ISIS and the foreign-fighter phenomenon

[webfact]

ISIS and the Foreign-Fighter Phenomenon
Why do people travel abroad to take part in somebody else’s violent conflict?
JESSICA STERN AND J.M. BERGER

In August 2014, ISIS marked Eid al-Fitr, the end of Ramadan, with a 20-minute, high-definition video offering its greetings to the Muslim world.

Gauzy images of smiling worshippers embracing at a mosque cut to children passing out sweets to break the Ramadan fast. These scenes were interspersed with shots of the muhajireen (Arabic for “emigrants”)—British, Finnish, Indonesian, Moroccan, Belgian, American, and South African—each repeating a variation on the same message.

“I’m calling on all the Muslims living in the West, America, Europe, and everywhere else, to come, to make hijra with your families to the land of Khilafah,” said a Finnish fighter of Somali descent. “Here, you go for fighting and afterwards you come back to your families. And if you get killed, then ... you’ll enter heaven, God willing, and Allah will take care of those you’ve left behind. So here, the caliphate will take care of you.”

Hijra is an Arabic word meaning “emigration,” evoking the Prophet Muhammad’s historic escape from Mecca, where assassins were plotting to kill him, to Medina. Abdullah Azzam, the father of the modern jihadist movement, defined hijra as departing from a land of fear to a land of safety, a definition he later amplified to include the act of leaving one’s land and family to take up jihad in the name of establishing an Islamic state. For most Islamic extremists today, the concepts of hijra and jihad are intimately linked.

Full story: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/03/isis-and-the-foreign-fighter-problem/387166/

-- The Atlantic 2015-03-09

[JetsetBkk]

Here, you go for fighting and afterwards you come back to your families. And if you get killed, then ... youll enter heaven, God willing, and Allah will take care of those youve left behind. So here, the caliphate will take care of you.

What a load of rubbish. How do normal, sane people get so indoctrinated/brainwashed?

I fear for the world.

[Seastallion]

Here, you go for fighting and afterwards you come back to your families. And if you get killed, then ... youll enter heaven, God willing, and Allah will take care of those youve left behind. So here, the caliphate will take care of you.

What a load of rubbish. How do normal, sane people get so indoctrinated/brainwashed?

I fear for the world.

Yeah, it's phenomenal, literally.

Mind you, when I was in my early 20's, the thought of becoming a mercenary was very exciting, and being a young male, the excitement was very attractive. I guess all it would have needed was a little bit of coaxing, and I could have been convinced to go.

When you're young and full of testosterone, and you see danger and adventure, you're open to any sort of persuasion, even if in your heart of hearts you don't believe it.

We don't really grow common sense until after the mid-20's, and some men don't ever!

I think Western governments should definitely ramp up psychological warfare on this issue.

[trogers]

Here, you go for fighting and afterwards you come back to your families. And if you get killed, then ... youll enter heaven, God willing, and Allah will take care of those youve left behind. So here, the caliphate will take care of you.

What a load of rubbish. How do normal, sane people get so indoctrinated/brainwashed?

I fear for the world.

The deep desire to go into actual combat has been inculcated into minds of youth over the past 2 decades through violent video and computer games.

All they need is a cause and some finance.

[siampolee]

trogers post # 4.

The deep desire to go into actual combat has been inculcated into minds of youth over the past 2 decades through violent video and computer games.

All they need is a cause and some finance.

A sad but true fact, these kids have lived in a fantasy world where one walks away with nary a scratch.

Let us see what happens when the truth hits home being shot at is not fun, being shot hurts, well that's my personal experience anyway,.

The problem is these kids are but cannon fodder and have little or no chance of survival or escape.

Their only release comes with death either at the hands of those they are engaged in combat with or with those who have warped their minds.

The latter scenario is the more likely one as once there is an established ground area of bigoted dictatorial religious mania in existence those converts will be treated an non believers.

Edited March 9, 2015 by siampolee

[nidieunimaitre]

Here, you go for fighting and afterwards you come back to your families. And if you get killed, then ... youll enter heaven, God willing, and Allah will take care of those youve left behind. So here, the caliphate will take care of you.

What a load of rubbish. How do normal, sane people get so indoctrinated/brainwashed?

I fear for the world.

"normal, sane people"?

Have they ever been normal and sane?

Perhaps they are just psychopats that see their chance to kill and get away with it?

The unfortunate fact is that a small % of humans (not only moslims) are mentally deranged.



[Steely Dan]

Are we to believe that every Country these Jihaddists travel from are beset by poverty, poor job prospects etc. and are we to believe this phenomenon is unique to Muslims who have a grievance with western policies, but that this grievance is purely political and not motivated by religion, even when the media propaganda which radicalized them repeatedly mentions reward in the afterlife and religious obligation?

Nope, surely we are not so stupid as to believe all that.

[canuckamuck]

I agree with the video and encourage the whole lot of them (those that are inclined to go) to book their tickets. In fact they should be given free flights.

[Roadman]

I agree with the video and encourage the whole lot of them (those that are inclined to go) to book their tickets. In fact they should be given free flights.

Sadly, from the view point of a "honey trap" to clean all of them out from all corners of the globe, it seems ISIS is if not on the point of collapse, not far from it accordingly to local reports. They are suffering heavy loses in ground and numbers from not only the three different fronts they are being attacked on, but also from internally.

[Bwanatickey]

What angers Me most is this, when I was a kid, Moslum people where not everyday conversation, they lived in their own lands, over there, seemed contented and we never thought that one day, I would have to hear about Islam, as up front as this.

[Stargeezr]

In the case of ISIL and their own and their other foreign fighters, I think they all should be

showered with dirty bombs! Not nuclear bombs, just small chemical bombs, laced with

measles, and other diseases that will put most of the fighters in hospitals while they

are sick. Maybe they could get a bit of Ebola dropped on them as well, as it sure

would shrink their numbers and the urge for people to join them, if the people from other

parts of the world started seeing this group of terrorists dying in great numbers.

After all there are other ways for ISIL and those other terrorist groups, to

go and meet their maker.

My God! Does this make me sound too barbaric, or is all the beheadings barbaric enough

for all of you!

[96tehtarp]

Where are Saddam Hussein and Colonel Qaddafi when they are sorely needed⸮

Neither one of them put up with any of this fundamentalist nonsense. Now just look at the mess we have today with schoolchildren from the UK and Australia wanting to join the caliphate and behead apostates like me.

[wabothai]

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Here, you go for fighting and afterwards you come back to your families. And if you get killed, then ... youll enter heaven, God willing, and Allah will take care of those youve left behind. So here, the caliphate will take care of you.

What a load of rubbish. How do normal, sane people get so indoctrinated/brainwashed?

I fear for the world.

Yeah, it's phenomenal, literally.

Mind you, when I was in my early 20's, the thought of becoming a mercenary was very exciting, and being a young male, the excitement was very attractive. I guess all it would have needed was a little bit of coaxing, and I could have been convinced to go.

When you're young and full of testosterone, and you see danger and adventure, you're open to any sort of persuasion, even if in your heart of hearts you don't believe it.

We don't really grow common sense until after the mid-20's, and some men don't ever!

I think Western governments should definitely ramp up psychological warfare on this issue.

Indeed, and top it with with the being hooked on violent video games, recipe for disaster.

[spidermike007]

ISIS are nothing more than pathetic, power and money hungry gang rapists. They recruit young men and women and give them the authority to pillage, steal, rape, and murder. A kid without a future looks at this, and says this is my chance to become somebody. It is about on par with the Christian crusades, in terms of brutality and senselessness. And it has little to do with religion. All the religion nonsense does it give them an air of legitimacy. They are two bit punks, thugs, serial murderers, serial rapists, pedaphiles, criminals and gangsters. One can only hope the entire lot is exterminated.