ADICALIZATION SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE RISE OF

This hearing compilation was prepared by the Homeland Security Digital Library, Naval Postgraduate School, Center for Homeland Defense and Security.

OCTOBER 28, 2015

RADICALIZATION: SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE RISE OF

TERRORISM U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION

HEARING CONTENTS: MEMBER STATEMENTS: Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) [pdf unavailable, see 4:22 of webcast] Chairman, Subcommittee on National Security Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA) [pdf unavailable, see 10:13 of webcast]

Ranking Member, Subcommittee on National Security WITNESSES: Hon. Mark D. Wallace [view pdf]

Chief Executive Officer, Counter Extremism Project Mr. Walter Purdy [view pdf] President, Terrorism Research Center

Dr. Daveed Gartenstein-Ross [view pdf] Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies Hon. Alberto M. Fernandez [view pdf] Vice President, Middle East Media Research Institute AVAILABLE WEBCAST(S)*:

Full Hearing: https://youtu.be/9CT5aioTXZQ?t=262

https://youtu.be/9CT5aioTXZQ?t=262



This hearing compilation was prepared by the Homeland Security Digital Library, Naval Postgraduate School, Center for Homeland Defense and Security.

COMPILED FROM:

https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/radicalization-social-media-and-the-rise-of-terrorism/ * Please note: Any external links included in this compilation were functional at its creation but are not maintained thereafter.

https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/radicalization-social-media-and-the-rise-of-terrorism/

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Testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and

Government Reform

Subcommittee on National Security

October 28, 2015

The Honorable Mark D. Wallace

CEO, Counter Extremism Project Chairman DeSantis, Ranking Member Lynch and members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the

opportunity to appear before you. It has been a year and a half since ISIS declared itself a caliphate. It

has been more than a year since we launched the Counter Extremism Project – a non-profit, non-

partisan, international policy organization aimed at addressing the threat of extremist ideology. It has

been one year since we launched #CEPDigitalDisruption – a campaign and research effort to expose and

quantify ISIS’s exploitation of social media. And it has been nearly 10 months since I first testified before

the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade Subcommittee on this

very same critical issue.

Let me say in no uncertain terms – in that period of time, little has changed when it comes to thwarting

the use of social media by terrorists. ISIS’s presence on social media is a cancer. It continues to

metastasize, largely unaddressed by government, the private sector, or social media companies. One of

the most pressing public safety and national security issues we face today is without a doubt the

hijacking and weaponization of social media platforms by extremist groups to radicalize, recruit new

members, and plan violent attacks against innocent people around the world.

We commend this Subcommittee for recognizing the importance and the timeliness of these difficult

issues – with which the U.S., as well as our allies, continue to struggle. We hope that this hearing can

lead to a better understanding of the growing problem of social media abuse and hopefully, to a more

coordinated and cooperative relationship between technology companies like Twitter and those of us

who want to stop extremists from anonymously abusing social media platforms to expand their power

and propel their declared war on Western society, institutions, values and culture.

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It is time for us to respond – and not just by deepening our understanding and awareness of the

problem, but also by actually doing something about it. And I will offer our own ideas today about how

to do just that.

Over the past two decades, the United States has led the world in advances in online technology and

the development of social media. We are the country that gave birth to Google, Twitter, Facebook,

YouTube and Instagram – all of which have revolutionized the way we communicate with each other

globally, the way we share knowledge and ideas, and the way information is spread. These digital

platforms have been a colossal force in empowering individuals and shining a bright light on abuses of

power.

Unfortunately, these open platforms are also the tools of choice for spreading messages of hate,

creating a dark playground for extremist groups like ISIS to propagandize, radicalize, recruit new

members and commit cyber jihad in the form of broadcasted beheadings, stonings, cyber-attacks

and encouraging Denial of Service attacks and data hackings.

The sad truth is that extremists have been more agile, aggressive and insidious in their use of social

media platforms than governments and the private sector have been in tracking, stopping and

preventing them from hijacking the online world.

CEP is assembling what we hope will be the world’s most extensive research database on extremist

groups and their networks of support, mapping the social and financial networks, tools and

methodologies and providing an indispensable resource to governments, media, NGOs and the public.

On September 11, CEP released profiles of 66 Americans who have joined or allegedly attempted to join

the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), as well as other Americans accused of planning attacks on U.S.

soil, providing financial assistance to extremist entities, or propagandizing on their behalf. I invite you to

read their profiles. These individuals have very different backgrounds and experiences, but the one

characteristic they seem to share is active participation on social media. In addition, we will soon release

profiles on 54 of the most prolific social media propagandists.

Since its creation, ISIS in particular has deployed an incredibly sophisticated social media campaign to

radicalize and recruit new members and to call for acts of terror around the world. There are at least

43,000 active pro-ISIS Twitter accounts, sending approximately 200,000 tweets a day, amplifying and

endlessly repeating ISIS’s messages of hate and terror.

A major focus of CEP’s work is to combat the rampant extremist recruitment, rhetoric and calls for acts

of terror online, starting with Twitter. Through a rigorous research and crowdsourcing campaign called

#CEPDigitalDisruption, we have identified and reported hundreds of extremists to Twitter. To be clear,

we respect and honor our American constitutional traditions of free speech; our standard for reporting

an account is incitement of violence or direct threats.

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Over the past year, we’ve monitored hundreds of accounts and exposed the violent calls to action and

instances of direct threats against individuals that jihadis are propagating on Twitter. In June, we

expanded our campaign to include monitoring of Twitter accounts in French, Italian, German and

Turkish.

I would note that even with our sacred protections of free speech, our legal system does not protect

certain forms of speech that cross lines of public safety and national security. Regrettably, as extremists

have hijacked and weaponized social media platforms, we are at a moment of collision between the

good and thoughtful people who seek an unfettered and uninhibited right to speech through social

media and similarly good and thoughtful people who seek to protect us from those who use social

media platforms as an essential tool of terror.

We have seen these collisions before of course. Inevitably, public outrage over the horrific acts of the

relative few who abuse protected rights for perverse reasons leads to modifications through laws and

regulations.

Private enterprise and businesses that profit from new technologies can either be partners or

adversaries in this process. The question before us is whether or not companies like Twitter will choose

to thoughtfully partner with us to combat those extremists who hijack and weaponize social media for

terror or stubbornly refuse to acknowledge the problem and their responsibility.

As a private-sector, non-profit organization whose mission is combatting extremism, we have reached

out repeatedly in the spirit of cooperation to Twitter in an effort to stop extremists who encourage and

instruct in the ways of murder and terror, from abusing that platform.

Unfortunately the response we’ve gotten from Twitter is dismissive to the point of dereliction. We have

written three letters describing the problem and requesting a sit-down between Twitter and CEP

leadership. Twitter has ignored all but one letter, and its reply, simply put, was indifferent at best.

Worse, last month CEP co-hosted the first ever Global Youth Summit Against Violent Extremism with

support from the White House and the State Department. The event brought together nearly 100 young

people from 40 countries who are actively fighting extremism in their communities. Facebook and

Microsoft both presented at the summit on best practices and tactics to fight extremism. While CEP, the

White House, the State Department, Facebook and Microsoft united, Twitter decided to instead launch

a PR campaign to distract from the reality that their platform has been weaponized by ISIS extremists.

Twitter’s dismissiveness on the issue of violent extremists who have hijacked and weaponized its

platform can be best summarized in a quote provided to Mother Jones magazine by a Twitter official:

"One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter." Of course this statement is insipid and

unserious, particularly in the context of al Qaeda, ISIS and many other violent extremist groups. We

strongly disagree with Twitter. The hijacking and weaponization of its platform is a dangerous and

growing problem. We believe social media companies have a responsibility to do more than protect

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their bottom lines -- they have a responsibility to act against abuse. They provide the means for violent

extremists and there should be appropriate accountability.

A great example of Twitter’s failure to combat the threat of violent extremism online is a woman named

Sally Jones (known on Twitter as Umm Hussain al-Britani), a British ISIS operative who has used social

media to propagandize, recruit members and incite Westerners to violence. Jones was the wife of Junaid

Hussain a.k.a. Abu Hussain al-Britani, the deceased British computer hacker formerly in charge of

recruiting new hackers to ISIS. Over the last year, we witnessed Jones and her now deceased husband

return to Twitter with slightly altered monikers dozens of times. The type of content they push out is

insidious. Most recently, in September, Jones issued a “kill list” of 100 U.S. servicemen. She was

designated as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist and placed on the United Nations Security Council

Sanctions List later that month. And yet, Jones has continued her threatening activity on Twitter. In

October 2015, Jones incited violence against two additional U.S. veterans via Twitter: Navy Seal veteran

Robert O’Neill and Dillard Johnson, a former army sergeant.

I would like to clarify why our focus is on Twitter versus other social media networks. When discussing

the problem of drug abuse, marijuana is often referred to as a gateway drug. In the case of extremists

online – Twitter is the gateway drug. This is where vulnerable individuals (usually young people) are first

exposed to propaganda and radical content. This content is extremely accessible and public and Twitter

is the introductory point into this world. From Twitter, the conversation often moves to a platform like

AskFM or Askbook where those being recruited can ask more in-depth questions -- for example, “What

life will be like as a part of ISIS?” and “How can I get to Syria?” From there, the conversation moves to

private chat applications like Kik or WhatsApp. By the time the conversation gets to the point of

Kik/WhatsApp and even AskFM/Askbook in many cases, it’s too late; the radicalization has passed a

point of no return, as thousands of heartbroken families around the world know all too well. We need to

stop recruitment at its gateway, and without question, Twitter is that gateway. By the way, the scenario

I have just described is not fictional, it is exactly how three Denver girls were radicalized and were

almost successful in joining ISIS in Syria.

In the last year, there were terror attacks carried out in Canada, the United States, Australia, Denmark,

Israel and France in the name of radical Islam. In two of these cases, Canada and Australia, there is

undisputed evidence that the attack was perpetrated by a jihadi who was using social media – either to

spread content pushed out by others, or to leave messages and post justifications for his actions. If this

isn’t direct evidence of the extreme danger that comes from allowing these activities to take place

uninhibited online, then we are simply hiding our heads in the sand.

This problem cannot be overcome by wishing it away. The number of Twitter abusers is admittedly very

small in relation to the number of users, but that is an even more powerful and compelling justification

for taking action.

We believe strongly that there are very concrete actions that can help prevent extremists from using

online tools for terror. Our goal cannot simply be to investigate, draw conclusions and count the bodies

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after the carnage has already taken place. Our goal should be prevention of murder, injury and

destruction. And more broadly, there is a challenge for many parties in providing a counter-narrative

that is more compelling and empowering than the hatred we’re discussing today. But as a practical

matter, while we go after the extremists, we cannot simply pretend that social media companies are

helpless. They are not. They should — and they must — take a more active role in preventing extremist

access to their platforms, pulling down accounts of extremists and keeping them down.

If Twitter can beef up its policies as it relates to bullying and harassment of women, why does it show

such dismissiveness when it comes to those promoting and glorifying terror? We stand ready to work

with Congress, the Administration and any company in finding the right mix of remedies that effectively

attacks this growing problem, while protecting our values and liberties. But it must be attacked – and

now.

The war against ISIS, Al Qaeda and other extremist actors has many fronts – and an important one is

online. While we carry out air strikes and other military responses to combat extremists who have

declared war against us, nothing is being done on a large scale to counter the narrative of extremists

and fight back against them online.

Our concern is that we’ve seen a real evolution in the sophistication of methods utilized by ISIS and

other extremist groups in the past year. Many ISIS members, sympathizers and supporters are young

people. They’ve grown up in a digital world. They are digital natives, and they know how to use digital

media to their advantage. They prey on at-risk youths in the same way that gangs prey on at-risk kids in

bad neighborhoods. And their tactics are escalating.

ISIS alone has produced and posted online at least 900 videos that show them projecting power and

invincibility. These videos, at least 150 of which are focused on executions, are sophisticated and are

designed to turn terror into a popular cultural product.

There is an urgent need for social platforms to take action to stop extremists from abusing their sites to

spread terrorist propaganda, recruit new members and kill innocent civilians. Government, private

organizations like CEP, and companies like Twitter must work together to identify and counter the

violent narrative of extremists and their recruitment efforts.

We have outlined below five clear and immediate changes that all social media companies could make

that would go toward stemming some of the issues I have outlined today:

Trusted Reporting Status – One of the problems we’ve encountered is that many social media

companies place accounts that have been reported into a rolling queue. By giving CEP, as well

as other agencies like the State Department, trusted reporting status and opening a direct line

of communication, we can more easily and swiftly identify and remove the most notorious

extremists online.

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Streamlined Reporting Process – Our campaign relies in part on our audience reporting

accounts along with CEP. A roadblock we run into is that the reporting process on Twitter and

other social media sites is long and cumbersome, and weeks can pass before action occurs.

Twitter has recently begun a new reporting process for women who are being harassed online,

so those complaints are dealt with more quickly. But when we try to take down a violent

extremist, the request falls into a catchall category. We believe that a new reporting protocol

should be added for users to report suspected terrorist/extremist activity as a way to speed the

process.

Clear, Public Policy on Extremism –While organizations will have to take a somewhat different

approach to combat the unique ways extremists are using each platform, we believe that

showing a united front among America’s most important tech companies is of critical

importance to fighting violent extremism. This includes a clear, public, policy statement that

extremist activities will not be tolerated, and that organizations like Twitter and Google, along

with CEP, will work tirelessly to identify and remove content. All social networks and technology

companies should actively identify these perpetrators and ban them swiftly.

Shine the Bright Spotlight of Transparency on the Most Egregious Extremist Accounts – When

the United Kingdom’s Chanel 4 revealed that one of the most influential and pro-ISIS Twitter

accounts, ShamiWitness, belonged to Bangalore, India businessman Mehdi Masroor Biswas, it

shook up the cyber-jihadi network. Once revealed, Biswas immediately stopped his egregious

online support for Syrian and Iraqi Jihadis. The ShamiWitness Twitter account had 17,000

followers, including many of the Islamist foreign fighters active on social media. We believe that

Twitter should reveal detailed information – including names -- of the most egregious of the

cyber-jihad terror actors who are the foundation of the online jihad architecture. The bright

spotlight will assuredly have a further disruptive effect on other cyber-jihad account holders like

ShamiWitness. By calling out these seed accounts, Twitter can play a crucial role in shutting

them down. Of course, the most aggressive defenders of the anonymous and “right to tweet”

will chafe at such a suggestion and they should be heard. But surely, we can collectively agree

that these most egregious of cyber-jihadis do not deserve anonymity or the right of free hate

and incitement of terror speech through the use of Twitter.

Pro-Active Content Monitoring – At this time, many social media sites including Facebook and

Twitter only monitor and remove content that has been reported to them. Instead, each should

spearhead internal efforts to find content and remove it without relying on the public to police

the platform for them.

What many social media companies overlook is that the business imperative for them to act

cooperatively is great. With each successive and horrific misuse of social media, the outcry for

limitations will become greater and greater. Working in an adversarial way is not only morally wrong

but will also ultimately increase the cost of doing business.

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I would point out that while Twitter has been non-responsive, other Internet and social media

companies like YouTube have instituted reforms – such as instituting trusted reporting status for

government agencies – as a means of combatting serious instances of abuse without interfering with or

inconveniencing subscribers. While no social media company has been able to solve the problem

completely, companies like Google and Facebook are at least willing to have a conversation and take

steps to address the issue.

Successfully combatting extremist activities online need not be an insurmountable challenge. The

Federal Bureau of Investigation shut down Silk Road, an online “Darknet” market trading in Bitcoin (BTC)

currency, primarily used for selling illegal drugs, but also for child pornography, weapons, counterfeit

passports and money, and even for contract killers to solicit clients. Silk Road users could browse and

trade anonymously (to a very high degree), with a very low risk of detection. But the FBI pinpointed the

foreign server that ran Silk Road despite its use of anonymity software to protect its location, and

obtained records from the server’s hosting provider. That is one success story, but there are others

involving investigation and prosecution of online drug distribution, child pornography, illegal tobacco

sales, and sex trafficking.

This is a quote from FBI agent Gilbert Trill following a successful sting operation into online sex

trafficking.

“Some child predators mistakenly believe the anonymity of cyberspace shields them from scrutiny. In

fact, their use of the Internet gives us new tools in our efforts to investigate this insidious behavior.”

I am convinced that if we can make progress against these types of criminal activities, there are

strategies that we can bring to bear on those who attempt to hijack and weaponize social media

platforms.

The majority of social media companies are U.S. companies, but online misuse has global consequences.

It is time that social media companies like Twitter take responsibility for the global implications of their

platforms and their lack of action.

CounterExtremism.com | P.O. Box 3980| NY, NY 10185-3980 | 212.922.0061

Ambassador Mark D. Wallace Biography

Ambassador Mark D. Wallace serves as the Chief Executive Officer of the Counter Extremist

Project (CEP) and United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI). He is also the COO of The Electrum Group, LLC.

CEP launched in September 2014, as a not-for-profit, non-partisan, international policy

organization whose mission is to combat the growing threat from extremist ideology. CEP is led

by a renowned group of former world leaders and former diplomats, including Frances Townsend

and Senator Joseph I. Lieberman. CEP confronts the extremist threat by exposing and holding

accountable their financial and other support; by serving as a best-in-class database of

information about extremist groups and their supporters to governments, the private sector, the

press, NGOs and other interested parties; by conducting a sophisticated media campaign to

counter extremist ideology, and disrupt their messaging and recruiting; and assisting governments

in the formulation of policies to degrade and stop extremist movements.

Wallace founded UANI in 2008 with the late Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, former CIA

Director Jim Woolsey and Middle East expert Dennis Ross. Under his leadership, UANI has

launched dozens of successful business and corporate campaigns that have called on such

multinational firms as General Electric, Huntsman, Caterpillar, Ingersoll Rand, Porsche, Hyundai,

Huawei, Royal Dutch Shell, Terex and Siemens to end their business dealings in Iran. UANI

played a key role in pressuring SWIFT to end its provision of services to Iran's banking system.

UANI's "Auto Campaign" has successfully focused on the lucrative Iranian Automobile Industry

that is controlled by the regime and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. UANI has called on

international automobile manufactures to leave Iran including, among others, Nissan, Fiat,

Peugeot, GM and Hyundai.

UANI has authored and supported a variety of federal and state legislative and regulatory

initiatives designed to enhance Iran's economic isolation. The organization's model legislation has

been incorporated into both federal bills and state bills, including the Comprehensive Iran

Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act of 2010 (CISADA), the Iran Transparency and

Accountability Act (ITAA), the Iran Financial Sanctions Improvement Act of 2012 (H.R. 4179 as

introduced by Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Congressman Brad Sherman), California's

Iran Contracting Act of 2010 (AB1650) and New York's Iran Divestment Act of 2011 (A08668)

among others. UANI's legislative and regulatory efforts have focused on banking, insurance and reinsurance, disclosure and debarment and shipping.

Wallace is a frequent media contributor and has been featured in news outlets around the world

including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, the Financial Times, CNN, Fox News,

the Huffington Post, Voice of America and CNBC.

Wallace served previously as United States Ambassador to the United Nations, Representative for

U.N. Management and Reform. While at the U.S. Mission to the U.N., he was the lead U.S.

negotiator to the world body on matters relating to reform and budget, and he led U.S. oversight

into matters relating to U.N. mismanagement, fraud and abuse. During his tenure as Ambassador,

Wallace most notably sought to uncover corruption in UN programs in such places as North

CounterExtremism.com | P.O. Box 3980| NY, NY 10185-3980 | 212.922.0061

Korea. He exposed the "Cash for Kim" corruption scandal in North Korea, revealing that the

United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) had funneled millions of dollars in hard

currency to North Korea with little assurance that North Korea's dictatorship would use the

money to help the North Korean people instead of diverting it to illicit activities. In addition he

led the U.S. delegation's "no" vote against using UN money to pay for the 2009 "Durban II"

conference. He opposed the 2008-2009 UN Biennium Budget for its "ad hoc" and "piecemeal"

approach that ensured spending increases in the UN general budget that far outpaced the general

budget increases of member states. While at the UN, Wallace launched the UN Transparency and

Accountability Initiative (UNTAI) that focused on eight areas of reform related to member states'

access to UN financial documents, ethics, financial disclosure, oversight mechanisms, IPSAS accounting standards and administrative overhead.

Upon his departure from the U.S. State Department, The Wall Street Journal editorial board

compared Wallace to a list of "distinguished" Americans who tried to make the United Nations

live up to its original ideals including Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Jeane Kirkpatrick and John Bolton.

Prior to his work at the United Nations, Wallace served in a variety of government, political and

private sector posts. He served in the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) as

Principal Legal Advisor to the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and as the

Principal Legal Advisor to the Bureau of Immigration and Citizenship Services. Prior to serving

in the DHS, Wallace served as the General Counsel of the INS as it transitioned into the DHS as

part of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 reorganization. He served as General Counsel of the

United States Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) where he oversaw and managed

all aspects of the FEMA Office of General Counsel which, among other areas of responsibility,

acted as counsel to the FEMA-led New York and World Trade Center recovery effort in the

aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

During the 2004 Presidential campaign, Wallace served as President George W. Bush's Deputy

Campaign Manager where in addition to his day-to-day responsibilities of the management of the

national campaign, he was the campaign's lead at the Republican National Convention in New

York City, the campaign's representative in debate negotiations, and he led the campaign's debate

team at each of the Presidential and Vice-Presidential debates. During the 2008 Presidential

campaign, he was a senior advisor to Senator John S. McCain and led the debate preparation team

for Governor Sarah Palin in her vice-presidential debate with then-Senator Joseph Biden.

While in the private sector, Wallace worked as a commercial attorney. He was the General

Counsel of the State of Florida's City of Miami Emergency Financial Oversight Board. He has

served on various for profit, and not-for-profit boards of directors, including the Liberty City

Charter School Project, Florida's first Charter School.

Radicalization: Social Media and

the Rise of Terrorism

Walter Purdy

October 28, 2015

Testimony presented before the House Committee on Oversight and

Government Reform’s Subcommittee on National Security

Walter Purdy

Terrorism Research Center Inc.

Radicalization: Social Media and the Rise of Terrorism

Before the Subcommittee on National Security

United States House of Representatives

October 28, 2015

Chairman DeSantis, Ranking Member Lynch, distinguished members of the committee, thank

you for inviting me to testify on this important issue. These issues are of the utmost importance

for our country’s security not only today, but in the future. My remarks will focus on the concept

of radicalization and the Homegrown Violent Extremist. I will touch on the constant themes by

certain mentors for those who have become radicalized to undertake violent actions or travel

abroad to wage jihad. Lastly, I look forward to providing an overview of the challenges

associated with radicalization, the use of social media by terrorists and how Homegrown Violent

Extremists (HVEs) posed the United States a growing threat.

Radicalization and the Homegrown Violent Extremist

Radicalization takes many forms. There is no single pathway for someone to become

radicalized. Brian Jenkins, speaking at one of the Terrorism Research Center’s training

programs stated that “radicalization as a whole is a process of adopting for oneself or inculcating

in others a commitment not only to a system of beliefs, but to their imposition on the rest of

society.” Individuals here in the United States have been identified, manipulated, motivated and

radicalized to undertake activities that have run the spectrum from raising money, providing

material support, travel to fight jihad, to plotting operations in the United States.

Many of those radicalized have associated themselves with a spiritual mentor. This individual

might be someone educated in the religion or even someone with more religious experience than

the convert. Some mentors might be from a mosque or might be accessed via the internet. Major

Nidal Hasan, the Ft. Hood shooter exchanged more than a dozen emails with Anwar al-Awlaki.

American citizens, Anwar al-Awlaki and Adam Yahiye Gadahn have both radicalize and

recruited others for jihad. Virtual mentors have communicated with potential recruits and others

deliver their message by audio tapes, books, videos, websites, blogs, chatrooms, and forums.

Some of the more popular have included Abu Musab al Suri, Anwar al-Awlaki, Abu Basir al-

Tartousi, Sheih Omar Bakri, Sheikh Abu Mohammad al-Maqdisi and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Adam Gadahn, in a propaganda video stated “I advise every brother who wants to work for this

religion not to undertake any action before taking advantage of the wide range of resources

available today on the internet. Particularly, the various manuals, encyclopedias and courses

which deal with the mujahideen operational and electronic security and security in general.

The United States faces challenges from Homegrown Violent Extremists (HVEs) who have been

radicalized to launch attacks here or to travel abroad for jihad.

Marc Sageman, in his book, Understanding Terror Networks stated that “The virtual community

is no longer tied to any nation, a condition that corresponds to the mythical umma of Salafism,

which specifically rejects nationalism and fosters the global Salafi jihad priority of fighting

against the ‘far enemy’ rather than the ‘near enemy’”.

Whether the individual has been radicalized by another person or self-radicalized there is a body

of work that we have seen often in the process that has incited them to undertake a path of

violence. Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez had downloaded audio recordings of Anwar al-

Awlaki.

Al-Qaeda has used English speaking propagandists like Anwar al-Awlaki and Adam Yahiye

Gadahn to radicalize and recruit individuals for jihad. ISIS has a constant social media campaign

aimed at English speaking individuals that includes its slick, glossy, and colorful magazine

entitled DABIQ. ISIS in “The Return of Khilafah” (DABIQ, Issue 1) seeks to expand its

recruiting by putting out a call for “All Muslim Doctors, Engineers, Scholars and Specialists.”

Most terrorist recruiting efforts have focused on recruiting young fighters but here they are

seeking others with special skills. Special skills are evident in the propaganda campaign being

waged against the west by ISIS from the technical skills used to create the high tech videos,

editing their colorful targeted magazine and their campaign style social media blitz.

While the concepts of radicalization and recruitment have changed with ISIS’ use of social

media certain themes have been used by other terrorists groups in the past. The Salafi ideology

that we have seen Anwar al-Awlaki (AQAP) and ISIS use is a driver that motivates young men

to carry out violent acts of terrorism. ISIS has used the internet and social media as an enabler,

providing a medium familiar to their targeted audience seeking the path of radicalization.

We have seen works like Millat (Path) Ibrahim by Abu Mohammad al-Maqdisi, Ma ‘alim fi

Tariq (Milestones) by Sayyid Qutb, The Call to Global Jihad by Abu Musab al Suri, and

Constants on the Path of Jihad by Anwar al-Awlaki are just some of the resources that ISIS and

other terrorist groups have used in the radicalization of terrorists.

Today, the danger we face is that anyone with a smart phone or internet connection can be

radicalized here in the United States. Jihadi social media will continue to increase and has

become one of the major weapons in ISIS’ arsenal. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, chatrooms,

blogs, messaging systems and numerous other social media platforms project the adventure and

glorify the violent actions undertaken by fighters and martyrs as ISIS seeks others to follow in

their footsteps.

We have seen too many individuals that have been radicalized and traveled overseas seeking to

wage jihad. Moner Mohammad Abusalha from Ft. Pierce, Florida was radicalized and traveled to

Syria where he became the first American suicide bomber in Syria. Shirwa Ahmed from

Minneapolis traveled to Somalia where he became the first American suicide bomber there. A

young man from Daphne, Alabama traveled and fought with the Al-Shabaab in Somalia. Omar

Hammami made numerous videos and a rap song seeking to inspire other Americans to follow in

his footsteps. The true number of Americans that have traveled to Iraq and Syria to fight is

unknown. But we are constantly seeing the FBI and law enforcement identify those “stinging”

some of these who are seeking to join and provide material support for ISIS and other terrorist

groups.

The threat in the near future is that the United States could face a new generation of jihadists

who make up part of the “Syrian-Iraqi Alumni.” These individuals having traveled overseas,

fought with ISIS or other terrorist groups could return to the United States with skillsets and

connections that give them a capability to undertake terrorist operations within the United States.

The Terrorism Research Center has trained thousands of law enforcement, military and

intelligence officers and the threat now and in the near future continues to grow. We need to do

more to equip law enforcement and our communities to understand and be able to identify this

growing threat. James Comey, the Director of the FBI was on point when he stated “We have a

very hard task” attempting to identify and interdict individuals inspired to launch terrorist attacks

in the United States. But families of those radicalized often pick up on the changes of the person

but don’t realize what they are seeing until it is often too late. Even with some intelligence or

information about a person one can never know with certainty whether the individual will

mobilize to violence once radicalized. The recent attack in Garland, Texas in May 2015 is a clear

example of the task that law enforcement in the United States faces every day.

Even law enforcement has been targeted. On October 23, 2014, Zale Thompson, attacked four

New York City Police Officers with an ax. On Facebook, Thompson had posted “Which is

better, to sit around and do nothing or to wage jihad.” The threat will only continue. The United

States has always been able to solve complex problems. I look forward to exploring some of the

things we can do to counter the message that terrorist groups like ISIS is espousing and how

working within our communities and with law enforcement we can communicate the ideas and

concepts that have made America great. No ideology can compete with that.

Walter Purdy

President

Terrorism Research Center

Walter Purdy is the President of the Terrorism Research Center (TRC), a Virginia based

company that seeks to provide the best professional practices in dealing with terrorism, global

issues, contemporary operating environments, asymmetrical warfare and insurgencies. TRC

provides cutting edge counterterrorism research, analysis and training.

Mr. Purdy is an Adjunct Professor with the Criminology, Law and Society Department of

George Mason University where he teaches Law Enforcement and Homeland Security,

Introduction to Homeland Security and Use of Force Issues.

Mr. Purdy has also undertaken a number of special research projects to include: Faces of

Terrorism: Connecting the Data Points, Worldwide Study of Truck Bombings, From Munich

to Manhattan and Beyond: Lessons Learned From Thirty Years of Terrorism, Emerging

Threats to the United States: The Tri-Border Region, Global Study of Suicide Bombers and

Attacks, The Lion Cubs: Terrorism Travel, The Hunter and the Prey: Omar Sheikh and

Daniel Pearl, Europe’s Elusive Terrorist Organization: 17 November, Profiles of the Taliban

Leadership, Understanding the Haqqanis: How the Haqqani’s View the Region, The

Kidnapping Project-Captivity, Hostage-Taking and Kidnapping and others.

He created and directs the Terrorism Research Center’s Training and Special Projects Division.

Mr. Purdy has trained thousands of military, law enforcement and intelligence personnel. He has

traveled extensively to the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Asia. Mr. Purdy created and

directs the “Mirror Image: Training to Combat Terrorism” which has placed specialized law

enforcement, military and intelligence operatives designed to give operatives an understanding of

terrorist training, tactics, techniques and procedures by allowing them to walk in the shoes of the

terrorist.

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross October 28, 2015

Foundation for Defense of Democracies www.defenddemocracy.org

Radicalization: Social Media and the Rise of Terrorism

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Chief Executive Officer, Valens Global

Hearing before the

U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security

Washington, D.C.

October 28, 2015

House Testimony

1726 M Street NW ● Suite 700 ● Washington, DC

20036


1


Chairman DeSantis, Ranking Member Lynch, and distinguished members of the

committee, on behalf of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, it is an honor to appear before

you to discuss how violent extremist organizations use social media and other tools to radicalize

and mobilize supporters.

This testimony focuses primarily on the propaganda and recruitment strategy of the Islamic

State (IS), which has justifiably moved to the top of the U.S.’s national security agenda. IS has

shocked the world not only with its utter barbarity, but also with the quality and quantity of its

propaganda output, particularly on social media. The proficiency of IS and its supporters as

communicators can be discerned from the group’s creation of tightly choreographed and slickly

produced videos, its apparently deep understanding of how to catch the Western media’s attention,

and IS’s coordinated distribution of its content on platforms like Twitter.1 Through the strength of

its communications, IS has helped inspire unprecedented numbers of young Muslims from across

the globe—around 30,000—to flock to the battlefields of Syria and Iraq to fight on behalf of

jihadist organizations. IS has provoked a wave of terrorist attacks in the West that raises legitimate

questions about whether extremists’ savvy use of social media might produce a permanent rise in

so-called lone-wolf terrorism.2

But IS’s propaganda machine is not indestructible. Beneath the hard shell that IS has

cultivated through its propaganda campaign there is a soft underbelly: IS relies on cultivating an

image of perpetual success and momentum, and should this image of a successful organization be

disrupted, IS’s “brand” may precipitously decline. IS’s flawed military strategy has left it

surrounded by foes, fighting wars on multiple fronts. As IS fights a range of foes, from the nation-

states bombing its convoys to the shadowy vigilantes killing IS officials in the group’s territory,3

IS’s propaganda has become the key to recruiting new fighters in order to prevent IS’s

overstretched caliphate from experiencing even greater setbacks.

IS’s grotesque propaganda and battlefield successes have also had a significant impact on

al-Qaeda. In many ways that impact has been negative, as al-Qaeda has lost both leaders and

affiliates—including Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis in Egypt’s Sinai and Boko Haram in Nigeria—to IS.

But in other ways al-Qaeda has been able to benefit by playing itself against IS’s more overt

brutality, adopting a propaganda strategy that stands in contrast to IS’s hyper-violent and highly

public approach. Al-Qaeda has quietly engaged in an image makeover. Using IS’s over-the-top

brutality as a foil, al-Qaeda has depicted itself as a more reasonable and controllable entity, one

that represents an extension of the aspirations of people in the areas it operates, rather than being

purely imposed by force. This rebranding campaign, which al-Qaeda has sought to implement ever

since the defeat of al-Qaeda in Iraq (IS’s predecessor) in the 2007-09 period, has gained traction

among local Sunni populations and some Sunni states, which have come to see al-Qaeda as a

potential bulwark against expansion by both IS and Iran. But behind this façade, al-Qaeda’s core

objectives remain the same: to weaken and overthrow impious regimes in the Middle East and

1 See, e.g., J.M. Berger, “How ISIS Games Twitter,” The Atlantic, June 16, 2014; J.M. Berger and Jonathon Morgan,

The ISIS Twitter Census: Defining and Describing the Population of ISIS Supporters on Twitter (Washington, DC:

The Brookings Institution, 2015). 2 The limitations of the term “lone wolf” to describe recent IS-inspired attacks in the West are discussed later in this

testimony. 3 E.g., Sam Kiley, “Underground Guerrilla Force Battles IS in Mosul,” Sky News, April 21, 2015.


2


North Africa, and to reestablish a global caliphate.

This testimony first explores two core elements of IS’s propaganda strategy: projecting and

maintaining an image of strength, and presenting the caliphate as a religiously legitimate utopia.

It then illustrates how IS, using its propaganda machine, has inspired significant numbers of

individuals living in the West to migrate to the caliphate or to carry out violent attacks on its behalf.

The testimony then explores al-Qaeda’s rebranding strategy, and the early successes it has attained.

Finally, the testimony examines policies that legislators can consider to undercut jihadists’

propaganda efforts.

IS’s Propaganda Strategy: The Victorious Caliphate

The central theme of IS’s propaganda strategy is that the group is extraordinarily powerful,

constantly gaining new territory, and in perpetual possession of momentum. Indeed, IS has based

its legitimacy on its ability to establish, defend and expand the caliphate’s territory. The group’s

slogan, baqiya wa tatamaddad—remaining and expanding—speaks to the importance of

defending and enlarging the caliphate.

IS relies on three primary sources of external support: “foreign fighters” from outside the

Syria/Iraq theater, likeminded jihadist organizations outside Iraq and Syria who may pledge

allegiance to IS or otherwise support it, and other rebel factions in Syria and Iraq who can bolster

IS’s local capabilities. IS’s propaganda machine—which emphasizes its strength, and thus can be

understood as a “winner’s messaging”—is critical to the group’s efforts to attract these kinds of

support, particularly from individuals who might never come into physical contact with IS

fighters.4

The military campaign against the Islamic State has been confused, disjointed, and slow to

find success. Nonetheless, as the group comes under increasing military pressure due to the war it

is fighting on multiple fronts, its winner’s narrative is challenged. IS’s victories in Ramadi and

Palmyra in May 2015 were highly significant, but came in the context of a broader trajectory of

slow decline. Put simply, IS took on too many enemies too quickly, and refused to cooperate with

potential allies, which has hampered the group’s ability to sustain its gains. IS is now in a defensive

position in most theaters. In the months following the Palmyra and Ramadi offensives, IS has made

only incremental gains while ceding other territory, such as the cities of Ain Issa and Tal Abyad

in Syria’s Raqqa Province, and the Bayji oil refinery in northern Iraq.

For this reason, IS has systematically exaggerated its gains and its capabilities, particularly

in Africa. In October 2014, a group of militants in the eastern Libyan city of Derna openly pledged

bayat (an oath of allegiance) to IS, and declared that they had established an emirate in the city.

Soon after the bayat pledge, IS flooded social media with videos and pictures of IS militants in

Derna, including a video showing a parade of militants waving IS flags as they drove down a

thoroughfare in the city. This show of force led many observers to conclude that the Islamic State

controlled Derna, and numerous major media outlets reported IS’s control of Derna as an objective

4 See a more complete discussion of IS’s “winner’s messaging” propaganda strategy in Daveed Gartenstein-Ross,

“Jihad 2.0: Social Media in the Next Evolution of Terrorist Recruitment,” written testimony before the Senate

Committee on Homeland Security & Government Affairs, May 7, 2015.


3


fact.5 But in reality, control of Derna was divided between a number of militant groups, including

some al-Qaeda-linked groups that opposed IS’s expansion into Libya.

Recent developments demonstrate that IS’s reported control over Derna was highly

exaggerated. In early June, Islamic State militants killed Nasir Atiyah al-Akar, a senior leader in

the Derna Mujahedin Shura Council (DMSC) with longstanding ties to al-Qaeda. Clashes broke

out between the Islamic State and DMSC immediately after Akar’s death. On June 9, Islamic State

militants killed Salim Darbi, the commander of the Abu Salim Martyrs Brigade and the head of

the DMSC. In response, the DMSC launched an offensive to oust the Islamic State from the city.

Without drawing upon outside reinforcements, the DMSC defeated IS in most of Derna, swiftly

confining the group to limited areas in and around the city. The fact that IS was so easily forced

out of Derna suggests that it did not control Derna to begin with.

In addition to exaggerating its gains, IS has sought to downplay, or deflect attention from,

its military losses. Relatively little media attention has been devoted to IS’s losses in Derna—

which is actually justifiable, as IS came to control the city of Sirte, which is a significant victory

for the caliphate. But an even more under-publicized IS setback has been its losses in Algeria.

An IS branch emerged in Algeria in mid-2014, when the “center zone” of al-Qaeda in the

Islamic Maghreb, which was based in the Kabylie coastal mountain region, announced that it was

defecting and joining the Islamic State. The commander of the unit, Gouri Abdelmalek, declared

that al-Qaeda had deviated “from the true path,” and announced that his group would now be

known as Jund al-Khilafa (Soldiers of the Caliphate). Days after Jund al-Khilafa was formed, the

group posted a video of its beheading of Hervé Gourdel, a French hiker whom it had kidnapped.

The Islamic State’s Algeria branch was never well-positioned to endure a great deal of attrition

because, even at its peak, Jund al-Khilafa only had around thirty fighters. In December 2014, the

Algerian army killed Gouri Abdelmalek and two other militants in a raid in the Boumerdès region

east of Algiers. But an even deadlier blow occurred in May 2015, when Algerian security forces

launched a large-scale military operation against a high-level meeting of Jund al-Khilafa militants

in the Bouira region. The Algerian operation not only killed about two dozen fighters at minimum,

but also new emir Abdullah Othman al-Asimi and five of Jund al-Khilafa’s six military

commanders. Algerian security forces were able to kill three more Jund al-Khilafa fighters the

following day. The May 2015 operation imposed significant attrition on the Islamic State’s

Algerian branch at the leadership and foot soldier level, and at this point IS is essentially irrelevant

in Algeria from a strategic perspective unless it can rebuild its in-country capabilities.

Overall, IS’s winner’s message is prone to disruption and reversal. IS’s claim that the group

is defeating its opponents on the battlefield is not a simple matter of opinion: It is either objectively

true or not. Yet IS’s opponents have done little to publicize the group’s most significant losses.

IS’s Propaganda Strategy: The Idyllic Caliphate

IS’s brutality and military exploits should not cause us to overlook another core component

of IS’s strategic messaging: the group’s effort to portray itself as a capable governor, and to create

5 For examples of these reports, see Maggie Michael, “How a Libyan City Joined the Islamic State Group,”

Associated Press, November 9, 2014.


4


the perception that the caliphate is an Islamic utopia. IS must show that it is able to govern,

implement sharia (Islamic law), and provide basic services to its “citizens.” If IS cannot

demonstrate its credentials as a governing entity, then the integrity of the caliphate project may be

called into question. Conversely, if IS can show that the caliphate is a functioning and sharia-

adherent state, it can bolster the group’s legitimacy relative to both its jihadist competitor al-Qaeda

(which has refrained from declaring a caliphate) and Sunni states in the region.

One IS propaganda genre specifically focuses on IS’s governance efforts, projecting the

image that the caliphate is the only place in the world where Muslims can live according to the

precepts of the Qur’an and ahadith (sayings attributed to the Prophet Muhammad). Charlie Winter,

an analyst at the London-based Quilliam Foundation, recently published a rich and detailed report

examining IS’s propaganda focused on governance, justice, and life in the caliphate.6 Examining

IS’s propaganda from mid-July to mid-August 2015, Winter found that more than half of IS’s

propaganda content during that period focused on life in the caliphate, a category Winter defined

as the “utopia” narrative. Winter further divided IS’s utopia narrative into seven sub-categories:

religion, economic activity, social life, justice, governance, expansion, and nature and landscapes.

Each sub-category projects an idealized image of the caliphate. For instance, content focusing on

religion and justice highlights, among other things, IS’s implementation of hudud punishments,

the piety of IS’s citizens, and IS’s efforts to eliminate forbidden (haram) or questionable items

such as cigarettes. In this way, IS seeks to demonstrate that it is purifying society and implementing

sharia as it was practiced by the first generations of Muslims. Propaganda that highlights

governance and economic activity seeks to show that IS is providing services to local populations,

and that the caliphate is thriving financially, rather than the destitute and crumbling entity that is

depicted in Western media reports.

The target audiences of IS’s utopia narrative overlap with, though differ somewhat from,

the intended targets of the group’s military propaganda content. This material appeals primarily to

“migrants” (individuals who move to the caliphate to build the society) rather than to foreign

fighters, to whom military propaganda may be more inspiring. Charlie Winter also notes that the

utopia narrative resonates more with people living in the Arab world than it does with Western IS

supporters.7 Perhaps the utopia narrative resonates more deeply in areas where there are more

governance failures on the part of the existing authority. Content focusing on life in the caliphate

is also internally directed, intended to persuade those who live in the caliphate’s confines that IS

is providing public services and governing effectively. Propaganda with a justice motif, including

footage of IS members implementing corporal punishments, may also be designed to deter IS’s

“citizens” from opposing the organization or otherwise engaging in behavior deemed forbidden or

undesirable under IS’s austere version of sharia law.

Just as IS’s winner’s messaging is prone to disruption, so too is the narrative that the

caliphate is a utopia. Much of IS’s governance-focused propaganda is embellished or fabricated

entirely. The few news accounts of life in the caliphate that have emerged indicate that IS has

failed to provide most public services, and that individuals living in IS’s territory suffer from

6 Charlie Winter, Documenting the Virtual Caliphate (London: Quilliam Foundation, 2015). 7 Charlie Winter, “More than Just Beheadings: How the Islamic State Sells Itself,” War on the Rocks, October 15,

2015.


5


shortages of food, medicine, electricity and other key resources.8 If the United States and other

actors involved in countering IS’s propaganda can expose the destitution and strife suffered under

IS’s rule, they may be able to shift the narrative of life in the caliphate from one of utopia to

dystopia.

The Successes of IS’s Mobilization Strategy

IS has experienced unprecedented success in mobilizing its supporters, largely due to its

mastery of social media. The group’s propaganda machine has yielded remarkable results, both in

terms of the number of foreign fighters and “migrants” that the group has attracted to the caliphate

and in the group’s ability to inspire individuals from the West to carry out attacks in the IS’s name,

often without ever meeting an IS supporter face-to-face.

To date, around 30,000 foreign fighters and migrants have traveled to Syria and Iraq to join

jihadist groups since 2011. This is the largest foreign fighter flow that any jihad has attracted,

including the Afghan-Soviet war in the 1980s, and the Bosnian and Chechen conflicts in the 1990s.

Though most foreign fighters have come from the Middle East and North Africa, a significant

number—at least 4,500—have come from the West, including 250 Americans who either joined

or tried to join jihadist groups.9

IS has also honed its ability to inspire lone individuals and small groups to carry out attacks

in the West in the Islamic State’s name. These attacks are typically referred to in the media as

“lone wolf” attacks, meaning these individuals acted on their own, and lacked connections to a

broader network. But the term lone wolf appears increasingly misleading in the age of social media.

Many IS-inspired individuals have developed strong relationships online with IS members and

sympathizers, though they may never meet them in person. IS-inspired attacks in the West play an

important role in IS’s propaganda strategy. Such attacks create the perception that IS is present

everywhere. They also give IS an advantage in its competition with al-Qaeda, allowing IS to

portray itself as the jihadist organization best equipped to sustain the struggle against the West.10

Since June 2014, when IS declared the establishment of its caliphate, the organization has

inspired attacks across multiple Western countries, including Australia, Canada, Denmark and

France. One of the more notable IS-inspired attacks was the October 2014 Ottawa Parliament

operation, in which Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, a convert to Islam, killed a Canadian soldier guarding

the National War Memorial and then stormed into the Parliament building, where he was shot and

killed. Investigators concluded that Zehaf-Bibeau had followed IS social media accounts,

including the Twitter account of Abu Khalid al-Kanadi, a Canadian convert and IS member

fighting in Syria who called for attacks in Canada.11 Zehaf-Bibeau’s attack came the day after

Martin Couture-Rouleau, another convert and IS social media follower, struck two members of the

8 See, for example, Liz Sly, “The Islamic State is Failing at Being a State,” Washington Post, December 25, 2014. 9 Eric Schmitt and Somini Sengupta, “Thousands Enter Syria to Join ISIS Despite Global Efforts,” New York Times,

September 26, 2015. 10 For more on the competition between the Islamic State and al-Qaeda, see Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, Jason Fritz,

Bridget Moreng and Nathaniel Barr, The War between the Islamic State and al-Qaeda: Strategic Dimensions of a

Patricidal Conflict (Washington, DC: Valens Global, 2015). 11 Stewart Bell, “Ottawa Shooter Read Posts by ISIS Convert Calling for ‘Jihad in Canada,’” National Post, January

24, 2015.


6


Canadian military with his car before initiating a high-speed car chase that ended in his death.

Other high-profile IS-inspired attacks in the West since June 2014 include:

September 2014: Alton Nolen, a convert to Islam and ex-convict who had just been fired

from his job at a food processing plant, entered his former workplace and beheaded an

employee with a knife. This attack combines elements of workplace violence and terrorism.

Nolen had been a voracious consumer of IS propaganda, a fact reflected on his Facebook

page.12

September 2014: Abdul Numan Haider, an 18-year-old whose passport was revoked by

Australian authorities who were concerned that Haider would join IS in Syria and Iraq,

stabbed two Australian counter-terrorism officers at a police station in Melbourne before

he was fatally shot. Haider had reportedly waved an IS flag at a local mall, and had also

threatened to attack then-prime minister Tony Abbott.13

December 2014: Man Haron Monis, an Iranian refugee who had been granted asylum in

Australia, raided a café in Sydney and held more than ten patrons hostage for sixteen hours

before police stormed the café, killing Monis. Two hostages also died. In the days prior to

the attack, Monis posted a pledge of bayat to IS on his personal website.14

February 2015: Omar Abdel Hamid El-Hussein, a 22-year-old Danish citizen of Palestinian

descent, opened fire at an event in Copenhagen featuring Lars Vilks, a cartoonist who had

received death threats after drawing the Prophet Muhammed as a dog. El-Hussein missed

Vilks but did kill a filmmaker who was attending the event. El-Hussein then attacked a

synagogue, killing a Jewish man who stood guard outside before El-Hussein himself was

killed by Danish security forces. The Danish intelligence service concluded that El-Hussein

may have been motivated by IS propaganda.15

Ramón Spaaij’s book Understanding Lone Wolf Terrorism: Global Patterns, Motivations

and Prevention helps to put into perspective the recent wave of IS-inspired attacks.16 Spaaij

examined trends of lone wolf attacks from 1968 to 2010 across 15 countries, and found that in the

first decade of the twenty-first century, there was an average of 7.3 lone wolf attacks per year

across all 15 nation-states for all types of ideologically-motivated terrorism (including jihadist, far

left, far right, and single issue). When considered within the context of Spaaij’s research, the recent

phenomenon of IS-inspired attacks in the West over the last year-plus appears particularly

significant.

12 Michael Daly, “The Muslim Convert Behind America’s First Workplace Beheading,” Daily Beast, September 27,

2014. 13 Ian Lloyd Neubauer, “A Teenage Terrorism Suspect Is Shot Dead in Australia After Attacking Police,” Time,

September 24, 2014. 14 Ashley Fantz et al., “Sydney Hostage-Taker Called Himself a Cleric—and Had a Criminal Record,” CNN,

December 17, 2014. 15 Alexander Tange and Alister Doyle, “Special Report: How Denmark’s Unexpected Killer Slipped through the

Net,” Reuters, April 22, 2015. 16 Ramón Spaaij, Understanding Lone Wolf Terrorism: Global Patterns, Motivations and Prevention

(SpringerBriefs in Criminology, 2011).


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Social Media as a Mobilizer

IS’s recruiting successes are largely related to the group’s ability to exploit social media to

facilitate polarization, radicalization, and mobilization. There is a rich body of research on online

communication (known to academics as computer-mediated communication, or CMC) and human

behavior that psychologists, sociologists, and communication scholars have produced. Academics

have been studying the impact of CMC on human behavior since the 1960s, and the literature on

the subject, especially from the field of social psychology, can do much to inform our exploration

of online radicalization.

Three concepts from social psychology are particularly relevant to online radicalization:

identity demarginalization, group polarization, and the social identity model of deindividuation

effects.

Identity demarginalization is a theory articulated by Katelyn McKenna and John Bargh in

the 1998 study “Coming Out in the Age of the Internet: Identity ‘Demarginalization.’”17 Exploring

why some social groups are more drawn to online communication than others, McKenna and

Bargh found that membership in online groups is of greater importance to individuals with

“concealable and culturally devalued identities” than to those with mainstream identities. “For the

first time,” the authors wrote, individuals exploring their marginalized identity in an online

environment “can reap the benefits of joining a group of similar others: feeling less isolated and

different, disclosing a long secret part of oneself, sharing one’s own experiences and learning from

those of others, and gaining emotional and motivational support.”

CMC allows for a degree of anonymity, however imperfect, thus emboldening individuals

with concealable marginalized identities to discuss issues that may be taboo in a mainstream social

setting.18 Further, CMC is not constrained by geography, and allows individuals with

nonmainstream identities to link up to other people across the globe with similar identities. In a

study examining the website Stormfront and the white nationalist movement, Neil Caren and two

colleagues note that the absence of spatial boundaries in CMC allows online communities “to draw

in otherwise isolated movement participants.”19

McKenna and Bargh also explored the impact that participation in online groups had on

marginalized individuals’ social identity. They found this participation positively correlated with

group identity importance, as people who actively took part in online group discussions came to

“consider the group identity more important than did those who did not actively participate.”20

This contributed to what McKenna and Bargh described as demarginalization: individuals with

marginalized identities who joined groups of like-minded people online came to view their identity

17 Katelyn McKenna and John Bargh, “Coming Out in the Age of the Internet: Identity ‘Demarginalization’ through

Virtual Group Participation,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 75:3 (1998). 18 See Lynne Hillier et al., “The Internet As a Safety Net: Findings From a Series of Online Focus Groups With

LGB and Non-LGB Young People in the United States,” Journal of LGBT Youth 9:3 (2012), and Deborrah E.S.

Frable, “Being and Feeling Unique: Statistical Deviance and Psychological Marginality,” Journal of Personality

61:1 (1993). 19 Neil Caren et al., “A Social Movement Online Community: Stormfront and the White Nationalist Movement,”

Research in Social Movements, Conflicts and Change 33 (2012). 20 McKenna and Bargh, “Coming Out in the Age of the Internet.”


8


more positively, thus strengthening self-acceptance and potentially reducing feelings of isolation.

Positive reinforcement from peers in online networks can also result in validation and

normalization of marginalized behavior. A 2008 study by Jeff Gavin and colleagues that examined

pro-anorexia online communities found that such forums were “an ideal space for maintaining and

validating a pro-anorexic identity,” and accentuated in-group (pro-anorexic)/out-group

dynamics.21 In turn, McKenna and Bargh found that such acceptance of one’s concealed

marginalized identity made participants more likely to reveal this identity to family and friends,

and make it a part of their public persona.

Identity demarginalization theory suggests that salafi jihadists and other adherents to

violent ideologies that are socially marginalized can reinforce and even normalize their extremist

views through participation in online social networks. And normalization of a marginalized

identity can prompt individuals to make that identity a “social reality” through public, and not just

online, expression of these views. While the public expression of previously concealed identities

is a positive development for many marginalized populations, the costs of normalization are

greater when the individuals in question adhere to violent extremist ideologies.

Group polarization theory expands upon some of the themes highlighted in identity

demarginalization. Group polarization refers to the propensity for a cohesive group to move toward

a more maximalist stance. As with identity demarginalization, this process is neither inherently

good nor bad: a group predisposed to doing community service may become even more committed

to altruism following deliberations. But group polarization presents significant challenges when a

group is predisposed to racial or ethnic prejudice, or religious extremism.

Numerous studies have concluded that groups interacting via CMC experience a greater

degree of group polarization than groups that interact face-to-face.22 There are several possible

explanations for why CMC contributes to group polarization. For one, CMC, as opposed to face-

to-face communication, is characterized by an absence of visual and verbal cues, which may make

individuals interacting via CMC less inhibited or apprehensive about communicating their

opinions.23 As inhibitions decline, participants become willing to “contribute more novel

arguments and engage in more one-upmanship behavior,” which may drive group polarization.24

The social identity model of deindividuation effects (SIDE) provides a theoretical

framework for understanding processes like group polarization and demarginalization in an online

setting. SIDE is a revision of classic deindividuation theory, which suggests that group immersion

and anonymity within a group result in a loss of self-awareness and increase in anti-normative

behavior.25 SIDE, in contrast, concludes that in the CMC context, anonymity and group immersion

21 Jeff Gavin et al., “The Presentation of ‘Pro-Anorexia’ in Online Group Interactions,” Qualitative Health Research

18:3 (2008). 22 For a review of these studies, see Choon-Ling Sia, Bernard C. Y. Tan and Kwok-Kee Wei, “Group Polarization

and Computer-Mediated Communication: Effects of Communication Cues, Social Presence, and Anonymity,”

Information Systems Research 13:1 (2002). 23 Charlotte Gunawardena, “Social Presence Theory and Implications for Interaction Collaborative Learning in

Computer Conferences,” International Journal of Educational Telecommunications 1:2 (1995). 24 Sia et al., “Group Polarization and Computer-Mediated Communication.” 25 For an overview of deindividuation theory, see Philip Zimbardo, “The Human Choice: Individuation, Reason, and

Order versus Deindividuation, Impulse, and Chaos,” Nebraska Symposium on Motivation 17 (1969).


9


do not foster anti-normative behavior but rather cause individuals to ignore idiosyncratic

differences between in-group members, and to more closely identify with a common group

identity. As Tom Postmes and his colleagues explained in a 1998 study, the SIDE model found

that individuals who adopt a group identity are receptive to group cues, and are thus more

susceptible to adopting local group norms through CMC, regardless of whether they are normative

or anti-normative in the general societal context.26

The SIDE model has significant implications for online communications. Several studies

have suggested that CMC reduces the salience of personal characteristics and interpersonal

differences, and increases the salience of group identity and group norms.27 Anonymity in CMC

interactions may also accentuate in-group/out-group distinctions, and intensify intergroup

hostility. In his doctoral research, social psychologist Tom Postmes found that individuals had

more negative perceptions of out-group members when out-group members were anonymous than

when they were visible.28

Other factors besides anonymity may also facilitate the shift from individual to group

identity in CMC. In a 2011 study, Haines et al. modified the SIDE model, concluding that group

identity becomes more salient in online interactions when a group identifier (for example, avatars

or other labels that distinguish in- and out-group members) is visible to others.29 Thus, Haines

found that group influence actually decreases in completely anonymous online situations—for

example, where “no labels are attached to comments”—due to lack of awareness of others’

opinions. But group influence increases when common group identifiers exist. This finding is

particularly relevant for platforms like Twitter and Facebook, where group identifiers can be

reflected in avatars or other symbols attached to a user’s profile.

Identity demarginalization, group polarization and SIDE all have considerable explanatory

power in informing the discussion about online radicalization. All three theories demonstrate that

certain characteristics of online communications, including reduced social cues and high degrees

of anonymity, often strengthen group influence at the expense of individual identity.

Al-Qaeda’s Image Makeover

While IS has shown off its brutality and strength in its propaganda, al-Qaeda has adopted

a different approach. With IS dominating the media spotlight and horrifying observers with its

savagery, al-Qaeda has seized upon a long-awaited opportunity to recast an image that it believes

was tarnished in large part through the excesses of al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). Thanks to two parallel

developments—IS’s emergence and rising Sunni-Shia sectarian tensions in the Middle East—al-

Qaeda’s campaign to rebrand itself has been invigorated. Al-Qaeda has taken on the image of a

more reasonable—and perhaps controllable—alternative to the Islamic State, and a bulwark

26 Tom Postmes et al., “Breaching or Building Social Boundaries? SIDE-Effects of Computer-Mediated

Communication,” Communication Research 25:6 (1998). 27 Tom Postmes et al., “Social Influence in Computer-Mediated Communication: The Effects of Anonymity on

Group Behavior,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 27:10 (2001). 28 Tom Postmes, “Social Influence in Computer-Mediated Groups,” unpublished doctoral thesis, University of

Amsterdam. 29 Russell Haines et al., “A New Perspective on De-Individuation via Computer-Mediated Communication,”

European Journal of Information Systems 20:2 (2011).


10


against Iranian expansion.

Al-Qaeda’s belief that it needed to remake its image dates back to the group’s campaign in

Iraq in the mid-2000s. AQI ascended rapidly to the fore of the global jihadist movement and burnt

out just as quickly, scorching al-Qaeda’s image as well. AQI’s early success during the U.S.

occupation derived in part from its ability to spark sectarian strife through waves of attacks into

Shia areas; AQI correctly believed that it could interject itself into a sectarian civil war by

presenting itself as the Sunnis’ protector. Yet even while it offered protection from the Shia

reprisals that it had provoked, the group oppressed those same Sunnis by imposing an alien form

of religious law through its reign of terror in Anbar province.

AQI’s proclivity for brutality and indiscriminate violence worried al-Qaeda’s senior

leadership (AQSL), which feared that AQI would alienate Iraqis. Members of AQSL sent at least

two letters—from then-deputy emir Ayman al-Zawahiri and masul aqalim (head of regions)

Atiyah Abd al-Rahman—to AQI’s emir Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, exhorting the hot-headed

Jordanian to moderate his approach. The objections offered by Zawahiri and Atiyah were strategic

rather than moral. Indeed, Zawahiri noted that rather than beheading AQI’s prisoners, “we can kill

the captives by bullet.” The preeminence of strategic over moral concerns can be discerned also in

al-Qaeda’s current rebranding efforts, where rather than avoiding atrocities, al-Qaeda appears

more concerned with keeping them off-camera and minimizing the negative attention that often

accompanies this brutality.

However, Zarqawi disregarded AQSL’s instructions, and after a period of repression, the

Sunni population in Anbar rebelled in a tribal uprising known as the Sahwa (Awakening)

movement. The Sahwa soon spread to other provinces and, along with the “surge” in U.S. troops

and American shift to population-centric counterinsurgency, contributed to AQI’s downfall. It

amounted to a repudiation of AQI—and by extension, of al-Qaeda itself.

After AQI’s failed experiment, top al-Qaeda commanders began exploring how to repair

the group’s reputation. Perhaps the clearest evidence of al-Qaeda’s rebranding efforts can be found

in a letter that bin Laden wrote to Atiyah in May 2010.30 Bin Laden lamented the damage that

affiliates had done to al-Qaeda’s image, noting that indiscriminate violence had “led to the loss of

the Muslims’ sympathetic approach towards the mujahedin.” Bin Laden proposed commencing a

“new phase” in al-Qaeda’s operations that would “regain the trust of a large portion of those who

had lost their trust in the mujahedin.” Bin Laden emphasized minimizing Muslim casualties, and

directing affiliates to exert caution when civilians could be harmed. He urged a new media strategy,

ordering media operatives to avoid “everything that would have a negative impact on the

perception of the nation towards the mujahedin.”

AQSL even considered changing the organization’s name. In a letter discovered in bin

Laden’s Abbottabad compound, an unidentified official remarked that the group’s name had

become disassociated from Islam, allowing Western states to claim that their war was with al-

Qaeda and not the broader Muslim community. The official asserted that al-Qaeda (the base in

Arabic) had become associated solely with a “military base,” without any “reference to our broader

30 Letter from Osama bin Laden to Atiyah Abd al-Rahman, SOCOM-2012-00000019, May 2010.


11


mission to unify the nation.” The official proposed several alternative names.31

Officials continued to try to put a rebranding plan into action following bin Laden’s death.

In September 2013, Zawahiri released a document titled “General Guidelines for Jihad” that made

public al-Qaeda’s new, population-centric approach.32 Zawahiri instructed affiliates to avoid

conflict with Middle Eastern governments when possible, asserting that conflict with local regimes

would distract from efforts to build bases of support. Zawahiri also instructed affiliates to minimize

violent conflict with Shias and non-Muslims in order to prevent local uprisings, and to abstain

from attacks that could result in Muslim civilian casualties. A purportedly leaked letter that

Zawahiri wrote to the Islamic State’s caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in September 2013 notes that

the General Guidelines were distributed to all of al-Qaeda’s affiliates for review prior to their

publication to allow for comments and objections, thus suggesting the document represents the

unified policies of al-Qaeda as a whole.33

But despite AQSL’s push to institute a new organization-wide strategy, early efforts to

change al-Qaeda’s image yielded mixed results. Some affiliates executed the rebranding strategy

poorly or inconsistently, while others disregarded this more constrained approach entirely.

The jihadist experience in northern Mali in the spring of 2012 illustrates how aggressive

local commanders could undermine al-Qaeda’s rebranding efforts. When jihadist groups under the

command of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) took control of northern Mali, they

implemented a harsh form of sharia. The jihadists’ strict governance was at odds with Malians’

more moderate religious practice, and the jihadists’ heavy-handed approach—militants frequently

beat, whipped, and stoned locals—sparked a mass exodus of civilians to neighboring Mauritania.34

This approach earned a rebuke from AQIM’s emir Abdelmalek Droukdel, thus illustrating the

cohesion between AQIM’s leadership and its counterparts in Afghanistan-Pakistan. In a letter to

the Mali-based jihadists, Droukdel criticized the “extreme speed with which” they imposed sharia,

castigating them for destroying Sufi shrines and for relying excessively on corporal punishments.

Droukdel instructed the Malian jihadists to ally with other militant groups, including Tuareg rebels

and other non-salafists, and to focus on amassing public support.35 These directives closely

mirrored the guidelines for jihad that Zawahiri would release publicly a year later.

This uneven implementation was true also of AQAP, al-Qaeda’s Yemen-based affiliate. In

December 2013, AQAP militants attacked the defense ministry compound in the capital of Sana’a.

A hospital was targeted, and several unarmed medics and civilians were killed.36 While AQAP

immediately claimed credit, the group backpedaled after a video aired on state television showing

an AQAP fighter gunning down doctors and other civilians in the hospital. Qassem al-Rimi,

AQAP’s then-military chief, was forced to issue a rare apology, claiming the hospital attack had

been the work of a rogue militant. He promised that AQAP would pay blood money.37

31 Letter from unknown al-Qaeda official, SOCOM-2012-0000009, date unknown. 32 Ayman al-Zawahiri, “General Guidelines for Jihad,” September 2013. 33 The “leaked” letter can be found at http://justpaste.it/asrarwkk. 34 Adam Nossiter, “Jihadists’ Fierce Justice Drives Thousands to Flee Mali,” New York Times, July 17, 2012. 35 Letter from Abdelmalek Droukdel to the Shura Council of Ansar Dine, Date Unknown, available at

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_international/_pdfs/al-qaida-manifesto.pdf. 36 “Al-Qaeda Apologizes for Yemeni Hospital Attack,” Al-Jazeera, December 22, 2013. 37 “Al-Qaeda Branch in Yemen Regrets Hospital Attack,” Associated Press, December 22, 2013.

http://justpaste.it/asrarwkk

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_international/_pdfs/al-qaida-manifesto.pdf


12


The Mali case suggests a disconnect between top-level leaders and local commanders,

while Yemen is more likely an instance of al-Qaeda trying to show moderation only after having

its atrocities broadcast. At any rate, uneven implementation often undercut al-Qaeda’s early

rebranding efforts.

But IS’s emergence on the global stage was a watershed moment in al-Qaeda’s rebranding

campaign. While al-Qaeda’s missteps prior to IS’s rise as a competitor received considerable

media scrutiny, the group’s use of violence has been eclipsed by IS’s unchecked atrocities. IS’s

beheadings, immolations, and mass executions have allowed al-Qaeda to change its image in a

way that would have been unthinkable when the “Arab Spring” revolutions first gripped the region

in 2011. Al-Qaeda is in the process of recasting itself to two audiences: locals and regional

governments. IS has become a convenient foil, and Sunni-Shia geopolitical tensions have also been

a boon to al-Qaeda’s rebranding strategy. The intensifying rivalry between the Sunni Gulf states

and Iran has provided al-Qaeda an opportunity to present itself as a potential ally in the fight

against Iranian influence in places like Syria and Yemen.

As part of its rebranding initiative, al-Qaeda has launched a full-blown media campaign in

recent months, deploying top officials to give interviews with mainstream media outlets. These

officials downplay the threat the group poses to the West, and sometimes even encourage the

perception of al-Qaeda’s weakness. One of the first concrete signs of this media offensive came in

early 2015, when Zawahiri issued a directive to Abu Muhammad al-Julani, the emir of al-Qaeda’s

Syrian affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra, ordering Julani to improve Nusra’s ties with the Syrian population

and other rebel groups.38 Zawahiri’s decree codified, to some extent, Nusra’s existing strategy.

Since 2012, Nusra has collaborated with other Syrian rebel groups, and amassed considerable

public support. However, in the latter half of 2014, Nusra was involved in infighting with other

rebel groups, and Zawahiri’s edict was intended to clarify Nusra’s position.

Since then, Syria has become a primary testing ground for al-Qaeda’s rebranding strategy.

In March 2015, Al Jazeera aired an interview with Abu Sulayman al-Muhajir, an Australian cleric

who became one of Nusra’s top religious officials. Muhajir contrasted Nusra with IS, stating that

Nusra’s primary goal was to topple Bashar al-Assad and “restore the right of the Muslim people

to choose their leaders independently.” His emphasis on popular representation and claim that

Nusra focused on national objectives would become hallmarks of Nusra’s media campaign.

After Muhajir’s interview, Nusra granted Al Jazeera a conversation with Julani. In May

2015, Nusra’s emir sat for a 47-minute interview in which he too contrasted Nusra’s approach with

IS’s extremism.39 Julani asserted that Nusra’s sole goal was to topple Assad’s regime, and adopted

a comparatively tolerant stance toward religious minorities, promising that Nusra would neither

target Druze nor Alawites. (Julani did say that Alawites would have to renounce elements of their

faith that contradicted Islam, and Al Jazeera’s English-language reporting on the interview

conveniently omitted these ominous statements.)

38 For a discussion of this directive, see Charles Lister, “An Internal Struggle: Al-Qaeda’s Syrian Affiliate is

Grappling with its Identity,” Huffington Post, May 31 2015. 39 For a video clip of Al Jazeera’s Arabic-language interview with Julani, see

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QBuvwsg0Gc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QBuvwsg0Gc


13


Al-Qaeda ideologues have also been involved in rebranding efforts. Abu Muhammad al-

Maqdisi and Abu Qatada, two of al-Qaeda’s most prominent religious figures, gave an in-depth

interview to the U.K.’s Guardian for an article published in June 2015.40 Both Abu Qatada and

Maqdisi slammed IS, while claiming that IS’s emergence had caused al-Qaeda’s organization to

“collapse.” The two clerics’ statements look different when examined in the context of al-Qaeda’s

rebranding campaign: Their portrayal of al-Qaeda as a dying organization fits the group’s strategy

of understating its strength in order to avoid drawing the attention of Western militaries and

alleviating Gulf states’ fears.

Nusra has buttressed this media offensive by adopting a more collaborative approach

toward other Syrian rebel factions. In March 2015, Nusra and several other prominent rebel groups,

including the hardline salafi group Ahrar al-Sham, announced the establishment of a new coalition,

Jaysh al-Fatah (Army of Conquest).41 Since then, Nusra and its allies have made considerable gains

in Idlib province. Nusra has exported this collaborative model to other provinces, and has signaled

that it is open to sharing power with other organizations: After Jaysh al-Fatah captured Idlib city,

Julani stated that Nusra would not “strive to rule the city or to monopolize it without others.”42 But

consistent with the uneven implementation of al-Qaeda’s rebranding campaign, some of Nusra’s

actions have departed from its goal of displaying a moderate face.43

Al-Qaeda is also implementing its rebranding strategy in Yemen, where the conflict

between Iranian-backed Houthis and a Saudi-led military coalition, as well as the Islamic State’s

emergence, have enabled AQAP to portray itself as a force that can counter the Houthis and IS.

AQAP sometimes fights the Houthis alongside the Saudi-led coalition, and has engaged in a

careful balancing act where it carries out attacks against Houthi militants while distancing itself

from IS’s terrorist operations against Houthi civilians.44 AQAP capitalized on the anarchic

conditions in Yemen to carve out territory for itself, and has exhibited a gradualist approach to

governance. In April, AQAP seized the city of al-Mukalla, the capital of Hadramawt province and

Yemen’s fifth-largest city. The group refrained from hoisting jihadist banners, and even issued a

statement refuting rumors that it would ban music and shorts for men. AQAP established an

umbrella group to rule Mukalla known as the Sons of Hadramawt, a name intended to emphasize

the group’s local roots, and has generally avoided measures that could alienate the local

population.

Al-Qaeda’s rebranding efforts have already found some traction with local populations and

Sunni states, and even some Western analysts. In both Syria and Yemen, al-Qaeda affiliates have

40 Shiv Malik et al., “How ISIS Crippled Al-Qaida,” The Guardian, June 10, 2015. 41 Thomas Joscelyn, “Al-Qaeda and Allies Form Coalition to Battle Syrian Regime in Idlib,” Long War Journal,

March 24, 2015. 42 “Al-Qaeda in Syria Signals Sharia Law for Captured City,” Reuters, April 1, 2015. 43 One such example is Nusra’s treatment of the Druze. At one point, Nusra apologized for slaughtering a number of

Druze civilians. “Jabhat Al-Nusra Apologizes For Massacre In Druze Village, Says Its Commanders Were Unaware

Of The Killing,” The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), June 14, 2015. Despite this, Nusra has forced

Druze to publicly relinquish their faith and put them through “re-education” programs, policies that meet the

technical definition of genocide. 44 Thomas Joscelyn, “Analysis: Why AQAP Quickly Denied any Connection to Mosque Attacks,” Long War

Journal, March 20, 2015.


14


received support from, or fought alongside, Sunni states. The Jaysh al-Fatah coalition in Syria has

become a favorite aid recipient for Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, AQAP has

benefitted from the Saudi-led coalition’s preoccupation with the Houthi and Iranian threats.

Mukalla residents say the tribes that run the city receive Saudi aid, some of which almost certainly

reaches AQAP.45 Saudi Arabia has refrained from carrying out air strikes against AQAP

strongholds, and has looked the other way as AQAP develops a foothold in other parts of southern

Yemen. Prince Faisal bin Saud bin Abdulmohsen, a scholar at the King Faisal Center for Research

and Islamic Studies, explained the Saudis’ approach toward al-Qaeda and IS: “At this point we

must really differentiate between fanaticism and outright monstrosity.”46

The IS threat has also raised al-Qaeda’s stock in Jordan. When IS captured a Jordanian air

force pilot in December 2014, Jordan tasked Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi with negotiating with

IS. Later, Jordan released Maqdisi from prison and allowed him to appear on Jordanian television.

While Jordan isn’t naïve about Maqdisi or al-Qaeda, the Hashemite Kingdom appears to be

tolerating Maqdisi and other al-Qaeda supporters in the hope that they can curb IS’s growth.

As IS dominates headlines, analysts seem to be underestimating al-Qaeda’s capacity to

adapt and thrive. Al-Qaeda’s affiliates have worked to restore the group’s image, garnered public

support in countries like Syria and Yemen, and even won the support of some Sunni states. This

rebranding campaign puts it in a strong position today.

Conclusion: Addressing Violent Extremism in the Online Sphere

So what can be done? I offer four major recommendations.

First, refute IS’s narrative of strength. The group’s narrative is not impregnable. IS’s

propaganda campaign relies on deception and exaggeration to sustain its narrative of strength and

perpetual momentum. Contrary to its propaganda, IS is not in constant possession of military

momentum; the group has not made major territorial gains in months, and is on the defensive in

Iraq. Though the group is far from defeated, IS’s winner’s messaging is contrived, and defanging

it can dilute some of the group’s appeal to foreign fighters and migrants. Similarly, IS’s caliphate

more closely resembles a failed state than a thriving utopia. The U.S. should expose the myths that

underpin the militant group’s narrative. This means fact-checking IS’s claims, publicizing the

group’s lies, and producing a stream of reports that highlight IS’s battlefield losses and governance

failures. In the propaganda fight with IS, quantity and speed matter every bit as much as the quality

of content.

Second, the U.S. government should collaborate with civil society and private sector

actors. Tech firms are now becoming interested in how they can play a role in mitigating some of

the damage that their platforms are unleashing. This is a good thing. American tech companies are

highly creative, and thus far extremist groups like IS have harnessed far more creativity than the

various actors who oppose them. Bringing the ingenuity of these firms to bear on the problem set

45 Maria Abi Habib and Mohammed al-Kibsi, “Al Qaeda Fights on Same Side as Saudi-Backed Militias in Yemen,”

Wall Street Journal, July 16, 2015. 46 Yaroslav Trofimov, “To U.S. Allies, al-Qaeda Affiliate in Syria Becomes the Lesser Evil,” Wall Street Journal,

June 11, 2015.


15


can help efforts to combat online violent extremism; and similarly, the U.S. government should be

more proactive in alerting these firms to possible negative second-order consequences of their

technologies in the future.

Third, the U.S. should resist al-Qaeda’s rebranding strategy. While IS has grabbed

headlines with its raw brutality and mastery of social media, al-Qaeda’s rebranding efforts have

enabled it to garner significant support from both local populations and Sunni states. The U.S.

should take the lead in exposing the lies underpinning al-Qaeda’s rebranding campaign, and

reminding its partners of the various international legal frameworks that prohibit support for al-

Qaeda.

Fourth, legislators should immediately demand an explanation from the administration as

to why the CIA is arming and supporting rebel factions in Syria that are collaborating with Jabhat

al-Nusra. Numerous news reports, quoting U.S. officials, show that Syrian rebel factions that have

received arms, training, and funding from the CIA are collaborating on the battlefield with Nusra

in places like Idlib province.47 Regardless of the fact that some CIA-supported rebel factions

describe their collaboration with Nusra as an “uncomfortable marriage of necessity,” the fact

remains that weapons the CIA distributes to rebels in Syria are consistently ending up in Nusra’s

hands, and CIA-backed rebels have helped Nusra make gains.48 Fourteen years after the 9/11

attacks, there is no justification for the United States to be aiding an al-Qaeda affiliate. Legislators

should demand to know how and why this has happened, and should call for the administration to

end all of its foreign support that it knows will help al-Qaeda affiliates, or has reason to believe

will do so. Further, it may be worth inquiring whether any U.S. material support law were violated

in the process.

Thank you again for inviting me to testify today. I look forward to answering your

questions.

47 See, e.g., Ken Dilanian, “Officials: CIA-Backed Syrian Rebels Under Russian Blitz,” Associated Press, October

10, 2015. 48 Anne Barnard and Karim Shoumali, “U.S. Weaponry Is Turning Syria Into Proxy War with Russia,” New York

Times, October 12, 2015.

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross is a senior fellow at the Foundation forDefense of Democracies and is the chief executive officer of ValensGlobal, a D.C.-based consulting firm that focuses on analyzing andcrafting responses to the challenges posed by violent non-stateactors (VNSAs). He is also an adjunct assistant professor inGeorgetown University’s security studies program, and a lecturerat the Catholic University of America. Gartenstein-Ross is theauthor or volume editor of seventeen books and monographs, andhas published widely in the academic and popular press. Hefrequently conducts field research in relevant regions, includingNorth Africa and South Asia.Gartenstein-Ross frequently consults for clients who need to understand VNSAs andtwenty-first century conflict. His client work has included advising the U.S. Department ofDefense and Dutch ministry of foreign affairs on the crisis in North Africa, participating inlive hostage negotiations in the Middle East, conducting risk assessments for oil and gascompanies, undertaking border security work in Europe, and developing both stories andseries for major media companies. He regularly lectures for the U.S. Department ofDefense’s Leader Development and Education for Sustained Peace (LDESP) program, andhas designed and led training for the U.S. State Department’s Office of Anti-TerrorismAssistance.Gartenstein-Ross has taught or been on faculty at a number of major academic institutions,including the Catholic University of America, the University of Maryland, and the Universityof Southern California. He holds a Ph.D. in world politics from the Catholic University ofAmerica and a J.D. from the New York University School of Law. Gartenstein-Ross canconduct research in five languages.

1726 M Street NW ● Suite 700 ● Washington, DC 20036

Daveed Gartenstein-RossSenior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of DemocraciesChief Executive Officer, Valens Global

WRITTEN TESTIMONY BY THE HONORABLE ALBERTO M. FERNANDEZ

It is an honor to have been asked to address this Committee. For most of my 32 year career as a

Public Diplomacy Officer in the U.S. Foreign Service, serving mostly in the Middle East and the

Muslim world, the great and continuing challenges presented by the juxtaposition of the power

of media, radicalization, and political violence have been most salient in much of my work.

As Vice President of the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), I am fortunate to have

joined an independent institution which has for almost 20 years been in the forefront of

documenting and analyzing political, social and intellectual currents in the Middle East,

including the rise of terrorist groups like ISIS, al-Qa’ida, Hamas and Hizbullah and their use of

media, and especially social media, for propaganda purposes. MEMRI continues to meticulously

document the latest twists and turns of the extremist narrative, bridging the language gap for

Western audiences with translated primary material in Arabic, Turkish, Farsi and other

languages.

Radicalization and terrorism is nothing new in the world. In the late 19th

century and early 20th

century, influential individuals such as the anarchist leader Mikhail Bakunin popularized the

concept of the “propaganda of the deed,” that the best way to demonstrate the importance and

power of a political idea was to show it by concrete action, preferably by violent action. “We

must spread our principles, not with words but with deeds, for this is the most popular, the most

potent, and the most irresistible form of propaganda, " Bakunin wrote in 1870.

As scholarly studies such as the 2013 Rand Europe report on radicalization in the West have

shown, social media alone is not the creator or reason for radicalization but merely a very

powerful and effective accelerant. Social media takes concepts and actions already present in the

real world and rapidly disseminates it to a willing and receptive audience. It is a powerful idea

which seemingly has real effect in the actual world and which can then be dynamite in the virtual

world.

It is the narrative that gives power. This has certainly been the case throughout history when

people have been motivated by great causes, many of them political or religious, some of them

truly evil, to give all they had in the fulfillment of goals that to us clearly seem odious. When we

think of something like Leni Reifenstahl’s repulsive yet compelling 1935 documentary “The

Triumph of the Will, “ we are conscious of the technical quality, of the power of images, AND

of an ideological worldview that for millions of Germans at a particular time and place seemed

particularly potent and seductive. Reifenstahl’s skill added to the power of the message but it

was the message itself that was the wellspring of that evil. So it is with social media today,

which makes certain messages in certain spaces appealing to specific audiences easy to see and

seemingly difficult to remove.

While the narrative of some terrorist groups are tied to a specific political narrative such as

Hamas or Hizbullah, both albeit with a strong Islamist component, there are few narratives as

ambitious and as aggressive as that of the Islamic State. This is a complete package which

includes a strong ideological component deeply rooted in a specific Salafi Jihadist reading of the

period of formative Islam, a political project which is seemingly a going concern, and a 21st

century appeal to substantive and consequential participation aimed at youth searching for

purpose and identity in a seemingly aimless, empty and hedonistic world.

Indeed, one can marvel at the fact that so few have been motivated to join up with the

mesmerizing siren call of this revolutionary vanguard offering purpose, violence, sex, the end of

the world, and fulfillment in the path of God rather than so many. Despite the relatively small

numerical appeal of ISIS within the context of the number of Muslims worldwide, its impact has

been tremendous when coupled with that toxic accelerant which is social media.

So we have a message that is difficult for governments, both in the East and the West, to counter

directly. And you have an on the ground political reality, in Libya, in Nigeria, and especially in

the ISIS heartland in Eastern Syria and Western Iraq, that gives the propaganda the necessary

mooring it needs in the real world. What are the logical steps to be taken in confronting this

uniquely potent propaganda challenge?

Obviously, changing the political reality on the ground is one sure way of rapidly reducing the

impact of the propaganda. The shiny, soaring, scary object that was “Triumph of the Will” had

tremendous appeal in its heyday of the mid-30s, it had less so in the rubble of German cities in

1944-45. The gap between the propaganda and the reality was too wide to be breached by

celluloid. An ISIS Caliphate who predicates that it will conquer Constantinople, Rome and

America “by the permission of God,” is unmasked if it cannot hold Tel Abyad or Raqqa or

Mosul.

But given the difficult political-military reality and the difficulty in identifying on the ground

alternatives to the Islamic State, what are practical steps which can be taken now to mitigate the

appeal of the Islamic State and to at least try to put a blanket on that accelerant which is social

media?

On a strategic level, governments must identify ways to combat the basic pillars of Jihadist

Salafism which is the breeding ground from where this ISIS pathology emerges. It is important

to point out that this worldview does not emerge fully formed, Athena-like, out of nothing but

has been promoted by countries like Saudi Arabia – whether officially or unofficially – for

decades. Salafism, not all of which is pernicious, has for decades had the cash, the patronage,

the protection and the push that other trends and worldviews within Islam have lacked.

But much of the activity in this Salafi sphere does frankly promote a worldview which is very

conducive to radicalization, material that is extremely intolerant, anti-Semitic, anti-Christian, and

anti-all sorts of Muslims such as Shias or Sufis or others found insufficiently “Islamic” by this

worldview. Once the strategic decision is taken that a key part of the problem is Jihadist

Salafism, this can be tackled in a variety of ways. Some of the best ways to counter this may be

through quiet and frank conversation by our diplomats behind the scenes with local interlocutors

but this is still something than needs to be prioritized and done.

On the tactical level, there are a series of practical steps that need to be taken to begin to reverse

the head start the extremists have built up over the past few years. We need to recognize that

while social media propaganda is not super-expensive, we in the West have treated it with far

less urgency and importance than have our adversaries. ISIS is prolific, working 24/7, tailoring

its approach to the individual and nationality it is seeking to influence. The budget over a three

year period of the Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications (CSCC), for example,

which I headed for three years equaled cumulatively the cost of just one Reaper drone. It

accomplished some good things with small amounts of money but was always outnumbered and

outgunned in the very specific space we are talking about. We need to fund a media

counteroffensive appropriately. We don’t need to break the bank to fight this adversary in social

media but we do need to spend somewhat more than we have and spend more wisely.

In the highly charged narrow space we are talking about, the good guys are heavily

outnumbered. ISIS and its supporters are trolling and messaging 24/7 in large numbers. You

need a network to fight a network. The way to address this is to both increase the number of anti-

ISIS messengers and to make it more difficult for extremists to communicate freely while

recognizing that you will never be able to remove everyone and that the extremists’ message

needs to be actually confronted. An August 2015 MEMRI report minutely documented how an

ISIS hashtag campaign was “hijacked” by anti-ISIS twitter trolls. The hashtag #WeAllGive

BayahToKhalifah was massively interrupted with over 50% anti-ISIS material including a sorts

of mockery and even a lot of explicit sexual content within 24 hours. This hijacking limited the

reach of the ISIS media campaign, caused ISIS supporters to abandon the hashtag and is

something that was not happening a year ago at the height of the ISIS media offensive after the

declaration of the Caliphate.

Secondly, you need content. ISIS messaging is MOSTLY about a Utopian, grievance laden

version of Jihadist Salafism but it is presented in a wide range of tailored ways, many of these

approaches are not particularly violence filled. There has been some incremental progress in

this field but not enough. A sarcastic approach on Twitter such as ISIS Karaoke is an interesting

small-scale effort but this is not enough. Another recent effort comes from Japan where

#ISISchan uses the imagery and language of anime to push the revolutionary concept that

“knives are for cutting melons,” not heads. There are a number of reformers, liberals and

secularists throughout the Muslim world who have been fighting the good fight against

extremists, on their own for years even before the rise of ISIS. Maximizing the stories and

visuals of the steady stream of individuals disillusioned with the Islamic State is another resource

that counterterrorism communicators are aware of but that is still being used too little. There

also needs to be some sort of organized “off-ramp” in Western countries where returnees or

convicted, repentant supporters can look directly into a camera, like ISIS supporters often do,

and relate in their own words how they were wrong.

Much work can also be done in highlighting the voices and stories of Sunni Arab Muslim victims

of ISIS violence. The stories of the massacres of the Syrian Shaitat tribe or of the hundreds of

Iraqi Anbar province Sunni tribesmen or clerics are yet to be told in the words of those who

knew them. There are people today in Syrian refugee camps, on the road to Europe as refugees,

or being held as prisoners by friendly governments that can make a more compelling case than

we can directly on why joining ISIS is a really bad idea and underscore a basic criticism of ISIS

that actually has power, which is that most of its victims are the very Sunni Muslim population it

claims to represent. It is also pertinent to mention the heroic work of citizen journalist

collectives such as “Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently” and Mosul Eye, reporting bravely from

deep inside ISIS-controlled territory.

Deepening understanding among at risk populations about the rights and responsibilities of being

a citizen in the West is still another needed element. It has been a while since I was in school but

we generally seemed to do a good job in the United States in inculcating civic values about what

it means to be an American to our children. That is not the case elsewhere. I recently spoke to a

Northern European citizen who lamented that his country did a poor job in promoting love of

country among its immigrant population. The symbols and stories of the nation-state had,

because of a fear of extreme nationalism which has existed in Europe in the past, been

surrendered and instead of promoting loyalty, pride and inclusion all too often governments

promoted nothing, allowing a vacuum to exist which will be filled by others. As Bob Dylan

once said, “you’ve got to serve somebody,” and if you can’t serve and be proud of the country

you are in, you may go and try to find that with someone else.

More can also be done to digitally empower leaders and opinion-makers in at-risk communities

(both domestically and overseas) to be able to fund and support their own private, individualized

approaches to counterterrorism messaging. This will not all look the same or necessarily say the

things we would say, but that is alright as long as there is activity constant over time against

those who would radicalize the innocent and lead them to violent extremism. An individualized,

handmade approach to counter-radicalization can have power by the very nature of its

authenticity and independent nature. The very fact that such an approach doesn’t sound or look

like what the State Department spokesman would say gives it more, rather than less, credibility.

Radicalization through social media is often not the mass consumption of snuff videos but rather

the direction, intimate interaction between individuals who form a bond through cyberspace.

There is a role for vetted members of civil society in helping out in a very powerful, unique and

individualized way to intervene against these extremist interactions.

Finally, we need to recognize that just like extremists have flourished in the ungoverned corners

of the world on the ground – Waziristan, Somalia, Northern Mali, parts of Yemen, the chaos of

Syria and Iraq – they have also taken advantage of the mostly ungoverned space existing in

social media, in space provided by mostly American social media companies. Not all companies

are the same and there has been real progress made, for example, by Facebook in protecting its

space from ISIS supporters. Others have done less well with YouTube and especially Twitter

being far too open to the incitement and provocation of explicitly labelled propaganda by

Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) which should have no place in social media. Both those

companies are trying to do better, but they should do more to police the space they control and

ensure protection from misuse by FTOs and supporters in what often is abuse of the terms of

service of the companies themselves.

And there are still other online hosts, such as the San Francisco-based “Internet Archive”

founded by Brewster Kahle in 1996 which is frequently used by Jihadists as a safe harbor for

their material. Surely there has to be a better way to safeguard freedom of expression, preserve

online archives, and protect the public from terrorist propaganda. A bright light needs to be

shined on the work of companies so that there should at the very least be an informed and

rational discussion of the challenges that democratic open societies face in dealing with the

propaganda of violent radicals.

The political pathologies of the Middle East have very deep roots going back centuries which

can be addressed and mitigated by Western governments but in the end cannot be solved by

them. While the heavy military and political lifting can best be done by governments in the

region, many of whom have a longstanding and productive relationship with the United States,

there are a series of commonsense, relatively low cost steps that the US government alone, and in

partnership with friendly governments, with civil society, and with social media companies can,

and should, take to, at the very least, make the work of these terrorists seeking to radicalize the

unwary more difficult. As impressive as ISIS propaganda is, the impact has all too often been not

because it was so great but because there were little or no countermeasures taken by its

opponents.

ADICALIZATION SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE RISE OF

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