Phil Taylor's papers
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BACK TO : TALIBAN & AL QAIDA PROPAGANDA (including the 'bin Laden Tapes' & AQ statements) with analysis
Surfing on Jihad 
Surfing on Jihad US Homeland Security attributed a lot of Al-Qaeda's recent success to its use of the internet, reports HSToday. "Al-Qaeda employs the internet to transmit globally its messages and the numbers of such messages have increased exponentially over the last 18 months,h says Charles Allen, DHS Undersecretary for Intelligence and Analysis. The Al-Qaeda narrative is greatly disseminated and facilitated through the internet, which has become a tool to build relationships and gain expertise that previously was available only in overseas training camps. On May 8, the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs completed a report entitled, "Violent Islamist Extremism, the Internet and the Homegrown Terrorist Threat," detailing the escalating threat posed by terrorists' use of the Internet for recruiting and training future jihadists. The report stated, "Terrorists have a virtually unrestrained reach via the Internet and Al-Qaeda in particular operates a multi-tiered online media operation in which a number of production units, associated with Al-Qaeda or allied violent Islamist organizations, produce content consistent with the core terrorist enlistment message." The internet establishes a line of communication where "an individual can at night auto-radicalize himself via the Web and get in touch with leaders of terrorist organizations," according to Bernard Squarcini, chief of the Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire. Elsewhere, Abdul-Rahman Al-Hadlaq, supervisor of Saudi Arabiafs Interior Ministry's Good Counsel Committee, said 80% of recruitment of youths by terrorist organizations is being done through the Internet. "The low cost of reaching a large number of people in various countries, followed by the Internetfs multimedia capabilities, and the ability to use the internet under numerous aliases" is what makes the internet such an attractive medium. Government Executive reports that radicalization of disaffected Muslims and recent converts is increasing in the US and while the government has no effective strategic communication to counter it, terrorists make the most out of the internet. "The propaganda regularly produced finds its way to literally thousands of violent Islamist Web sites across the Internet, many of which are either 'mirrored' versions of one another, or 'simply bulletin boards' that disseminate the same material," hence increasing extremists' outreach. The growing sophistication of Al-Qaeda's Internet campaign poses a serious threat and has the potential to erode the United States' cultural and community characteristics that have thus far discouraged violent radicalization, worries the news site. "Left unchallenged, Al-Qaeda's message espoused over the Internet will drive more individuals in the United States through the radicalization process and encourage them to conduct actual attacks," asserts the Senate committee. The committee concluded in the report that the most efficient way to counter this trend is to promote non-governmental actors who must play a more visible and vocal role in discrediting and providing alternatives to violent Islamist ideology. Menassat notes that Al-Qaeda has always been strategic in its use of the media, recognizing the importance of addressing the public opinion even if it meant at times having to rely on the Western media to put the organization's message across. "At a later stage, Al-Qaeda decided it needed an in-house media strategy," points out the Lebanese website, "As-Sahab [which] would monopolize Al-Qaeda's media policy." Menassat elucidates that Iraq set the pace for a new media generation with videos of beheading and other atrocities available on the internet. Prof. Marc Lynch at GWU in DC., adds that consequently, "The quantity and volume of anti-jihadi voices in the Arab media have dramatically increased in recent years, with every Al-Qaeda-linked terror attack now met by a chorus of Arab criticism and condemnation." It explains, in turn, Al-Qaeda's shift from TV to internet as a source of media. Menssat remembers Al-Zawahiri's statement in July 2005 during an address to Muslims, "We are in a battle, and more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media... [We] are in a media battle for the hearts and minds of our umma." Facing increasing hostility from both the government-run Arab media and satellite TV stations such as Al-Jazeera, it seems logical that Al-Qaeda's media strategy should become more and more internet-oriented. The internet's popularity lies in being able to avoid censorship, argues Menassat, although illiteracy remains a relevant factor. Ikbal Gharbi, a professor of Anthropology in the Institute of Sharia and Religious Principles, argues in Maghrebia, "In view of the high illiteracy rates in the Islamic world, the audio recording is considered an effective means to convey the message that can then be copied and sent via cell phones. To Al-Zawahiri, the Internet is the 21st century's blessing." The release of Bin Laden's recent audio message for the Muslims, the third this year, is presumed to be in response to Al-Qaeda's bashing of the Muslim media, especially on pro-terrorist web sites, notes Strategy Page. Lately, Al-Qaeda has tried to rebrand itself "as an essential component in thestruggle to destroy Israel and rescue the Palestinians from 'Zionist oppression.'" However, it has remained unsuccessful, despite recent web and audio messages threatening direct attacks on Israel. Sen. Joseph Lieberman, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, urged in a letter to Eric Schmidt, chief executive officer of Google Inc., to take down YouTube videos that he said Al-Qaeda and "other terrorist organizations" use to encourage violence and disseminate propaganda, reports CNN. Advocating YouTube to enforce stricter security measures to prevent jihadist videos from re-appearing, Lieberman asked the web company to "implement its own policy against this offensive material by removing the videos." YouTube said on its blog that it had removed a "number of videos" from its site after examining several videos that Lieberman's staff said "violated YouTube's Community Guidelines." The videos that were removed "depicted gratuitous violence, advocated violence, or used hate speech," YouTube said. However, "Most of the videos, which did not contain violent or hate speech content, were not removed because they do not violate our Community Guidelines," claimed the video-sharing website. The statement did not say how many videos were removed, and it was not immediately clear when they were taken down. YouTube also declared that it could not entirely comply with the request because some of the videos that mention or feature those groups include "legal nonviolent or non-hate speech videos. "While we respect and understand his views, YouTube encourages free speech and defends everyone's right to express unpopular points of view," the site said in defense of its inaction. "Too often when people around the world reflect on the situation in the Middle East they focus on extremism and the different problems," Wikipedia founder James Wales told journalists at the World Economic Forum for the Middle East, reports Agence France Presse. An explosion in Internet usage in the Middle East by "ordinary" people will show the world that the region is just like anywhere else, he argues, before adding, "ordinary people are far more moderate and far more ordinary than the unfortunately polarized views of extremes you see coming out." Pointing that new users are going to come from the developing countries, he concluded that eventually people will see that the region is something else than "just a basket of problems." |