Online jihadist magazines and the “religious terrorism” thesis

ABSTRACT

This article presents findings from an empirical study of 39 issues of five online terrorist magazines in order to problematise the concept of religious terrorism. The presentation of the study’s findings focuses on the magazines’ textual content, examining the types of textual item each magazine contains, how the producers of the magazines perceive the publications, the justifications the magazines offer for the groups’ activities and the motivations that underlie these activities. This analysis shows that there are important differences between the messages each group expounds. These differences, the article argues, are obscured by the homogeneous label “religious terrorism”. Moreover, an examination of these groups’ messages shows that the purported distinction between religion and politics is unsustainable and has detrimental political-normative repercussions.

KEYWORDS:

• Terrorism
• religion
• politics
• propaganda
• narratives

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the Swansea Employability Academy, the Colleges of Arts & Humanities and Law & Criminology at Swansea University, and the Center for Terrorism & Security Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, for their support for the research on which this article is based.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. All four issues of Jihad Recollections were published in 2009 under the editorship of Samir Khan. Khan moved to Yemen and began work on Inspire in October 2009, publishing the first issue in 2010. This timeline – plus the fact that a biography of Khan published by al-Qaeda after Khan’s death that described Inspire as “an extension of Jihad Recollections, a magazine he described as ‘America’s Worst Nightmare’” – suggests that, at the very least, Jihad Recollections was endorsed by al-Qaeda even if it was not technically an al-Qaeda publication.

2. Of the other seven statements, one was attributed to the Prophet Muhammed and the others were attributed to six different individuals (one of which was Anwar al-Awlaki).

3. The editorials in three of the issues of Gaidi Mtaani (issues 1, 2 and 6) were not in the English language and so could not be analysed.

4. For further discussion, see Macdonald (2016).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Stuart Macdonald

Stuart Macdonald is a Professor of Law at Swansea University, UK. He is Director of the University’s multidisciplinary Cyberterrorism Project and Co-Director of the CHERISH Digital Economy Centre. In 2017 he was the holder of a Fulbright Cyber Award.

Nyasha Maravanyika

Nyasha Maravanyika graduated from Swansea University, UK, in 2016 with a LLB degree in Law. He is now a case handler for a conveyancing firm.

David Nezri

David Nezri graduated from Swansea University, UK, in 2016 with a LLB degree in Law. He then went on to complete his LPC at BPP University, London, UK, and is currently working as a trainee solicitor.

Elliot Parry

Elliot Parry graduated from Swansea University, UK, in 2016 with a BA degree in Philosophy, Politics and Law. Since then he has engaged in voluntary work around the world, including with an international lifeboat rescue project based at The United World College.

Kate Thomas

Kate Thomas graduated from Swansea University, UK, in 2016 with a LLB degree in Law. She then completed her LPC at Swansea University and is currently working as a trainee solicitor.