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Thread: Studies on radicalization & comments

  1. #241
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default The inside Story of the British Suicide Bomber of Ramadi

    A superb IMHO article on radicalisation in London, that appeared on Professor Landis blog on Syria, last week:http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/the...y-tam-hussein/

    The author's opening summary:
    This is the back story of Abu Musa al-Britani, a young British suicide bomber who blew himself up in Iraq. He grew up in Ladbroke Grove, the area that I worked and grew up in as a youth worker. We also went to the same school. My essay seeks to answer the question as to why such a popular young man went to Iraq when he had planned a trip to Spain two weeks earlier. What compelled him to go, it also seeks to explain why the like of him and Jihadi John came from the same area. What are the factors that lead to their choices?

    It is clear that neither foreign policy nor ideology are solely responsible for motivating European youth to go on Jihad. My essay argues that the reason many of these men went to Syria and join specifically ISIS is due to the subtle interplay between religion, foreign policy and gang culture and modernism.
    Curiously his neighbourhood was:
    a stones throw away from David Cameron’s Notting Hill
    Needless to say this thread will be merged one day into the main thread on radicalisation:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=7188
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 08-05-2017 at 07:54 PM. Reason: 9,571v before merging
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  2. #242
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Dealing with extremism in UK prisons

    The UK has had considerable experience with convicted terrorists, mainly during 'The Troubles' in Northern Ireland, so it is hard to understand that the system has been criticised by an official report as inadequate. This report, the public version, may be of interest:
    This summary provides an overview of the review led by Ian Acheson into Islamist extremism in prisons, probation and youth justice, namely its context, key findings and principal recommendations.
    Link:https://www.gov.uk/government/public...-youth-justice

    A different point of view by the Gatestone Institute (US-based, conservative), neat title 'Prisons: Harvard for Radicals':https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/8...-radical-islam
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 09-06-2016 at 09:01 PM. Reason: 95,334v . Add 2nd link.
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  3. #243
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    An Australian commentary on the UK's Prevent strategy and what lessons can be learnt:http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/dis...ent-extremism/

    A BBC report on Sweden, which has problems at home, let alone jihadists going abroad:
    Sweden is a peaceful democratic state that has long been a safe haven for those fleeing conflict. Yet many young people whose families took refuge there are now turning their back on the country. More than 300 people have gone to fight in Syria and Iraq, making Sweden per capita one of the biggest exporters of jihadists in Europe.
    Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-37578919?

    Jason Burke provides links to a World Bank report on who is radicalised in the MENA and aFinnish report on Boko Haram, in Nigeria:https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ion-boko-haram

    The UK's Prevent strategy once again is in the foreground, with a variety of opinions on whether it is flawed, "toxic" and working.

    From a Muslim woman activist, who practices Prevent:
    Despite the government engaging with hundreds of mosques, community organisations and faith organisations in the last year, many Muslim organisations do not want to publicise the fact that they support Prevent. Sara Khan argues that this is because of a loud anti-Prevent lobby that is dominating the discourse on Prevent and vilifying those Muslim organisations that do engage with it. Khan argues that a far more complex and nuanced picture exists amongst British Muslims than is commonly presented.
    Link:http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/religionpubli...ppose-prevent/

    Then there is a prominent criminal lawyer, David Anderson, who is the independent reviewer of CT legislation, who is now calling for change:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/pa/...mmunities.html
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 10-07-2016 at 09:27 PM. Reason: 99,815v
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  4. #244
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Criminal Pasts, Terrorist Futures

    An ICSR report released today; the full title being 'Criminal Pasts, Terrorist Futures: European Jihadists and the New Crime-Terror Nexus'. From their summary:
    In many European countries, the majority of jihadist foreign fighters are former criminals.
    The purpose of this new report is to describe the nature and dynamics of the crime-terror nexus, and understand what it means. To do so, a multi-lingual team of ICSR researchers compiled a database containing the profiles of 79 recent European jihadists with criminal pasts.
    What we have found is not the merging of criminals and terrorists as organisations but of their social networks, environments, or milieus. Criminal and terrorist groups have come to recruit from the same pool of people, creating (often unintended) synergies and overlaps that have consequences for how individuals radicalise and operate. This is what we call the new crime-terror nexus.
    Link to press release:https://gem.godaddy.com/p/e167d8?fe=1&pact=57646-134827918-8754577104-181c025174f51fc63dd05d9
    57a46010a02cbe5ee

    One press report:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...-a7352271.html
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 10-11-2016 at 08:37 PM. Reason: 100,396v
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  5. #245
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Listening to Criminal Pasts, Terrorist Futures

    Just found that one of the authors of the above ICSR report, Peter Neumann, spoke recently @ IISS, London and there is a podcast (just over 1hr):http://www.iiss.org/en/events/events...-jihadist-c84e
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 10-18-2016 at 07:00 PM. Reason: 101,598v 1k in a week.
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  6. #246
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default An extremist in the family

    A mother's story about her son who suddenly left for ISIS and died later. In a joint BBC-PBS report she tells:
    ..the truth about her son’s secret life and death.
    Links:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/...4-96cec7824254 and http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/son-j...form=hootsuite

    There are subtle differences in the two reports.
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 08-05-2017 at 07:56 PM. Reason: 6,629v before merging
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  7. #247
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default 4 Short Video Clips by Formers

    Four short video clips where ex-radicals give their stories: three British and one German; three Muslims and one fascist.

    One of them, Shahid Butt, I know slightly, as a former Jihadist radical, with a very mixed history; with history in Bosnia and Yemen. His voyage away took years. His video is available on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ph3wfvVk01c or the main website of ConnectFutures (linked below).

    There are several online references to his story; this one is fair and in one place points out his account about the Yemen is contested:https://themodernthesis.wordpress.co...-to-extremism/

    ConnectFutures is a small, Birmingham based company, led by two women and their website states:
    Our Formers project aims to tell the stories of four former extremists in their own words. These include a mixture of both former ‘Islamist’ as well as former ‘far-right’ violent extremists.
    Link:http://connectfutures.org/formers/
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 08-05-2017 at 07:57 PM. Reason: 8,325v before merging
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  8. #248
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default The missing link between terrorism and sex

    An Australian story reporting on the work by a US academic in Australia for a year, Valerie M. Hudson and with a provocative title on April Fool's day no less:http://www.smh.com.au/world/the-miss...28-gv871a.html

    It starts with:
    What makes it easier to recruit young men into terrorist groups? Lack of employment opportunities, alienation and disenfranchisement are sometimes cited. But what if we've been missing something fundamental all along?What if we were ignoring sex?
    A group of researchers have found a causal relationship between the rising trajectory of "brideprice" (similar to a dowry but paid by the prospective groom to the family of the bride) and the ease of recruitment into insurgent groups, in groundbreaking research that is soon to be published in the Harvard-based journal International Security."For example, the sole surviving terrorist from the Mumbai attack of several years ago admitted his father urged him to join the group so that he and his brothers could afford to marry...
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 04-09-2017 at 08:31 PM. Reason: 124,148v nearly 23k up since last post
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  9. #249
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    Default Terrorism and Sex

    Quote Originally Posted by davidbfpo View Post
    An Australian story reporting on the work by a US academic in Australia for a year, Valerie M. Hudson and with a provocative title on April Fool's day no less:http://www.smh.com.au/world/the-miss...28-gv871a.html

    It starts with:
    Well, if these young men were getting any, would they be that committed to killing and dying? No wonder Daesh stayed put after capturing all of those Yazidi women...

  10. #250
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    Default U.S. Increasingly Concerned About Nexus of Terror, Criminal Networks

    U.S. Increasingly Concerned About Nexus of Terror, Criminal Networks

    Entry Excerpt:



    --------
    Read the full post and make any comments at the SWJ Blog.
    This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

  11. #251
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Identifying Vulnerability to Radicalisation

    A new, 94 pgs Henry Jackson Society (UK) report and the full title is 'Spotting the Signs: Identifying Vulnerability to Radicalisation Among Students', albeit from a very small sample.

    Sadly topical after the Manchester bombing, as the bomber enrolled at a local university, then dropped out and funding his activity - in part - from a student loan to study another year.

    From the summary the author explains:
    examining the cases of 29 students who travelled, or attempted to travel, to work with extremist groups or fight for armed Islamist groups in Syria and Iraq. Through profiling and analysis of the cases it aims to provide a supportive tool to assist with understanding how indications of radicalisation, or vulnerability to radicalisation, manifest in real cases.
    Short of time? Try the two page infographic:http://henryjacksonsociety.org/wp-co...c-revise-1.pdf

    Link to the report:http://henryjacksonsociety.org/wp-co...rs-Project.pdf
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 05-27-2017 at 02:46 PM. Reason: 132,580v 8k up in six weeks
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  12. #252
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default They are different: extemists and gangs

    A pointer to research on 'Gang members, domestic extremists vastly different, says first study to compare the two', with a number of links. It opens with:
    Domestic extremists tend to be much older, better educated, more affluent, more religious, and are more likely to be white than street gang members, according to a sweeping new University of Colorado Boulder study that systematically compares the groups for the first time. The study, funded by the U.S. Department of Justice and published in the journal Justice Quarterly, also found that contrary to popular belief, U.S. gang members seldom go on to become radicalized and commit acts of terrorism.
    Link:http://www.start.umd.edu/news/gang-members-domestic-extremists-vastly-different-says-first-study-compare-two#
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 06-21-2017 at 09:06 PM. Reason: 138,099 6.5k up in 3 weeks
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  13. #253
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Lessons from Spain

    One article from CTC's Sentinel on Spanish research; the Abstract says:
    Violent radicalization leading to involvement in jihadi terrorism appears to be highly contingent upon two key factors of what has been termed “differential association,” namely contact with radicalizing agents and pre-existing social ties with other radicalized individuals. This empirical study, which examines all those arrested in Spain for jihadi terrorism activities over the four-year period between 2013 and 2016, quantitatively assesses the importance of these two factors and sheds light on why some individuals radicalize while many more with similar demographic and social characteristics, in the same country, do not. The importance of contact with a radicalizing agent points toward the relevance of ideology in the development of jihadi terrorists, while the significance of pre-existing social ties indicates the relevance of communitarian bonds with local networks, which facilitate terrorist radicalization and recruitment.
    Link:https://ctc.usma.edu/posts/different...titative-study

    A couple of "gems" within:
    35.3% of detainees radicalized exclusively online.....24.4% detainees appear to have radicalized only offline.....13.1% of all the detainees—about one out of every 10 of them—radicalized on their own without interacting with others aside from their exposure to jihadi propaganda, making them genuine cases of self-radicalization.

    (in the conclusion) the importance of pre-existing social bonds emphasizes the relevance of local networks, made out of interpersonal ties and communitarian bonds, which facilitate jihadi radicalization and recruitment.9 Taken together, these two factors indicate that jihadi radicalization leading to terrorism involvement to a large extent is associated with social interactions through which individuals learn about ideas justifying terrorism.
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 06-28-2017 at 10:49 AM. Reason: 139,608v up 1.5k in six days
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  14. #254
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Moderator at work

    I have just merged in four stand alone threads, three with a UK theme, this thread now has had 185,969 views and has 250 posts.
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 11-01-2017 at 07:34 PM.
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  15. #255
    Council Member AdamG's Avatar
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    Default Inside al Qaeda: Living and working with terrorists

    In his first interview, an FBI undercover operative tells Scott Pelley how he infiltrated al Qaeda and thwarted potential terror attacks planned for New York and Toronto
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/inside-...th-terrorists/
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 01-06-2018 at 08:35 PM. Reason: 1347v when a stand alone thread
    A scrimmage in a Border Station
    A canter down some dark defile
    Two thousand pounds of education
    Drops to a ten-rupee jezail


    http://i.imgur.com/IPT1uLH.jpg

  16. #256
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default

    Two articles found today.

    'Jihadi Culture' by Thomas Hegghammer in a short Q&A:
    discusses one of the most underexplored terrains of research on political violence, the culture of jihadi groups
    Yes there is a new book: Jihadi Culture: The Art and Social Practices of Militant Islamistswas recently published.
    Link to article:https://sustainablesecurity.org/2017...as-hegghammer/

    From a staff member @ Open Society Foundation, a slightly different viewpoint on 'The Truth About Terror and Youth Radicalization'

    One sentence stood out:
    A family member of one of the Barcelona attackers said of the terrorists, “All of them were well integrated here. All of them spoke Catalan, went to school and [had] jobs. But here in Ripoll, we are and will always be los moros” (a racial slur for people of Arab descent).
    Link:https://www.opensocietyfoundations.o...radicalization
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 11-01-2017 at 07:44 PM. Reason: 202,705v 63k up since June '17
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  17. #257
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Another resource to plunder

    Peter Neumann of ICSR @ Kings College is a SME on this topic and a few weeks ago OSCE published a report he prepared for them. He explains in the summary what it contains:
    This report provides a summary of my findings. It seeks to (1) define key concepts and major dynamics; (2) evaluate the OSCE’s current and future role; and (3) identify areas of good practice, with particular emphasis on preventing and countering processes of violent radicalisation.
    Link to summary:http://icsr.info/2017/09/icsr-insigh...s-osce-report/

    Not read though. The full title is Countering Violent Extremism and Radicalisation that Lead to Terrorism: Ideas, Recommendations, and Good Practices from the OSCE Region.
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  18. #258
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    Default Moderator's pointer

    In a review of threads I have found an old thread 'Engineers in the Jihad', which is a useful read:Engineers of Jihad

    A reference was made to the Oxford University study that started the Engineers thread in a recent article on Foreign Fighters:https://lawfareblog.com/foreign-fighter-hot-potato
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 12-26-2017 at 02:29 PM.
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  19. #259
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    Default Patterns of Disengagement from Violent Extremism

    The full title of a book chapter is: 'Patterns of Disengagement from Violent Extremism: A Stocktaking of Current Knowledge and Implications for Counterterrorism' and added here as there is a free, lengthy bibliography for reference.
    Link:https://link.springer.com/chapter/10...319-65566-6_10
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  20. #260
    Council Member davidbfpo's Avatar
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    Default Anatomy of terror: What makes normal people become extremists?

    Thanks to a "lurker" for the pointer to this New Scientist article, in August 2017; it is a good overview, even if most of the experts cited are Americans, like Atran, Sageman and Crenshaw.
    Link:https://www.newscientist.com/article...ts/#bx313907B1
    Last edited by davidbfpo; 01-19-2018 at 04:36 PM. Reason: 218,084v
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