CQ HOMELAND SECURITY
April 4, 2008 - 8:03 p.m.
New Report Tracks Relationship Between Al Qaeda and Jihadist Media
By Matt Korade, CQ Staff

It must have been hard for the world’s most notorious terrorists to admit.

Al Qaeda was becoming so alarmed over the undisciplined postings by amateur jihadists, it published a study explicitly decrying the practice.

The al Qaeda report, titled “Media Exuberance,” warned that scattershot efforts undertaken “without official authority or prior study” undermined the group’s “credibility” and was taking attention away from them.

While Western media outlets had managed to maintain their credibility in spite of the “information revolution” taking place - a respectability evidenced by the fact that information often flowed to ABC and CNN rather than from them, the report pointed out - supporters would have to be more careful with information they put online. Otherwise, they risk losing “a weapon that we desperately need” - a meaningful presence on the Internet.

That tidbit came out at a release of a report on the terror group’s online activities, “The al-Qaeda Media Nexus: the Virtual Network Behind the Global Message,” written by Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty correspondent Daniel Kimmage.

The report attempts to answer some key questions about the relationship between al Qaeda and affiliated movements and the structure of jihadist media. It is clear from the study that online media is critical to al Qaeda’s success, the author wrote.

The study also found that:

● The “original” al Qaeda led by Osama bin Laden accounts for a fraction of the jihadist media.

● Terrorist units that produce and distribute jihadist media create important links between al Qaeda and its affiliates.

● The key media entities that in particular link al Qaeda to the rest of the world are Fajr, Global Islamic Media Front and Saham.

● These and other media entities serve as the network’s “virtual connective tissue” and should be targeted for operations intended to disrupt the effectiveness of jihadist media.

● The jihadist media are attempting to boost credibility and control messaging by mimicking traditional Web formats.

The report comes at a significant time in the life of al Qaeda, the panelists said; its 20th anniversary is this August. Such longevity is rare for a terrorist group, and this anniversary comes at a troubled
time.

Beaten back in Iraq and recently denounced by former supporters, such as Sayyed Imam al-Sharif, one of the movement’s living legends, al Qaeda increasingly has had to reach out to supporters to make its case.

This, coupled with the upcoming presidential election, could be a potent mix for a group desperate to reassert its relevancy, the panelists said.

Given that al Qaeda has made its presence felt in previous presidentialelections, “one could see this tremendous activity of theirs . . . as laying the foundation for another dramatic event,” said Bruce
Hoffman, a journalist and professor in security studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.

Last December, the group’s media campaign has culminated in bin Laden’s second-in-command, Ayam al Zawahiri’s agreement to answer questions from concerned sympathizers.

If bin Laden’s strategy was to overthrow moderate Muslim governments, he has done a terrible job of it, said noted author and terrorism expert Peter Bergen. His organization is on the run while the governments he targeted are now stronger than ever, and the fact that Zawahiri made the
attempt to communicate is a sign of the group’s waning influence.

“To me, that is the way these things begin to end,” Bergen said. The terror group’s decline could be accelerated by pointing out the inconsistencies between its rhetoric and reality - criticizing, for
example, al Qaeda’s repeated killings of Muslim children, the panelists said. But attempts by Western nations to discredit radical jihad typically meet with failure; for any criticisms to be effective,
they must remain within the Muslim and particularly the hard-line community.

“The best thing we have going for us is al Qaeda itself,” said Frank J. Cilluffo, director of George Washington University’s Homeland Security Policy Institute.

The fact that al Zawahiri spun his responses to some hard-hitting questions of supporters showed that he recognized how important it was to regain the rhetorical ground. But the group’s resiliency has proven predictions of its demise wrong more than once, Hoffman said.

“Maybe this is the beginning of the end of al Qaeda, but I don’t think they’ll go out without a bang,” Hoffman said.

Matt Korade can be reached at mkorade@cq.com.

Source: CQ Homeland Security
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