http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/06/03/missionaries_of_jihad

 

Missionaries of jihad

By Christopher Anzalone, June 3, 2011
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2011 - 2:31 PM http://www.foreignpolicy.com/images/091022_meta_block.gif
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In the aftermath of the U.S. military's killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin
Laden last month,
<http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/05/03/wanted_charismatic_terror_
mastermind_some_travel_required> analysts and presumably Al-Qaeda Central
(AQC) are heavily engaged in discussions about possible successors to the
Saudi militant as the new public face of the transnational jihadi trend,
with sources reporting recently that Egyptian Saif al-Adel had
<http://articles.cnn.com/2011-05-17/world/mideast.al.qaeda.appointee_1_al-ad
el-al-qaeda-libyan-islamic-fighting-group?_s=PM:WORLD> been named the
group's "interim" leader. Yet the intense focus on who will be the "new bin
Laden" glosses over the important fact that al-Qaeda has over the past
several years developed a charismatic and influential cadre of
scholar-ideologues who play a major role in legitimating the group's
campaign of violence and calling on Muslims to join or support it, a role
made more important by the confusion that has resulted in jihadi circles
from bin Laden's death. 

In an attempt to overcome the deficit of religious legitimacy in the senior
levels of al-Qaeda and other militant groups, these organizations rely
heavily on this cadre of ideologues, figures who possess some scholarly
credentials (though the exact nature of these credentials is often left
ambiguous). They combine some intellectual bona fides with personal charisma
and rhetorical flare and serve as a kind of "missionary vanguard" for AQC
and its sister groups. Chief among this group are AQC's "mufti" (chief
religious jurist), Abu Yahya al-Libi, the Kuwaiti preacher Khalid bin ‘Abd
al-Rahman al-Husaynan, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula-affiliated (AQAP)
American militant cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, and Libyan ‘Atiyyatullah al-Libi,
who some counter-terrorism officials have
<http://www.propublica.org/article/bin-laden-documents-portrait-of-a-fugitiv
e-micro-manager> described as AQC's "operations chief." 

Abu Yahya is among the most prominent of these scholar-ideologues. He is a
veteran of the anti-Qadhafi Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), a prolific
writer, gifted rhetorician, and charismatic orator. Following his July 2005
escape from the U.S. prison at Bagram, he was quickly put at the forefront
of AQC's media campaign. He has authored numerous juridical treatises and
books on a wide variety of theological and political topics, such as
martyrdom and the use of violence, and has contributed numerous video-taped
sermons, lectures, and messages ranging from eulogies to comprehensive
jihadi excoriations of enemies like the Saudi ruling family and Muslim and
Arab allies of the United States.  

His rhetorical flare and gifts as an orator are most clearly displayed when
he appears on film.  His voice rises and falls, depending on the emphasis he
wishes to place on certain key sections of his message, a skill clearly
demonstrated in videos of his annual sermons for the Muslim religious
holidays of ‘Eid al-Fitr and ‘Eid al-Adha. Abu Yahya's ability to connect to
the jihadi base, particularly online, has made him one of the most popular
leaders in the group, as evidenced by the buzz on militant Internet forums
when rumors of death in a drone strike
<http://occident.blogspot.com/2009/12/leaderless-jihad-what-rumors-about-abu
.html> surfaced in December 2009.  

AQC has never fully elaborated on Abu Yahya's specific scholarly
credentials, beyond saying that he
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/specials/terror/yahya.html>
pursued religious studies for an undetermined number of years with
traditional Muslim scholars in Mauritania. His real talent and strategic
value to AQC, however, do not rest solely on his claims to scholarly
credentials, but rather on how he combines an aura of scholarly legitimacy
with charisma and rhetorical flourish. He strategically and selectively
deploys citations from key texts from within the Islamic scholarly
tradition, as well as key legal writings of famous Sunni Muslim theologians
and jurists, all while
<http://fora.tv/2010/01/11/Making_the_Next_Bin_Laden> presenting himself as
a humble "in-the-trenches" type of jihadi leader, unlike, for example, the
abrasive and elitist Ayman al-Zawahiri.  

Abu Yahya has in particular played a key role in justifying violence against
the Pakistani state. In April 2009, the Al-Fajr (The Dawn) Media Center, a
shadowy jihadi media outlet that distributes media material produced by AQC
and its three official regional affiliates in Yemen, North Africa, and Iraq,
published a  <http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/KL24Df05.html> lengthy
book by Abu Yahya online, Sharpening the Spearheads to Fight the Government
and Army of Pakistan, which was a systematic attack on the Pakistani state
and military. He used extensive citations from juridical sources to forge a
multi-layered theological and legal assault on the legitimacy of Pakistan as
a nation-state. AQC, which has become increasingly reliant on its Pakistani
allies, such as the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in recent years, will
likely draw upon these writings in its ongoing war inside Pakistan. 

Al-Libi's popularity extends, however beyond AQC and its regional allies in
Afghanistan and Pakistan. Abu Yahya is regularly referenced in media
releases from Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and other AQC regional
affiliates. He has also been cited by Somalia's Islamist-insurgent movement
Harakat al-Shabab al-Mujahideen (Movement of the Warrior-Youth). Abu Yahya's
March 2011 video message supporting the rebels in Libya was impassioned,
unlike al-Zawahiri's tediously dry six-part series on post-Mubarak Egypt.
The Libyan leader urged continued resistance but also caution: "Let [your
weapons] help you achieve the truth, obtain justice for the oppressed, and
prohibit vice [but] refrain from using these weapons to spill protected
blood, taking an inviolable life, destroying people's homes, shops, or their
finances. Also, do not use these weapons for tribal or racial fighting."  

Khalid bin ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Husaynan is also an increasingly prominent AQC
scholar-ideologue and Internet presence, who was introduced to the world in
an often-comedic
<http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xegkxm_a-quiet-talk-with-obama-1of2-khalid
_people> video message entitled "A Quiet Dialogue with Obama" released by
Al-Sahab in June 2009. A former prayer leader (imam) and preacher employed
by Kuwait's Ministry of Religious Endowments and Islamic Affairs, the jovial
preacher is also known as Abu Zayd al-Kuwaiti. He is an animated and
<http://jarretbrachman.net/?p=1398> conversational speaker who often comes
across as cartoonish. He sometimes elongates Arabic long vowels to a
ridiculous extent for oratorical effect and makes comical facial expressions
as he emphasizes particular points. 

Despite his cartoonish façade, though, al-Husaynan should not be taken
lightly. Although his specific scholarly credentials, like Abu Yahya's,
remain the subject of debate, AQC propaganda presents him as a member of the
Muslim scholarly elite, the ‘ulama. The Kuwaiti has become a full-fledged
participant in AQC's charismatic vanguard over the past year-and-a-half.
His value to the transnational jihadi trend is most readily apparent in the
release of a video series of short religious lectures for Ramadan 2010
entitled "Al-Durus al-Da‘wiyya" (Propagation Lessons) in which he discussed
a range of topics, from exegesis of the Qur'an and the correct behavior of a
Muslim to sins, like envy and backbiting, that the pious should avoid. This
series of religious lectures was recently restarted in April. 

‘Atiyyatullah al-Libi, AQC's second senior Libyan leader, also plays a
prominent role in the organization's communications and media operations.
Like Abu Yahya, he is a former member of the LIFG and has been at the fore
of AQC's media campaign addressing the ongoing civil war in Libya and the
other popular demonstrations and violence in other Arab states such as
Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen. In an essay released on February 23,
‘Atiyyatullah urged Libya's rebels and particularly "the youth" not to fall
into the trap of infighting. An audio message from him on Libya was released
in mid-March. In contrast to Ayman al-Zawahiri's lecture series on
post-Mubarak Egypt, in which the Egyptian AQC leader pompously lectures his
audience, ‘Atiyyatullah's audio message supporting Libyan rebels was
succinct and focused on praising, rather than lecturing, his home country's
people. 

‘Atiyyatullah, whose real name was recently given in an Al-Sahab audio
message about Libya as Jamal Ibrahim Ishtaywi al-Misrati (indicating that he
is from the then-besieged Libyan city of Misrata), has also been one of the
most prominent jihadi voices to deny that the "mujahideen" have
intentionally targeted Muslim civilians. In a March video, Maximizing the
Sanctity of the Muslims' Blood, he calls these allegations as a campaign of
slander by the U.S. and its allies. "We abide by the guidelines of God's
law. He has forbidden the unlawful killing of people despite the extent of
the enemy's transgression," he said. "We remind our brother mujahideen
everywhere of the importance of emphasizing and spreading knowledge about
the importance of the sanctity of Muslim blood and the obligation to take
great precautions to protect and preserve it." ‘Atiyyatullah's video message
mirrors a January 2010 essay he wrote in which he denied allegations that
AQC or the TTP were responsible for targeting markets in the Pakistani
frontier city of Peshawar. 

The American-Yemeni preacher Anwar al-Awlaki is the most recognizable of the
transnational jihadi charismatic ideologues. He is wildly popular with the
online jihadi community, particularly among native English speakers, and his
influence continues to grow, as evidenced by the increasing number of
languages into which his writings, sermons, and video messages are
translated. In addition to Arabic and English, there are translations of his
writings, videos, and lectures in Urdu, Bosnian, French, Russian,
Indonesian, Russian, and Somali. The Global Jihad Internet forum recently
<http://thewasat.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/global-jihad-internet-forum-launch
es-new-sub-forum-dedicated-to-anwar-al-awlaqis-lectures-a-sign-of-his-growin
g-influence/> launched a new sub-forum dedicated to collecting his lectures,
sermons, and other media materials. 

Al-Awlaki, like the others, is a charismatic speaker and skilled
rhetorician. However, unlike them, the he is able to speak in both classical
Arabic and idiomatic English, enabling him to reach a wider audience than
those jihadi ideologues who can only speak one of the languages.
Al-Awlaki's influence on jihadis and pro-jihadi activists outside of his
original English-language base, though it seems to be growing given the
increasing number of translations of his releases, remains unclear and
contested. However, there is a growing amount of anecdotal evidence that
suggests his influence outside of his original base is steadily, if not
rapidly, expanding. 

Awlaki's pre- and post-radicalization sermons and lectures are often
passionate and he adeptly links historical events with contemporary concerns
faced by many Muslims in the West, particularly those Muslims who are
confused by their multiple identities and angered by U.S. and European
military involvement in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other Muslim-majority
countries. He speaks authoritatively and frequently cites the Qur'an and
Hadith as well as the Sunni juridical and theological canon. Yet he does so
in a thoroughly contemporary way, presenting himself as a modern and yet
also credentialed religious scholar. Al-Awlaki, for an English-speaking and
-reading audience, also serves a similar role as Abu Yahya does for an Arab
audience in attacking mainstream Sunni Muslim scholars and even outside
commentators who criticize AQC, AQAP, and likeminded groups.  

For example, al-Awlaki has been a key figure in the effort to delegitimize
the March 2010 Mardin Conference in Turkey at which a group of Sunni
religious scholars attempted to contextualize historically the "Mardin
fatwa" of the medieval jurist Ibn Taymiyya, whose work forms a cornerstone
of jihadi writings. "The [Mardin Declaration] is an ignominy that would be
bad enough in an impromptu speech let alone a well deliberated and
thought-out, written declaration," he wrote in an eight-page article in the
<http://www.jihadica.com/inspire-2/> second issue of AQAP's Inspire
magazine.  "It is an insolent statement that shows no respect to the
suffering of our ummah." 

Al-Qaeda's charismatic communicators will play an increasingly important
role in ensuring the survival the transnational jihadi trend in the
aftermath of bin Laden's killing. Amidst intense speculation about bin
Laden's successor as the global public face of Muslim militancy, these men
remind us that AQC and other groups are multifaceted organizations that
cannot be boiled down to one individual, however central and symbolically
important. Even with bin Laden out of the picture, al-Qaeda and its
affiliates and allies continue to field a cadre of personable
scholar-ideologues who mix some academic credentials with personal flare and
linguistic and oratorical skills, and who will continue to serve as
charismatic missionaries of jihad. 

Christopher Anzalone is a doctoral student in the Institute of Islamic
Studies at McGill University where he studies modern Muslim socio-political
movements, Shi'ite Islam, and Islamist visual culture. He blogs at
<http://occident.blogspot.com/> Views from the Occident and
<http://thewasat.wordpress.com/author/ibnsiqilli/> Al-Wasat. 

 



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