2017 Review VOX-Pol

VOX-Pol ‘Violent Extremism and Terrorism Online in 2017: The Year in Review’,February 21, 2018

NY Attacks

WSJ, After New York Attack, Investigators Ask: Should ISIS Material Be Online?

Independent, New York attack: Terror manuals containing instructions for bomb used by Akayed Ullah remain online "Terrorist manuals showing jihadis how to build the same type of bomb used in last week's New York subway attack remain online amid warnings of further attacks."

Online Jihadism workshop

ICSR, ICSR Workshop – Online Jihadism: Beyond The English-Language Literature This ongoing event (concluding today) is being live-tweeted #beyondeng

Philippines jihadis

Robert Windrem, NBC News, ISIS Recruits Fighters for the Philippines Instead of Syria " The seven-minute, English-language video, released by the official ISIS media operation late last month, includes messages from several fighters in the Southern Philippines, and scenes from battles with government troops near the city of Marawi, including the pillaging of a Catholic church."

Aussie ISIS bride becomes poster girl for Islamic State terrorists

9News, Aussie ISIS bride becomes poster girl for Islamic State terrorists "Islamic State has paraded an Australian ISIS bride in the latest issue of its online propaganda magazine, featuring the story of how she and her two children secretly sneaked into Syria."

Letters from a Jihadi

Joanne Slater & Colin Freeze, Globe & Mail, Letters from a Jihadi: inside the mind of a Canadian accused of joining al-Qaeda "What drove three students at the University of Manitoba to travel to Pakistan to join al-Qaeda? Newly-released correspondence reveals their state of mind in their own words, including a nine page handwritten letter home."

Two British Members of Islamic State 'Beatles' Have Been Identified

Vice News, Two British Members of Islamic State 'Beatles' Have Been Identified, 7 Feb 2016 On Sunday, a Washington Post and BuzzFeed investigation named a member of the group known as "Jihadi Ringo" as 32-year-old Londoner Alexanda Kotey, while an ITV News investigation also named Kotey as well as identifying a third member of the group as Aine Davis, a drug dealer who converted to Islam and left the UK in 2013.

Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State: Gaging Failure and Success in Online Jihad

Rita Katz, Site Intelligence, Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State: Gaging Failure and Success in Online Jihad
"We always hear about the overwhelming social media campaigns by the Islamic State (IS), and how they flood the internet with gruesome images of beheadings, threats, military achievements, and victories. But what about al-Qaeda (AQ) fighters and supporters? After all, geographically speaking, they include a much larger array of areas and groups, from AQ in Afghanistan, Shabaab al-Mujahideen in Somalia, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) in Algeria, and al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS).

"With these questions in mind, a comparison of a recent social media campaign by AQ/AQAP supporters following the failed U.S. rescue mission (and consequential execution) of Luke Somers, to those more successful ones launched by IS supporters, provides a better scope of success (or lack thereof) in today’s jihadist social media campaigns."

Opinion/analysis

The Jihad Cult: Why Young Germans Are Answering Call to Holy War

The Jihad Cult: Why Young Germans Are Answering Call to Holy War - Spiegel Online

'Report Jihad'

Mirror, 'Report Jihad' button promised by UK internet providers to help tackle online extremism "Internet service providers in the UK including BT, Virgin, TalkTalk and Sky have pledged to introduce a 'report Jihad' button to make it easier for customers to flag extremist materials."

Jihad + poetry

RFE/RL, 'What Rhymes With Islamic State?' Militants Express Ideology Through Poetry "In one recent poem about Syria, published on the khilafa.org website, which is run by Chechens in the Latakia-based Khalifat Jamaat faction, the Daghestani author criticizes such "armchair warriors," who he says post pictures of food on social media instead of defending hungry children in Syria."

ISIS/Kassig

Independent, A new Isis video – but a different ending. What could it mean? "The video that appeared on Sunday confirmed to show the head of the American aid worker Peter Kassig at the feet of a hooded killer of Isis is at once similar and dissimilar to the tapes we have seen before announcing the killing of Western hostages. Common to all of them is their savagery."

Malaysia - net recruitment

asianews.it, Malaysia Islamic state "recruiters" arrested: They include Internet experts and politicians "The group of 14 people arrested earlier this week include personalities active in the recruitment campaign for the militias of the Islamic State (IS). Police sources explain that they were organizing the movement in Syria and used the internet to attract new (and increasingly younger) supporters. In particular, three of them played a very personal and individual role to promote, organize and finance trips to Syria."

ISIS/Austria

Independent, Isis’s teenage Austrian poster girl jihadi brides 'have changed their minds and want to come home', 12 Oct 2014 "Experts now believe that the social media accounts associated to the girls were commandeered by Isis, with images and posts doctored to encourage other girls to follow suit."

Also see aljazeera.com, Austrian youth flocking to ISIL, 10 Oct 2014 "Mainstream Austrian media have been filled with screen shots of Facebook profiles and posts of Austrians who have gone to fight in Syria and Iraq. One newspaper even published a Facebook interview with one of Austria's foreign fighters."

There's also this quote from an imam, Mamdouh El Attar: "Those who have gone to Syria and Iraq didn't attend religious classes or prayers. They are easily manipulated because they have no idea what Islam really is."

60,000 Pro-IS Twitter Accounts Set Up Since May

Sky News, 60,000 Pro-IS Twitter Accounts Set Up Since May: "Some 60,000 Twitter accounts have been set up by IS sympathisers since May, a Sky News investigation has found.

And despite the site vowing to stamp them out in the wake of the murder of James Foley, 27,000 continue to express pro-jihadi views."
Also see the accompanying report 'Armchair Jihad'

I understand why Westerners are joining jihadi movements like ISIS

Michael Muhammad Knight, Washington Post, I understand why Westerners are joining jihadi movements like ISIS. I was almost one of them.

British jihadist calls for 'flag of Islam' over Downing Street and Buckingham Palace

Independent, British jihadist calls for 'flag of Islam' over Downing Street and Buckingham Palace, 4 Jul 2014

"The number of global jihadis is increasing, but Americans aren't necessarily less safe"

PRI, The number of global jihadis is increasing, but Americans aren't necessarily less safe, 4 Jun 2014

‘Bomb-Making for Beginners’: Inside al Al-Qaeda E-Learning Course

‘Bomb-Making for Beginners’: Inside al Al-Qaeda E-Learning Course | Anne Stenersen | Perspectives on Terrorism "This study explores how terrorists utilize the Internet to learn bomb-making skills. Unlike previous studies, it does not focus on assessing the quality of online bomb recipes. Rather, it discusses the efforts being made by on-line jihadists to help others learn by providing so-called “e-learning courses.” As of today, such courses have few active participants yet they tend to attract large interest – indicating that there is a demand among Al-Qaeda’s online sympathizers for developing this concept further."

New and Noted: Jihadi Culture on the World Wide Web

Anne Stenersen, e-ir, Review – Gilbert Ramsay, Jihadi Culture on the World Wide Web, New York: Bloomsbury, 2013



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