concept of information and communication. Information that comes from the propaganda that every terrorist organization makes of itself and from the communication produced by the media to inform the public opinion about the facts. In the 70's, in Italy, the Red Brigades used flyers as real ideological treatises, intended for the media. Thirty years later, the jihadist organization of Al Qaeda inaugurated the season of the new global terrorism; on 11th of September 2001, a new type of propaganda was born, which exploited the television channels and the web, reaching all the rest of society. Nowadays, we are faced with ISIS, which has managed to set up a very articulated and complex recruitment work based on online propaganda, through the diffusion of photos, audio and video messages on the Internet, succeeding in making proselytes even among Europeans. The aim of this in-depth study is to demonstrate how all terrorist movements are organised and lucidly determined to plan their actions and messages. The historical context that gave birth to the organizations, the internal structure, the ideology, the modus operandi and the media dimension; the role of women and children, the enrolment, the new scenarios and the extra-European measures of prevention in the fight against terrorism have been deepened.