The recovery of a non-violent identity for an Islamist pesantren in an age of terror

This article examines the ways in which one of Indonesia's largest local, non-violent fundamentalist Islamist groups, Hidayatullah, has worked towards recovering a non-violent identity in the aftermath of allegations of terrorism made by the international community at the height of the War on Terror. Significantly, in international circles post-September 11, Indonesia's pesantren (Islamic boarding school) network more generally became associated with terrorism as they were seen as potential breeding grounds for Islamist extremism. Subsequently, allegations emerged implicating Hidayatullah as part of an extremist organised network linked to Jemaah Islamiyah and, by extension, Al Qaeda. The article demonstrates how, in the aftermath of the allegations, the group negotiated with the wider society and the state's national security laws on terrorism as it worked to recover its non-violent identity. In doing so, it also raises further questions about methodological practices in distinguishing between the heterogeneity and subjectivities within wider Islamist movements, especially in terms of militant and non-violent forms of Islamism.     

Long wars and long telegrams: containing Al-Qaeda

Can history help the ‘war on terror’? It is a cliché that 9/11 changed the world. But the idea that the war is exceptional lacks historical perspective. Assuming a radically new threat, the Bush administration proclaimed a theology rather than a coherent strategy. It articulated the ‘war on terror’ as a utopian and unbounded quest for absolute security. It did not effectively measure costs against risks or orchestrate ends, ways and means. This led the United States into exhausting wars of attrition. A more careful dialogue with the past can address this. Containment, America's core idea during the Cold War, supplies a logic that can inform a prudent strategy. Like Soviet communism with its fatal self‐contradictions, Al‐Qaeda and its terror network is ultimately self‐destructive without major military operations. America and its allies can contain it with more limited measures in the long term as it destroys itself. The US should show restraint, doing nothing to hinder the growing Islamic revolt against Al‐Qaeda. In other words, fight small and wait.     

Skyjackers,jackals and soldiers: British planning for international terrorist incidents during the 1970s

Following the Munich Olympics massacre of September 1972, the British government conducted a series of contingency plans to ensure that Whitehall, police constabularies and the armed forces were prepared for similar crises affecting the UK and its citizens. This article examines the evolution of British counterterrorist planning during the 1970s, which still shapes Whitehall's crisis management procedures for responding to international terrorism, and also procedures for calling for military support in response to hijackings, hostage‐taking and similar incidents both domestically and overseas. It demonstrates that while there are differences in the character of the terrorist threat 40 years ago and today, there are also parallels between the practical and political challenges of counterterrorism in the era of the Baader–Meinhof group and Carlos the Jackal, and the struggle against al‐Qaeda and its affiliates today.     

The trials and travails of the Islamic State in Pakistan

While Pakistan is in many ways an ideal location for transnational terrorist groups due to state weakness, Islamic State has had difficulty making headway in the country. In this article, the authors argue that Islamic State’s failures in Pakistan are due to competition from other groups. Drawing on the terrorist competition literature and interviews with Pakistani counterterrorism officials, the authors find that the presence of other groups in Pakistan meant there was little demand for what Islamic State offered. Islamic State relied on splinter groups and defectors for recruitment, which alienated mainstream groups and harmed the group’s capacity. Islamic State’s competition problems were exacerbated by its internationalist ideology, which was at odds with that of many groups in Pakistan, and allowed opposing groups to present themselves as reasonable alternatives to other actors. Despite Islamic State’s lack of success, it and its allies have still engaged in extreme violence in Pakistan as a result of attempts to outbid other groups. This article has implications for fighting terrorism in Pakistan and more generally.     

Radicalization revisited: violence,politics and the skills of the body

For more than a decade, ‘radicalization’ has been a keyword in our understanding of terrorism. From the outset, radicalization was conceived of as an intellectual process through which an individual would increasingly come under a spell of extremist ideas. This ideological understanding of radicalization still prevails. In a 2015 speech on extremism, British Prime Minister David Cameron, for instance, claimed that the ‘root cause of the threat we face is the extremist ideology itself’. But the way we understand radicalization has specific consequences for the way we manage and fight the scourge of terrorism. Considering recent events, including the November 2015 Paris attacks, the present article sets out to reassess the above‐mentioned intellectualist understanding of radicalization and come up with new suggestions as to how radicalization may be understood today. Initially, the article suggests that ideology is not necessarily a precondition for violence, but that a prior experience with violence is more often a precondition for engaging an extremist ideology. Such experience with violence can be both domestic and international, obtained in Europe or Syria and other conflict zones. In the second part of the article it is argued that although radicalization is often conceived of as an individual process, pathways towards terrorism are inherently social and political. Finally, the article argues that by stressing the importance of ideology and ideological processes, concepts of radicalization have abstracted away from another factor that is pivotal for understanding pathways towards terrorist violence: the skills and capacities of the body.     

How al Qaeda lost Iraq

Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) has suffered a grave setback in the context of its ongoing campaign there. Since late 2006 Sunni tribal militias working in conjunction with Coalition forces have decimated AQI's ranks, and the organisation has been largely expelled from its former sanctuaries in western Iraq. This article seeks to explain the causes of al Qaeda's defeat with a view towards drawing out their broader implications for the ongoing struggle against jihadist terrorism. I argue that AQI's defeat can be ascribed to its ideological inflexibility, its penchant for indiscriminate violence, and its absolute unwillingness to accommodate the sensitivities and political interests of its host communities. Furthermore, I argue that, far from being exceptional, al Qaeda's mishandling of its local allies in Iraq represents merely the latest instance of a tendency to alienate host communities that has long been evident in its involvement in conflicts in the Islamic world. My analysis confirms that al Qaeda's ideological extremism constitutes a vital point of vulnerability, and that it remains possible to pry global jihadists away from their host communities even in the context of ongoing high-intensity conflicts.     

Islamist violence and regime stability in Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia, homeland of Osama bin Laden and 15 of the 19 hijackers of September 11, 2001, experienced low levels of internal violence until 2003, when a terrorist campaign by ‘Al‐Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula’ (QAP) shook the world's leading oil producer. Based on primary sources and extensive fieldwork in the Kingdom, this article traces the history of the Saudi jihadist movement and explains the outbreak and failure of the QAP campaign. It argues that jihadism in Saudi Arabia differs from jihadism in the Arab republics in being driven primarily by extreme pan‐Islamism and not socio‐revolutionary ideology, and that this helps to explain its peculiar trajectory. The article identifies two subcurrents of Saudi jihadism, ‘classical’ and ‘global’, and demonstrates that Al‐Qaeda's global jihadism enjoyed very little support until 1999, when a number of factors coincided to boost dramatically Al‐Qaeda recruitment. The article argues that the violence in 2003 was not the result of structural political or economic strains inside the Kingdom, but rather organizational developments within Al‐Qaeda, notably the strategic decision taken by bin Laden in early 2002 to open a new front in Saudi Arabia. The QAP campaign was made possible by the presence in 2002 of a critical mass of returnees from Afghanistan, a clever two‐track strategy by Al‐Qaeda, and systemic weaknesses in the Saudi security apparatus. The campaign failed because the militants, radicalized in Afghan camps, represented an alien element on the local Islamist scene and lacked popular support. The near‐absence of violence in the Kingdom before 2003 was due to Al‐Qaeda's weak infrastructure in the early 1990s and bin Laden's 1998 decision to suspend operations to preserve local networks. The Saudi regime is currently more stable and self‐confident—and therefore less inclined to democratic reform—than it has been in many years.     

The Islamic State lexical battleground: US foreign policy and the abstraction of threat

This article suggests that President Obama's consistent references to the extremist Sunni group as ‘ISIL’ (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) is not a trivial matter of nomenclature. Instead, the Obama administration's deliberate usage of the ISIL acronym (as opposed to other commonly‐used terms such as ‘Islamic State of Iraq and Syria’ or ‘ISIS’, ‘Islamic State’, ‘IS’, ‘so‐called Islamic State’ and ‘Daesh’) frames the public perception of the threat to avoid engagement with the requirements of strategy and operations. Both the labelling and the approach could be defended as a response to the unique challenge of a transnational group claiming religious and political legitimacy. However, we suggest that the labelling is an evasion of the necessary response, reflecting instead a lack of coherence in strategy and operations—in particular after the Islamic State's lightning offensive in Iraq and expansion in Syria in mid‐2014. This tension between rhetoric, strategy and operations means that ‘ISIL’ does not provide a stable depiction of the Islamic State. While it may draw upon the post‐9/11 depiction of ‘terrorism’, the tag leads to dissonance between official and media representations. The administration's depiction of a considered approach leading to victory has been undermined by the abstraction of ‘ISIL’, which in turn produced strategic ambiguity about the prospect of any political, economic or military challenge to the Islamic State.     

Security journalism and ‘the mainstream’ in Britain since 7/7: translating terror but inciting violence?

News reporting of terrorism, in the form of security journalism, faces a set of challenges to the functions it serves as a result of both its own practices and the changing practices of news consumers. Security journalism performs some predictable functions, namely the regular delivery of representations of terrorist threats to a presumed national (and international) audience through coverage of Al‐Qaeda leaders’ speeches, bomb attempts, criminal trials, and ‘radical’ protests in Britain, among others. Security journalism offers a consistent repackaging of jihadist media productions from one context and language to another. For example, in reducing jihadist texts to short clips of an angry gesticulating man security journalism is prohibiting public understanding of their persuasive potential by cutting any political, religious or sensual appeals. This article presents original data from interviews with British Muslims familiar with jihadist materials that suggest mainstream media reporting may contribute to radicalization in ways not sufficiently appreciated by journalists, policy‐makers and the public. Interviewees report that any news depicting Muslim suffering activates and reinforces frustrations and grievances, whether the source is a mainstream media outlet or Al‐Qaeda's media wing. Mainstream media may unintentionally contribute to a more enduring but diffused resentment a priori to the existence of jihadist media; as one participant says, ‘I am already convinced’.     

The evolution of threat narratives in the age of terror: understanding terrorist threats in Britain

This article examines the evolution of threat narratives in the age of terror, focusing on the United Kingdom. The analysis is broken down into two sections. The first part of the article presents four distinct and yet overlapping notions of the threats which have influenced both the West, and more specifically the UK, in debates about counterterrorism since 9/11. The four threat narratives—Al‐Qaeda as a central organization; decentralized terror networks; home grown; and finally apocalyptic threats—have all been used to inform counter terror measures in the West. The second section of the article argues that terrorism has evolved strategically, and is hybridized owing to the security environment—interpenetrated by globalization, digital media and information communication technologies—in which it occurs. The article concludes with a preliminary discussion of some strategic and operational themes which have influenced the form and character of terrorism and insurgency, exploring how they impact on the ways in which threats are constituted and countered, illustrating that what is new maybe the nature of our own fears.     

Community engagement for counterterrorism: lessons from the United Kingdom

This article explores the development of community engagement within the UK's strategy to tackle international terrorism linked to and inspired by Al‐Qaeda, commonly known as CONTEST. It focuses mostly on the ‘Prevent’ strand of the strategy which seeks to prevent radicalization towards violence, reduce tacit support for violence, and increase the resilience of communities to tackle radicalization and extremist messages themselves. Community engagement for counterterrorism also relates to certain aspects of the ‘Pursue’ strand of CONTEST, and these are highlighted. The article outlines the case for a community‐based approach to counterterrorism and outlines a number of the key developments in its emergence from 2005 onwards. It analyses the performance of this aspect of the counterterrorism strategy, pointing to a number of shortcomings in relation to the establishment of partnerships, the integration of the approach, capacity shortfalls at the local level, and the wider challenges of a hostile political and media environment. Written as the new UK coalition government announces a review of the ‘Prevent’ strategy, it offers a number of recommendations for the future direction of this area of policy. It calls for an overhaul in working styles, a focus on people rather than projects, and the need to draw a much clearer line between downstream and targeted ‘Prevent’ work and the broader and longer‐term community development work, with the latter encapsulated within the government's Big Society Programme and aimed at all fragile communities, not just Muslims.     

From terrorism to ‘radicalization’ to ‘extremism’: counterterrorism imperative or loss of focus?

This article argues that there has been an increasing convergence of the discourses of terrorism, radicalization and, more lately, extremism in the UK and that this has caused counterterrorism to lose its focus. This is particularly evident in the counterterrorism emphasis on non‐violent but extremist ideology that is said to be ‘conducive’ to terrorism. Yet, terrorism is ineluctably about violence or the threat of violence; hence, if a non‐violent ideology is in and of itself culpable for terrorism in some way then it ceases to be non‐violent. The article argues that there should be a clearer distinction made between (non‐violent) extremism of thought and extremism of method because it is surely violence and the threat of violence (integral to terrorism) that should be the focus of counterterrorism. The concern is that counterterrorism has gone beyond its remit of countering terrorism and has ventured into the broader realm of tackling ideological threats to the state.     

Pakistan,militancy and identity: parallel struggles

This article focuses on the dominant and parallel struggles that have been carried out in Pakistan in terms of its Islamic identity since 9/11. It argues that the Pakistan government has legitimised and explained its partnership with the US government in countering terrorism through a discourse that makes use of Islamic symbols. The Islamists have engaged in a similar process, arguing for jihad against the enemies of Islam. Simultaneously, a tension has persisted between liberal/progressive and orthodox notions of being a Pakistani Muslim, which has been reflected in, for example, the debate on the blasphemy law in Pakistan. It is important that strategies to strengthen Pakistan also creatively empower groups subscribing to liberal/progressive ideas so as to succeed in the struggle against militancy in the long term. The argument is developed in three parts, starting with a discussion of opposing views on Pakistan's identity and the place of Islam as the context for the Pakistan government's participation in the War on Terror. The second part explores features of the opposing discourses adopted by Islamabad and jihadi groups. The third part discusses the parallel tensions between alternative understandings of Pakistan's Islamic identity at the societal level with reference to the blasphemy law. The concluding section suggests a carefully crafted approach to assisting Pakistan at this stage in its history that could also respond to the subordinate tensions.     

The evolution of counterterrorism: will tactics trump strategy?

Counterterrorism efforts over the past five years have yielded important progress against Al‐Qaeda abroad, even with heightened anxiety about the threat of attacks at home. There was certainly no ‘clash of civilizations’; violent Salafism engendered a muscular backlash in Muslim‐majority countries, which threatened Al‐Qaeda's ability to recruit and even survive. At the same time, the policies of major states became more effective and better aligned. A nascent counterterrorism coalition emerged with unprecedented sharing of intelligence, operations and deradicalization techniques (especially bilaterally). In the face of these developments, a defensive Al‐Qaeda scrambled to exploit vulnerabilities so as to regain a mental edge. The result was two tactical setbacks for the allies: first, Al‐Qaeda and its associates redoubled their efforts to kill civilians on western soil, focusing particularly on radicalized home grown amateurs; and second, they leaned more heavily on reinvigorated affiliates, some of whom tried to project force beyond their local operating areas for the first time. As a result, terrorist operations in the US and UK were more frequent, unpredictable and unsophisticated, but nonetheless potentially lethal. As the period drew to a close, the crucial question was whether the two western allies could maintain their nerve, luck, skill and sufficient equilibrium to both fend off a domestic attack and plan for an effective strategic response in the event that one occurred.     

From terrorism to dispossession: Pakistan's Anti‐Terrorism Act as a means of eviction

The discourse of the ‘war on terror’ fails to address the complex and multifaceted structural violence of landlessness, food insecurity and environmental degradation that afflicts the world. Pakistan, for instance, has been a subject of great discussion and geopolitical analysis as the ground zero in the war against terror. However, the scholarship on terrorism in Pakistan analyzes militant and jihadi groups as discrete agents of primordial conflicts, spy agencies and sectarian rivalries with little analysis of the history of the cold war and the effects of the Afghan war. In this article, the author analyzes how the global ‘war on terror’ has proliferated into seemingly unrelated domains of life, and specifically how anti‐terror security legislation has pulled the rug out from under the most successful peasant land rights movement in Pakistan.     

Somalia and Yemen: The Links between Terrorism and State Failure

The scope of this study is to demonstrate that the failed state scheme of Somalia has not been and is not a safe haven for the al‐Qaeda, an issue that has been already displayed in Ken Menkhaus's excellent study (2004 ). Within this context, the article will consider the Somali Islamist political landscape in contrast and in relation to the current situation in Yemen, and thus, it aims to support the premise that weak states, such as Yemen, rather than “collapsed” states, can be incubators of international terrorism. In addition, while studying the interactions between Somalia and Yemen, we will attempt to answer some other important questions arising from this relationship: (1) does the emergence of al‐Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and al‐Shabaab have potential convergence; and (2) why is piracy a cross‐border phenomenon and how is it connected to radical Islamism?     

Greece: the persistence of political terrorism

Greece has one of the most sustained problems of political terrorism anywhere in the world. From the mid‐1970s to the present, the country's political and socioeconomic institutions have been confronted by systematic terrorist violence mainly at the hands of revolutionary guerrilla groups. The long story of Greek terrorism was thought to have ended in the summer of 2002 with the collapse of the country's premier terrorist group and one of Europe's longest‐running gangs, the notorious Revolutionary Organization 17 November (17N). 17N's dismantling and imprisonment, rather than demoralizing and emasculating the country's armed struggle movement, led instead to the emergence of new urban guerrilla groups and an increase and intensification of revolutionary violence. In consequence, the article places Greek extremist violence in a broader political and cultural perspective and explains why it has become a permanent fixture of national public life.     

The Geopolitics of Terrorism: Russia's Conflict with Islamic Extremism

A British specialist on the Russo-Chechen wars and international terrorism examines Russia's role in the Global War on Terror and, in particular, its long-term campaign against both separatists and Islamic extremists in Chechnya and elsewhere in the North Caucasus. The author advances the argument that Russia's Eurasian (as opposed to European) mode of governance, equating self-determination with separatism and cultural/religious differences with extremism, has generated societal pressures conducive to heightened political violence and terrorism. The implications of such pressures for the future incidence of terrorism in Russia are explored. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: H770, O180, P300. 2 figures, 52 references.     

Bilad al‐Qadim revisited: recent archaeological research at the Al‐Khamis Mosque,Ain Abu Zaydan and Abu Anbra,Bahrain

In comparison to our understanding of pre‐Islamic occupation and land use on Bahrain, that of the Islamic period has remained less well known. In connection with the building of a visitor centre at the Al‐Khamis Mosque and the planning of an associated heritage trail, renewed archaeological research has taken place in Bilad al‐Qadim, an archaeologically important area of Islamic settlement in the north‐east of the main island of Awal. This has involved excavations in the Abu Anbra cemetery, at Ain Abu Zaydan and at the Al‐Khamis Mosque. The results of these excavations are reported here and these contribute to our understanding of Islamic settlement on Bahrain by supporting the interpretation that Bilad al‐Qadim was the main centre of Islamic settlement in the eleventh–thirteen century AD.     

Nuclear fears,hopes and realities in Pakistan

In the four decades since Pakistan launched its nuclear weapons program, and especially in the fifteen years since the nuclear tests of 1998, a way of thinking and a related set of feelings about the bomb have taken hold among policy‐makers and the public in Pakistan. These include the ideas that the bomb can ensure Pakistan's security; resolve the long‐standing dispute with India over Kashmir in Pakistan's favour; help create a new national spirit; establish Pakistan as a leader among Islamic countries; and usher in a new stage in Pakistan's economic development. None of these hopes has come to pass, and in many ways Pakistan is much worse off than before it went nuclear. Yet the feelings about the bomb remain strong and it is these feelings that will have to be examined critically and be set aside if Pakistan is to move towards nuclear restraint and nuclear disarmament. This will require a measure of stability in a country beset by multiple insurgencies, the emergence of a peace movement able to launch a national debate on foreign policy and nuclear weapons, and greater international concern regarding the outcomes of nuclear arms racing in South Asia.