Jihad after the Fall of IS – Reframing the Apocalyptic Narrative

Abstract

This study analyzes the use of apocalyptic frames by jihadist groups and how they have been developing after the fall of IS. It contextualizes these developments in the history of Muslim apocalyptic though and literature. After describing the apocalyptic narrative in the hadith literature and in the Quran, as well as the differences between classical and modern apocalyptic literature, the study analyzes differences in how jihadist groups have used apocalyptic framing of their fight. Finally, using interview data, the study analyzes how the Salafi-jihadist environment in Sweden has started to reframe the apocalyptic narrative after the military defeat of IS.

The rise of IS was a unique event in the modern history of global jihad in terms of the organization’s ability to attract an unprecedented number of recruits and the polarization of the jihadist movement.¹ In recent years, however, some scholars have announced the potential weakening of global jihad, as transnational groups are facing organizational problems and localizing affiliates.² Also jihadist environments in the West, connected by global jihad, are facing several difficulties, which has created a need for new strategies and renewal.³ What is clear is that the jihadist environments continue their efforts to adapt to new circumstances. However, how the environments are adjusting to a new situation after the military collapse of IS has received less empirical attention. This study analyzes the use of apocalyptic frames by modern jihadist groups and how they have been developing after the fall of IS. It contextualizes these developments in the long history of Muslim apocalyptic though and literature. After describing the apocalyptic narrative in the hadith literature and in the Quran, as well as the differences between classical and modern apocalyptic literature, the study analyzes differences in how jihadist groups have used apocalyptic framing of their fight. Finally, the study analyzes how the Salafi-jihadist environment in Sweden has started to reframe the apocalyptic narrative after the military collapse of IS.

The study argues that apocalyptic thinking has been expressed in different ways by different jihadist groups, such as IS and al-Qaeda. Such differences in the use of apocalyptic frames may depend on the different strategic thinking of the groups. Moreover, interviews with three returned Swedish jihadists, individuals around the Salafi-jihadist environment, and a former IS recruiter, suggest that the apocalyptic narrative is currently been reframed to fit the strategic realities after the defeat of IS in Syria and Iraq.

Method

According to Goffman, frames are schemata of interpretation enabling people “to locate, perceive, identify, and label” events in their lives and in the world at large.⁴ Kuypers argues that the act of framing consists of constructing a particular point of view that encourages a situation to be viewed in a certain manner, so that some facts become more or less conspicuous than others.⁵ Frames can also be transformative as they reconstitute the way in which some experiences are perceived – for example, by transforming seemingly routine grievances into mobilizing grievances.⁶

Framing has been used for explaining recruitment to social movements and how collective action frames are created, as different actors seek to inspire and legitimate movement activity.⁷ For example, Snow, Rochford, Worden and Benford identify four frame alignment processes by which social movements seek to align their ways of understanding with those of potential recruits: frame bridging, frame amplification, frame extension and frame transformation.⁸ Moreover, in recruiting people, the frames a jihadist organization uses can differ when addressing different audiences.⁹ Framing is also an important strategy for responding to new unexpected and changing circumstances, such as the collapse of IS and the failed expectations of an imminent Doomsday, which may affect jihadist organizations’ ability to mobilize old and new recruits. Indeed, as Kuypers argues, “when highlighting some aspect of reality over other aspects, frames act to define problems, diagnose causes, make moral judgments, and suggest remedies.”¹⁰ After laying out the apocalyptic tradition in Sunni Islam and how it has been framed by different jihadist groups, this study seeks to identify frames, with reference to these four functions, that can be used to modify the apocalyptic narrative after the fall of IS.

About 300 Swedes joined jihadist groups in Syria after the start of the civil war, and the number of Swedish jihadists per capita (28.8 per 1 million inhabitants) was among the highest in Europe. Moreover, Sweden has a lively Salafi-jihadist environment, with more than 2000 members,¹¹ where the future of jihad is actively being discussed. This makes focusing on Sweden well suited for identifying possible modifications in the apocalyptic narrative. Eleven informants who have been members of the Swedish Salafi-jihadist environment or have social ties to it were interviewed in Gothenburg where up to 100 individuals left for jihad in Syria during the Syrian Civil War. The author used contacts from his previous research on jihadists as starting points for using the snowball method to locate new informants.¹² When using such a snowball sampling method, previous informants help recruit new ones, which makes it suitable for accessing hidden populations that are difficult to access.¹³ To avoid bias, as previous informants may help recruit individuals who have similar perceptions, the author established several independent starting points among his contacts.¹⁴ The interviews were conducted in private homes and at cafes and lasted about one hour each. Two of the interviewees were interviewed twice. The informants gave informed consent to be interviewed and all the data has been anonymized. The study was approved by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority.

Five of the informants, Ali, Yahya, Mohsen, Jabir, and Malik, have friends and acquaintances in the Swedish Salafi-jihadist environment and are therefore in a position to observe new developments. Kareem is a former jihadist recruiter with many contacts. Two of the informants, Fazl and Awad, have left the Salafi-jihadist environment, and Mazen, Abdullah, and Hamdi have returned from IS controlled territories but have not expressed willingness to travel to some other conflict zone. However, they are in a position to observe general trends in the Swedish Salafi-jihadist environment.

Apocalyptic Thinking

The Apocalyptic Narrative in Early Sunni Muslim Tradition

According to the Quran, the apocalyptic times are approaching: “Then do they await except that the Hour should come upon them unexpectedly? But already there have come [some of] its indications. Then what good to them, when it has come, will be their remembrance?”¹⁵ Islamic eschatology (‘ilm akhir al-zaman fi al-islam) is a field of study that concerns the events of the end times. Its sources are the Quran and tradition (sunnah). It mainly focuses on eschatological predictions and signs (alamat al-sa’ah), as well as on eschatological events both before and on the Day of Judgment (Yawm al-Din). Eschatological signs are sometimes divided into minor signs (ashrat al-sa’ah al-sughra) and major signs (ashrat al-sa’ah al-kubra).¹⁶ Minor signs include, for example, the moral decay of society, and major signs consist mainly of end-time battles between good and evil forces.

Despite several hadiths that list these eschatological signs, according to the Quran the exact time of the Day of Judgment is impossible for people, even the Prophet, to know:

They ask you, [O Muhammad], about the Hour: when is its arrival? Say, “Its knowledge is only with my Lord. None will reveal its time except Him. It lays heavily upon the heavens and the earth. It will not come upon you except unexpectedly.” They ask you as if you are familiar with it. Say, “Its knowledge is only with Allah, but most of the people do not know.”¹⁷

Despite such epistemological humbleness, much of the apocalyptic tradition is collected in special apocalyptic hadith books, which Muslim theologists (ulama) began to compile in the ninth century. The most famous and authoritative of them are Imam Muslim’s (815–875) Kitab al-Fitan wa Ashrat al-Sa’ah (The Book of Trials and the End Times) and Muhammad al-Bukhari’s (810–870) Kitab al-Fitan (The Book of Trials). They are widely regarded as the most important scholars of hadith in the history of Sunni Islam, and these books consist of the Prophet’s transmitted words related to the apocalypse. The second and much later type of apocalyptic literature consists of books in which the authors interpret the apocalyptic passages of the Quran and the contents of the apocalyptic hadith books in light of events in society. Many of these writers, who appeared in large numbers in the twentieth century, were laymen.

Much of this apocalyptic literature contains elements easily recognized by Christians and Jews: In the future, the world will end, but a messianic figure will return to Earth before God condemns people to either Heaven or Hell. Thus, it has the same linear conception of time and deterministic tone, as the world created by God moves toward its end in a predetermined manner. It also includes a similar end-time twist.¹⁸ The chronological order of the events is sometimes unclear, but Mahdi, who resembles the Messiah of Christianity or Judaism, plays a major role in this narrative. Although the Quran and the main canonical hadith collections (Sahih Bukhari and Sahih Muslim) do not mention him, he has inspired much apocalyptic thinking among Muslims. Indeed, he represents the dreams and hopes of many oppressed Muslims. He is expected to fill the earth with justice before the great eschatological trials begin. At some point there is peace between Christians and Muslims, but Christians still attack Muslims, leading to the “Great Battle” (Malhama al-Kubra).¹⁹ The Muslims are expected to win the battle, but it is so unprecedentedly fierce that if a bird passed the combatants, “it would fall down dead before reaching the end of them.”²⁰

After the battle, the Muslims capture Constantinople (the capital of Byzantium, which may also symbolize Christendom), and another major figure of apocalyptic literature, Dajjal, appears.²¹ He is not mentioned in the Quran either, but Dajjal is portrayed a demonic figure, corresponding to Christianity’s Antichrist, and he will test the Muslim community as the Day of Judgment approaches. His name derives from the Arabic three-letter root daa-jiim-laam, which means “deceitful”, and he increases the eschatological trials (fitan) of Muslims. In the Sunni Muslim tradition, this figure has represented everything that Muslims oppose and all the temptations that they must overcome. Indeed, Dajjal is generally considered to be a malevolent being in human form.²² He is described as a chubby, one-eyed man with a ruddy face, curly hair, and the Arabic letters kaaf-faa-raa, meaning “disbelief,” on his forehead. He claims to be the returning Messiah, and many believe and follow him. His forces will then attack Mahdi and almost defeat him.

At this point, Jesus, who is the third important character in the story, descends from Heaven. Jesus fights Dajjal and finally kills him, ending the eschatological period in which Muslims will be tested. These end times also include Jesus showing the correctness of Islam compared to Christianity: “Allah’s Apostle said, ‘The Hour will not be established until the son of Mary (i.e. Jesus) descends amongst you as a just ruler, he will break the cross [the symbol of Christianity], kill the pigs [which are considered impure]…’”²³ At the same time, he corrects the misunderstanding of Christians that he is the son of God. Islam emphasizes the indivisible unity of God (tawhid) and, although Jesus plays a decisive role in the end times, in Islam he is God’s prophet.

The fourth factor in Islamic eschatology is Yajuj and Majuj. Yajuj and Majuj are mentioned in the Quran as two hostile, corrupt groups of people who will wreak havoc on Earth before the end of the world. They are the equivalent of Gog and Magog in the Bible. According to the Quran, a nation terrorized by Yajuj and Majuj caused Dhu al-Qarnayn (possibly Alexander the Great or some Persian king) to build a great wall that neither could penetrate.²⁴ This wall traps them between two mountains almost until the Day of Judgment.²⁵ Some hadiths say that they try to escape every night by burrowing under the wall, but every morning they find that God has rebuilt the wall. Only after Jesus has killed Dajjal will God allow the wall to break and release Yajuj and Majuj. In the end, however, “the sky will send down rain that will carry them and throw them in the sea. Then the mountains will turn to dust and the earth will be stretched out like a hide. I have been promised that when that happens, the Hour will come upon the people…”²⁶

Sunni Muslim Apocalyptic Literature

Hadith literature, which is based on oral tradition and started to grow in the ninth century, does not try to interpret and date the end times in the same way as later apocalyptic literature. However, the hadiths contain both minor and major signs to warn mankind that the end is near, and perhaps make them repent of their sins. Examples of minor signs are natural disasters.²⁷ They also include that “the Muslims will fight against the Jews” and that (formerly) poor Arabs compete “in the construction of magnificent buildings.”²⁸ If one believes that the eschatological times are fast approaching, it is also easy to believe that its signs are already visible: Climate change has caused several natural disasters, Israel has repeatedly been at war with its neighboring countries and Palestinian groups, and the oil-rich Persian Gulf states have invested in expensive skyscrapers. However, this is a possible case of confirmation bias, a form of cognitive bias, which is a human tendency to pay selective attention to information that confirms one’s own perceptions and beliefs. Other minor signs point to events that may have already happened a long time ago: Muslims fighting the Turks and conquering Constantinople.²⁹ The major signs, on the other hand, refer to events that have not yet happened, such as the appearance of Dajjal and the rising of the sun from the west.³⁰

Belief in the coming of the just Mahdi has often grown during crises such as the Crusades and the Mongol conquest of Baghdad (1258). For example, after the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212), when the Muslims lost a large part of Spain, many Spanish Muslims spread hadiths predicting Mahdi’s reconquest of Spain. After Napoleon invaded Egypt (1798), a man who claimed to be Mahdi even appeared in Lower Egypt.³¹ Similarly, Christian and Jewish apocalyptic literature often comments on the political upheavals of the time.³² However, early Sunni Muslim apocalyptic literature did not include equally strong political themes as the literature written later in the twentieth century.³³ For example, al-Shawkani’s al-Tawdih bi-ma tawatara fi al-muntazar wa al-Dajjal wa al-Masih, which he wrote during Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt (1798–1801), contains no mention of this major political upheaval that took place during the author’s lifetime. As Cook explains, al-Shawkani was merely transmitting apocalyptic traditions.³⁴ The reader was allowed to interpret them himself and notice their significance to the political events of society. This approach to the apocalyptic traditions was common in the older literature due to the political and religious explosiveness of apocalyptic thought.

The approach began to change only after Israel defeated its Arab neighbors in the Six-Day War in 1967 and the laity took a more prominent role in writing apocalyptic literature. During the previous decade, Western conspiracy literature translated into Arabic, for example the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, had spread in Arab countries and was widely used to interpret political events in the wake of Israel’s birth. Authoritarian political leaders were also able to use this literature, which saw Jews as an evil behind-the-scenes force, to legitimize their own power position and the lack of democracy in Arab countries. However, the Six-Day War was such a shocking event for many that Israel’s victory was not only explained by a Jewish conspiracy, but also by reference to Dajjal. Dajjal was not the most popular figure in apocalyptic Islam in the classical era, and neither did Jews play a significant role in classical apocalyptic thought, but the role of both Jews and Dajjal now grew rapidly.³⁵ With the rise of anti-Semitic conspiracy literature, apocalyptic thinking gained a conceptual framework that explained several otherwise inexplicable and frustrating events, such as the defeat of the Arab countries in the war. Thus, anti-Semitic literature in the West influenced the development of apocalyptic thought in the Muslim world, and therefore ultimately also the later development of modern jihadism. For example, this literature, coupled with the Israeli conquest of the easter parts of Jerusalem in 1967, increased the importance of Jerusalem for the jihadist movement. As stressed in IS recruitment materials, this is where Dajjal will besiege the Muslims, Jesus will usher in the messianic kingdom, and Mahdi will reign.³⁶

One of the most influential apocalyptic writers of our time is Sa’id Ayyub, who synthesized the aforementioned modern materials and apocalyptic traditions in his book al-Masih al-Dajjal, arguing that the end is near because the prophecies have already been fulfilled.³⁷ Ayyub frames the history of Christianity through an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory: The problem is that Jews have infiltrated Christianity from within, and he presents especially the Apostle Paul as a secret agent who has corrupted Christianity. As a result of Paul’s actions, Christianity not only deviated from the prophetic teaching of Jesus, but developed into the “apocalyptic cult of the Antichrist.”³⁸ Another major theme in Ayyub’s book is the liberation of Jerusalem. The problem was that the armies of the Arab countries were unable to stop Israel in the Six-Day War, when the Israeli army practically crushed the Arab armies, which was a great surprise and disaster for both the Arab countries and the Palestinians. Already during the war that led to the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, an estimated 750,000 to 900,000 Palestinians had fled or been deported to the neighboring countries of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt.³⁹ In 1967, however, the situation worsened when Israel conquered Gaza, Sinai, the West Bank, and thus also all of Jerusalem, Islam’s third holiest city. In the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Israel’s Arab neighbors also failed to reconquer the territories. However, Ayyub frames the apocalyptic narrative as a solution to the problem: Jerusalem was in an area where, according to many hadiths, several eschatological events would take place, and thus many believed that the situation would change as the Day of Judgment approached:

Rejoice, O daughter of Jerusalem! The Jew in the courtyard will be like a broken man, prepared for death in any form […] Jerusalem was never made for the Jews. Weep, O daughter of Jerusalem, behind whatever wall you please! The dictator will die and your destiny will be in the hands of fate.⁴⁰

Apocalyptic currents of thought have usually appeared in similar troubled times, consisting of frames that offer solutions to perceived problems. For example, some scholars have connected the accounts of Mahdi and Dajjal to the three civil wars that took place in the Umayyad Caliphate in the eighth and ninth centuries (656–661, 680–692, and 744–750) and the early failed Muslim efforts to conquer Byzantium.⁴¹ By expanding the historical context, apocalyptic narratives helped Muslims understand why they fought each other in several civil wars and why Byzantium did not fall despite several attempts. Similarly, after the disastrous Six-Day War, apocalyptic narratives offered many a vision of a future in which the enemy occupying Muslim lands would be finally defeated.

New interpretations were also made in response to modern developments that were seen as problematic by Muslims, such as the spread of communisms and atheism in the Muslim world in the twentieth century. Also here, by framing them in apocalyptic terms, they could be set in a predefined narrative where the problem is guaranteed to be solved. For example, Said Nursi (1877–1960), suggested that Dajjal could be an ideology, communism or atheism, which he saw as spreading during the Cold War. Some of his students also speculated that Dajjal could be the leader of anti-Islamic secularism, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who founded the secular Turkish state on the ruins of the Ottoman Caliphate.⁴² Not only does this framing provide a solution to the perceived problem with the expected coming of Mahdi and Jesus, but it also involves a stark moral condemnation of these ideologies, thus motivating the audience to act.

Al-Qaeda

Apocalyptic themes and references to Dajjal have also appeared in the writings of jihadist theorists, such as Abu Mus’ab al-Suri. Especially his Da’wat al-Muqawamah al-Islamiyyah al-’Alamiyyah, published in 2004, contains apocalyptic themes. However, leaders of various jihadist groups had already in the past used the same strategy to motivate Muslims to join jihad. Abdullah Azzam, dubbed the father of Afghan jihad after recruiting thousands of Muslims to fight the Red Army in the 1980s, argued that the battle in Afghanistan was one of the signs of the end times. Bin Ladin also referred to hadiths according to which the end-time battles will begin in the east in Khorasan, which includes Afghanistan: “Then the black banners will come from the east […] When you see them, then pledge your allegiance to them even if you have to crawl over the snow, for that is the caliph of Allah, Mahdi.”⁴³ Bin Ladin probably wanted Muslims to associate the black flag of al-Qaeda with the black flags mentioned in the hadith, so that the organization would gain legitimacy and more fighters. The same symbolism of black flags was already used in the eighth century, when the Abbasids rebelled and seized the caliphate from the Umayyads. The Abbasid struggle also began in Khorasan, including Afghanistan, where bin Ladin fought in the 1980s against the Red Army and where he also lived in 2001 when al-Qaeda attacked the United States. Such framing includes strong moral condemnations as it places the jihadist group firmly on the side of goodness and the enemies are relegated to the side of evil. The enemy is framed as the problem, while the jihadist group is framed as the solution, as divine providence guarantees that it will prevail in an apocalyptic fight. It is difficult to find more motivating frames to mobilize both old and new recruits.

Later, especially Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi (1966–2006), who led al-Qaeda’s bloody campaign in Iraq during the early years of the civil war, began to exploit apocalyptic frames to recruit and motivate jihadists.⁴⁴ Al-Zarqawi’s extreme views on takfir (accusing other Muslims of heresy and thus justifying their killing) and the attacks that led to the deaths of many Muslims, however, caused great friction between him and bin Laden. In a letter to al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida’s leadership criticized him for using extreme violence, fearing that he would alienate many Muslims and erode support for the jihadists.⁴⁵ Such fears were justified because civilian casualties had previously made it difficult to mobilize people for local jihad in Egypt.⁴⁶ Al-Zarqawi’s framing of the fight in apocalyptic terms was not necessarily just an effort to increase the organization’s legitimacy and recruit more fighters. It was possibly also an attempt to justify the use of extreme violence. Bin Laden, on the other hand, was more restrained in the use of violence against other Muslims, which created less need to appeal to an apocalyptic framing of the conflict, although it creates legitimacy for the organization’s struggle through a sense of urgency as the imminence of the end times itself is framed as a problem that requires solution through mass mobilization.

Jihadist movements started to expand in the 1960s, especially in Egypt. Egypt had been loosely connected to the Ottoman Caliphate. But with the collapse of the caliphate after World War I, Egypt became independent, with King Fuad I as head of state. In 1953, the overthrow of the Western-backed Fuad II had raised hopes among Islamists for the establishment of an Islamic state in Egypt. However, the new military government persecuted and imprisoned thousands of Islamists, and many were tortured or killed. This made Islamists wonder how the country’s leaders could call themselves Muslims.⁴⁷ The Islamists’ conflict with the Egyptian government intensified when President Anwar Sadat was assassinated in 1982 by members of a local group, Islamic Jihad.

However, the efforts of local jihadists to oust the governments of Egypt and Algeria, for example, turned out to be unsuccessful. The future of local jihad against the so-called near enemy (al-’adu al-qarib) in the Middle East looked uncertain because many resources had been wasted. Numerous jihadists had been killed or captured. The jihadists had also lost the support of the local people as a result of civilian casualties.⁴⁸ Especially the Algerian Civil War (1991–2002) was very bloody, and the jihadists simply failed to motivate the masses, who were often economically dependent on the state that the jihadists were fighting.⁴⁹ The victory of the jihadists in Afghanistan and the withdrawal of the Red Army in 1989 was a significant achievement, but it led to a protracted civil war. Al-Zawahiri wrote in his memoirs, Knights under the Prophet’s Banner, that the jihadists had not succeeded in building a solid social base in their homelands and therefore their primary task was to once again create credibility in the Muslim world: “The jihad movement must come closer to the masses […] We must win the people’s confidence.”⁵⁰ This was the first crisis of modern jihad, which required the creation of a new strategy to save the movement and re-establish God’s rule (hakimiyyah) on earth 70 years after the collapse of the Ottoman Caliphate.

This first crisis of modern jihad was an existential threat to the entire jihadist project, and because of that it was important to be able to recruit more fighters. The solution, however, required a new framing of the context of the conflict. The answer to the problem was believed to be found in attempts to polarize the entire world by attacking the United States. Thus, in 1996, bin Laden declared war on the United States, and two years later, he announced the establishment of an Islamic front against the Jews and the Crusaders. Jihadists had fought unsuccessfully for three decades against local rulers in Muslim countries, and now priorities had to be changed and limited resources better directed to attacks where they were thought to have the greatest impact.⁵¹ Al-Zawahiri wrote in his memoirs that the future of the Egyptian government seemed to depend more on its supporters in Washington than on jihadist attacks in Muslim countries.⁵² Thus, attacking local governments directly seemed like a futile project and a waste of resources. In the 1990s, bin Laden and al-Zawahiri instead founded a new jihadist organization, al-Qaeda, whose main strategy became to attack the distant enemy (al-’adu al-ba’id), the United States. Attacks were first made against both US embassies (in Tanzania and Kenya in 1998) and the armed forces (USS Cole in 2000 in Yemen), but everything culminated in the so-called 9/11 attacks in the United States in 2001.

However, despite framing the fight as emanating from a polarized world where the United States was the main problem, most of the fighting took place in Iraq after the United States ousted Saddam Hussein from power in 2003. Moreover, Iraq descended into a bloody civil war with skyrocketing civilian casualties that did not produce the results al-Qaeda had hoped for. As Gerges argued, the ideology of global jihad had not taken root among most jihadists.⁵³ Both the desire and the ability to attack the United States were limited, at least outside of Iraq. This inability to convince the masses that attacking the United States is a religious duty and a solution to the problem was the second crisis of modern jihad. However, bin Ladin, al-Suri and al-Zarqawi’s apocalyptic allusions were part of an ongoing strategy to resolve this crisis with new frames.

ISI and IS

Despite their apocalyptic framing of the fight, bin Ladin, al-Suri and al-Zarqawi avoided mentioning Mahdi and the expected date of the end of the world.⁵⁴ But the situation changed in Iraq after al-Zarqawi’s death in 2006. Abu Ayyub al-Misri was the organization’s minister of war and chief ideologist after al-Zarqawi’s death and became a fervent believer in the urgency of establishing an Islamic state. In 2008, he announced the creation of ISI (Islamic State of Iraq - Dawlah al-’Iraq al-Islamiyyah). He believed in the coming of Mahdi within a year, and a caliphate was to be established to support Mahdi in solving the problem of US occupation of Muslim lands.⁵⁵ This completely new apocalyptic framing of the fight, prompted ISI’s chief lawyer, al-’Utaybi, to write a letter to al-Qaeda’s leadership complaining about how al-Misri’s beliefs negatively affected ISI’s combat strategy in Iraq: “So they issued an order [to the fighters] against withdrawing from the battlefield until the [apocalypse] comes to pass. This is dangerous for the brothers.”⁵⁶ After 2008, ISI began to lose support among jihadists. Al-Misri had staked everything on one card, and the expectations of the imminent arrival of Mahdi, which did not materialize, undermined the organization’s legitimacy.⁵⁷ Local tribal leaders also eventually grew weary of the high toll of human casualties in the apocalyptic battle and allied with the United States against the jihadists. As a result, much of the ISI leadership soon died and the remaining fighters often had to hide in the vast desert areas of Iraq. ISI’s days seemed numbered.

However, the civil war that started in Syria in 2011 was a stroke of luck for the weakened jihadists in Iraq. After ISI moved to Syria, part of it separated from al-Qaeda and called itself ISIL (Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant – al-Dawlah al-Islamiyyah fi al-’Iraq wa al-Sham), and later became IS (Islamic State – al-Dawlah al-Islamiyyah). Those who did not leave al-Qaeda formed a new organization, Jabhat al-Nusrah, and after bin Laden’s death they pledged allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the new leader of al-Qaeda. Like its parent organization, Jabhat al-Nusrah used apocalyptic framing of the fight sparingly. IS, on the other hand, built its vision of a new caliphate on the ruins of Syria and Iraq, further developing al-Zarqawi and ISI’s strategy. However, Fishman suggested that the legacy of Zarqawi’s extreme violence, even against Muslim civilians, which he had picked up from al-Muhajir—a jihadist shaykh in Afghanistan whom even bin Laden considered an extremist—would influence IS in a way that made the organization “prone to internal fracture.”⁵⁸ Fearing governance failures and the US ability to destroy it, al-Qaeda saw the establishment of a caliphate as a long-term project, but IS sought to swiftly form a single political structure by fighting other jihadist groups.⁵⁹

In Syria, IS took al-Zarqawi’s earlier apocalyptic framing of jihad to a whole new level. Its purpose was no longer just to legitimize extreme violence—IS also adopted it as part of its efforts to polarize the Muslim community (ummah), which involved deeper moral judgments than previous frames used by other jihadist groups. Indeed, as Fishman argued, “Zarqawi had a stricter conception of what made a good Muslim,” which IS later embraced.⁶⁰ Those who did not support IS were not “real” Muslims who fight against evil as the end times approach, and they could be fought with reference to the concept of takfir—excommunication.⁶¹ Thus, the apocalyptic framing helped create an image of jihadists as an elite group. However, IS had learned from the events in Iraq and did not frame the end of the world as equally imminent as did ISI, which had ultimately led to the weakening of ISI’s legitimacy and the weakening of support for the jihadists.

IS used a wide array of apocalyptic frames in its media productions, which defined the problem by referring to old anti-Semitic narratives and claiming that Jews and Dajjal were in a conspiracy against Islam.⁶² Building on Zarqawi’s legacy of inciting sectarian fighting in Iraq, IS also called Shia Muslims rafida—“rejecters”—because they rejected what was seen as orthodox Sunnism, and IS accused them of collaborating with Jews in this anti-Islamic movement. It even blamed Jews for the birth of “heretical” Shia Islam and claimed that Imam Muhammad al-Mahdi, whose reappearance many Shia Muslims expect as the Day of Judgment approaches, is both a Jew and Dajjal.⁶³

In the context of apocalyptic beliefs, these anti-Semitic and anti-Shia frames created an enemy that could be countered with extreme violence, but apocalyptic Islam also had another function. It played a decisive role in IS’s efforts to polarize and divide the community of Sunni Muslims into true Muslims and the others. More than any jihadist group before it, IS did this using takfir (excommunication) against other Sunni Muslims. This large-scale excommunication and the splitting of the Sunni Muslim community into two camps were easier to sell to potential supporters because IS attached to them deep moral judgments and a sense of urgency created by apocalyptic thinking. If the world is about to end, it justifies the use of extreme measures, and it is important to belong to the right camp. According to a well-known hadith, the Prophet Muhammad said that “my Ummah will split into seventy-three sects. All of them are in the Fire except one sect.”⁶⁴ There are also other, but less well-known, versions of this hadith. One even suggests that 72 sects will end up in Heaven and (ironically) only one in Hell. Nevertheless, throughout history, many Muslim sects have used it to justify their ideas and actions. IS fighters were no exception in believing that only those who support IS will go to Paradise.

In an effort to polarize the world, al-Qaeda’s focus was to fight the distant enemy (al-’adu al-ba’id) in the United States. The focus of IS was, however, to fight the internal enemy (al-’adu al-dakhili).⁶⁵ It consisted of the rest of the Muslim community that challenged the religious and political legitimacy of the IS caliphate. This new type of polarization, which created an elite group of ostensibly true Muslims, appealed to a new generation of young Muslims living in Western countries who had a weak connection both to their country of residence in the West and to the culture and religion of their parents’ homeland. It made jihadism a meaningful identity-building activity and thus also increased the number of fighters willing to sacrifice their lives. Al-Qaeda tried to create a positive relationship with other jihadist groups, even seeking to loosely unite them. This would have been difficult if the organization had been more apocalyptic in its worldview and visions of the future, but IS members formed a small sect with an exclusive identity and therefore accepted only their own legitimacy. To create this sense of exclusivity about themselves, they needed the sense of emergency that IS’s apocalyptic framing provided.

In a state of emergency, there is also room for heroism. Such a solution to the problems associated with the trials of the end of times appealed especially to many Western youths who were looking for a new positive identity. Indeed, apocalyptic images create a new heroic potential in average people and establish a new community where self-sacrificing heroes are rewarded.⁶⁶ Thus, although IS also appealed to the poor in many Arab countries by offering, for example, jobs and marriage opportunities, the primary purpose of the apocalyptic framing was to polarize the Sunni Muslim community so that IS could recruit more people looking for a new, stronger identity. Al-Qaeda had also tried to use apocalyptic frames to strengthen its own legitimacy and recruit new fighters, but its frames were weaker, and as they did not seek to polarize the Sunni Muslim community the strategy did not work as well.

IS’s strong apocalyptic frames were appealing not only because of the new identity they helped create. Some young jihadists also listened mesmerized to stories of end-time battles and the harsh punishment that will befall those who are on the wrong side of history and do not support IS. The apparent reason for this interest in frames that included strong moral judgements was that stories about the Doomsday and Hell were very exciting to young audiences, as if they were an apocalyptic Hollywood movie.⁶⁷ As a former Swedish IS recruiter, Kareem, explained:

This way of preaching and lecturing is very much about Hell, the grave, punishment and very little about God’s grace and spirituality and the more traditionally religious things, you know, that you should get like close to God, because usually people in this environment are not really interested in sacrificing their lusts or, you know, they follow their impulses. So, we often use rhetoric about, for example, what happens in the grave, you will be punished like that, and many details. Or if you are going to talk about the opposites – it is called in Arabic targhib [desiring for Paradise] wa tarhib [and the terror of Hellfire] […]. If I’m talking about the grave, the Doomsday and stuff, Yajuj and Majuj, something like that, you know, then it’s going to be really exciting!

A Need for Reframing Arises

The standard apocalyptic narrative begins with a world filled with injustice and oppression. This will be followed by the appearance of Mahdi and Dajjal and the second coming of Jesus to Earth. In several hadiths, Syria plays an important role in these end-time events, which fit well with IS’s apocalyptic framing of the fight. According to a famous hadith, the Prophet Muhammad said that “The Last Hour would not come until the Romans would land at al-A’maq or in Dabiq. An army consisting of the best (soldiers) of the people of the earth at that time will come from Medina (to counteract them).”⁶⁸ Al-A’maq is located near the city of Antakya in Turkey, but Dabiq was part of IS-controlled territory and was expected to be the site of the last battle. As one British IS member said in a propaganda video after killing an American aid worker, with Dabiq visible in the background: “Here we are, burying the first American crusader in Dabiq, eagerly waiting for the rest of your armies to arrive.”⁶⁹

According to other hadiths, Dajjal “would appear on the way between Syria and Iraq and would spread mischief right and left.”⁷⁰ And “the angels will turn his face towards Syria and there he will perish.”⁷¹ The expected reason for his death is that Jesus kills him when he arrives in Syria: "Allah would send Jesus, son of Mary, and he will descend at the white minaret in the eastern side of Damascus wearing two garments lightly dyed with saffron and placing his hands on the wings of two Angels […] Then he would search for him (Dajjal) until he would catch hold of him at the gate of Ludd and would kill him.”⁷²

Beliefs that the end of the world was near and that Syria would play a key role in the final battles began to gain strength amid Iraq’s bloody civil war. Al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida’s representative in Iraq, said in 2004, as several issues of IS’s Dabiq magazine reported, that “the spark has been lit here in Iraq, and its heat will continue to intensify — by Allah’s permission — until it burns the crusader armies in Dabiq.”⁷³ These apocalyptic images became part of IS’s standard propaganda, but twelve years later the battle for Dabiq turned out to be a disappointment, as IS lost the city to other Syrian rebels without a fight against the West. However, as in Christian apocalyptic thinking, if the expectation of an imminent apocalypse does not come true, the situation has to be explained later.⁷⁴ Or at least the framing of the fight has to be somehow changed. The IS leadership likely sensed the turning tide even before the loss of Dabiq in 2016, as the Dabiq magazine was quickly renamed Rumiyah, meaning Rome. The new name apparently referred to the jihadists’ continuous struggle until the fall of Rome, i.e. the West, although the road there now seemed to be longer than IS had previously suggested. Consequently, the references to the much-hyped apocalyptic battle in Dabiq disappeared as a result of the new political circumstances. With the caliphate shrinking due to the military support given to the Kurds by the United States and the international coalition, attacking the distant enemy (al-’adu al-ba’id) by all available means once again became a strategic necessity. After Dabiq disappeared from IS propaganda, the second issue of Rumiyah included instructions on how IS supporters could use readily available knives to carry out attacks in the West.

One of the reasons why the loss of Dabiq did not have equally negative consequences for IS’s legitimacy among jihadists, as compared to what had previously happened to ISI, was that IS had used weaker apocalyptic frames. ISI had boldly claimed that it would assist Mahdi, who was expected to arrive within a year, but IS only said it would engage in fighting ahead of larger end-time battles, the exact timing of which IS did not attempt to specify. Thus, IS sought to solve a problem that many other apocalyptic protest movements had also faced before it: How to first mobilize a large number of jihadists with urgent apocalyptic frames, and then explain the long-term existence of the state when the Doomsday is not anymore imminent. Both the Fatimid Caliphate (910–1171) and the Abbasid Caliphate (750–1258) had succeeded in this earlier.

Even though Dabiq was lost, many jihadists saw their fight for IS as part of an impending upheaval in the world order, although the exact date was unclear. Such apocalyptic framing of the future is a powerful motivational force. It seems that when the military collapse of IS was imminent, the apocalyptic expectations of many of those who chose to stay with IS even increased, as Mahdi was expected to appear shortly to turn the tide.⁷⁵ If the end of the world is coming soon and you have not been successful in this world, it is easier to see the end of the world as a positive development that you want to promote. The likelihood that a jihadist will adopt this apocalyptic worldview increases if he believes that personal failures in life are caused by unjust power structures that limit people’s lives. The apocalyptic worldview then acts as a liberating mechanism and a way to regain control of a life situation perceived as hopeless. Thus, unlike al-Qaeda that had become renowned for “highly rehearsed (often boring) propaganda videos,”⁷⁶ IS was able to make jihadism a more meaningful identity-creating activity. It appealed especially to some young second-generation Muslim immigrants looking for quick solutions to their experienced predicament of neither being in touch with their parents’ religion and culture nor feeling part of the Western societies they live in. This is an example of jihadism as a discursive journey consisting of new ideas, meanings, problems and solutions that change as new circumstances are encountered.⁷⁷

Al-Qaeda did not use apocalyptic frames as much in its efforts to mobilize new jihadists. These differences between IS and al-Qaeda were at least partly due to their different strategies. IS sought to polarize the Muslim community by creating an elite group whose leader claimed to possess universal religious and political authority, but al-Qaeda sought to polarize relations between the Muslim world and the rest of the world. The latter strategy did not require an equally radical reframing of what it means to be a Muslim. Although bin Laden emphasized the importance of jihad more than did most traditional interpretations of Sunni Islam, his strategy still required a more open approach to different interpretations and groups within Sunni Islam. The boundaries of Islam were not radically reframed because al-Qaeda hoped to mobilize and unite various jihadist groups across the Muslim world to defend a much larger Muslim community (ummah) than IS imagined existed. The strategy also included a different attitude toward the nature of jihad. Despite al-Qaeda’s global aspirations, the goals of its local representative in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusrah, were in practice more local as it pursued its long-term dream of creating its own Islamic state.⁷⁸ Its use of violence was also not as extreme and demonstrative as that of IS. Thus, al-Qaeda did not have to strive as hard to legitimize its actions and impress its own fighters and other Muslims with urgent apocalyptic frames and beliefs. Such frames and beliefs, if taken to extremes, would have divided jihadist organizations rather than uniting them.

Although IS’s apocalyptic frames were weaker than those of ISI in Iraq eight years earlier, they also made the urgent declaration of a caliphate necessary. Thousands of Muslims poured into the new caliphate and at one point it seemed that a new de facto state was being born on the ruins of Syria and Iraq, but the price was not only the polarization of Muslims and jihadists, but also the increasing vulnerability of the organization. An Islamic state driven by an apocalyptic framing of the fight easily becomes a victim of its own apocalypse because it makes too many enemies, both Muslim and non-Muslim. Thus, despite its short-term success, it was a long-term strategy doomed to failure. However, no other group has been as successful at using apocalyptic framing to polarize the Sunni Muslim community and take over power since the rise of the Abbasid Caliphate (750–1258), although the Abbasid Caliphate was more long-lived as it was in a better position of power to ward off external threats. Unlike IS, it also accepted cultural diversity and promoted commerce, arts, and science, which replaced polarization with internal stability. Table 1 summarizes the different approaches that al-Qaeda and IS had in Syria, contributing to IS’s short-term success in terms of recruitment and territorial control, as its jihad was perceived as a more appealing identity-creating project. For IS, the stronger apocalyptic framing of jihad legitimized and supported the other strategies which helped portray IS as an elite group fighting in the end times.

Table 1. Different approaches in Syria – IS’s apocalyptic framing as a more appealing identity-creating strategy and the making of an elite group.

al-Qaeda	IS
Weaker apocalyptic framing	Stronger apocalyptic framing
Polarize the world	Polarize the ummah
Avoid takfir	Exaggerate takfir
Less extreme violence	More extreme violence
Focus on local legitimacy	Focus on global legitimacy
Long road to a caliphate	Urgency to declare a caliphate

In hindsight, although IS succeeded mobilizing more fighters and establishing a de facto state, al-Qaeda’s locally focused strategy, which made the organization seem less extreme and helped it avoid making too many enemies, contributed to it being able to control territory much longer. Still, despite al-Qaeda’s continued presence in Idlib, the future of its long-term project of establishing a caliphate still seems bleak. Maybe the lesson to be learned is that the transition from a network of local jihadist groups to greater political unity requires framing, perhaps an apocalyptic one, that better inspires beliefs in the global legitimacy of a caliphate, as well as ruthlessness that forces unity where there is none. However, how to achieve what IS did, without simultaneously creating the conditions for one’s own collapse through internal polarization, extreme violence, and takfir, remains a conundrum for the modern jihadist movement.

A New Framing of the Fight

Patience and Rewards

IS’s frequent use of apocalyptic framing made it difficult to completely stop using it. Apocalyptic framing had supported the other identity-creating strategies that had helped mobilize unseen numbers of foreign fighters wanting to belong to an elite group of Muslims as the end times were approaching, and it had simply become an integral part of its image. However, the organization’s more imprecise version of the apocalyptic narrative (as compared to ISI) allowed it to make some adjustments by, for example, changing the name of the Dabiq magazine, without large scale dissent from its supporters. The renaming of Dabiq to Rumiyah already suggested that the struggle would be longer than many IS supporters had expected. However, it has been unclear how the frames have been developing after the fall of IS. With interview data from eleven informants, the rest of the article analyzes new components in the evolving apocalyptic framing of jihad.

Today, the basic idea among IS supporters is that the struggle (jihad) consists of trials (fitan), which explains and even glorifies the lack of quick successes. Already in 2016, when IS’s future was unclear, the organization’s spokesperson, Adnani, referred to “the established way of Allah testing and trying the muhajidin.”⁷⁹ And in 2018, when the tide had already turned, the leader of IS, Baghdadi, urged his followers to be patient: “And He [i.e. God] informed us that the sifting of the believers’ ranks would inevitably occur: ‘Or do you think that you will enter Jannah [i.e. Paradise] while such [trial] has not yet come to you as came to those who passed on before you?”⁸⁰ Even Abdullah, who had returned from IS, suggested that “life and jihad is a big test to see who the trustworthy ones are.” However, after the fall of IS, the focus was also on explaining why the Day of Judgement did not come and what the benefits of continued struggle were. As Mazen explained:

The basic idea is that no one really knows the date [of the Day of Judgment]. There is also a focus on that you must go through the trials. They have always been there, but the more your struggle the greater the reward. It is like you have an opportunity to gather more points on the way.

Fazl also said that one of the most difficult things the Salafi-jihadist environment has to face is to realize that “no group or person, not matter whether he claims to be a caliph or not, knows the timing of the last hour.” He argued that there is now less talk about the urgency of jihad and more about being rewarded for “perseverance.” Yahya even referred to a verse in the Quran that deals with the Battle of Uhud in 625, but it can also be seen as a general lesson on how jihad has always had its ups and downs and a way to test the believers:

If a wound should touch you - there has already touched the [opposing] people a wound similar to it. And these days [of varying conditions] We alternate among the people so that Allah may make evident those who believe and [may] take to Himself from among you martyrs - and Allah does not like the wrongdoers.⁸¹

The battle of Uhud was a defeat for the Muslims, at least by virtue of suffering greater losses than the enemy. After the Muslims had buried their dead, they sent a group of fighters to scout the enemy forces returning home. Watt argues that the purposed of such a show of force after an apparent defeat was to hasten the retreat of the enemy forces from the Muslim territory.⁸² Thus, patience does not mean humbleness and it can be combined with vigilance and a need to show that one is not completely defeated.

Ali also stressed that patience is a virtue that one is rewarded for:

The jihadists’ blood is worth a lot, so if you shed it you get more rizq [i.e. God’s sustenance]… And sometimes you just have to wait. Sabr [i.e. patience] also gives you great benefits. Whatever comes, it is from Allah subhana wa tala [i.e. the most glorious and the highest]. A lot of people really believed that Yawm al-Qiyamah [i.e. Day of Resurrection] would come soon, but you never know. Allahu alam [i.e. God knows best].

Thus, both patience (sabr) and the rewards that one can get from a longer struggle (jihad) and trials (fitan) are framed as solutions to the problem of IS’s military collapse. Such an increased focus on the virtues of patience and enduring longer trials is not only seen as a solution to a problem. By being able to gather more points, it also involves strong moral judgements about the higher ground that the Salafi-jihadist movement stands on. Thus, both fighting and preparing for it are rewarded and raise the status of an individual. Already during the Afghan jihad, fighters could argue that even preparations are rewarded. Moreover, also a jihadist who does not die, and therefore becomes a ghazi (someone who fights for Islam) rather than a shahid (martyr) is revered.⁸³ However, although even being patient and facing various trials is meritorious, it does not exclude the possibility of becoming a martyr. Indeed, the value of martyrdom may even become greater when it is achieved through greater trials that require more patience.

These moral connotations are expected to make especially the mobilization of old recruits easier. However, they also describe the problems facing the Salafi-jihadist environment in many Western countries. As Mohsen said, “Only the patient ones will stay. Life easily becomes meaningless unless you have something to look forward to. You need to feel that what you are doing is worth it. But the younger generation is looking for kicks and often lacks patience.” Thus, the increased focus on patience was not well received by all Salafi-jihadists, and some slipped back to the gang environment.

In sum, reframing the apocalyptic narrative by focusing on longer trials and patience was possible because IS was less precise about the timing of the apocalypse. If only God knows when the Day of Judgment will come, the restoration of the caliphate may take time. The duty of the individual is only to engage in jihad.

Loving Brotherhood

Reframing the apocalyptic narrative of jihad, with supporters adopting it without asking too critical questions, also seemed to be possible because IS, like many other sects, is guided by strong emotions and a sense-making common purpose. As Mazen argued, “there is a lot of love, brotherhood, very intense feelings, nothing ordinary like with other Muslims.” Hamdi continued in the same vein:

Some have been depressed after leaving Dawla [i.e. IS]. You know, it is difficult to see so much collapse, and things did not turn out how we thought they would. But people also have iman [i.e. faith] and you do not want to lose the brotherhood that was created. So, things must continue no matter what, and the struggle continues, and it can because of the brotherhood.

Brotherhood and the strong emotions that an exclusive group offers are also framed as a solution to the problem of mobilizing new recruits. As Mazen argued, “the problem is how to mobilize young people in a civilian environment. To offer them something exciting to do. That is almost impossible today. But love is a strong feeling that attracts everyone.” Jihadist groups have used various strategies to mobilize new young recruits. For example, al-Qaeda used hip-hop slang in their magazine Inspire to target especially young people in the West.⁸⁴ However, IS recruiters also focused on providing a new family for those who did not have a father to look up to.⁸⁵ IS propaganda contained promises of a happy family life to attract entire families to the state-building project, which appealed to both men and women, but the images of a brotherhood created strong feelings that especially appealed to young men. Even if joining Salafi-jihadism does not today necessarily entail immediately moving to a conflict zone, the groups can still offer a family-like environment consisting of affectionate brothers. These feelings are based on mutual trust and shared religiosity. Kareem explained from the perspective of a recruiter that although those who enter the Salafi-jihadist environment “want to become religious,” the most important aspect for inclusion in the affectionate groups of brothers is loyalty:

You must become loyal. And this requires that you become religious, so that the recruiter must feel that you are loyal. If you come there with an [deviant] outward appearance and not praying—Should I trust him? You know what I mean? If you prove that you are religious, strong and stable, then it can be easier for the person [to be included].

Thus, in addition to the virtue of patience and the rewards of a longer apocalyptic struggle, also love and brotherhood are framed as solutions to the problems facing the Salafi-jihadist environment. As Hegghammer argues, jihadist groups not only fight but also value humility and displays of emotion.⁸⁶ Today, however, the problem is not how to motivate jihadists fighting in a foreign conflict zone, but the military collapse of IS in Syria and Iraq and that the Swedish Salafi-jihadist environment competes with local gangs for recruits.⁸⁷ The boundaries between street culture, Western jihadist subculture, and actual jihadism have been argued to be blurry, but it was not previously framed as a problem. Instead, it made “Western jihadi subculture attractive (to some people)”, although it could also repel people with a strict Salafi world view.⁸⁸ Today, after the fall of IS, the balance of power between the gangs and the Salafi-jihadists has become more problematic for the jihadist groups, with gangs attracting more recruits in Sweden.

The attractions of the gangs have forced the Salafi-jihadist groups to accept some overlapping of the two environments. As Kareem said, the other Muslims represent a greater threat to the Salafi-jihadists, and there is some acceptance for the struggles that former jihadist go through: “Because if you leave and become an ordinary Muslim, it’s ‘no, no, no!’ But if you leave and become a gang member, shoot people, do drugs, then it will be [a milder reaction]: ‘May Allah guide him.’” Thus, even individuals who have become involved with the gangs are sometimes framed as “struggling” (jihad) and facing trials (fitan) of their own. Malik explained: “Some grew up with the gangs before they left for Syria, so it is quite normal that they struggle with temptations like drugs when they come back.” Thus, the struggles that some former jihadists have faced after returning are seemingly normalized because of their background. Moreover, these personal struggles take place in the broader apocalyptic context where the ummah’s struggles, waiting for the end of days, take a longer time than previously expected.

Sometimes these struggles are even framed as merging on some level. Jabir asked, “What is the difference? You can be killed by bombs from a plane or drugs from your local dealer. I am not saying that someone thinks that you will become shaheed [i.e. martyr] if you overdose, but it is still a struggle.”

Accepting some overlapping of the gang environment and the Salafi-jihadist environment is a strategic necessity as completely losing members through deradicalization would be a worse option. Kareem argued that sometimes returning jihadists end up in non-violent Salafist groups. “But it only happens when they are suddenly alone. He has no knowledge of Islam.” Therefore, upholding the radical social context is important for Salafi-jihadist groups. In this way, they hope that they can pull individuals who either have double identities and loyalties or may become deradicalized closer to them. However, since individuals who identify both with the Salafi-jihadist and the gang environment have a weaker religious identity than the more full-fledged members, they must be better socialized into the Salafi-jihadist environment. This is more difficult today as many activities have moved online, which means that opportunities to spend time in the gang environment are abundant. But at the same time, the core group of Salafi-jihadists is more isolated from the rest of the Muslim community than before, which favors socialization processes and the creation of strong feelings for the Salafi-jihadist community once you enter. Kareem argued that the most efficient contacts still take place face to face. And the Salafi-jihadists work persistently and methodically to make it happen. As Kareem explained, it starts with a question:

Then I come there… with a beard. That raises questions. That raises questions, that creates interest in the area, merely through my presence. And then someone always will come to you, asking, wondering, the word spreads, you start googling. If someone shows interest, asks a question, they won’t let you go…

He further argued that when contact is established, socialization into a group of loving brothers and making one feel special starts:

For those who come from a bad family background, you replace this with family and love. So, he [i.e. the recruit] does not want to lose you. So, he does everything to keep you content and happy… As long as you are a charismatic Muslim, you have him wrapped around your little finger. During the recruitment process, in their minds, you do not say “recruitment.” You say, of course, things such as “the right way”, sirat al-mustaqim [i.e. the straight way], “guidance”, “saved in the group”, understanding Islam though salaf al-saleh [i.e., the pious ancestors]. So, when you talk in this way and make him feel special, that he is chosen among all—“Just look at all the kufar [i.e. infidels]. Allah chose you!”—of course, he will be affected.

Kareem stressed that some young men with an unstable family background become dependent on this alternative family and the love that it offers. For them it simply does not matter that the apocalyptic frames call for more patience as long as the promise of a loving brotherhood and strong feelings is strong:

There is a despairing search for attention [by potential recruits]. This, of course, has nothing to do with Islam… They will not listen to Hamza Yousef [a popular American Islamic scholar]. His English is sometimes too difficult, and too academic. So, who do they go to? To someone with a long beard, screaming “Oaah!” They are young and look for strong feelings.

The Impact of External Events

Kareem believed that the only way to counter this process is for the Muslim community, and the society at large, to offer similar strong feelings. However, he did not believe that it was likely to happen in the short run. Instead, recent events in Sweden have improved the Salafi-jihadist environment’s ability to attract new potential recruits by arousing hostile feelings against Sweden. First, in 2022 an international social media campaign portrayed Swedish social workers as kidnapping Muslim children. This led to widespread demonstrations and even threats of violence on social media connected to extremists.⁸⁹ Messages spread especially on Arab speaking social media. Second, in 2022 and 2023 copies of the Quran were publicly burned in several demonstrations, which lead to a diplomatic crisis with some Muslim countries and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) condemning the actions. The Swedish Security Service (SÄPO) also feared that the burnings had increased the threat of terror attacks. As the deputy head of counter terrorism at SÄPO, Susanna Trehörning, argued, “We have gone from being perceived as a tolerant country to being hostile to Muslims in Muslim parts of the world.” On 16 October 2023, three Swedish men were shot in Brussels by an assailant who had the burning of the Quran as a likely motive.⁹⁰

Fazl argued that these events have played into the hands of the Salafi-jihadist environment and contribute to reframing the military collapse of IS as not being the end of its apocalyptic narrative:

Muslims who did not support Dawla now believe that hijrah [i.e. emigration to Muslim lands] is a necessity. These countries, like Sweden, are seen as really hostile to Islam. If you try to live like a Muslim, your children are taken away from you and the Quran is burned in front of your mosque. This will wake up people who were sleeping when the brothers were struggling [in Syria].

Thus, external events have given the Salafi-jihadist movement an opportunity to make strong moral judgments that can contribute to greater mobilization. Experiences of alienation and hostility toward Muslims have also in the past been used to mobilize people for jihad. Similarly, events such as the publishing of Muhammad caricatures have previously inspired radicalization, even laying the groundwork for the broader mobilization for foreign fighting.⁹¹ However, the recent social media campaigns have consisted of more general moral judgments that appeal to a broader public, not only fundamentalists but also a great many other Muslims, which can create a potentially new recruitment dynamic. Moreover, the Muhammad caricatures had led to attacks against those who drew or published them, but now the potential for mobilization and the range of targets has increased when the state is held responsible for the burning of the Quran. As Abdullah argued, “the police are behind it all.” He also saw these events in an apocalyptic perspective, which further strengthened the moral judgments: “Allah will punish these wrongdoers. The Day of Judgment is coming.”

Awad believed that the recent events are strengthening the framing of sabr as a solution to the recruitment problems faced by the Salafi-jihadist environment. But he also agreed with Abdullah that the effects of this new mobilization will be felt for a long time as the events can be seen as reviving apocalyptic thinking and mobilization:

You know, at first it seemed gloomy. People were depressed and not so active. But this Quran thing makes you think that maybe something is finally happening again. Most people have little sabr, I mean that they need something to give them hope that things are on the move again. But this kind of proves the whole thing with sabr: If you wait, some things will happen to kickstart the movement again. You may not see it today, but the effects will be felt in the long term. More young Muslims are now looking for new ways and are being pulled in [to the Salafi-jihadist environment] when the police allow the burning of the Quran. And there is also a belief that, maybe, inshallah [i.e. God willing], this is a sign that the end [i.e. the Day of Judgement] is still approaching fast. Maybe not as fast as we though, but still…

Conclusion

IS lost its last territories in Syria in 2019. IS should not only be seen as a radical Islamist movement that took the use of violence to the new level, but also as an organization that creatively made use of Islam’s long history of apocalyptic thought and thus influenced the development of modern jihad. Although there is a clear connection between traditional apocalyptic thinking and modern jihadism, apocalyptic thinking has been expressed in different ways by different jihadist groups, such as IS and al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda did not use apocalyptic frames as much in its efforts to mobilize new jihadists. These differences between IS and al-Qaeda were at least partly due to their different strategies, the former seeking to polarize the Muslim community (ummah) and the latter seeking to polarize the world. However, now that IS has lost its territories in Syria and Iraq, its need to make apocalyptic references has ostensibly diminished. However, since apocalyptic framing was such an important part of the organizations’ legitimacy and ability to mobilize jihadists, it was difficult to completely stop using it.

The interviews are not necessarily representative of the entire population of interest. However, even with this limited sample, we can see a return to epistemological humbleness: Only God knows when the Day of Judgment will come, and therefore the restoration of the caliphate may take time. This involves a new kind of rhetoric where patience, the rewards of a longer struggle, as well as love and brotherhood are framed as solutions to the third crisis of modern jihad after the collapse of IS. Some of the solutions also involve strong moral judgements that can make mobilization easier. The duty of the individual is only to struggle, i.e. to engage in jihad.

Interestingly, the struggle is not only framed as a military struggle, as also the temptations created by the gangs, such as drugs, can be framed as a struggle. Thus, the military collapse of IS is not the only problem to be solved by the Swedish Salafi-jihadist environment. The challenges created by the new strategic situation, where gangs are more successful in recruiting new members, also affect framing. Moreover, social media campaigns arguing that Swedish social workers kidnap Muslim children and the public burning of the Quran on several occasions have improved Salafi-jihadists’ ability to make new moral judgments. They can have a long-term effect on the environment by making the recruitment base broader and increasing the ability to revive and reframe the apocalyptic narrative after the military collapse of IS in 2019.

Such alterations in the framing that adapt to new events can be beneficial for the Salafi-jihadist environment because apocalyptic expectations are not a marginal phenomenon in the Sunni Muslim world. In 2012, even before the heyday of IS, a large survey showed that many people in Muslim countries believed they would see the appearance of Mahdi in person. This expectation was most common in Afghanistan (83%), Iraq (72%), Turkey (68%), Tunisia (67%), and Malaysia (62%). Many also waited for the second coming of Jesus.⁹² Given the pervasiveness and long historical roots of such apocalyptic thought, and how it has often been strengthened in politically troubled times, we are likely to see it reframed by jihadist groups to suit their strategic needs. Analyzing such modern applications of apocalyptic literature can tell us much about how jihadism is a moving target. Indeed, the future of jihadism will in part depend on how apocalyptic thinking will develop and is utilized by Salafi-jihadist environments in the coming years.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Marco Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia: Motivations, Experiences, and Change (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2022).

2 Daniel Byman and Asfandyar Mir, “Assessing al-Qaeda: A Debate,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism (advance online publication) doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2022.2068944; Jerome Drevon and Patrick Haenni, “Redefining Global Jihad and Its Termination: The Subjugation of al-Qaeda by Its Former Franchise in Syria,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism (advance online publication), doi: 10.1080/1057610X.2022.2058351.

3 Marco Nilsson and Henriette Esholdt, “After the Caliphate: Changing Mobilization in the Swedish Salafi-Jihadist Environment following the Fall of ISIS,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism (advance online publication), doi: 10.1080/1057610X.2022.2104682.

4 Erving Goffman, Frame Analysis (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1974), 21.

5 Jim A. Kuypers, “Framing Analysis,” in Rhetorical Criticism: Perspectives in Action, ed. Jim A. Kuypers (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2009), 182.

6 David A. Snow, “Framing and Social Movements,” in The Wiley–Blackwell Encyclopedia of Social and Political Movements, eds. David. A. Snow, Donatella Della Porta, Bert Klandermans, and Douglas McAdam (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2013), 392–410.

7 Robert D. Benford, R. and David A. Snow. “Framing Processes and Social Movements: An Overview and Assessment,” Annual Review of Sociology 26, no. 1 (2000): 611–639.; Joseph E. Davis, Stories of Change: Narrative and Social Movements (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002), 7.

8 David A. Snow, E. Burke Rochford, Jr., Steven K. Worden, and Robert D. Benford. “Frame Alignment Processes, Micromobilization, and Movement Participation.” American Sociological Review 51, no. 4 (1986): 464–481.

9 Marco Nilsson, “Hezbollah and the Framing of Resistance,” Third World Quarterly 41, no. 9 (2020): 1595–1614.

10 Kuypers, “Framing Analysis,” 182.

11 Sveriges Radio,” 3000 extremister i Sverige” [“3000 Extremists in Sweden”], 3 July 2017, https://sverigesradio.se/artikel/6731295 (accessed 30 November 2023).

12 Raymond Lee, Doing Research on Sensitive Topics (London, UK: Sage Publications, 1993).

13 Ibid., 63–69.

14 Mikael Hjerm, Simon Lindgren, and Marco Nilsson, Introduktion till samhällsvetenskaplig analys (Malmö, Sweden: Gleerups, 2012), 153.

15 The Quran 47:18, Sahih international, https://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp (accessed August 1, 2023).

16 David Cook, Contemporary Muslim Apocalyptic Literature (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2008).

17 The Quran 7:187, Sahih international, https://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp (accessed August 1, 2023).

18 Niko Huttunen,” Johdanto,” in Mitä on apokalyptiikka? – Apokalypsi ja politiikka, eds. Niko Huttunen and Elina Kahla (forthcoming).

19 Sunan Abi Dawud, Hadith 4292, https://sunnah.com/abudawud (accessed August 1, 2023).

20 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2899a, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

21 Sunan Abi Dawud, Hadith 4294, https://sunnah.com/abudawud (accessed August 1, 2023).

22 David B. Cook, “Dajjal,” in Encyclopedia of Islam, 3rd ed., eds. Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, and Everett Rowson (Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2012).

23 Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 2476, https://sunnah.com/bukhari (accessed August 1, 2023).

24 The Quran 18:94–97.

25 The Quran 18:98–100, 21:96.

26 Sunan Ibn Majah, Hadith 4081, https://sunnah.com/ibnmajah (accessed August 1, 2023).

27 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2901b, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

28 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2922; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 8a, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

29 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2912c; Jamì at-Tirmidhi, Hadith 2239, https://sunnah.com/tirmidhi (accessed August 1, 2023).

30 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2901b, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

31 “Mahdi,” Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/topic/mahdi, last modified May 23, 2023 (accessed August 1, 2023).

32 Huttunen “Johdanto.”.

33 Jean-Pierre Filiu, Apocalypse in Islam (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2011), 48.

34 David A. Cook, Studies in the Muslim Apocalyptic (Feltham, UK: Darwin Press, 2002), 36.

35 Ibid.

36 Bronislav Ostřanský, The Jihadist Preachers of the End Times (Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press, 2021), 93.

37 Said Ayyub, Al-Masih al-Dajjal (Cairo, Egypt: Al-Fath lil-Aalam al-’Arabi, 1987).

38 Filiu, Apocalypse in Islam, 84.

39 Dawn Chatty and Gillian L. Hundt, “Introduction: Children of Palestine Narrate Forced Migration, “in Children of Palestine: Experiencing Forced Migration in the Middle East, ed. Dawn Chatty and Gillian L. Hundt (Oxford, UK: Berghahn Books, 2005), 134.

40 Ayyub, Al-Masih al-Dajjal, 286–287.

41 Said Amir Arjomand, “Islamic Apocalypticism in the Classical Period,” in Apocalypticism in Western History and Culture, vol. 2., ed. Bernard McGinn (New York: Continuum, 1998), 248; Cook Contemporary Muslim Apocalyptic Literature, 8; Filiu, Apocalypse in Islam, 28.

42 Mücahit Bilici, “Turkish Messiahs, Mahdis, and ‘False’ Prophets,” DuvaR, January 27, 2020. https://www.duvarenglish.com/columns/2020/01/27/turkish-messiahs-mahdis-and-false-prophets.2020 (accessed August 1, 2023).

43 Sunan Ibn Majah, Hadith 4084, https://sunnah.com/ibnmajah (accessed August 1, 2023).

44 William McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse: The History, Strategy, and Doomsday Vision of the Islamic State (New York: St Martin’s Press, 2015), 146.

45 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 147.

46 Fawaz A. Gerges, The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 295.

47 Steven Brooke, “Jihadist Strategic Debates Before 9/11,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 31, no. 3 (2008): 202–203.

48 Gerges, The Far Enemy, 295.

49 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 192.

50 Laura Mansfield, In His Own Words: A Translation of the Writings of Dr. Ayman al Zawahiri (Old Tappan, NJ: TLG Publications, 2006), 208–209.

51 Brooke, “Jihadist Strategic Debates Before 9/11,” 215.

52 Mansfield, In His Own Words, 219–220.

53 Gerges, The Far Enemy, 275.

54 Ostřanský, The Jihadist Preachers of the End Times, 73.

55 McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse, 122.

56 James Fromson and Steven Simon, “ISIS: The Dubious Paradise of Apocalypse Now,” Survival 57, no. 3 (2015): 29.

57 Ostřanský, The Jihadist Preachers of the End Times, 121.

58 Brian H. Fishman, The Master Plan: ISIS, al-Qaeda, and the Jihadi Strategy for Final Victory (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2016), 70.

59 Ibid., 216, 220.

60 Ibid., 72.

61 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 166–174, 237.

62 Daniel Rickenbacher, “The Centrality of Anti-Semitism in the Islamic State’s Ideology and its Connection to Anti-Shiism,” Religions 10, no. 8 (2019): 483.

63 Ibid.

64 Jami at-Tirmidhi, Hadith 2641, https://sunnah.com/tirmidhi (accessed August 1, 2023).

65 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 13.

66 Karen J. Renner, “The Appeal of the Apocalypse,” LIT: Literature Interpretation Theory 23, no. 3 (2012): 206–207.

67 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 219.

68 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2897, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

69 BBC Monitoring, “Dabiq: Why is Syrian Town so Important for IS?,” BBC News, October 4, 2016, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-30083303 (accessed August 1, 2023).

70 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 2937a, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

71 Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1380, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

72 Sahih Muslim, hadith 2937a, https://sunnah.com/muslim (accessed August 1, 2023).

73 “The Flood,” Dabiq 2. Al Hayat Media Center, July 27, 2014, 2.

74 Huttunen “Johdanto.”.

75 Patricio Galvez and Joakim Medin, Amanda: Min dotters resa till IS (Stockholm, Sweden: Verbal 2022), 147.

76 Fishman, The Master Plan, 158.

77 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 11.

78 Byman and Mir, “Assessing al-Qaeda: A Debate.”.

79 Haroro J. Ingram, Craig Whiteside, and Charlie Winter, The ISIS Reader: Milestone Texts of the Islamic State Movement (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2022), 258.

80 Ibid., 266.

81 The Quran 3:140. Sahih international, https://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp (accessed August 1, 2023).

82 Montgomery Watt W, Muhammad at Medina (London, UK: Oxford University Press, 1981), 432.

83 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 160.

84 Caroline Joan S. Picart, “‘Jihad Cool/Jihad Chic’: The role of the Internet and Imagined Relations in the Self-radicalization of Colleen LaRose (Jihad Jane),” Societies 5, no. 2 (2015): 354–383; Jan Christoffer Andersen and Sveinung Sandberg, “Islamic State Propaganda: Between Social Movement Framing and Subcultural Provocation,” Terrorism and Political Violence 32, no. 7 (2020): 1506–1526.

85 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 214, 217.

86 Thomas Hegghammer, Jihadi Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017).

87 Nilsson and Esholdt, “After the Caliphate.”.

88 Sune Qvotrup Jensen, Jeppe Fuglsang Larsen, and Sveinung Sandberg, “Rap, Islam and Jihadi Cool: The Attractions of the Western Jihadi Subculture,” Crime, Media, Culture 18, no. 3 (2022): 430–445.

89 “Detta har hänt: Kampanj om att myndigheter kidnappar barn,” Svt Nyheter, January 23, 2023, https://www.svt.se/nyheter/inrikes/detta-har-hant-kampanj-om-att-myndigheter-kidnappar-barn (accessed August 1, 2023).

90 “Two Swedes shot dead in Brussels; Belgium raises terror alert to top level,” Reuters, October 17, 2023, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/two-swedes-shot-dead-brussels-police-2023-10-16/(accessed October 17, 2023).

91 Nilsson, Jihadism in Scandinavia, 98.

92 “New Pew Forum Report Describes Unity and Diversity of Islam Around the Globe”, Pew Research Center, 2012. https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2012/08/09/new-pew-forum-report-describes-unity-and-diversity-of-islam-around-the-globe/(accessed August 1, 2023).