-
Jihadist web forums are reporting that Abu Musab al-Suri has been freed from prison in Syria – a highly significant development, if true. Although rumours of Suri’s release have been circulating for over a week, the announcement of this news by forum users with known links to al-Qaeda… View the full article +Jihadist web forums are reporting that Abu Musab al-Suri has been freed from prison in Syria – a highly significant development, if true. Although rumours of Suri’s release have been circulating for over a week, the announcement of this news by forum users with known links to al-Qaeda now makes it highly likely that he is no longer in custody.
Background
- Suri has not been seen in public since his arrest in the Pakistani city of Quetta in October 2005. It was widely believed that he was subsequently rendered to Syria.
- Suri has a long history within the global jihad movement and al-Qaeda, enjoying a relative degree of seniority within the movement.
- He was also widely respected by jihadists as an intellectual and gifted strategic thinker. Indeed, after 9/11 Suri emerged as the single most important strategic thinker within al-Qaeda writing his seminal work, the 1600-page tome, The Global Islamic Resistance Call (Da'wat al-muqawamah al-islamiyyah al-'alamiyyah) in late 2004.
- Ayman al-Zawahiri recently asked for Suri’s release in exchange for kidnapped American aid worker, Warren Weistein.
The significance of Suri
- Suri’s book was credited with developing al-Qaeda’s strategy in response to the challenges it faced after the United States and allied forces invaded both Afghanistan and Iraq. He recognised that al-Qaeda would no longer be able to train sympathisers in camps as it had prior to 9/11. Suri therefore developed the so-called ‘lone wolf’ strategy (or strategy of ‘leaderless resistance’), and as a result, the group focused less on trying building a centralised structure and instead began inspiring sympathisers to commit random (and often individual) acts of terrorism.
- This proved to be a highly effective strategy despite its lack of sophistication when compared with 9/11, 7/7, or the Madrid bombings. This strategy was perhaps most effectively carried out by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and Anwar al-Awlaki who inspired scores of lone wolves (sometimes called ‘self-starters’). For more on the effect and impact of lone wolves see Raff Pantuci’s paper for ICSR here.
Implications of Suri’s release
- At the most basic level, Suri’s release will provide a morale boost to al-Qaeda which has suffered massive setbacks with the killing of influential leaders including Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki, and Atiyah Abd al-Rahman.
- Within Syria however, it is not known what role Suri could play as disorder continues to grow. Domestic opposition groups (and exiled Syrian opposition leaders) will likely view him as a liability to their cause. The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood is also unlikely to provide support for Suri for a number of reasons. It recognises the dangers of embracing al-Qaeda and also shares significant ideological difference with the group (at least in method, if not always in aims). Suri has also written about leading figures within the Syrian Brotherhood in acerbic tones in the past, alienating him from the movement.
- It is will be almost impossible for Suri to reconnect with al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan, Pakistan, or Yemen. It is likely that he will seek to reconnect with al-Qaeda by slipping across the border into Iraq, where al-Qaeda in Iraq is operating with renewed zeal since the withdrawal of American troops in December 2011. Should this transpire, his long period of incarceration will further add to his credibility.
Need for caution
- Rumours of Suri’s release have been circulated before without much credence. On this occasion news of his release was announced by the jihadist forum participant, ‘Asad al-Jihad2’ (Lion of Jihad 2). The news has subsequently been carried on reliable web forums including Ansar al-Mujahideen and al-Shmukh.
- ‘Asad al-Jihad2’ is a prolific and well established member of several jihadist forums with known links to al-Qaeda. In 2009, the Global Islamic Media Front – a translation service for the global jihad movement – interviewed him about ‘the future plans of the mujahideen’, suggesting he enjoys an operational role within the movement.
- It is possible this could be misinformation from Bashar al-Assad’s administration with the purpose of either ‘warning’, or ‘punishing’, the West over its support for Syrian demonstrators.
- As disorder grows within Syria it will be increasingly difficult for the United States and its allies to both acquire accurate information about Suri and to take effective measures which prevent him from slipping into Iraq.
-
Americans love to berate Europe and its failings. Youthful America looks to its European progenitor and sees post-colonial stagnation and sclerotic economies that are unwilling to face up to their problems. A bugbear of the past few years has been criticism of Europe’s approach to its… View the full article +
Americans love to berate Europe and its failings. Youthful America looks to its European progenitor and sees post-colonial stagnation and sclerotic economies that are unwilling to face up to their problems. A bugbear of the past few years has been criticism of Europe’s approach to its resident Muslim population. Commentaries have focused on a problem that is seen by many as an incubator of anger that has expressed itself in the form of attacks by European, or European-based, terrorists against America – most notably on September 11, 2001.
But while Europe has in the past provided a depressingly productive Petri dish for Muslim rage with contradictory policies that have had an alienating effect on parts of the broader community, it is increasingly the case that America is simply following Europe in the same direction. Recent stories of New York’s police department using inflammatory videos about Islamist extremism in training come in the wake of stories of possibly CIA assisted intelligence operations against Muslim communities. Whatever the tactical utility of such operations, it is clear that from a hearts-and-minds perspective they can be seen to be a failure.
More absurdly, states have tried to pass laws preventing shariah law from being imposed on them – a highly unlikely outcome, but reflective of the high levels of paranoia and anti-Muslim feeling amongst the American public. Something also seen in stories of Muslim leaders being disembarked from domestic flights with little reason given, in some cases as they were on their way to conferences about “Islamophobia”.
At a political level the conversation has been just as poisonous as in Europe. Potential Republican candidate Newt Gingrich has spoken of “the mortal threat to the survival of freedom in the United States and in the world as we know it” posed by shariah. In Congress, Representative Peter King has held hearings accusing America’s Muslim community of failing to regulate itself and producing homegrown terrorists. And while a direct correlation with this polarizing narrative is of course impossible to draw, there has been an increase in young Americans drawn by the lure of jihad abroad or into becoming involved in what they believe are terror plots within the US in the past few years.
Europe has hardly covered itself in glory in integrating its Muslim communities. But neither has America, and the current approach is increasingly emulating many of Europe’s failed policies. It is all very good to shout about Europe’s failings, but the United States needs to increasingly look within before it allows its problems to get too out of hand.
America has a long tradition of being a national melting pot, able to absorb people of all cultures and creeds and accepting of diversity as a crucial element of its identity. For years, the belief was that America would be immune to the sort of problems that Europe faced with homegrown extremism. As time has shown, however, this is clearly not the case with numerous young men drawn to the flame of extremism. The United States should focus on learning positive lessons from Europe’s problematic experience and avoid emulating its failed policies.
Posted by Raff Pantucci on 02/02/12
-
NEFA recently released their latest background report which focuses on US-based extremist preacher, Abu Taubah. For the full report, please click… View the full article +NEFA recently released their latest background report which focuses on US-based extremist preacher, Abu Taubah. For the full report, please click here.
Posted by ICSR on 27/01/12
-
One indication of the changed security situation in Mogadishu is the re-opening of the UN Political Office in this war-ravaged city after an absence of 17 years. Other embassies have followed suit reflecting greater confidence in the security situation. African Union forces in the form of AMISOM… View the full article +
One indication of the changed security situation in Mogadishu is the re-opening of the UN Political Office in this war-ravaged city after an absence of 17 years. Other embassies have followed suit reflecting greater confidence in the security situation. African Union forces in the form of AMISOM together with Somalia Transitional Federal Government (TFG) troops forced al-Shabab fighters from the capital in August 2011. Feeling more confident now that troops from Djibouti have joined the AMISOM mission which now numbers 12,000 another major offensive together with TFG forces was launched in January 2012. The results of this saw AMISOM and TFG forces taking control of Mogadishu University as well as Barakat cemetery and allowing these forces for the first time in years to be in a position to defend greater Mogadishu as opposed to just the city limits of the capital.
Meanwhile, Ethiopian forces captured Beledwyne, 30 kilometres from the Ethiopian border. The town is quite strategic in that it is the main artery linking the north and south of the country. From Beledweyen, Ethiiopian forces rapidly advanced to the central regions of Hiran and Galgadud displacing al-Shabab fighters there. Ethiopian troops have continued their rapid advance southwards into the heart of al-Shabab territory by forging an alliance with clan militias in the Shabelle River Valley.
In the south, al-Shabab fighters are also attempting to repulse a formidable force of Kenyan combat troops and local clan militias backed up by fighter jets and heavy armour. The Kenyans have been making significant territorial gains in Gedo and Juba. All this is compelling al-Shabab to fight on multiple fronts at a time when the movement is wracked by internal rivalry between Mukhtar Ali Robow and Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys on the one side and Ahmed Abdi Godane on the other. In addition, al-Shabab has also been losing some of its most important military commanders, such as Fazul Abdul Mohammed who was killed at a government roadblock in Mogadishu. Mohammed was al-Qaeda’s military operations chief in East Africa and a key Godane ally. With the loss of his key military planner, Godane’s rivals within al-Shabab might well think that now is an opportune moment to strike at Godane himself. At the same time, American drones continue to take out key military skilled foreign jihadis among the group. This month Lebanese national Bilaal Al-Barjawi, also known as Abu Hafsa, was killed in such a drone attack.
Whilst definitely, on the ropes, it is much too early to dismiss al-Shabab as a spent force. The movement has a history of rebounding following previous military defeats. For instance, al-Shabab has shifted back to guerrilla tactics and far from confronting foreign forces is once again using suicide truck bombs, like that used against the Ethiopian military base in Beledweyne which killed 10 Ethiopian soldiers. Moreover, there is an average of eight improvised explosive devices discovered or detonated every day in the capital.
Whilst doing well on the military front, AMISOM (together with the UN) needs to have a clear political strategy. Areas liberated from al-Shabab control are little more than tiny fiefdoms at the whim of the local militia commander. According to the UN, there are already between 14 and 20 “min-states” in the country. If the international community is serious about sustainable peace in this blighted country they need to give urgent attention to the overarching political strategy and not just focus on the military defeat of al-Shabab, important as this is as a short term goal.
Posted by Hussein Solomon on 27/01/12
-
Towards the end of last year a story emerged that suggested that infamous al Qaida ideologue Mustafa Setmariam Nasr, aka Abu Musab al- Suri, had been released from the Syrian jail in which it was believed he had been languishing. Picked up in Quetta in October 2005, al-Suri was a longtime… View the full article +
Towards the end of last year a story emerged that suggested that infamous al Qaida ideologue Mustafa Setmariam Nasr, aka Abu Musab al- Suri, had been released from the Syrian jail in which it was believed he had been languishing. Picked up in Quetta in October 2005, al-Suri was a longtime jihadist who during his career had served as a trainer in Afghanistan, married a Spanish woman, and worked as a propagandist from Londonistan. He is most well-known, however, as an author and ideologue and particularly for his massive tome, Global Islamic Resistance Call, a text that laid out his idea for al-Qaeda’s structure as “nizam, la tanzim” (system, not organization). Most recently, his writing had gotten increased traction as al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) had very publicly taken up his ideas as part of their push in Inspire magazine to try to stir up Lone Wolf terrorism.
While the unconfirmed announcement of his release has not gotten much traction, the story was interesting given the importance al-Suri’s work is often given by researchers (and the fact that he was amongst the individuals whom Zawahiri asked for in exchange for kidnapped American Warren Weistein). Intrigued by the story, I reached out to Dr. Brynjar Lia of FFI in Norway, the world’s foremost expert of al-Suri, having written the excellent biography “Architect of Global Jihad: The Life of Al Qaeda Strategist Abu Musab al Suri,” to see what he thought of the story and its potential consequences:
I think it is quite likely that al-Suri was transferred to Syria and has been held there, judging by the various reports pointing in that direction over the past few years. However, I am not sure whether Syrian authorities would have much to gain by releasing him. He is no friend of the Syrian regime to say the least, and he consistently denounced the Syrian regime both politically and religiously, labeling them "a Nusayri [another word for the Alawi, Bashar al Assad’s ethnic community] occupation". The only thing I could think of is that the regime is trying to send a signal to the West, and the U.S. in particular, that if they push the Assad regime too hard, they will lose a partner in "the war on terrorism", to use an outdated term. Al-Zawahiri mentioned al-Suri as one of several jihadis he wanted to see released in return for a U.S. citizen, reportedly held hostage by al-Qaida in Pakistan. However, in the current climate it is hard to imagine U.S.-Syrian cooperation on swapping al-Suri for the U.S. hostage.
“The impact of al-Suri's release, if true, will not necessarily be dramatic, although it depends on the circumstances of his release. I don't really see him in any operational role in the jihadi organisations in the region such as al-Qaida in Iraq, Ansar al-Islam, Fatah al-Islam or others. As for the Syrian opposition in exile, they will probably view him as a liability and they seem to believe that he might have been released as part of the Syrian regime's orchestrated efforts to portray the opposition as an al-Qaida supported insurgency. Furthermore, al-Suri has few friends among the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, whom he singled out for very harsh criticism in his early writings. He did not have a large crowd of dedicated disciples, but was mostly a theoretician and a writer and was admired for his writings and his seniority as a jihadist.
For my own two cents, it would be strange for the Syrians to take such an action for a man who was so clearly their enemy and unlikely to ever do them any favors – but then again, as the Shia Iranian experience with allowing Sunni al Qaida to stay in their territory has shown, the geopolitics of the war on terrorism are complex. But I also wonder whether it would necessarily be the case that his release would be some sort of a boon to the notion of Lone Wolf jihad as espoused by AQAP. Clearly Inspire magazine saw al-Suri as their ideological godfather and repeatedly held up his image and writing as key in their thinking, but I wonder if al-Suri would equally embrace the notions as they have advanced it.
To start with, it is unclear to me on the basis of his work that al Suri would be that impressed by the religious and ideological knowledge displayed by the army of young people who are taking up arms in response to AQAP’s call. In the early 1990s as he was first advancing his ideas in Peshawar, al Suri spoke of being unimpressed by the lack of “necessary doctrinal, programmatic, ideological and political guidance” amongst his fellow Arab-Afghans. Furthermore, in his magum opus, the Global Islamic Resistance Call, where he praises “the school of individual jihad and small cells” and a group of lone individuals who took up the cause of jihad, he highlights how while these attacks may be a military, security and agitation success, their political and educational impact is relatively low. It is hard to imagine that he would see greater ideological fervor or wider political success amongst the young people claiming his heritage.
Beyond this, it is unclear that he would necessarily approve of the sort of random targeting that is suggested by Inspire magazine’s ideas of taking down apartment blocs full of people by renting out one on a lower floor and letting the gas run freely or the idea to use a combine harvester to literally mow through crowds. While al-Suri’s writing does recognise the validity of targeting civilians, he does say that this needs to be done in a discriminating fashion. This is reflected in information to have emerged from Abbotabad where it is claimed that bin-Laden was “taken aback” by the Inspire proposal to use a harvester “he complains that this tactical proposal promotes indiscriminate slaughter. He says he rejects this and it is not something that reflects what al-Qaeda does.”
It is unclear whether al-Suri will be able to react in any sort of a public way to the children of the jihad who have claimed his legacy, not least because we have no idea at the moment of whether he has even been released (or if he has what limitations he may be under). But should he have been released and be able to become an active jihadi ideologue once again, it will undoubtedly prove a coup for al-Qaeda’s battered ideology and forces (as Jarret Brachmann has pointed out). What is less clear, however, is what kind of an impact it would have on the AQAP driven push towards indiscriminate, undirected Lone Wolf terrorism. It is uncertain to what degree the group is responsible for the growth in such events, and it is even less certain whether al-Suri would necessarily appreciate the interpretation of his work that they have been advancing.
Lone Wolf terrorism will no doubt continue to emerge whether al-Suri has been released or not. Al Suri’s potential addition to this mix will be to breathe new life into a group whose ideology and leadership has taken a sound beating, offering a leader whose ideas at the time were not paid much attention to, but since his arrest have increasingly become the vogue amongst terrorist tacticians.
Posted by Raff Pantucci on 26/01/12
-
Over the weekend, media outlets reported that the Afghan National Army (ANA) soldier who killed four French soldiers and injured 16 in the Tagab district of Kapisa claimed to have been motivated by the video of US Marines urinating on the corpses of the enemy in Helmand Province. I… View the full article +
Over the weekend, media outlets reported that the Afghan National Army (ANA) soldier who killed four French soldiers and injured 16 in the Tagab district of Kapisa claimed to have been motivated by the video of US Marines urinating on the corpses of the enemy in Helmand Province.
I encourage our friends and allies in France to consider (1) the source, (2) the history of “green-on-blue” attacks in Afghanistan, (which see members of the Afghan National Security Forces, ANSF, attacking their partners of the International Security Assistance Force, ISAF), and (3) who gains by advancing this interpretation of events.
THE SOURCE: The Telegraph received this information from an “Afghan army officer” and was “backed by an intelligence source and another with access to information from the Afghan ministry of defence.”
This account is, in short, impossible to confirm based on The Telegraph’s reporting and there are plenty of reasons to doubt this account as explained below. The French are conducting an investigation. I am sure ISAF is conducting its own. Any judgments and operational decisions should be postponed until these investigations end.
And the French suspension of operations was to be expected. They have done the same thing after sustaining casualties before. As for talk of an early French withdrawal, it doesn’t look like that is going to happen.
GREEN-ON-BLUE ATTACKS: The claim that the soldier, 21-year old Abdul Mansour, launched this tragic attack due to the video is one of a few competing versions of events out there. French Defence Minister Gerard Longuet said he was told in a meeting with General Emam Nazar of the 3rd Light Infantry Brigade of the ANA that the killer was a Taliban infiltrator who had returned to the ANA after deserting to Pakistan. This is a claim the Taliban confirmed, but unusually, they denied it at first. Insurgent groups in Afghanistan have a history of claiming "green on blue" attacks that they had nothing to do with. President Karzai downplayed the possibility of Taliban infiltration.
The suggestion that the Marine urination video was the cause is more insidious, as it can undermine inter-ally relations.
Why do these attacks happen? They rarely happen due to Taliban infiltration, but it seems more likely in this case than the video explanation. By and large, these attacks happen because inter-personal disputes and inter-cultural animosities that have nothing to do with the Taliban. I highly recommend an unclassified ISAF red-team study from last year called, A Crisis of Trust, examines how ANSF and US personnel view each other in order to understand and mitigate “the phenomena of ANSF-committed fratricide-murders.” This report is an excellent example of red-teaming.
I’d be curious to discover the soldier’s ethnicity, because if he is a Tajik (which, judging by the ethnic composition of the ANA, he most likely is), this makes it even less likely that he cared what happened to a couple of dead Pashtun Taliban on the opposite side of Afghanistan. If anyone knows anything more about Abdul Mansour, please let me know on Twitter: @evansryan202.
WHO GAINS?: In short, some actors in the Afghan government and the Taliban. This is not to suggest they are colluding. Quite the opposite. But parties on each side have an interest in advancing this narrative. The Taliban have an obvious interest in undermining trust in the ANA and inter-ally relations so as to disrupt what is intended to be a carefully orchestrated ISAF withdrawal plan.
Some actors in the Afghan government feel threatened by the course of negotiations between the Taliban and the United States. They worry (with some justification) that their interests are not being looked after and they believe they are not being kept in the loop. President Karzai’s heated reaction to a video of Marines urinating on dead insurgents (when members of the ANSF do worse to living insurgents all the time) and possibly the leaking of this information from the Afghan MoD should be seen in this context.
Posted by Ryan Evans on 24/01/12
-
There has been a steady stream of thought-provoking remarks about the role of leadership (or lack thereof) in the activist movements that coordinated via social network sites to overthrow the Mubarak regime in Egypt. Most recently, Clint Watts wrote a thoughtful post on the subject at his blog,… View the full article +There has been a steady stream of thought-provoking remarks about the role of leadership (or lack thereof) in the activist movements that coordinated via social network sites to overthrow the Mubarak regime in Egypt. Most recently, Clint Watts wrote a thoughtful post on the subject at his blog, Selected Wisdom. His comments were sparked by a Steve Inskeep interview with Wael Ghonim, the Egyptian activist and Google executive who played a significant role in the uprising. The occasion of the interview was the release of Ghonim’s new book, Revolution 2.0, which I blogged briefly about the other day.
Ghonim insists he is not a leader.
The question of leadership is an old one in social movement studies and the larger discipline of sociology (dating back to Weber). As a disciple of both who is beginning a PhD this year on the dynamics of social movements in the Muslim world and Egypt more specifically, I am keenly interested in the questions raised by the ‘Arab Spring’ and, more specifically, Clint’s arguments about leadership in ‘leaderless’ movements.
Ghomin told Inskeep that “[T]his revolution has no leader, has no face to it. And the collective effort of all the Egyptians is what mattered at the end of the day.” Similarly, he told Newsweek that, “What you don’t understand, and it seems what you don’t want to understand, is that this protest doesn’t have real organizers. It’s a protest without a leader.”
Inskeep himself expressed his skepticism, asking Ghonim:I wonder if you're not giving yourself enough credit, because you describe yourself putting up Facebook pages, sending out statements, writing quite dramatically on behalf of causes, doing things that leaders do, and organizing protests, getting this revolution going.
In response, Ghonim insisted: “I think this is not leadership. When I say a leader, it means that directs the revolution, where it should be going.” This is something Ghonim refuses to do.
Should we take Ghonim’s claim of non-leadership seriously? Of course not.
Whether or not Ghonim wants to acknowledge it, he is a leader, although he was a more important one than he is now, having been overcome by the superior “organizational weapon” of the Muslim Brotherhood political machine and others who are not so shy about their status as leaders.
Things that social movement leaders do:
• Inspire commitment
• Mobilize resources
• Create and recognize opportunities
• Devise strategies
• Frame demands
• Influence outcomes
Although he seems happy to take a backseat now (like his former patron, Mohammad El Baradei), Ghonim did all of these things. Scholars Aldon D. Morris of Northwestern University and Suzanne Staggenborg of McGill University define movement leaders as “strategic decision-makers who inspire and organize others to participate in social movements” (pdf). No matter what Ghonim says, he fits this definition.
The cycle of contention that led to Mubarak’s downfall was sparked by the torture and death of 28-year old Khaled Said in June 2010 at the hands of Egyptian police. In his book, Ghonim explains:Together, we wanted justice for Khaled Said and we wanted to put an end to torture. And social networking offered us an easy means to meet as the proactive, critical youth that we were. It also enabled us to defy the fears associated with voicing opposition. The virtual world seemed further from the oppressive reach of the regime, and therefore many were encouraged to speak up. (p. 66)
Ghonim then did something many of us have done: he started a Facebook group. But whereas the Facebook groups most of us have founded were related to sports teams, celebrities, or – in my case – photos of jack-o-lanterns vomiting (I wish I could say it was due to my relative youth, but I still think they are funny), his was called “We are all Khaled Said” and its aim was – as Ghonim (who adopted the pseudonym Al Shaheed, or “the martyr”) noted – to stop torture in Egypt. It attracted thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands. It became a key node for activists to organise and coordinate the massive street demonstrations that eventually toppled the regime.
This wasn’t Ghonim’s first dance. This marketing guru previously ran Mohammad El Baradei’s official Facebook group and social media campaign. A Newsweek article quotes Ghonim as saying of his El Baradei’s period, “In the morning I lead a 1m budget [at Google]. At night, I am a video editor at YouTube.” I recommend reading the whole article and Ghonim’s book for the rest of the story.
Popularly viewed as the standard-bearer of secular, left-wing virtual activism, Ghonim refuses to express the slightest hint of concern about the Brotherhood’s political ascendency (And one of the many interesting details in his book is that he was a sometimes-participant in Brotherhood activism while in university, but this sort of flirtation is not uncommon for young, politically-interested Egyptians).
Clint Watts argues that the "Twitter uprisings" have two crucial weaknesses: (1) Internet-based activists are happy to coordinate effective anti-regime protests, but have reluctant "to collaboratively and physically discuss, compete and compromise as an organization around a central agenda and stated long-run objectives" since Mubarak fell. And (2), they are averse to "developing, appointing and following leaders." Watts explains:Notions of leaderless movements are the rage on social media platforms and corporate America loves talking about flat organizations. But, those structures work well only in certain situations where motivations and values are shared equally amongst the organization’s members and objectives are clearly defined. Revolutions are conflicts and during the fog of war, sustaining the organization’s values, the motivation of the troops and keeping actions in line with objectives requires leadership.
As such, Ghonim’s aversion to accepting the leader role, while admired by some as humbleness, is the biggest weakness of the most visible, vocal, and largely left-wing activists responsible for Mubarak’s fall. And, as Watts notes, the Brotherhood who played an equally important, but much quieter role in the revolution, has reaped the electoral gains along with the Salafi Nour Party.
If he refuses to accept this role and use his popularity to take the next logical steps of old-fashioned party-building and political organisation, that is his prerogative, but it may come at the cost of seeing the ideals he and others in Tahrir stood for, wither on the vine while other (more religious) vineyards flourish. It is not the first time that those heavily involved in the early period of a revolution remained out of power when things settled down (examples here, here, and here).
He is just one man, but with Mohammad El Baradei out of the running, there are few figures more admired by the secular(ish)* left in Egypt than Ghonim.
But I am still going to call him a leader. Deal with it, Wael (if I may).
And you can read more about my thoughts on the Egyptian revolution in my forthcoming (Febuary-ish) review of Performative Revolution in Egypt: An Essay in Cultural Power by Jeffrey C. Alexander for the blog, British Politics and Policy at LSE (Spoiler Alert: It’s good and short so you should read it).
*The democratic activists of Tahrir Square deployed religious idioms more often than was reported in the Western press.
Posted by Ryan Evans on 23/01/12
-
The tone of recent newspaper and journal articles can scarcely be more triumphant. Al Qaeda on the Ropes; The Rise and Fall of Al Qaeda and The End of the Road for Jihad are just some of the headlines at the newspaper stands in recent weeks. What accounts for this triumphalism? We are told that… View the full article +
The tone of recent newspaper and journal articles can scarcely be more triumphant. Al Qaeda on the Ropes; The Rise and Fall of Al Qaeda and The End of the Road for Jihad are just some of the headlines at the newspaper stands in recent weeks. What accounts for this triumphalism? We are told that the Arab Spring has seen the politics of non-violent protest and the ballot box triumphing over the politics of the bullet and the suicide bomber.
We are told that the Arab Spring has severely undermined the Al Qaeda narrative. In his Knights Under the Banner of the Prophet, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri argued that, ‘The international Jewish-Crusader alliance, led by America, will not allow any Muslim force to obtain power in any of the Muslim lands ... It will impose sanctions on whomever helps it, even if it does not declare war against them altogether. Therefore, to adjust to this new reality, we must prepare ourselves for a battle that is not defined to a single region but rather includes the apostate domestic enemy and the Jewish-Crusader external enemy.’ Yet rulers are being toppled generally non-violently and Western nations have either stood on the sidelines or actively supported the Arab street against repressive rulers. More importantly, Islamists have come to power via the ballot box in both Tunisia and, in more spectacular fashion, in Egypt. Whilst Zawahiri masterminded the attempted assassination of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Ethiopia in 1995 and failed, young people in Tahrir Square managed to topple the “Pharaoh” through non-violent means.
Whilst the undermining of al-Qaeda’s narrative together with the death or incarceration of its senior leadership certainly raises questions as to the organisation’s future, it is far from certain that its goal towards the creation of several Islamist states on the way to a caliphate has been abandoned. After all, the victors of both the Tunisian and Egyptian polls were not exactly the young Facebook and Twitter activists desirous of a liberal democratic state. In both countries despite assurances to the contrary from the Islamists, Coptic Christians and their churches are being attacked in Egypt whilst in Tunisia female university students are being physically assaulted when not dressed “appropriately”. Is this Islamism by stealth? One of the Muslim Brotherhood’s early and most prominent ideologues, Sayyid Qutb, did not only influence generations of Muslim Brothers but also the very founders of al-Qaeda itself, especially Ayman al Zawahiri. If two organizations differ on tactics but agree on the same end-goal, does it really make the two organisations that different from each other?
The most recent edition of Newsweek has an interesting piece on how al-Qaeda’s traditional funders from the Persian Gulf are now supporting the Muslim Brothers and the Salafists at the polls. What do they know that we do not? Is this a case of al-Qaeda is Dead, Long Live al-Qaeda?
Posted by Hussein Solomon on 20/01/12
-
The late great sociologist Talcott Parsons writing in 1964:Since in social conditions the most effective action is collective action, the most important liberty is liberty to co-operate with others to participate in collective action. Furthermore, the most important single condition of effective… View the full article +
The late great sociologist Talcott Parsons writing in 1964:
Since in social conditions the most effective action is collective action, the most important liberty is liberty to co-operate with others to participate in collective action. Furthermore, the most important single condition of effective co-operation is communication with others. The most important deprivations of liberty are therefore those that block communication, in order to limit or prevent altogether co-operation with others.(Talcott Parsons (1964) “The Place of Force in Social Processes,” in: Eckstein (ed.) Internal Wars (New York:Free Press), pp. 41-42)
Activist and, dare I say it, revolutionary Wael Ghonim in his new memoir, Revolution 2.0:
Minimal or not, April 6 sent out a clear signal to everyone that the Internet could be a new force in Egyptian politics. The security force's reaction was to develop a new division dedicated to policing the Internet. Similarly, the NDP established an "Electronic Committee" rumored to have legions of well-paid young men and women whose mission was to influence only opinion in favor of the part through contributions to websites, blogs, news sites, and social networks. (p. 36)
Enjoy Steve Inskeep’s recent interview with Ghonim here.
…
Together, we wanted justice for Khaled Said and we wanted to put an end to torture. And social networking offered us an easy means to meet as the proactive, critical youth that we were. It also enabled us to defy the fears associated with voicing opposition. The virtual world seemed further from the oppressive reach of the regime, and therefore many were encouraged to speak up. (p. 66)Posted by Ryan Evans on 17/01/12
-
More than eighty Christians have been killed in recent weeks in northern Nigeria following the ultimatum by the Islamist sect Boko Haram for Christians to leave the largely Muslim northern Nigeria. This only adds to the more than 500 killed last year by the group. The fact that these attacks… View the full article +
More than eighty Christians have been killed in recent weeks in northern Nigeria following the ultimatum by the Islamist sect Boko Haram for Christians to leave the largely Muslim northern Nigeria. This only adds to the more than 500 killed last year by the group. The fact that these attacks took place despite the state of emergency existing in Yobe, Borno, Plateau and Niger states as well as a curfew in Adamawa state point to the inadequacy of the security response. Indeed, the security response itself is problematic.
The use of the military and its heavy-handed response has only served to alienate the local population. In one incident, Nigerian soldiers set fire to a whole street of cars, punishing residents for not warning them of a bomb attack. Part of the problem is that the army is a national force and not a local one and therefore does not share the cultural and ethnic background of local residents undermining both trust and sympathy. In the process, some locals are actively supporting Boko Haram. Whilst the group only consists of 300 fighters, its local sympathizers are said to number in their thousands. These sympathizers may also be in government. In a recent speech, Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan claimed that Boko Haram sympathisers are also located within the executive and legislative arms of government, in the judiciary as well as in the armed forces, police and other security agencies. Clearly no counter-terrorism effort could be successful in this context and these supposed supporters need to be rooted out. In addition, the Nigerian government also needs to adopt a more focused intelligence-driven approach to counter-terrorism – one which would not alienate the local population. This however, is easier said than done. Professor Murray Last of University College London recently noted that, “Not even the intelligence people in Nigeria know the leadership [of Boko Haram], they are not on top of it at all”.
Any sustainable counter-terrorism effort also needs to consider the broader context in which Boko Haram thrives. Beyond the obvious religious dimensions of the conflict in terms of the demand for sharia law, there is also the socio-economic context. 75 percent of Northern Nigerians live in poverty compared with 27 percent in the South resulting in Northern Nigerians becoming increasingly alienated from Abuja and the central government. Religious differences between North and South are also compounded by ethnic divides. In the volatile mixed city of Jos, for instance, religious and ethnic divides reinforce each other pitting the Christian Berom against the Muslim Hausa.
Commenting on the deteriorating security situation, a hapless President Jonathan drew parallels between Nigeria now and during the 1967-1970 Biafra War when a million people were killed. The difference he lamented was that at least then one knew who and where the enemy was. In the current situation neither does the Nigerian state know who Boko Haram is or where and when they will strike next. Small wonder then, that Nigerian Christians have lost faith in their government’s ability to deal with Boko Haram with Reverend Ayo Oritsejafor, the President of the Christian Association of Nigeria branding the attacks on Christians and churches as a `declaration of war’ – one in which Christians `have no choice but to respond appropriately’.
Whilst sectarian strife threatens Nigeria, US General Carter Ham, head of the US military Africa Command warned that Boko Haram may be expanding because of an alliance with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Somali-based and Al Qaeda aligned Shabaab. This, in turn, raises the danger of overlapping and reinforcing extremist Islamist networks from East Africa to the Sahel and Sahara.
Posted by Hussein Solomon on 11/01/12
Introduction
FREErad!cals is the ICSR blog. It's a forum for debate and fresh ideas on radicalisation and political violence. It features some of the most innovative, young thinkers, discussing radicals and radicalisation. They are looking at how the challenge has been understood, and how it should be addressed.
Contributors
Guest Contributors
Recommended Reading
-
General
- The Long War Journal
- Global Terrorism Analysis – Jamestown Foundation
- MICROCON: A Micro Level Analysis of Violent Conflict
- University of Maryland, START Center
- Terrorism and Homeland Security – RAND
- Terrorism Answers – Council on Foreign Relations
- Institute for War & Peace Reporting
- The Jamestown Foundation
- Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty
-
Blogs
- Jihadica
- The Cable
- Abu Muqawama
- Danger Room - What’s Next in International Security
- Jarret.Brachman.Phd
- Small Wars Journal Blog
- Kings of War
- Counterterrorism Blog
-
Regional
- Ghosts of Alexander
- Registan
- The Pakistan Policy Blog
-
Online Radicalisation
- Cyber Law Blog
- Ubiwar
- MetaSecurity Security of Virtual Worlds
- Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University
Posted by Shiraz Maher on 03/02/12