Extremism Archives - Page 5 of 6

May 29, 2019May 29, 2019 by Rise to Peace

Will the United Kingdom’s Online Harms White Paper Curb Extremism but Allow Expression?

On April 8, Theresa May turned to Twitter to make a bold statement. Upon the release of the United Kingdom’s Online Harms White Paper, a tweet noted, “The era of social media companies regulating themselves is over.” The 102-page policy document urges the establishment of new regulations which will hold all social media companies liable for harmful and extremist content. Is this a sensible way to deal with digital extremism?

Social media companies and platforms have a part to play in making the internet a safer place. In order to combat harmful content, the United Kingdom seeks to hold companies such as Google, Facebook, and Twitter responsible. Authorities in the United Kingdom plan to enforce penalties for harmful content, which would be a fine of 4% of global turnover or 20 million euro ($23 million), whichever is greater.

In addition to the fines, the United Kingdom aspires to create a regulatory body, and enact bans and restrictions on user content, limiting what citizens can view. Regulations on internet freedoms and bans will undoubtedly anger citizens. Countries such as Russia and China have similar authoritarian beliefs. Liberal democratic nations adopting parallel legislation potentially legitimizes such restrictions and can be viewed as a victory for extremists.

Overreaction by the government of the United Kingdom has extremely detrimental consequences. Changing online regulations and censoring citizens is a flawed legislative move. Passing this particular law encourages extremists because it shows their actions initiate socio-political change and cause legislative action. Further, it provokes pessimism in financial markets by causing a greater risk for tech startups.

Proactive responses to digital extremism and hoping to make the internet a safer place are at the core of the United Kingdom’s argument. The May government is correct in its mission, but its execution needs more work. Fining social media companies and censorship of user content seems more like a punishment rather than a solution.

The United Kingdom is faced with a few considerations should it proceed with the proposed White Paper. Public safety is of the utmost importance, as is the ability of free expression. Fining companies for the negligence of extreme content is justifiable. As extreme content lingers, it continues to spread. Thus, social media platforms are directly responsible for stopping hateful and extremist messaging.

Major social media companies — Facebook, Twitter, YouTube — must update their Terms of Service and ask all users to act as moderators. If content appears to be approaching an extreme or violent conclusion, it should be reported by the community. False reports regarding extreme content should have penalties as well, in order to ensure users are being responsible. This avenue permits millions to help protect cyberspace on their own terms. It would allow citizens to come together to combat online hate, which presents a powerful message against extremism.

If the UK plans on changing its online usage and how its users interact in online spaces, the people should have a say. The solutions in the United Kingdom’s Online Harms White Paper need to be more focused. The 12 weeks of consultation have begun and will end July 1st.

Currently, the resolutions to the proposed issues are very broad and seem severe. The best way to ensure a safer internet space is to create a unified community of users. Group accountability will help ensure the internet is a safer place as the people of the United Kingdom define it. This could be the beginning of a safer internet and a model for other countries.

March 8, 2019March 3, 2019 by John Wilson

Who are Warren Christopher Clark and Zaid Abed al-Hamid?

Warren Christopher Clark (left) and Zaid Abed al-Hamid (right) in SDF Custody.

In January 2019, Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) captured a group of men who they state were seeking to launch attacks against civilians fleeing the small pockets of territory still under Islamic State control. The group consisted of men from around the globe, including Pakistan, Ireland, and the United States. Warren Christopher Clark and Zaid Abed al-Hamid, two of the men captured by SDF forces, were named and identified as American citizens by their captors on social media based on forms of identification on their persons. Clark, who goes by the kunya of Abu Mohammad al-Ameriki, has since been positively identified as an American from Texas. Al-Hamid, who now goes by Abu Zaid al-Ameriki, has a much less clear background.

Clark’s background has been explored and significant insight has been gained from Clark himself in videotaped interviews he participated in while in SDF custody. Clark is a former substitute teacher from the Houston metropolitan area. It is believed that Clark is 34 years of age. It has been confirmed that he graduated from University of Houston, where he majored in political science and minored in global business. After several years of being a substitute teacher, Clark began to watch videos of the Islamic State online. Curious, Clark was able to make contact with an Islamic State representative, sending them a resume and cover letter explaining his desire to teach English to children in the caliphate. Clark states that he is a convert to Islam, though it is unclear when he converted. After traveling to Syria via Turkey, Clark states that he never picked up arms for the caliphate. In interviews after he was captured, Clark stated that he did not regret joining the group, and even justified beheadings conducted by the group, comparing them to executions in the United States criminal justice system.

While questions remain about al-Hamid and his background, it is known that he is originally from Trinidad, where he was detained in 2011 for plotting to kill their prime minister. Beyond this, al-Hamid was featured in numerous Islamic State propaganda videos where he discusses converting to Islam and the struggles he faced practicing his religion there. Rumors have circulated that al-Hamid is a dual-US citizen. This has not been confirmed, but his use of al-Ameriki in his kunya suggests some background in the United States. When al-Hamid made his journey to the caliphate, he brought along his wife and multiple children. It is unclear if they are still alive.

Clark, who has been transferred to US custody and brought back to Texas, has since been indicted and charged with providing material support to the Islamic State. The indictment covers a period from 2011, when he first drew the attention of federal law enforcement officials for online activities pertaining to jihadists social media entities.

Early investigation into both Clark and al-Hamid has not resulted in substantial findings in terms of potential solutions for further countering violent extremist ideology. Both Clark and al-Hamid were converts to Islam. In both of their lives, it appears that there was or may have been a feeling of marginalization within society. Clark, despite having a formal education, could not find a full-time position teaching. Al-Hamid, in Islamic State propaganda videos, stated that he struggled practicing his faith in Trinidad and felt like an outsider. Both men appeared to have been at least partially influenced by online extremist sites.

The lessons learned thus far in both Clark and al-Hamid’s cases is limited. However, perceived or real marginalization appears to be an underlying factor in both cases respectfully. Time will dictate policy recommendations to prevent radicalization, but one cannot ignore the continuous appearance of marginalization in case studies of those who have become radicalized towards extremist ideologies.

December 3, 2018December 10, 2018 by Sonia Lay

Psyops: A New Frontier in Counterterror?

Image result for psychological operations

An American soldier spreads free newspapers to the people of Baghdad as part of a mission in psychological operations. Image credit: Department of Defense.

“Capture their minds, and their hearts and souls will follow”.

This slogan, popular among psyops experts, clearly exemplifies the main implications and targets of psychological operations in war.

The term “psyops” refers to strategic operations aiming to evoke emotional reactions in other people. Daniel Lerner, Social Scientist and Military Intelligence Officer in World War II, identified three levels of psychological operations:

White Propaganda: characterized by gentle methods of persuasion. The information given is truthful and not strongly biased. Sources are cited. At this level, the most powerful techniques are narratives, framing, omissions and emphasis.
Grey Propaganda: the source of information is ambiguous or non-disclosed, but the messages cannot be proven false. Information shows a clear bias, and a combination of omissions and selective emphasis is used.
Black Propaganda: achieves its objectives by means of falsifications. Its purpose is to create confusion and deceive its audience about the origins of information. This strategy has proven to be the least effective and durable in the long term.

Today, psychological operations play a key role in counterterrorism programs. If properly used, strategic communication can help induce a shift in human behaviors and attitudes- potentially making psyops a kep weapon in the fight against terrorism.

According to current approaches and approved studies, in the war against terrorism psychological planned activities are expected to act on at least four areas, with the purpose of:

inhibiting people from joining terrorist groups;
producing dissent within groups;
facilitating exit from groups;
reducing support for groups and their leaders.

Before being able to change human emotions, every counterterrorism strategy must first understand what causes them. For this reason, it is of primary importance to investigate the variables that motivate people to join extremist groups before we can engage in successful psyops.

Messages spread by jihadist extremists clearly label their enemies as disbelievers and invaders. These strong and dangerous beliefs are a powerful means of promoting extremist ideology, and must be countered with our own narratives. In order to be effective, these counter-narratives should be able to reverse the effects of jihadi propaganda by promoting a positive image of democratic societies and values. Psyops can be used to introduce potential radicals to more positive images of secular society.

Peace-building is an extremely complex and delicate task, one which requires the intervention of several forces and involves a wide range of actors coming from different cultural backgrounds. Even so, we must not give up hope. The stakes are high: if we are successful, the reward will be more freedom, respect and peace for all of global society.

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June 26, 2018October 3, 2018 by Gabriel Piccillo

Countering Youth Extremism in Iraq: A Generational Challenge

Of the many countries around the world affected by terrorism in recent years, few have suffered to the degree that Iraq has. The brutal terrorist group known by various names including ISIS, ISIL, and Daesh has drastically damaged the country’s economy and infrastructure. More than anything else, it has brought a great deal of bloodshed and suffering to the country’s people. Through international cooperation and resolve Iraq has made great strides in disrupting, weakening, and dismantling ISIS by targeting its leadership, financial resources, and sources of propaganda. The battle to prevent the group from re-emerging, however, is far from over. Fortunately, the international community finds itself at a place in time wherein preventing groups like ISIS from flourishing is possible.

Qayyarah, Iraq © Cosimoattanasio – Redline

The Federal Government of Iraq announced months ago that the terrorist group had been defeated. This may be true. But eradicating and preventing Daesh and groups like it from reemerging presents the greatest obstacle to sustained peace and stability. In order to address this issue, it is crucial that local governing authorities within the country, aided by logistical support from the international community, take steps to de-radicalize and reintegrate the children who’ve been taken as intellectual hostages by terrorist ideology. Without so doing, the terrorist narrative will be passed onto future generations.

According to Peter W. Singer from Brookings, despite, “…global consensus against sending children into battle…there are 300,000 children under 18 (boys and girls) serving as combatants in almost 75 percent of the world’s conflicts; in 80 percent of these, there are child fighters under 15, and in 18 percent, fighters less than 12 years old.” Many children have fought alongside terrorist groups carrying out executions, acting as suicide bombers, and contributing – to an increasingly large degree – to the development and proliferation of extremist propaganda. Terrorist groups see children as invaluable in passing their ideology onto future generations. Children are vulnerable to manipulation and are seen as effective vehicles for carrying out surprise attacks against terror organization’s enemies.

In the face of poverty and despair, children with little access to education often see joining terrorist groups as a source of income, pride, and adventure. They join terrorist groups because they provide them with a feeling of purpose and belonging. Addressing the issues that enable children and their families to see terrorist groups as feasible paths to a decent quality of life is crucial to preventing such groups from being able to successfully recruit children.

A variety of steps should be taken by international organizations, nonprofits, civil society, and local governments to tackle at its ideological roots the challenge of modern-day terror in Iraq. In order to address child terrorism, it is crucial that steps are taken to identify and weaken the structures and mechanisms through which terrorist groups recruit and mobilize youths. Religious leaders have a significant role to play here. It is critical that religious leaders who children see as role models and sources of guidance are encouraged to explicitly denounce false and perverted interpretations of Islam espoused and promulgated by groups like ISIS. In so doing, it’s possible that fewer children will be vulnerable to terrorist recruitment. Further, it increases the possibility of youths themselves speaking out against terrorist ideology. This, in turn, would prevent children from subscribing to the terrorist ideology for that sense of camaraderie and belonging.

Rudaw – An ISIS propaganda photo shows a prayer session for child soldiers

Steps should also be taken to strengthen the fragile education system in parts of rural Iraq to make it harder for terrorist groups to indoctrinate children with their views. Developing Iraq’s education system through international cooperation and ensuring that educators are teaching peaceful Islamic values is vital to preventing terrorist groups from preaching violence and hate to children. Schooling must be made affordable and accessible as well. Throughout ISIS’s rise and brief reign, impoverished families were forced to send their children to schools that taught extremist interpretations of Islam. Ensuring Iraq’s future generations are provided with quality alternatives to schools of this nature is an important step toward inoculating them against extremism’s allure.

Adopting measures to heighten the accountability of everyone – from religious and terrorist leaders to family members – for terrorist activity perpetrated by recruited youth, is also paramount to discourage the proliferation of terrorist groups’ extremist ideologies. Demonstrating that Iraq’s judicial system is capable of identifying and bringing to justice those who contribute to the radicalization of children will discourage adults from engaging in the practice thereof.

Michael Kamber/The New York Times

Defeating terrorism in Iraq will be a generational challenge. Reducing the pool of desperate, vulnerable children available for terrorist recruitment can only be achieved through improved living standards and access to education. According to Brookings’ Singer, “…underlying problems of hopelessness often lead children (and even their parents) to believe they have no better future than joining terrorism and its likely outcome of an early death.” Fadl Abu Hein, a psychology lecturer from Gaza, notes, “Martyrdom has become an ambition for our children. If they had a proper education in a normal environment, they wouldn’t have sought value in death.”

Defeating terrorism in Iraq and preventing it from reemerging is possible. Addressing the socioeconomic factors that render children vulnerable to extremist recruitment is indispensable to a comprehensive long-term counterterrorism strategy. The international community must help guide Iraq in its efforts to provide its younger generation with a better education, an improved economic environment, and finally, hope. As long as Iraqi youths lack such opportunities they will seek meaning and welfare anywhere it can be found. As long as terror organizations can provide such things, they will be able to recruit from a pool of Iraq’s most vulnerable.

References

Singer, Peter W. “The New Children of Terror.” Brookings, Brookings, 28 July 2016, www.brookings.edu/research/the-new-children-of-terror/.

“Saving the ‘Cubs of the Caliphate.’” Fair Observer, Fair Observer, 5 June 2018, www.fairobserver.com/region/middle_east_north_africa/iraqi-youth-countering-violent-extremism-isis-middle-east-latest-news-65241/.

“Iraq Research: Sense of Injustice Is Key to Violent Extremism.” United States Institute of Peace, 28 Dec. 2016, www.usip.org/publications/2016/01/iraq-research-sense-injustice-key-violent-extremism.

Press Release – June 5, 2018, et al. “Iraq: Extremism & Counter-Extremism.” Counter Extremism Project, 9 May 2018, www.counterextremism.com/countries/iraq.

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January 31, 2018October 3, 2018 by Austin Ludolph

The Laptop Bomb: The Latest Extremist Weapon and Homeland Security Nightmare

The new threat for TSA and Homeland Security officials is not suicide bombers, but what is being described as a “laptop bomb”. For many years now, terrorist organizations – such as ISIS, Al-Shabaab, even dating back to Al-Qaeda – have been working steadily to create a bomb that can slip through x-ray machines and make its way onto an aircraft. This has caused a nightmare for the Department of Homeland Security due to the worry “that ISIS is particularly tech-savvy and has shown an unusual willingness to turn consumer tech into weapons” [1].

One event that sparked the questioning of x-ray machine usage at U.S. airports was the detonation of a laptop bomb on a Daallo Airlines passenger plane back on February 2nd, 2016. Officials say that “suspect Abdullahi Abdisalam Borleh, a Somali national, carried the laptop computer with a bomb in it onto Daallo Airlines Flight 159” [2]. The bomb detonated before the plane reached its normal cruising altitude, essentially saving the plane and its passengers from something that could have been devastating. It still raised the question of exactly how Abdullahi managed to slip this explosives-laden laptop through security systems and x-rays at the airport. A scarcity of upgraded systems could have caused the bomb to slip through security. “Most airports in the developed world use the latest generation of multiview X-ray machines, but some airports in less developed parts of the world still use single-view X-ray machines significantly less reliable in detecting explosives” [2]. The U.S. has state of the art security and x-ray machines in its airports, but it would take only one snafu to allow a bomb through.

The laptop bomb’s arrival has coincided with attempts to smuggle bombs in shoes, purses, and even underwear. “Saudi-born (Ibrahim al-)Asiri, 34, who was based in Yemen, was behind the failed Christmas Day attempt in 2009 to bring down a Detroit-bound plane by a suicide bomber with plastic explosives sewn into his underwear” [4]. This demonstrates how dedicated to achieving their goals terrorists are and the lengths to which they will go.

One of President Trump’s principal campaign objectives was to tighten U.S. security and border protection. In response to a growing number of threats from ISIS and other intel, the Trump Administration announced a ban that “forced passengers to put any devices larger than a cell phone in their checked baggage,” [3] from, “10 airports in Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.” [3] A foiled plot that involved “explosives hidden in a fake iPad that appeared as good as the real thing” [4] was one of many factors that prompted the ban. Public outrage soon followed, and people began to question if it was a requisite security measure or “Islamophobia”. Since then, security procedures have been revamped and new measures have been implemented, discontinuing the ban.

There will always be a struggle to stay one step ahead in the battle between Homeland Security and terrorist organizations. As Homeland Security updates their technology and screening processes for passengers, terrorist organizations will continue to test their newest variants until they fulfill their perennial goal of taking down a U.S. (or U.S. bound) commercial airliner. It will be a difficult task; U.S. airport screening processes are top-notch.

Sources:

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