Brett Daniel Shehadey
Special Contributor for In Homeland Security
All enemies have to first be “perceived” to be fought. Such perception can change or shift under varying conditions, information, narratives and agendas. This means that the enemy must be communicated to and from the speakers and their audiences; the most compelling arguments and reasons must be given as to why this one actor is bad and remains bad for Islam. If there is no more communication or a lack of clear information, there can be no more external jihad and certainly no successful jihad. The airwaves and the internet are the real center of war but the gravity that pulls these groups to action are perception streams that surface.
Perception is the key to the heart of the world and the entire Middle East. Characterization, vilification, on-going deeds or interactions- all create a pattern and excuse to wage war. For the international jihadists, this is even more crucial and extreme in the waging and continuing of violent jihad. Such information events that can be communicated are the triggers and the wheels of international jihad.
Everything is perception, whether the success of other terrorist attacks, the jihad culture of operational trends and methods (e.g. prison breaks); Western and Israeli actions, conflicts in Muslim states—all is proportional to image. If there is no news, they can only make some up for so long; eventually they will run out of credibility. They rely on a perceived “aggression” from their “perceived” enemy.
One reason that Islamic jihadist attacks are based on information, communication and perception is because “jihad” still remains a “defensive” doctrine of Islam. This is not done because the most extreme and violent elements want to be defensive but because it can only scholarly and morally be continued as such. Thus their justification and legitimacy of jihad is crucial to its rise as much to its discontinuance. It is also far easier to persuade a foreign Muslim audience of the continued need of “resistance” only when such continued atrocities remain present and loudly visible. As there are so many enemies to Islam in the mind of an extremist-fundamentalist, it is impossible to destroy them all or purge them from the larger international Islamic community. Therefore the loudest and most visible are targeted.
It is, in the eyes of jihadists, justified only in that the pure and faithful Muslims are being persecuted by a greater evil than they could possible inflict. While they preach extremes like “death to [all] Americans” the majority of their audience still rests on the most “defensive” interpretations. Many Muslims and non-Muslims around the world would love to see the downfall of America but after they contemplate just what that would mean to the fullest extent it is both unrealistic, perilous and counterproductive in the aggregate and to their needs.
The perturbations and disturbances that are felt or seen raise a cultural/religious alarm in the most fundamentalist Muslims first. This then trickles through an intensified propaganda campaign narrative according to various international, regional and local agendas by a plethora of groups and individuals. They are a loose bunch that is not hierarchical or vertical but horizontal. It is the information of events and their directed and modified communication of the day that permits the dotted line to connect the community, hubs, cells and the network together.
When the news presents itself in favor of terrorism, terrorism increases [with successful attacks]. When certain methods are pulled-off against perceived enemy forces, they are copy-catted and adopted by other jihadists but only for a short amount of time are they popular; especially if security services can counter them successfully. Most important for the most distant states like the USA, will be the negative image.
If America is paying less money on defense and having national security funding issues and it is in the news for a long time- this now becomes a true feed that is exaggerated with a new narrative, something to the tune of ‘the Americans are at their weakest right now and ripe for an attack.’
This means that the more news about American activities in Middle East, North Africa, drone attacks that kill civilians, wars, or support of Israel- the greater the directed attacks at the USA. It is not possible for international jihad to carry out the attacks they desire when the American image is not negative or when another actor is more negative. For this very reason, European states have had a better image for the reason mentioned above. It is a matter of publicity and priority for jihadists as much as it is opportunity. Support, funding and momentum is not there as much as international cooperation against damaging the status quo- states pitch in, share intelligence, take the operatives neutralize planned attacks or jihadists at this stage.
We also see that perception, image and events triggered the recent Islamic revolutions in states as well with the same mechanical precision as the flare of mob dynamics- protest movements and Islamic militancy surrounding embassies, for example all happen because of informational pressure points. Even the most hardline core finds that it ebbs and flows- swells or caves- depending on the bad and emotional information they receive and their respective present narrative. For this reason a jihadist may attempt to create their own news but these are the most difficult to do and potential for failure is at its highest.
What does that mean for the US?
America continues to spend most of its time and money fighting the last terrorist attack. After reading a classic of 2001 by Steven Emerson, “American Jihad,” it reoccurred to me that there is a much wider evolution of international jihad against America and its allies. There are really multiple jihadists and multiple layers of jihadist propaganda and perception streams. The ties jihadists have consist of layers of: 1) the deed and 2) the word and 3) the silent struggle work together in mesh and there is also existent those perception streams that are triggered or deactivated by a threshold of emotional events and other methods of jihadist manipulation, incitement and recruitment.
The key for the anti-terrorist or counterterrorist is to remain invisible but at the same time highly active and successful. Those operatives’ governments must appear strong on the surface, permanent, demonstrate universal morality and be successful at the real “secret” war against international jihadists.
A few tips for the West: play on the fears of highly superstitious men; set ablaze rumors and rumors of rumors; take advantage of the classic world’s word of mouth; highlight jihadist backlash in balance, so as not to upset or do the work of the enemy propagandist; highlight new technologies that project the fear of Allah into the natives; promote and produce narratives that make the only remaining words: ‘Allah is blessing the American Republic’ and continue to force one of the main objectives- America is right and the jihadists are wrong; or if this is not possible, at least that America is more holy than the “so called” holy men who directly plan to attack the women, the children and the old men.
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