Jihadi Organizations Research Articles

Book Review / Compte rendu: The Strategic Logic of Women in Jihadi Organizations: From Operation to State Building

Book Review / Compte rendu: The Strategic Logic of Women in Jihadi Organizations: From Operation to State Building

Al-Qaʿida Revisited

ABSTRACT This essay addresses the history of Usama bin Laden’s al-Qaʿida and the U.S.’s global war on terror through the prism of two new books by leading experts in the field. Nelly Lahoud’s book makes important use of new documents seized at bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad. Peter Bergen explores the relationship between Pakistan, al-Qaʿida, and the American war on terror. Both of these books add to the scholarly literature and shed light on existing debates in the field of jihadism studies. And examined in combination these books help scholars in the field conceptualize broader analytical issues that are important not only for how one understands al-Qaʿida, but also, more generally, for how one interprets and evaluates the history of jihadi organizations. For example, how does one judge success and failure for these groups? And what is the proper framework for analyzing the relationship between the central leaderships of these organizations and their regional branches, or even those who are inspired to act in their name? How do we explain the resilience and longevity of al-Qaʿida and its ideology? These two books help point the way forward for future scholars in the field.

Facing the Threat of Modern Islamic State Insurgence to Increase National Resilience

The threat of insurgency or modern rebellion of Islamic State in Indonesia is strongly influenced by the Southeast Asian regional environment which has a region with religious, ethnic, and cultural diversity. Ethnic, religious, racial, and intergroup conflicts have caused economic, political, and psychological losses. This article aims to describe and analyze using a variety of approaches applied in Indonesia to face the modern insurgency of the Islamic State using qualitative analysis methods. The technique of collecting data and information is through literature study. There are several jihadi organizations and groups that carry out operations, such as Jamaah Islamiyah, the Indonesian Mujahideen Council, and others. The vitality of radical and extremist groups is able to rise to renew leadership in the organizational network structure based on personal closeness, friendship, and family. National resilience as a dynamic condition of the nation and the conception of national development in achieving the goals and ideals of the nation, which is tough and tenacious and capable of developing national strength in dealing with all kinds and forms of threats, challenges, obstacles, and disturbances both coming from within and from within. outside, which threatens and endangers the integrity, identity and survival of the nation and state, especially the threat of modern Islamic State insurgency. Modern insurgency may never develop sufficient military strength to carry out conventional operations and must therefore rely on terrorism and psychological and political means. Therefore, facing the threat of the Islamic State, the Government of Indonesia must map the transformation of ISIS in Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia, so that it is faced with proportional efforts and actions such as dealing with domestic insurgency, regional cooperation, and the involvement of extraregional forces within the ASEAN framework.

LOCATING WOMEN IN JIHAD: THE CASE OF WOMEN IN THE ISLAMIC STATE OF IRAQ AND SYRIA (ISIS)

The increase in women’s engagement with jihadi groups around the globe fueled debates regarding women’s incorporation into jihadi organizations. The current trend in the global labor force clearly demonstrates a discriminatory pattern in favor of men. Surprisingly, despite this traditional restrictive view of Islamic jurisprudence on women’s social activities, the level of women’s incorporation into jihadi organizations has grown rapidly both in numbers and roles. Before the defeat of the organization in late 2018, nearly 20 percent of all members of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) were women. As ISIS morphed beyond a mere militant organization and into a state builder, its utilization of women also transformed accordingly to address the challenges that a functioning state faces. By using primary data collected from several field trips in the Middle East, this article argues the position of women in ISIS and the mechanisms by which they were incorporated.

Jihadi Culture: The Art and Social Practices of Militant Islamists

Jihadi Culture: The Art and Social Practices of Militant Islamists

Toward a New Typology of Sunni Jihad

One recurring theme of the immediate post-9/11 environment was that of regional political organizations and violent lone-wolf actors pledging allegiance to Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda group (AQ). Following the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)’s 2014 capture of Mosul, Iraq, many of these loose affiliations began shifting to ISIS. This resulted in a blurring of distinctions between different types of Sunni jihadi organizations, with media commentators and analysts at times referring to groups as “Al Qaeda–like” or “ISIS-affiliated,” despite those groups’ goals and operational scopes being largely disconnected from both AQ and ISIS. This article proposes a new typology of Sunni jihadi groups according to theater of operation, strategy, and geopolitical alignment. This typology offers three categories: global jihad, local jihad, and sectarian jihad. In addition, it identifies four types of operation types that Sunni jihadi groups adopt: (1) core theater attacks, (2) power-projection attacks, (3) local recruitment, and (4) foreign recruitment. The main contribution of this article is its frameworks for improving the quality of the analysis of Sunni jihadi groups.

The Shifts in the Jihadi-Salafi Paradigms: From the Peshawar and Jalalabad Paradigms to Those of Idleb and Raqqa

ABSTRACT This paper, based on numerous interviews conducted with former jihadists, argues that the emergence of the Islamic State, more than an organizational rift, has led to a major paradigm shift within the jihadi organizations. As such we argue that the Al Qaeda salafi jihadi paradigm, i.e., the “Peshawar paradigm,” has gradually evolved over the years, becoming more in phase with the realities of the battlefield and less dogmatic, explaining this organization’s constant resilience in spite of many setbacks and leading to the rise of a new thinking which we call “the Idelb Paradigm.” Conversely, the ISIS jihadi paradigm, which we call “the Raqqa Paradigm,” stems from the Takfiri school of thought. While not new and already present in the 1980s in Afghanistan, the Takfiri school of thought has been gaining momentum over the years and emerged as a major to the Al Qaeda one. This schism is likely to have a long-term effect on the strategies and alliances of the respective affiliates of both Al Qaeda and ISIS.

The Strategic Logic of Women in Jihadi Organizations

ABSTRACTDespite the traditional restrictive views of Islamic jurisprudence on women's social activities, the level of women's incorporation into jihadi organizations is growing rapidly in both numbers and roles. This article argues that this increase reflects a strategic logic—jihadi groups integrate women to enhance organizational success. The article develops a typology of jihadi organizations: operation-based and state building and argues that the strategic logic of women in operation-based organizations lays in the tactical advantages women provide them. However, for state-building jihadi groups, the strategic logic of women is geared toward addressing the challenges facing a functioning state.

The Tablighi Jama’at: Proselytizing Missionaries or Trojan Horse?

Tablighi Jama’at, a transnational Deobandi (Sunni) Muslim proselytizing group with branches in over 150 countries today, has garnered attention in the West since 2001. With increasing frequency, terrorist plots in the West reveal Jama’at linkages. Although its leadership enunciates a peaceful, apolitical stance; the organization does share the same core ideology and ultimate objectives (the expansion of Dar al Islam and the establishment of a global Caliphate) as the Salafis, Wahhabis and other “revivalist” Islamist movements such as the Ikhwan al Muslimin (Muslim Brotherhood). The only difference between the Jama’at and the Ikhwan, for example, is their respective modus operandi. Although the Tablighi Jama’at stress proselytism as their sole objective, they have also provided cover, a conduit and a fertile recruiting ground for jihadi organizations such as Al Qaeda and Lashkar-i-Taiba.

Power and Identity in the Discourse of Jihad

The recent rise of religious militancy in Muslim countries has been explained either in theological idiom or as an offshoot of national, regional, and international geopolitics. However, such analyses have often ignored micro-level actors in Jihadi ventures, leaving the breeding grounds at the grassroots unexplored. The meta-narratives articulated by these actors have privileged traditional hegemony at the cost of the social, which is complex. This article explores the dynamics of power and identity in the context of Jihad at the level of the individual, family, and Jihadi organizations, focusing on the participation of Pakistani civilians in cross-border violent conflicts in Afghanistan and Kashmir. Applying Foucault’s concept of power as the framework for analysis, this article demonstrates that the desire to exercise power, rather than any commitment to some divine project, is the major reason behind decisions to join Jihadi organizations. Identities based on gender, age, class. education, social status, and ethnicity were employed as instruments in the theater of power. In a complex process. multiple factors brought individuals into the ambit of Jihadi organizations to undertake violent actions.

Power and Identity in the Discourse of Jihad

The recent rise of religious militancy in Muslim countries has been explained either in theological idiom or as an offshoot of national, regional, and international geopolitics. However, such analyses have often ignored micro-level actors in Jihadi ventures, leaving the breeding grounds at the grassroots unexplored. The meta-narratives articulated by these actors have privileged traditional hegemony at the cost of the social, which is complex. This article explores the dynamics of power and identity in the context of Jihad at the level of the individual, family, and Jihadi organizations, focusing on the participation of Pakistani civilians in cross-border violent conflicts in Afghanistan and Kashmir. Applying Foucault’s concept of power as the framework for analysis, this article demonstrates that the desire to exercise power, rather than any commitment to some divine project, is the major reason behind decisions to join Jihadi organizations. Identities based on gender, age, class. education, social status, and ethnicity were employed as instruments in the theater of power. In a complex process. multiple factors brought individuals into the ambit of Jihadi organizations to undertake violent actions.

The Law of Peoples

The Law of Peoples