https://international.la-croix.com/news/portrait-of-a-jihadist/4434?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=e-mail&utm_content=04-01-2017&utm_campaign=newsletter__crx_lci&PMID=3d4bff6e21bd8a4c42e60d5186400d8e
Portrait of a jihadist Working from the records of convicted terrorists, the Tunisian Center for Research and Studies on Terrorism is attempting to classify their levels of dangerousness. Marie Verdier January 4, 2017 ISIS fighters / Dean11122 / Wikipedia / CC 4.0 What level of danger does a terrorist pose? To what extent can a terrorist be rehabilitated into society? Ridha Raddaoui is trying to find a way to answer important questions such as these, with many countries now facing the threat of terror. The Tunisian attorney has led the first and highly revealing study at the Tunisian Center for Research and Studies on Terrorism (CTRET) – a public initiative launched by the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights – on the profiles of jihadists and the structuring of violent Islamic organizations. Lawyers, jurists, judges, psychologists, sociologists, and experts in religion and security combined their expertise to analyze the body of documents related to the legal records of almost 1,000 individuals tried on charges of terrorism between 2011 and the end of 2015. The study involves 384 cases and implicates a total of 2,224 individuals. Terrorism in Tunisia appears to be a purely national phenomenon. Of the cases studied, there are 988 Tunisians, six Algerians, and five Libyans. A telling 75% of them are aged between 18 and 34. Just under half of the records contain information about the level of education and indicate that 40% have undertaken university studies. “The idea that underprivileged groups are the fertile ground for recruiting terrorists is false," Raddaoui points out. "Tunisian jihadists are average educated members of society." Although women form a small party of the study (35 participants), they “start to take up positions of command and commit acts of terrorism from 2014,” added the attorney. >From 2011, before recruiting students and intellectuals, jihadist >organizations filled their ranks with violent individuals with criminal >records, which complicates our comprehension of pathways to radicalization. In >Raddaoui’s view many countries, including France, tend to identify the most >dangerous terrorists through their criminal histories. "However, this can lead to a false perception of hierarchy, many Islamic leaders with no records are not identified. We run the risk of sending them back into society because we’ve made a mistake as to the level of danger they pose.” Using the 60 000 pages of reports and the corpus of documents seized, the study offers a description of radicalization specific to Islamic movements, which takes place in five steps. The first is an oath of allegiance pronounced before an emir (or a representative).This marks the individual’s renunciation of liberty and agreement to submit completely and irreversibly to the chain of command and to follow orders without question. The second step involves taking on an alias or nom de guerre to hide one’s identity. Following this, the third crucial step is to spend time in a weapons training camp. The fourth and fifth steps are to move to camps in other jihad countries, then to the neighboring "host country" which serves as a support base. For Tunisia this is Libya. The presence of training centers for Tunisians in Libya was confirmed in 2011, and in the mountains in western Tunisia in 2012. Raddaoui notes that “intellectual radicalization doesn’t make one a terrorist. To be a terrorist, an act of terrorism has to be carried out, and this takes place after someone has spent time in training camps." She adds: "The sleeper cells we’re searching out in order to quash are not to be found among sympathizers of Islamic movements but among those who have gone through each of these stages and have been placed right back in our midst.” The internet and social networks are not the main recruitment mechanisms. In light of what has been found in Tunisia, networks of people and services in mosques play a significant role. In addition, the elaboration of links through infiltration into state institutions, the army, and security services have allowed movements to expand. One defendant recounted how he crossed the country by car with four others in March 2013. The vehicle was stopped twice by the national guard but was allowed to continue because of the intervention of one of the passengers.
