Category: Foreign Fighters

The Clear Banner: The Death of Moroccan Exceptionalism: A Brief History of Moroccan Salafi Jihadism and Current Jihadist Trends

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

NOTE: For prior parts in the Clear Banner series you can view an archive of it all here.
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The Death of Moroccan Exceptionalism: A Brief History of Moroccan Salafi Jihadism and Current Jihadist Trends
By Jeffrey D. Palmer
As the conflicts in Syria and Iraq continue to attract foreign fighters, nations around the globe are formulating policies designed to mitigate the threat of radicalized and battle-hardened returnees from conducting terrorist attacks in their countries of origin. In the case of the Kingdom of Morocco, a real threat has emerged from the unprecedented mobilization of Moroccan jihadists to the region. The basis of this threat is illustrated by a parallel case of the returning Moroccan contingent trained in Afghanistan during the Taliban rule of the late 1990s. Here, hundreds of Moroccans received radical indoctrination and training in heavy weapons and explosives throughout various Salafi jihadi training camps. The knowledge and experience gained in these camps were subsequently employed in Morocco’s first-ever domestic terrorist attacks – a series of suicide bombings in the kingdom’s economic capital of Casablanca. In Syria and Iraq, over one thousand Moroccan nationals and hundreds of Europeans of Moroccan origin have now joined extremist organizations. Many members of these organizations have explicitly stated their intentions to perpetrate violent attacks in Morocco upon their return. Morocco and its monarchy, once the exception to Salafi jihadist domestic terrorism, has now become the direct target of such attacks.
The Vanguard of Moroccan Salafi Jihadism:
The events on May 16, 2003 marked the end of “Moroccan Exceptionalism” – the notion that Morocco’s Maliki school of Sunni jurisprudence had made the kingdom impervious to Salafi jihadist terror attacks. On that day, twelve suicide bombers detonated their explosive devices and ripped through the streets of Casablanca, killing themselves and 33 civilians. Under a subsequent anti-terrorism law, some 5,000 individuals would be arrested in a matter of months as the Moroccan government scrambled to bring any person associated with the attacks to justice.1 Operating under a broad definition of terrorism, many of the individuals caught up in the dragnet were swiftly convicted for crimes ostensibly related to the incident. Although the Moroccan authorities may have hoped to retain national prestige by attributing the attacks to foreign actors, the evidence pointed to an organization called the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group as having a key role. The vanguard of Moroccan Salafi jihadism had arrived.
Salafi Jihadist Terrorism in Morocco:
The Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (MICG), a Salafi jihadist organization founded in Afghanistan, was implicated as having a key organizational role in the 2003 Casablanca bombings. A year later several leading members of the MICG were convicted for their involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings. In light of these incidents, Moroccan security forces, in collaboration with European counterparts, worked to dismantle the MICG and liquidate the organization’s leadership with an aggressive counterterrorism campaign.2 However, in March and April of 2007, another string of attacks involving cells linked to MICG members would occur throughout Casablanca. In contrast to the 2003 bombings, these attacks were remarkably unsuccessful and claimed only one life besides those of the bombers.3 Although the lack of organization provided some insights with regards to the organization’s apparently declining capabilities, the 2007 attacks demonstrated to the Moroccan government that the threat of domestic Salafi jihadism remained a preeminent issue of national security.
Four years later, another incident would materialize in the wake of the so-called Arab Spring. On April 28, 2011, an explosive device was remotely detonated in the Argana Café, a restaurant frequented by tourists in Marrakech’s thriving Jemaa al-Fna markets. The blast claimed 17 lives and was attributed to an independent Moroccan jihadist cell.4 As Jack Kalpakian aptly wrote of Moroccan Salafi jihadist intentions, “The aim of these attacks was to wage war against both the Moroccan state and the society it represents because it views both as pagan.”5 In order to better understand how this Salafi jihadist ideology gave rise in Morocco, it is necessary to look back to the 1970s, during the reign of King Hassan II.
From Moroccan Wahhabism to the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group:
In the mid-1970s, Morocco’s King Hassan II attempted to gain political leverage over the rising Islamist and leftist parties by establishing bilateral relations with the Saudi Kingdom. In return for financial support to be used for the conflict in the Western Sahara, the Moroccan king allowed the Saudis to import their Wahhabi version of Islam into the country. With virtues of political conservatism and obedience to rulers, the Wahhabist school of thought seemed to align with the greater Moroccan political agenda.6 However, King Hassan II’s strategic alignment with the Saudi kingdom would have grave consequences, as it would greatly contribute to the rise of the Salafi jihadist phenomenon in Morocco.
By 1991, as the United States was staging troops in Saudi Arabia for the conflict in the Gulf War, radicalization among Moroccan Wahhabist leaders began to emerge. During this time, Moroccan clerics were being attracted to the Saudi Islamic tradition in part because of the vast economic resources being provided by the oil-rich Riyadh.7 These conditions gave rise to notable Moroccan Wahhabi clerics such as Mohamed Fizazi, who had by this time declared open support for Osama bin Laden’s vision.8 Fizazi promoted a strict Islamic ideology with an emphasis on jihad. His group would come to be branded by the Moroccan government as “Salafia Jihadia.”
In September 1996, the Taliban had consolidated political power and installed the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. As a result, some Moroccan Salafists began to migrate to Afghanistan in order to take part in the manifestation of the Salafist ideology. The small Moroccan foreign fighter contingent in Afghanistan had originally joined the ranks of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG). By this time, the Libyans had already established installations designed to facilitate and train incoming foreign fighters from North Africa.
As the Moroccan foreign fighter contingent in Afghanistan grew larger, the MICG would be formed. At a meeting in London in early 2000, al-Qaeda’s Abu Qatada al-Filistini would give his blessings to the leaders of the incipient organization, Mohammed Guerbouzi and Noureddine Nafia, on the formation of the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group. In this meeting, Abu Qatada emphasized the importance of strong organizational infrastructure and strategic vision. Abu Qatada additionally informed Guerbouzi and Nafia that attacks against the Kingdom of Morocco would be permissible.9 A subsequent mutual agreement between the leadership of both organizations, apparently made in good faith, allowed Moroccans belonging to the LIFG to join the MICG.10
According to testimony provided by Noureddine Nafia, a meeting with Ayman al-Zawahiri in July 2000 would yield even greater collaboration between the MICG and al-Qaeda. After the meeting, and with consent from the Taliban, al-Qaeda trainers assisted the MICG in establishing a reception center in Jalalabad and a training camp called Tarek ben Ziyad.11 At Tarek ben Ziyad, members of the MICG underwent further religious indoctrination; learned how to falsify identification documents; and received training on coordinated and remotely detonated explosive devices. MICG members also continued to receive training in weapons and explosives at al-Qaeda and LIFG training camps.12
In August 2001, leaders of the MICG would meet Osama bin Laden for the first time in Kandahar. Here, bin Laden urged the leaders to establish a jihadist base within Morocco. Shortly after their meeting, Osama bin Laden granted permission for the MICG to access all al-Qaeda affiliated camps in Afghanistan.13 However, upon the 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, most MICG members fled the country. As a result, many Salafi jihadists brought their new skills back to their countries of origin.
Saad al-Houssaini, “The Chemist,” was one such member. Having traveled to Afghanistan in early 1997, al-Houssaini had trained in al-Qaeda camps and had made contact with al-Qaeda leadership, including Ayman al-Zawahiri Jama’at

Check out my new ‘Policy Watch’ for the Washington Institute: "Syria: The Epicenter of Future Jihad"

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin


For jihadists, the Syrian war recalls Afghanistan in the 1980s and 1990s for various reasons. Perhaps most notably, in both conflicts groups traveled from other battlefields to fight and train for future jihad upon returning home. This comparison truly signals Syria’s emergence as the epicenter of the global jihadist movement, even if more attention has rightly been given in recent weeks to Iraq. Just as events in Afghanistan spawned many later insurgencies and terrorist attacks, many future threats will now likely emanate from or have a connection back to Syria.

LEGACY OF THE “AFGHAN ARABS”

During the latter years of the anti-Soviet jihad in the 1980s and, later, the fight against the Afghan puppet communist regime and the Taliban’s rise in the 1990s, individuals from jihadist national groups and, in some cases, the groups themselves traveled to Afghanistan to set up camp, train, and acquire new skills. Most often, these groups used the Afghan safe haven to escape harassment within their home countries. The groups also used Afghanistan as a planning site for insurgencies and terrorist attacks at home, with some such endeavors receiving seed money from al-Qaeda’s Usama bin Laden. Unlike the national jihadist groups, al-Qaeda focused on providing training for foreign-fighter insurgencies in central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Balkans. Al-Qaeda was also involved in planning terrorist attacks against Western targets, interests, or the states themselves.
Beyond the known cases of al-Qaeda terrorist attacks, national jihadist groups that graduated from Afghanistan include the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, Algerian Armed Islamic Group, and Egyptian al-Gamaa al-Islamiyah. All were involved in multiyear insurgencies in the early- to mid-1990s that killed many innocents. Other low-level insurgencies or terrorist attacks played out in Tunisia with the Tunisian Combat Group, in Morocco with the Moroccan Islamic Combat Group, in Uzbekistan with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), in China with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, in Indonesia with Jemaah Islamiyah, and in Yemen with the Aden-Abyan Islamic Army. Whereas many of these groups evoke the past, Syria is producing its own new generation of national jihadist groups, in addition to the global leaders, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) — now the Islamic State (IS) — and Jabhat al-Nusra (JN).
Click here to read the rest.

The Clear Banner: "Update on the French Volunteers in Syria"

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

NOTE: For prior parts in the Clear Banner series you can view an archive of it all here.
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Update on the French Volunteers in Syria
By Stéphane Mantoux
The phenomenon of French jihad in Syria began to get media exposure in 2013, two years after the beginning of the revolution, the civil war, and the intervention of foreign fighters alongside insurgents. For France, the magnitude of the phenomenon is unprecedented, far exceeding the Iraqi or Afghan experience. Departures are accelerating since the summer of 2013 and did not appear to have been hampered by the conflict between the Islamic State in Iraq and Sham (ISIS) and Jabhat al-Nusra (JN). Persons involved in jihad have some commonalities, including radicalization via the Internet and social networks, but typical profile does not really exist for French jihadists: they are actually quite varied. With few exceptions, departures are not carried out by organized networks or veterans of radical Islam in France: they are often individual, spontaneous and so for the most unpredictable. The issue of the return of the French jihadists concerned authorities, and a first attempted attack on French soil has probably been thwarted in February 2014, being the fact this time of members of the baptized “Cannes-Torcy” cell. Faced with this painful problem, calls from families and concerns inside the population, the French government proposed, April 23, 2014, a plan to fight against departures in Syria that has not convinced many experts, answering probably to a need for communication on the subject. This is an update of my first article that will discusses the evolution of recruitment in France from February until early June 2014 : the building of a “family jihad“, the acceleration of recruitment with the formation of a French brigade in JN and probably within ISIS, and attempts by the French government to send signals more or less suitable for jihadists.

Family Jihad: women, children, but also girls in Syria

A new trend is linked to jihad in Syria phenomenon: the departure of girls. Anissa, 22, was converted under the influence of a friend of his school in Bordeaux. She married a young Muslim presented by an imam met on Skype and left a farewell letter to his mother. Dozens of French are affected by this phenomenon: Ly, 19, a student from Senegal, left with her baby of 15 months. She is accompanied by a schoolgirl, 17, of Epinay, who stole the credit card from her father to finance the trip1. At the same time, at the end of February 2014, a 14 year-old girl from Grenoble was arrested at the airport Lyon-Saint-Exupéry as she was about to fly to Istanbul. Placed in a home, she fled before being caught again the next day. This is the third minor at least trying to reach Syria in January 2014 after a 15 year old girl who managed to make it to Syria2. Nora, 16, has gone on January 23; her brother says she was manipulated by others and, in mid-March, she regrets her departure in Syria3. Her brother went once to bring her back in February4; he went to the Turkish border, he succeeded in a second attempt in April 2014 to go to Syria and to see his sister two times5. At the end of March, Barbara Marie Rigolaud, a French 35-year-old from Nanterre, was arrested by the PYD (Kurdish party that controls areas in north-northeast Syria) near Aleppo. She had joined JN after having belonged to ISIS. She arrived in Syria in May 2013 with her husband and four children6. Also in March 2014 the mother of Assia, the girl of 23 months led by his father since October 2013 in Syria, launched numerous calls for help. Sahra, a 17-year-old from Lézignan-Corbières (Aude, southwestern France), would have run away and joined Syria since March 11. She would be shipped to Marignane in a flight to Turkey. On March 14, she confirmed to her brother that she is in the Aleppo region. Sahra, who practiced Islam for at least one year, had apparently prepared her départure7. Along the same lines, a young schoolgirl, 16, with the dual French and Algerian nationalities, living in Troyes, is reported in Syria by his parents on April 8, 2014, radicalized only in few months. She would have received as Sahra a sum of money in cash by an intermediary to pay her travel8. She was stopped in Germany before she could reach Syria.

Ongoing recruitment in early 2014

France Info interviews in February 2014, two French who have gone to fight in Syria, Abu Chaak, 24, and Abu Dahuk, 26. They say they are from the Paris region, fighting in the Aleppo region and belong to ISIS. Dahuk is among the first French arrived in Syria at the beginning of 2013 ; he plans not to return to France to carry out attacks but to die as a “martyr” on Syrian soil9. In March, Seif al-Qalam, a young man of 27 who also comes from the Paris region, who fought for ISIS before joining JN (he arrived on site in July 2013 with his wife and children), claiming that the latter group includes a brigade composed entirely of French (a hundred men?) which he is part. That would be the French who have imposed this solution for reasons of linguistic understanding. These men want to fight in Syria and did take the fight to France if it had operations against them10. Mid-February, Bilel, a man with a degree in economics and volunteer firefighter in Grenoble, was killed in fighting in Homs. He had gone to Syria in July 2013 with his brother and several others French volunteers for jihad ; he was clearly radicalized after a breakup. There, he joined JN and takes the « nom de guerre » of Abu Al-Siddiq Tounsi11. 22 March 2014 a French national, Sylvain Decker, was arrested by Moroccan police in Rabat. He was part of a network of recruitment for jihad, particularly in Syria, who worked in both Spain and Morocco12. A draft of a terrorist attack due to a veteran Syrian Jihad is probably foiled in south-eastern France. The DCRI had discovered on 17 February 2014 900 grams of explosives in a building near Cannes, drop point for a member of the Cannes-Torcy cell arrested a few days earlier. The young man, Ibrahim B., had gone to Syria in September 2012, with two others, thus escaping the dragnet of the DCRI for the cell. Abdelkader T., one of the companions of Ibrahim, was arrested in Italy January 16, 2014. Ibrahim B. would have returned the same time in France, having fought as others in JN. On 11 February, he was arrested in the building where the explosives were discovered later13. At the end of April 2014 a young man in his twenties, claiming to be a former French soldier in a regiment of infantry paratroopers, is seen in a video posted on Youtube14. On April 30, the Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve indicates that 285 French are currently in Syria, and is concerned about an increase of 75% of the total in a few months. One hundred jihadists have returned to France and 5 were killed15. The next day, a 37 year old Algerian, regular resident in France, was expelled on suspicion of recruiting in France for jihad in Syria. He was arrested by Turkey on board a bus taking a group of French to Syria. He was close to two other men living in Savoie, like him, known to have participated in routing volunteers to Afghanistan and sentenced in February 201116.

The plan of the French government: a communication operation?

April 23, 2014, the French government unveiled a plan to fight against the departure of young people in Syria, including an attempt to ensure early detection of potential candidates for jihad. Finally, the plan provides a hotline of crisis for parents welcomed by professionals, and consider the reintroduction of the authorization to leave the country for minors (measure eventually discarded). Human intelligence and cyber security will be leveraged to identify individuals likely to radicalize17. However, for Wassim Nasr, a journalist specializing in jihadists, these measures come ten years too late. He does not believe in the effectiveness of the alert platform for parents. He also calls to treat the phenomenon as a criminal problem; and indeed, the profiles are varied, too many to be reduced to this assumption, especially since as he points out, all candidates initially do not necessarily have to return to France to carry out attacks. The problem is political, and linked to the position of the French State in Syrian conflict18. David Thomson, RFI journalist and author of a book on French jihadists published in March 201419, confirms that the profiles are very different. If the initial motivations are just as varied, jihad in Syria is unprecedented in modern history, for France, because of the access to the battlefield and the easy use of social networks. He explains how the first contingent of twenty French arrived from late 2011 and 2012, carried an air call via social networks and led to the mass influx that we see in particular in the past year. It also confirms that there is a brigade of French in JN. The link of the jihadists to social networks and different ways from those of previous jihad are the difficulty of preventing the phenomenon and even following it when the jihadists are returning on French soil. The only red line not to cross, according to him, is the threat of attacks on the national territory. At that time, the government intervenes, but prefers to otherwise monitor these social networks, or forums, because they are also intelligence sources. Besides the net of jihadists, who go through many social networks, is almost impossible to control. The only positive effect he sees in the government’s plan is the creation of a plan for parents, but a

The Clear Banner: “For Our Freedom and Yours?”: The Lack of Central European Foreign Fighters in Syria

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

NOTE: For prior parts in the Clear Banner series you can view an archive of it all here.
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“For Our Freedom and Yours?”: The Lack of Central European* Foreign Fighters in Syria
*Central Europe is understood here as a bloc of formerly communist states, which are NATO and EU members (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria) plus the three former Soviet republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
By Kacper Rekawek, PhD
“For Our Freedom and Yours” is one of the Polish national mottos first unveiled during the anti-Russian rebellion of the early 1830s. Its standing was augmented by the subsequent participation of the current author’s countrymen in different conflicts around the globe – from the Hungarian Revolution of 1848 to all battlefronts of the Second World War. Nonetheless, Poles fought as foreign fighters in earlier conflicts as well – be it the wars waged by the revolutionary France in Italy  in the late 1790s (the song by the so-called Polish “legionaries” fighting alongside the French against the Habsburg Austria is Poland’s national anthem) or during the American War of Independence. The latter conflict produced one of Poland’s and possibly the world’s, most famous foreign fighter – Tadeusz Kosciuszko, a national hero to both Poles and Americans, whose monument stands yards away from the White House in Washington D.C.
Such strong and emphatic tradition of participation in foreign conflicts could, theoretically, result with scores of Polish volunteers ready and willing to fight for the cause of freedom around the globe. At the end of the day, citizens of the state, which regained its political sovereignty only in 1989 would be expected to remain zealously enthusiastic about aiding others in their quest for freedom. The same could be said about the societies of Poland’s Eastern and Southern neighbours or former communist countries, which are now all members of the European Union and NATO. Just as they all often offer and market their experiences of transformation from dictatorial regimes to liberal and prosperous democracies as interesting examples to all of the world’s democrats, different individuals from Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovenia, Latvia, Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia could be expected flock to the banners of non-violent or armed movements or organisations advocating independence or democracy. However, it has not happened and neither the stereotypically romantic Poles or more pragmatic Czechs, just to name two of Central Europe’s nations, made names for themselves either as foreign activists or foreign fighters. Moreover, they seem to be missing out on the fight some of their Western European, Eastern European, or Balkan (as detailed in the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation estimates) peers are waging against the Assad government in Syria. Let us investigate why this is the case and study the counter-terrorism implications such situation poses for the countries of Central Europe.
There had been individual cases of foreign fighters from the region making their trek to wage jihad in Afghanistan in the 1980s (Poland reports 3 such cases). The individuals were not religiously, but rather politically motivated – in theory, the war in Afghanistan offered a meaningful opportunity for those wanting to take the fight directly to the “Russians.” It is worth remembering, however,  that the opposition to communist regimes in Central Europe was entirely non-violent and such endeavors gained very little traction amongst the members of the likes of the Polish Solidarity or the Czechoslovak Charter 77. On top of that, Central and Eastern Europeans could get to battlefields in exotic places (like Afghanistan, but also in other countries in Asia or the Middle East) more easily as advisors to the local army, embedded with the Soviet troops, than as foreign fighters (e.g. the current author interviewed a Hungarian general who served as an advisor to the Syrian military in 1982). The logistical, financial, and bureaucratic obstacles while living under police states modelled on the Soviet Union would simply be insurmountable even for the most enthusiastic, but very small in number, prospective volunteers wishing to go to Afghanistan. For these reasons, the Poles who participated in this conflict used different Western European countries as launching pads for their forays into Afghanistan.
One could argue that the post-1989 reality of Central Europe should offer a marked change for potential foreign fighters emanating from this region. The aforementioned obstacles were disappearing and as the Central European countries were plugging themselves into the global economy, they and their citizens were becoming more and more aware of the world around them. Some activists and do-gooders  embraced humanitarian and relief efforts in e.g. the Balkans, but very few felt the need to help fight for someone else’s freedom in the ranks of foreign rebel or insurgent groups. Not that there was no sympathy for e.g. the Chechens, who just like the Afghans a decade earlier, were fighting what in the minds of especially many Poles, Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians initially constituted a struggle for independence of their homeland against the Russian invaders. This seemingly popular common Russian denominator, however, failed to ignite a phenomenon akin to the mobilization of Islamist foreign fighters in Western Europe for the civil war in Syria – only a handful of Poles, and hardly any Czech, Slovak, Hungarian or Bulgarian etc., trekked to Chechnya. The smaller, but perhaps more emphatically, at least initially, pro-Chechen, Baltic states are sometimes rumoured (as there is hardly any reliable data available) to have contributed more – some sources even mention allegedly Lithuanian female snipers fighting on the Chechen side. Moreover, after 9/11 and especially the Beslan school siege, much of the initial goodwill for Chechnya in Central Europe simply vanished. The alleged journalistic scoop of two prospective Polish fighters training in the Polish mountains for the hardship of the North Caucasus from 2012 or the 2009 Lithuanian alleged female suicide bomber, said to have been run from Chechnya and to be deployed against a military target in Russia, effectively constitute the most recent, but also farcical examples of “foreign fighting in the Caucasus” phenomenon on behalf of the Central Europeans.
The downfall of the Chechen cause in Central Europe, however, is not yet complete. Degi Dudayev, the son the late Dzhokhar Dudayev lives in Lithuania, and the the World Chechen Congress held its meeting in Poland in 2010. These are, however, forces seen as “secular” and in opposition to the Islamists of the Caucasus Emirate. After the horrors of Beslan, mobilizing support for this entity along the old anti-Russian lines of support in Central Europe became almost an impossibility and not only due to the fact of the world’s revulsion with “Chechen” terrorist acts, but also because the Emirate would not, in contrast to the Chechen rebels beforehand (see: the case of the late Aleksander Muzyczko, one of the leaders of the Ukrainian Right Sector who fought in Chechnya on the rebel side in the First Chechen War), accommodate non-Muslim foreign fighters. Thus one would have to be a Muslim even if they wanted to oppose Russia in e.g. North Caucasus or after 2011 in Syria where the rebels are fighting a Russia-backed Assad government. This seemingly trivial conclusion seriously reduced the potential number of foreign fighters from Central Europe as there are simply very few Muslims residing in the region.
There are traditions of Muslim communities in Central Europe, e.g. the tiny Polish Tatar community, present in the country from the late 17th century, residing in the North East of Poland. Many Bosniaks moved to Slovenia (richest part of Yugoslavia) in search of jobs and settled there, and there, of course, exists  a sizable Turkish minority in Bulgaria. Additionally, almost all of the countries of the region have a history of close ties (also in supporting terrorist groups) with some Middle Eastern states, which co-operated with the Soviet bloc before 1989. For this reason, one can find the likes of Libyans, Syrians, Palestinians or e.g. former members of the Middle Eastern communist parties currently based in the region. They are, however, very small in number, usually secular and most of them are by now more than well integrated into the societies of the region. Their numbers are not swollen by any waves of new immigrants who, when they make it to Europe, prefer to stick to Western and Northern Europe where more of their peers, perhaps also family members, are based and where they have a chance of a more prosperous existence. Conversions to Islam are not unheard of, but far from numerous and as a result, some Muslim communities in Central Europe are so small that they do not even possess a luxury of a Mosque around, which its members could rally.
Those communities, are often poorly organized or riven with petty rivalries between the “old” Muslims and the converts, profess moderation, but are susceptible to more radically Islamist influences from abroad – neighbouring Western European countries where Muslim communities are stronger (e.g. Sweden and Finland vis-à-vis the Baltic states) or directly via funding from the Middle East. This, to an extent, is their foot in the door as far the Muslim community in Europe is concerned and theoretically a chance for their more militant members to link up with their peers in Western Europe. However, the numerical starting base is so low that we are yet to see examples of Central Europeans

The Clear Banner: Update on Finnish Foreign Fighters

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

NOTE: For prior parts in the Clear Banner series you can view an archive of it all here. For Juha’s first post at Jihadology on the history, background, and the early mobilization of the Finnish contingent click here.

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Update on Finnish Foreign Fighters
By Juha Saarinen
Despite the fact that an unprecedented number of foreign fighters from Finland traveled to Syria since 2012, very little is known about the individuals who have taken part in the conflict. When I previously wrote about the Finnish foreign fighter contingent in Syria in March, only four out of the 30+ “war volunteers”  who had travelled to Syria had been covered in the Finnish media.Since then, information on only two new individuals – a Finnish-Syrian humanitarian worker regularly travelling to Syria to deliver aid, and a Finnish convert to Islam doing humanitarian work in Aleppo who was allegedly imprisoned by the FSA in early 2014 – has come to light. According to the most recent estimates from late March, this still leaves at least 24-34 foreign fighters completely unaccounted for.
Over the past eight months, I have collected data on Finnish foreign fighters. This has led to a list of 11 individual profiles of confirmed foreign fighters, most of whom identify with ISIS. These profiles are listed below, and they contain at least some information on individual fighters’ background, activity in Syria, and group affiliation. However, the list is hardly exhaustive as it includes around a fourth of the 30-40+ individuals currently estimated to have travelled to Syria from Finland.
unnamed
The already known individuals
“Muhammad” moved to Finland from Somalia with his family in 1993 when he was two-years-old. He grew up in Finland, where he received his education, most recently attending a vocational school in the Helsinki Metropolitan area. He lived in Espoo and exhibited some signs of radicalization before traveling to Syria via Turkey in December 2012, where he joined a radical Islamist group operating in north Syria. He is an ISIS fighter and still active in Syria – most recently near Al-Hasakah in early May. He is allegedly not interested in returning to Finland.
“Marwan” was a young convert to Islam from Turku in his early twenties. His mother was Finnish and his father was from Namibia. Before leaving for Syria, he had recently finished his compulsory military service in Finland and expressed a desire to study Islam abroad. He traveled to Syria via Turkey with his wife “Aisha” during summer 2012, when he joined an unidentified rebel unit in northern Aleppo—allegedly with other Finns. He was reportedly killed in a clash between Syrian rebels and Syrian government forces in Aleppo in June 2013. Prior to his death, he had likely fought at least near Idlib in spring 2013.
“Rami” was born in early 1990s to a Finnish mother and a father from an unidentified Arab country. He lived in Helsinki before traveling to southern Turkey in July 2013 – and presumably continuing to Syria. He grew up and was educated in Finland, converting to Islam as a teenager. Prior to his conversion, he had problems at school, suffered from alcohol abuse, and had exhibited some criminal behavior. Although he has reportedly denied being in Syria, his mother believes he has traveled there. Before traveling abroad, he had asked the imam at his local mosque about traveling to Syria.
The most recent Finnish casualty is “Abu Anas al-Finlandi”. He was born in the early 1990s and resided in Espoo. He traveled to Syria in late 2013, most likely via Turkey. He was killed in a battle between the Free Syrian Army and ISIS in February 2014, according to a Twitter account linked to ISIS. There are few details about his profile, but he likely converted to Islam either late 2011 or during 2012. It is likely he held some extremist political views prior to his conversion to Islam, and he was connected to the anarchist community in the Helsinki region.
New Additions to the Contingent
“Guhaad” is a Finnish-Somali man in his early 20s. He lived in Espoo before traveling to Syria, most likely via Turkey between spring and fall 2013, and he had joined ISIS by winter. He presumably has a combat role and has travelled at least to Raqqah and Manbij in 2014, and he is presently living in the latter. He and “Muhammad” are close friends.
“Lauri” is a Finnish convert to Islam from Espoo who travelled to Aleppo in June 2013. He was allegedly imprisoned in January 2014 for two weeks by FSA troops. In an interview in late April he stated his intention to continue his work in Syria, most likely in and around Aleppo. However, his current status or whereabouts are unknown. Lauri traveled to Syria with his wife, but nothing is known of her.
“Aisha” is “Marwan’s” widow. She had a baby two weeks before Marwan’s death while in Syria. Not much is known about her background, other than she too was a convert to Islam, around 20 years old, and originally from Espoo even though she lived in Turku with her husband prior to traveling to Syria. It was reported in August 2013 she was looking to return to Finland, but her current whereabouts are unknown. She re-activated on social media in spring 2014 and has occasionally shared jihadist propaganda. She presently identifies with ISIS, which suggests her husband – whose affiliation in Syria is unknown – may have joined and fought for ISIS and/or other jihadist groups prior to his death.
“Maryam” is a young Finnish Somali woman from Vantaa. She had attended a polytechnic school around Helsinki metropolitan area before travelling to Syria at some point between December 2013 and March 2014.Maryam is married, but it is not entirely clear whether her husband has accompanied her to Syria. She strongly identifies with ISIS, and has at least travelled to Manbij and Raqqah while in Syria.
“Isra” is a young Finnish woman, presumably of Somali descent. Not much is known about her, other than she identifies with ISIS, and may have travelled to Syria between winter 2013 and spring 2014. She also often shares graphic content depicting the suffering of civilians in Syria on social media.
“Rami A.” is a member of the Syrian diaspora in Finland who has regularly traveled to Syria in the past 18 months to deliver humanitarian aid, mainly in and around Aleppo and Idlib. According to him, he moves in Syria with Liwa al-Tawheed. At least in the last trip which took place in spring 2014, he was accompanied by “Hashim,” presumably another member of the Syrian diaspora in Finland from the Helsinki metropolitan area, but not much is known about him.
What do we know about the Contingent?
Overall, the tally of identified foreign fighters is now eleven, which is a significant increase but still leaves the majority of the contingent unaccounted for. However, the possibility that the list may include false positives cannot be excluded, as in most cases available or shared information cannot be independently verified.
These findings correlate with official statements. The majority of Finnish fighters are young Sunni Muslim men who were either born in Finland or moved there at a very young age, and there are also young Finnish men who have converted to Islam. Also, entire families have likely departed Finland to travel to the conflict zone, “Aisha” and “Marwan” being one such case. It is also possible that “Maryam” has travelled to Syria with her husband, while the marital status of “Isra” is unknown. It is also possible that some women from Finland have traveled to Syria alone, but it cannot be confirmed at this time.
Most the foreign fighters are from the Helsinki metropolitan area, and at least two are from Turku. This is hardly surprising as majority of the Muslims living in Finland live in or around the Helsinki region. There are known radicalized Muslims in Helsinki, as well as other large Finnish cities such as Tampere and Turku. Interestingly, no foreign fighters from Tampere have been identified thus far.
Again, not much is known about the Finnish fighters’ activities in Syria. However, majority of the fighters included here identify with ISIS, and thus live and/or operate around areas either controlled or contested by ISIS, mainly in or near Manbij and Raqqah. Previously, Idlib and Aleppo have been popular destinations. Out of the five identified foreign fighters with combat roles, only one has joined an unidentified group, but his wife presently identifies with ISIS, which may suggest her husband had joined and fought with a jihadist group in Syria, presumably affiliated with ISIS.
Majority of the foreign fighters identified here identify with ISIS, and majority of these are Somali. It is likely that ISIS-affiliated

Check out my new background paper for The Partnership for Peace Consortium: "Sunni Foreign Fighters in Syria: Background, Facilitating Factors, and Select Responses"

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

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Executive Summary
This background paper is based on a presentation during a partnership for Peace Consortium (PfPC) Combating
Terrorism Workshop held in Brussels April 23-25, 2014 on the topic of foreign fighters. The paper discusses reasons
driving the phenomenon and highlights some legal responses taken by Western European states to stem flow of foreign
fighters to Syria and to reduce any potential disruptive activities upon return to their countries of departure. The current
foreign fighter mobilization in Syria is unprecedented in the number of individuals, nations represented and the speed of
the mobilization. Since foreigners flocked to Syria in late 2011 and early 2012, based on more than 1,700 primary and
secondary sources in multiple languages that have been collated, one can estimate their numbers at 9,000 individuals who
represent more than 80 nations. The bulk of these foreigners come from the Arab world and Western Europe with
approximately 5,000 and 3,000 coming from each region respectively. The vast majority have joined designated terrorist
organizations the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham as well as al-Qaeda’s preferred branch Jabhat al-Nusra.
Compared with the two prior top foreign fighter mobilizations since it became a phenomenon in the 1980s, the numbers
for Syria are much larger. They have occurred over a far shorter time span. From 1979-1992, it is believed that about
5,000 individuals went to Afghanistan for the anti-Soviet jihad. Additionally, during the last decade from 2003-2007,
around 4,000 foreigners decided to take up the cause of jihad during the Iraq war. In both cases, the numbers are about
half or a little less than half of what we have seen thus far in Syria. In Afghanistan the process spanned 13 years, while in
Iraq four years, and in Syria, just two years.
Click here to read the full paper.
 

Check out my new article co-authored with Jonathan Prohov for Lawfare: "Proactive Measures—Countering the Returnee Threat"

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

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Editor’s Note: The conflict in Syria has attracted an unprecedented number of foreign fighters, with Muslims streaming in from the Arab world and Europe to take up arms against the regime of Bashar al-Asad. Mindful of the Afghanistan experience, where foreign fighters returning home from the anti-Soviet struggle often formed the nuclei of terrorist groups, governments are preparing for grim times ahead. Aaron Y. Zelin and Jonathan Prohov, researchers at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, describe the many steps taken by governments around the world to guard against this potential danger and assess the implications for the United States.

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Fears that foreign fighters traveling to Syria might return home once the conflict is over and engage in terrorism have prompted an unprecedented level of proactive measures by countries around the world. In the past, many countries only changed their laws after an attack occurred, but this time around many states are trying to get ahead of the issue.

Compared to the number of foreigners who fought against the United States in Iraq or the Soviets in Afghanistan, the number of foreigners fighting in Syria has exceeded both of those cases—and in less than half the time. Around 9,000 individuals from more than 80 countries have joined the fight against the Asad regime, with the majority coming from the Arab world and Western Europe. U.S. intelligence officials told the Los Angeles Times in February that at least 50 Americans had joined the fight in Syria, and FBI director James Comey recently stated that the number of Americans who had either traveled to Syria or tried to do so had grown by a few dozen since the beginning of 2014.

Click here to read the rest.

The Clairvoyant: The Return of Foreign Fighters in the Iraq Jihad

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

NOTE: ‘The Clairvoyant” will be a new sub-blog of Jihadology.net. It will be written by me the founder of this website for quick hit blog posts or interesting things I come across that might be too short, in the weeds, or random for more mainstream publication.
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The Return of Foreign Fighters in the Iraq Jihad
By Aaron Y. Zelin
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Earlier today, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham’s (ISIS) official Twitter account for the Wilayah of Northern Baghdad released a series of photos of foreigners who had been killed fighting the ‘safawis’ (a derogatory term for Iran/Shi’a) and the ‘dajal’ (the false messiah in Islamic end times prophecies). While much attention has been given to foreign fighters in Syria due to the unprecedented mobilization over the past two years or so, once again, Iraq also seems to be attracting foreign fighters. While it is likely that it never truly stopped, following the sahwa and surge, there was a lot less enthusiasm for it since the Islamic State of Iraq (prior name to ISIS) appeared in decline. The American withdrawal along with the outbreak of the Syrian war and more recent prison breaks have helped revive ISIS to once again be a spoiler within the Iraqi context.
Although ISIS in the Iraqi arena has gained more of a local flavor from Iraqi recruits over the years, since its inception when it was originally called Jama’at al-Tawhid wa-l-Jihad (and all of its later name iterations), foreigners have played an important role as previously documented by Evan Kohlmann as well as recovered from the US Military’s Sinjar Record cache in the organization. Prior to the release of this data on killed foreign members of ISIS fighting in Iraq, between April 2013-March 2014 I personally recorded 15 cases. It is possible that there is overlap. Here is the information from my set:

Tunisia 5
Libya 4
Egypt 3
Syria 1
Kuwait 1
Saudi Arabia 1

The information that ISIS released today was about 29 of its members killed between September 2013-March 2014 in northern Baghdad. Some of this data has unknown nationalities such as al-Shami, which could denote anyone in the Levant, or al-Muhajir, just meaning the emigrant, among other non-nation descriptive noms de guerre. Here’s the breakdown:

Tunisia 7
Morocco 6
Unknown 6
Egypt 4
Saudi Arabia 3
Denmark 1
Syria 1
Uzbekistan 1

It is likely this trend will continue and more information will be released in the coming months as ISIS expands its fight in Iraq once more. Whether they make the same mistakes as last decade in Iraq or more recently in Syria remains to be seen (though is likely), but for now, due to the infighting in Syria there has been a lot of discussion within jihadi social media that some foreigners have escaped the internecine fighting and decided (besides returning home or going to other fields of jihad like Egypt or Libya) to move their fight to the Iraq war zone.

Check out my new ‘Policy Watch’ for the Washington Institute: "Foreign Jihadists in Syria: Tracking Recruitment Networks"

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin


The clandestine nature of the various networks responsible for sending Sunni fighters into Syria makes it difficult to ascertain exactly how many foreigners have entered the war and from which countries. Yet social-media sources affiliated with jihadists often post death notices for slain fighters, providing a unique, though incomplete, picture of where they are being recruited and where in Syria they fought. Tracking and analyzing these notices can help broaden Washington’s understanding of foreign recruitment networks, the largest of which appear to operate in Saudi Arabia, Libya, and Tunisia.

HOW MANY HAVE BEEN KILLED?

Since the Syrian uprising turned into an armed rebellion, jihadists have announced the deaths of more than 1,100 fighters on their Twitter and Facebook accounts and, to a lesser extent, on password-protected forums. Although other foreigners have been killed in Syria, their deaths were reported by non-jihadist rebels, Western media, or Arabic media and are not included in this assessment. The figures below also exclude foreigners who have fought on the Assad regime’s side.
To be sure, the information gleaned from jihadist sources is self-reported, and some data might therefore be suppressed for political reasons, especially reports of Iraqi involvement. That said, it still offers a worthwhile snapshot of an otherwise murky world.
The most striking revelation in the latest data is the huge rise in overall death notices. Previously, jihadist sources had posted only 85 such notices as of February 2013, and only 280 as of June. In other words, the vast majority of the more than 1,100 notices have come in the past half year.
Click here to read the rest.

Check out my new ‘Insight’ for the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation: "Up to 11,000 Foreign Fighters in Syria; Steep Rise Among Western Europeans"

Posted on by Aaron Y. Zelin

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Since ICSR published its first estimate in April, the issue of foreign fighters in Syria has become a major concern for Western governments. More reports have emerged since, though few have accurately gauged the full extent and evolution of the phenomenon.
This ICSR Insight provides an update of our April estimate, offering the most comprehensive and richly resourced account of the Syrian foreign fighter phenomenon from open sources. Based on more than 1,500 sources, we estimate that up to 11,000 individuals from 74 nations have become opposition fighters in Syria – nearly double our previous estimate. Among Western Europeans, the number has more than tripled from (up to) 600 in April to 1,900 now.
Click here to read the rest.