Studies in Conflict & Terrorism
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ISIL's Execution Videos: Audience Segmentation and Terrorist Communication in the Digital Age Andrew Barr & Alexandra Herfroy-Mischler To cite this article: Andrew Barr & Alexandra Herfroy-Mischler (2018) ISIL's Execution Videos: Audience Segmentation and Terrorist Communication in the Digital Age, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 41:12, 946-967, DOI: 10.1080/1057610X.2017.1361282 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2017.1361282
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STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 2018, VOL. 41, NO. 12, 946 – 967 https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2017.1361282
ISIL’s Execution Videos: Audience Segmentation and Terrorist Communication in the Digital Age Andrew Barra and Alexandra Herfroy-Mischlerb a Anna Sobol Levy Fellow, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel; bThe Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace, Department of Journalism and Communication, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the CNRS/CRFJ, Jerusalem, Israel
ABSTRACT
ARTICLE HISTORY
This article offers a bottom-up understanding of the media strategy employed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as it relates to the production and dissemination of its hostage execution videos. Through an empirical analysis of sixty-two videos of executions produced by ISIL in the year following its establishment as the “Islamic State” in 2014, this study examines the videos as a major component of ISIL’s media strategy. Through these media products, ISIL seeks to spread a political message aimed at both local and global, ingroup and outgroup consumption through audience segmentation, while striving to influence both local and global audiences through the use and production of graphic violence. This article also discusses the strategy governing the production and release of ISIL’s execution videos; how it relies on the global media to transmit its intertwined political and religious agenda in the digital media age.
Received 30 March 2017 Revised 25 June 2017 Accepted 21 July 2017
When the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) proclaimed itself a “worldwide Caliphate” on 29 June 2014, few among the global media and political establishment took it seriously, despite its brutality and determination to “break modern states” in the pursuit of this goal.1 The group’s subsequent release of videos of graphic executions of non-Muslims and Muslims alike has necessitated a debate in both the political and media establishments regarding the nature of ISIL’s ideology and how these institutions may appropriately engage with ISIL. The way in which Al-Qaeda used the media coverage of 9/11 to serve its purposes, dubbed a “Disaster Marathon”2 highlighted the threat posed by terrorist media production to the ideals symbolized in the global free press.3 More than a decade later, this issue has retained its relevance and is complicated by the ever-expanding role of digital and social media, to the point that the ongoing conflict in Syria and the raise of ISIL has been referred to as “The first YouTube war.”4 Research on media and terrorism in the post-9/11 era has shown that modern terrorist organizations are very much aware of standards and values governing media coverage that largely prohibit the display of graphic acts of violence, and exploit these norms to
CONTACT Dr. Alexandra Herfroy-Mischler
[email protected] The Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace, Department of Journalism and Communication, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the CNRS/CRFJ, Office no. 210, 91505 Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, Israel. These authors contributed equally to this work. © 2017 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
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accomplish their objectives.5 Imperatives within the global media to provide coverage of major or “newsworthy” events creates a threshold which terrorist groups seek to cross by engaging in acts of graphic violence and brutality. Salem et al.6 argue that by using videos in particular, jihadist groups are able to leverage a highly versatile and powerful medium.7 As media producers, such groups are able to obscure the distinction and bridge the gap between professional and amateur media production, between objective coverage of an event and purposeful staging, as well as between actions undertaken for civic purposes and violence directed at creating and perpetuating a psychology of fear. Central to a terrorist group’s strategy is an effort to shape the agendas of governments, and the brutality of ISIL’s executions as displayed in their media production serves a dual role in this campaign. The graphic nature of these executions prompts coverage of and commentary on these acts, both by mainstream media outlets and on social media platforms. Thus, without showing the execution itself, traditional and social media sources engage with ISIL’s media products in a manner that advances the latter’s objectives in its “media battle.”8 Literature on terrorism such as Norris and colleagues9 and Papacharissi and Oliveira10 has focused on the framing of Western media coverage and how it has shaped both public opinion and national policy agendas. Insight into the core of the relationship between terrorist groups and their internal as well as external audiences is necessary to understand the whys and wherefores of this “media battle.” Notwithstanding the awareness of ideological differences between Al-Qaeda and ISIL,11 recent scholarship on ISIL has examined this relationship in a variety of contexts; Farwell12 discusses ISIL’s master narrative that strives to portray the group as a regional and global agent of change, a bastion of its self-defined conception of social justice, as well as a means by which the suffering of the community at the hands of “others” may be avenged. To advance this narrative, Farwell argues, ISIL has relied on the exploitation of the mainstream media. Friis13 discusses hostage execution videos in detail, focusing on the impact that execution videos have on the politics of war in the victims’ home countries, and argues that the role of the videos in the United Kingdom and United States specifically shows how visual imagery and the means of disseminating such imagery shapes public and governmental perception of the nature of the conflict. The videos have also been analyzed for their cinematic and documentary quality, as well as their extremely violent nature that allows them to become “object[s] in their own right”14 but these characteristics have not been examined in the context of the transmission of the videos through a global media adverse to the graphic violence displayed therein. As such, this study explores how an emergent terrorist group frames its execution videos in order to set its political agenda relying on global and digital media to be spread and accessed.15 To this end, this research examines the political and religious narrative framing16 of ISIL’s executions video productions. This case study provides a unique alternative to research conducted from the point of view of a media receiver, instead approaching the transmission of jihadi media products from the perspective of ISIL as a media producer. This choice is based on the conclusions of Salem et al.17 to provide an understanding of the “cultural intelligence” contained within such media products as it may further counterterrorism efforts: Video content analysis may provide us with important clues and information vital in recognizing how the extremist groups think, operate, and strategize. […] It should be expanded to include automatic extraction of structural and semantic content.
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As such, it is necessary to engage with ISIL’s own narrative within its media products. Following a review of the literature on terrorism, social media, and ISIL’s media battle, this study offers a systematic content analysis of the staging, rhetorical patterns, and production of execution videos that may be regarded as ISIL’s official media releases. Doing so, this analysis offers empirical insight into the factors that inform ISIL’s framing of these videos, media products that rely upon global media coverage to be communicated worldwide. Results are then discussed in light of audience segmentation theory,18 analyzing ISIL’s overall media strategy and its intertwined political and religious agenda it attempts to both set and propagate.
Terrorist Groups and Digital Media Age Terrorist organizations’ use of global media norms and values to further their aims, namely during coverage of the events of 9/11, has been termed a “disaster marathon” in the sense that the widespread, largely uninterrupted, and exclusive media coverage of the attacks effectively augmented the impact of the terrorist acts in its singular focus on visual images of the event and lack of perspective on the identity and nature of the perpetrators.19 More than a decade later, the same issue can be witnessed in mainstream media coverage of conflict. Al-Ghazzi20 argues that in the context of the ongoing Syrian conflict, media outlets such as Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya have muddied the distinction between witnessing, reporting, and lobbying by featuring commentary by Syrian political activists during prime-time news coverage. Strategic communication approaches to counterterrorism21 pointed at the fact that global media has aimed to counter this phenomenon by quoting only Western sources of information. Nonetheless, research has established22 that this shift, together with the rise of new media, that has led terrorist organizations to turn primarily toward the Internet in the last decade as a means of spreading and lobbying for jihadist ideology. On an empirical level, research on media and terrorist groups has focused principally on the response of Western publics and media groups,23 crisis communication policy,24 and the media’s portrayal of terrorism,25 all from the perspective of Western media as a producer. Research has also focused on classical media coverage of terrorist acts and Western responses in the printed press;26 television;27 radio;28 and cartoons29 using framing theory as defined by Entman30 as the selection of “some aspects of a perceived reality and make[ing] them more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation and/or moral evaluation.” As Weimann31 concludes, the Internet is a venue vital to the research of terrorist groups, and from this platform, a new corpus of research on media and terrorist groups has focused on the overall ability of jihadi groups to recruit,32 fund-raise,33 train, and operate.34 The content of jihadist media products35 has been examined in the form of blogs;36 user-generated content;37 and videos38 as well as websites, forums, Internet Relay Chat platforms, channels, blogs, social networking, and file sharing platforms.39 On the “Dark Web” and on YouTube specifically, Weimann highlights discussion on the potential of the online video community as a repository for jihadist technical knowledge, as well as propaganda and recruitment materials. As a post on the online jihadist forum al-Faloja states, “I ask you, by Allah, as soon as you read this subject, so start recording on YouTube, and to start cutting and uploading and posting clips on the jihadist, Islamic and general forums. Shame the
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Crusaders by publishing videos showing their losses, which they hid for a long time.”40 In addition to echoing the Crusader theme that is also very much present in ISIL’s religious rhetoric as this study discusses, this comment represents a pervasive and consistent desire to engage with digital media to develop and advance a specific media strategy.
ISIL’s “Media Battle”: An Image War Beheading videos as “acts of Jihad”41 have, according to Talbot,42 an enormous circulation rate: a video of American Nick Berg’s beheading by Al-Qaeda in Iraq’s leader, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was viewed more than 15 million times before it was removed. Previous research on the relationship between audiences and visual stimuli pointed at the importance of violent images (picture and videos) on audience perception43 and its efficacy in audience processing of political information44 to the point that some conceived it as “visual agendasetting.”45 Seminal work on how news images impact the public46 has pointed at how displays of presumed, possible, and certain death impact various strata of audiences’ emotions. However, previous research47 on executions carried out by terrorist groups has not systematically examined the content of produced execution videos with regard to political and religious framing or the legitimizing dimensions of the executions. After the Berg execution, Al-Qaeda leadership deemed such public displays counterproductive to the group’s ultimate objective of borderless global jihad, and as such, ISIL’s use of graphic violence and executions as a cornerstone of its media strategy is a marked departure from that of Al-Qaeda. Thus, although ISIL’s use of graphic violence is not unprecedented, the consistency of its use within the group’s larger media strategy sets it apart from other jihadist organizations. Because of ISIL’s uniqueness in this regard, this study does not attempt to conduct a contrast or comparison with the media strategy and use of graphic violence between ISIL and Al-Qaeda or other jihadist groups. It aims mostly at pinning down ISIL’s particularity in its “image war” as part of jihadi media battle. This is believed to be part of a “diffused war” technique.48 Terrorism has been defined according to its relationship with the state. Whether terrorism is conceived to be the action of a nonstate actor,49 or against civilians in order to gain publicity,50 it is inextricably intertwined with political aims and violence. The understanding and experience of terrorist groups are shaped by perceived realities specific to a given society.51 ISIL’s nature, however, has been difficult to define, in large part because of its seemingly dichotomous nature. Many among ISIL’s leadership have secular Ba’athist origins, but ideologically, the organization is cloaked in the tradition of Islamic jihad. It is a terrorist group that seeks to act as a state. It places much emphasis on local-state governance, but has displayed expansionist desires. It is borne of Al-Qaeda, but is ideologically and structurally distinct.52 This lack of clarity has resulted in various attempts by Western politicians, as well as Muslim religious authorities, to define ISIL in terms of what it is “not” rather than what it “is.” Such efforts seek to deny the legitimacy of “Islamic” attributes to ISIL,53 characterizing the group as a “perversion of Islam,”54 as well as a “terrorist group”55 that does “not belong to Islam at all.”56 What is the link between media, Islam, and statehood in ISIL’s media strategy? As Al-Ghazzi57 posits, modernist and universalizing discourse “implodes when encountering cultural and political difference exemplified by the uprising in Syria and the Arab world.” The “media battle” in this instance is conducted with the underlying imperative that
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Muslims need to fight against the “neocolonialist crusading ‘West’”58 based on a cultural perception of the “Christian enemy” that has persisted since the Crusades.59 The idea of a Western “cultural attack” (al-ghazw al-thaqafi) or “ideological attack” (al-ghazw al-fikri) that aims “to shatter Muslim identity as part of a grand design to re-conquer Muslim lands”60 was first formulated by Muhammad Rashid Rida (1865–1935), the founder of the political philosophy of the “Islamic State,” which, according to Engineer,61 refers to a type of government for which the primary basis is the enforcement of Sharia law. In this context, religion and statehood are fundamentally intertwined. This linkage is embodied by the concept of the Umma as a global community based on the practice of Islamic law and a commitment to an Islamic political project considered more important than a state, a language, or ethnicity.62 In other words, a “state” by this definition, refers to a community of believers with shared understanding and practices of Islam rather than the Westphalian conception of a territorial political system. For ISIL, the “media battle” aims at attracting a global Umma that is in agreement with ISIL’s religious interpretation of Islam and willing to fight for the establishment of its political entity known as the “Islamic State.” According to Corman and Schiefelbein,63 the jihadi “media battle” is comprised of three primary strategic goals: 1. Legitimization: a rhetorical effort to justify ideological and operational inconsistencies with religious, social, and political standards while establishing the jihadist group as an “outside” entity ideologically, a position from which it can then attack the legitimacy of other groups. 2. Intimidation: instilling fear in enemies and rivals of the group, in addition to the membership of the organization itself. 3. Propagation: the effective articulation and transmission of the group’s ideology, operational successes, and future goals by a recruitment and fundraising mechanism in order to increase the intimidation and legitimization. ISIL’s attempts at “legitimization” and “intimidation”64 are at the fore of its media strategy, to the extent that some, like Gaub,65 argue that the group’s rapid acquisition of territory, wealth, and power have enabled it to function as a “proto-state” based on an extremist interpretation of Islam. In this context, proto-state could be defined as an entity attempting to perform the actions and responsibilities traditionally carried out by a state government. As demonstrated by Lister,66 this proto-state control is ostensibly designed to consolidate ISIL’s power while quelling domestic dissent: it has effectively eliminated other entities that have traditionally provided these services, such as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and government agencies.67 The “propagation”68 aspect of the “media battle” is principally waged via a robust visual media and propaganda system, the most prominent branches of which are the Al-I’tisam Media Foundation, the Al-Hayat Media Center, and the Al-Furqan Establishment for Media Production. These videos represent a deliberate choice of content, and as such, can be analyzed as a component of ISIL’s broader media strategy. These media products conceive Muslim audiences throughout the world as ISIL’s Umma and aim at communicating both political and religious agendas to both this group of Muslims and a global audience of non-Muslims. This research contextualizes ISIL’s media strategy by analyzing the narratives justifying, explaining, and staging beheadings videos as a “Jihadi
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act” toward the “Islamic State” legitimization from the perspective of the terrorist group as a media producer.
Methodology and Coding Following the methodology of recent research on ISIL’s videos and counterterrorism (Foy;69 Boesman et al.;70 Grebelsky-Lichtman and Cohen;71 Herfroy-Mischler72), this study utilized a grounded theory approach (“the discovery of theory from data systematically obtained from social research”73) informed by framing analysis defined by Entman as the “process of culling a few elements of perceived reality and assembling a narrative that highlights connections among them to promote a particular interpretation.”74 This study aims to answer the following question: how does an emergent terrorist group frame its execution videos in order to set its political agenda relying on global and digital media to be spread and accessed? Our content analysis of framing was undertaken in several steps as follows: 1. Gathering videos via IntelCenter (www.intelcenter.com, an online database of multimedia resources relating to global terrorism) categorized as ISIL-produced “hostage videos” including “Executions” produced from August 2014, with the first beheading, until the end of June 2015, the first year anniversary of the proclamation of the caliphate as shown in Table 1; 2. Constructing a codebook of eighteen variables used to examine the videos using grounded theory;75 3. Identifying exceptions to the variables as annotated in the codebook (as shown in Table 2); 4. Based on the variables, establishing three main categories as follows: a. Production details b. Political and religious narrative framing c. Execution type 5. The videos were translated, and the resulting transcripts were coded in order to identify political and religious narrative patterns based on Entman’s framing model.76 As argued similarly by Touri and Koteyko77 and Boesman et al.,78 “the aim of this kind of qualitative analysis is not to have an estimate of the frequency of occurrence of the different frames, but to give an estimate of their prominence based on the breadth and density of the framing and reasoning devices.” Familiar frames that we refer to as “master-narrative” (defined as a “trans-historical narrative that is deeply embedded in a particular culture”79) were systematically activated in the religious and political “framing package” to create meanings by way of defining the situation, indicate what the problem is, and define the status of the main actors in the story. Our content analysis codebook is summarized in Table 2.
Results Video Production: A Strategy of Audience Segmentation The production components category considered elements such as: the use of branding, clothing, computer-generated graphics, and languages used.
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About 88 percent of the videos feature an image of ISIL’s flag, which features the Shahada (“testimony”), the Islamic declaration of faith, which reads “There is no god but God, Muhammad is the messenger of God” in white text over a black background. The flag’s design draws from the Pashtun tradition of battle standards, present in the flags of jihadist groups including the Taliban and Al-Qaeda. All videos, except for the execution of Japanese civilian Haruna Yukawa [video 12], feature the logo of one of ISIL’s main media arms, the “Al-Furqan Institute for Media Production,” the “Al-I’tisam Media Foundation,” the “Al-Hayat Media Center,” or one of twenty of its regional media offices in one of the top corners of the screen throughout the video, often superimposed with the ISIL flag. This regionalization is a representation of ISIL’s audience segmentation efforts directed at both local and global audiences.80 The use of these and other computer-generated logos features prominently in many of the videos. In the Al-Kaseasbeh execution [video 19], the insignia of an “Islamic State-Security Database” is displayed in an animated sequence at the beginning of the video, while in a number of other videos, including the execution of residents of Kot District in Nangarhar Province, Afghanistan [video 58] and the execution of a Kurdish Peshmerga fighter [video 2], animated logos and title screens are used. The use of such logos, as well as digital imagery in infographic displays, the incorporation of media clips from mainstream global news outlets, (present in eleven of the clips), the inclusion of jihadist chants (present in seventeen of the clips), sound effects, as well as the use of microphones, suggests an effort to create a sophisticated product that could be compared to governmental and military media productions of a state as a valid source of information for media outlets worldwide. Of the sixty-two videos analyzed, thirteen were produced by one of ISIL’s three main video production arms, Al-Furqan, Al-I’tisam, or Al-Hayat; twenty-four were produced by the media offices of ISIL-declared “provinces” in Iraq; sixteen by Syrian “offices”; two by the “Wilayah Khorasan Media Office” encompassing Afghanistan and Pakistan; two by the “Wilayah Al-Furat Media Office” spanning Iraq and Syria; two by the “Wilayah Shabwah Media Office” in Yemen; one in the Sinai Penninsula; and one video (the Haruna Yukawa execution, video 12) does not have an attributed producer. The use of microphones, either by the captive, executioner, or by another figure in the video, are clearly present in ten of the thirteen videos produced by ISIL’s larger media production entities, in twenty of the fortytwo videos produced by media outlets in Iraq and/or Syria, and visible in one of the six videos produced outside this region. This is indicative of the disparity in regional production capacities between ISIL’s media “franchises,” as well as an attempt to illustrate ISIL’s broad geographic reach to remote and resource-strapped areas. There are significant differences in the clothing worn by both captors and captives across victim groups consisting of military personnel, spies, criminals, civilians, as well as those whose state of origin is allied with coalition forces, and the region of production. Thirty-two of the captives are described as having military affiliations, eleven are identified as “spies,” eight are “criminals,” and eleven are “civilians.” Thirty-two of the videos feature captives wearing jumpsuits, in seven the captives wear military uniforms, and in twenty-three the captives wear civilian dress. The executioner(s) most often appear(s) in black dress, or in a uniform that separates him from other fighters standing around him, or from other executioners, who appear dressed in black, dressed in full military uniforms, or mismatching uniforms as well as civilian clothing. The highest degree of uniformity in executioner dress is observed in the videos produced by ISIL’s main media branches, with six of the thirteen of
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these productions featuring fully matching uniforms. Among victim group, thirteen of the videos of captives with military affiliations are dressed in jumpsuits, while eleven appear in civilian dress. Those captives identified as “spies” appear in jumpsuits in ten videos and in civilian clothing in one video, while “criminals” appear in civilian dress in all of the thirteen videos in which they appear. “Civilians” appear in orange jumpsuits in nine videos and in civilian dress in two. The orange color of the jumpsuits in a total of twenty-eight videos serves as a possible reference to the orange garments worn by United States detainees at Guantanamo Bay, again a manifestation of an attempt at audience segmentation. The language of the videos also contributes to audience segmentation strategy, tailoring content (and therefore language) to ingroups and outgroups, and allies and enemies. About 66 percent of the videos are presented in Arabic with no subtitles, one in Arabic with Arabic subtitles, nine in English with Arabic subtitles, three in Kurdish with Arabic and/or English subtitles, one in Russian and Arabic with Arabic and English subtitles, two in French and Arabic with English and Arabic subtitles and no subtitles, respectively, and one in Pashto with Arabic subtitles. The videos’ subtitling and variety in language is representative of ISIL’s efforts at rendering its media products accessible to its geographic and language-diverse ingroup and outgroups. ISIL’s execution productions combine both political and religious framing devices that expose global media audiences to an ideology that legitimizes the practice of graphic capital punishment as legitimate state action. ISIL’s Religious Agenda: War Against Apostates, Crusaders, and their States Justifying Violence Against Non-Muslims and Apostates The opening sequence of 95 percent of the videos features a title slide in Arabic stating “In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate,” a phrase known as the Bismillah, recited before most suras (chapters) of the Qur’an, and used in a variety of other contexts such as in daily prayer and in the constitutional preamble of a number of Islamic countries. The use of this phrase as a preamble to the videos may be an attempt at framing the execution as a divinely sanctioned act. This dynamic is an attempt to affirm ISIL’s religious authenticity and serves to negate those who condemn ISIL as “un-Islamic.” The videos include multiple references to Western governments and military forces as “crusaders”81 framing ISIL’s conflict and strategic aims in religious terms. The location of the execution of aid worker and former United States Army Ranger Peter Kassig [video 7], is stated as “Dabiq,” a place that bears a particular religious significance as a reference to the events of Yawm al-Qiyamah (“Day of Resurrection”). Such is a clear attempt to rely on an eschatological narrative of absolute and final confrontation between good and evil.82 The historical framing of Western governments and militaries as “crusaders,” whose defeat led to the Muslim re-capture of Jerusalem in 1187, is also present in a number of the videos. The 2015 video depicting the execution of the Egyptian Coptic Christians [video 26] is titled “A Message Signed With Blood to the Nation of the Cross,” with the Egyptian Church described as “hostile.” This contextualization of ISIL’s fight as one against Crusader forces in a religious and ethno-national conflict enables ISIL to access a master narrative that is well-known in the Muslim world. It attempts to apply this narrative to the everyday lives and struggles of Muslims across the world83 to both validate their activities and encourage a sense of righteousness and purpose. This reference also contributes to framing ISIL’s conflict as a religious struggle, that of a divinely sanctioned state against unholy enemies.
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The Gourdel execution video [video 5], exemplifies the crusader theme. His captors, Jund al-Khilifah (JaK) or “Soldiers of the Caliphate” (which pledged allegiance to ISIL but retains a separate identity) denounce the actions of the “French criminal crusaders” against Muslims in Algeria, Mali and Iraq, and in the Al-Kaseasbeh [video 19], in which a narrator states: “When the crusader campaigns ensued on the lands of Islam, the butcher applied his blade and delegated his agents to erect towers overflowing with apostasy and treachery.” The execution of an Iraqi Army soldier [video 18] also points not only to the “ongoing Crusader coalition” but also to the “Iran-led Safavid-rejectionist alliance against the Islamic State.” The use of the terms “Safavid” and “rejectionist,” derogatory terms referring to Shi’ite Muslims, may be an attempt to frame modern-day Iraq in terms of the latter’s past religio-military identity in the form of the Persian Safavid dynasty in the same manner that Western governments are characterized as “crusaders,” thereby creating an outgroup within an ingroup. American journalist Steven Sotloff’s pre-execution statement [video 3] echoes the absolutism of this religious rhetoric, referring to President Obama “marching us, the American people, into the ‘blazing fire,’” a possible reference to divine judgment of coalition forces at Dabiq. Japanese reporter Kenji Goto Jogo’s executioner [video 14] also uses religious rhetoric: “You [Japan], like your foolish allies in the satanic coalition, have yet to understand that we by Allah’s grace are Islamic caliphate with authority and power.” The Ethiopian Christians execution [video 39] frames ISIL’s doctrinal opposition to Christians, citing the Qur’an, various hadith, the medieval Sunni jurist Ibn-Taymiyyah, as well as a text by Imam Ibnul-Qayyim, an early Sunni figure. The video’s narrator further states that those that refuse Islam deserve “nothing save the edge of the sword.” However, this staunch opposition to Christianity is qualified if not contradicted by the assertion that, for Christians who pay jizyah in lieu of converting, “We [ISIL] will defend them and they will seek judgment from us in the Islamic courts. We will return their rights back to them,” a clear attempt at audience segmentation, dividing the Christian audience into an ingroup (those who accept the “dhimmah contract,” residence in return for taxes, the jizyah) and an outgroup (those who do not). Unity Among the Ummah The Qur’an is quoted extensively in the videos analyzed. It is interesting to note that in addition to a number of verses justifying violence against non-Muslims, several videos cite verses that discuss unity within the Islamic community. In the Al-Kaseasbeh execution [video 19], the partial verse “Heal the breasts of Believers”84 is used, which appears in full in the execution of residents of the Kot District in the northern Nangarhar Province of Afghanistan [video 58]. A verse quoted in the execution of alleged Russian spies [video 8] also fits this pattern: “Let not believers take disbelievers as allies rather than believers,”85 as well as a passage quoted in the execution of anti-ISIL Syrian paramilitary fighters [video 17]: “And he amongst you that turns to them [for friendship] is of them.”86 The unity that these verses prescribe very much fits into ISIL’s conception of statehood vis-a-vis the Umma. Because ISIL’s “community of believers” is simultaneously a religious and political construction, ISIL is able to justify its extreme social and political control through the invocation of religion, namely the application of Sharia law. As Corman87 suggests, the Qur’anic verses in the execution setting are also employed in the context of audience segmentation. To Muslim viewers, these verses may represent both a threat and an attempt to illustrate ISIL’s religious legitimacy, while to non-
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Muslims, in addition to a threat, these verses may signify an effort to portray unity among Muslims behind ISIL. ISIL’s Political Agenda: The “Islamic State” Legitimization The political rhetoric within the videos places considerable emphasis on the image of ISIL as a legitimate state entity, an attempt to create an aura of a sovereign. Further, the rhetoric presents ISIL as a protector of Islam and of Muslims around the world. The Foley execution [video 1] characterizes any future United States action against ISIL as an attack on those living “in safety under the Islamic Caliphate” rather than simply an attack on the group itself. This inclusion within ISIL’s sphere of influence and protection associates diverse geographic, cultural, and political ingroups with its community and aims. Such a message of inclusiveness often lies in sharp contrast to the emerging restrictiveness of political and cultural landscapes in the United States and Europe. Quotation of and reference to ISIL or Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) leadership is also prevalent in the videos, perhaps as an attempt at countering global media institutions’ penchant to reference “official” or state sources of information. In the execution of an Iraqi Soldier and ten Popular Mobilization Forces fighters at the Baiji oil refinery [video 25], ISIL leader AbuBakr al-Baghdadi is quoted on the theme of unity among the Umma and the religious importance of the fight: “Be certain of God’s victory! You are soldiers of God fighting in His cause. The rejectionists [derogatory term for Shi’ites] are the soldiers of Satan fighting in his cause.” In the execution of the Syrian soldiers [video 7], a recording of ISIL leader Muhammad al-Adnani makes reference to ISIL “armies” in Iraq and Syria, in the Kassig execution [video 7], AQI leader Abu-Mus’ab al-Zarqawi is quoted referencing the impending destruction of “the Crusader army in Dabiq” and in the execution of an Iraqi Army soldier [video 24], footage of Hafiz Sa’id Khan Orakzai, leader of “Wilayah Khorasan” (a historical Persian province) is shown pledging allegiance to Baghdadi. The idea of the state as a protector of its population is also applied to ISIL’s outgroups in its threats, using rhetoric that frames the conflict in absolute terms, that of a state against a state. This notion is further reinforced by ISIL’s display and use of conventional military material. In the execution of a Syrian Shabiha fighter [video 53], ISIL fighters are shown in possession of a large weapons cache, and in the execution video of “Popular Mobilization” fighters [video 54], an ISIL fighter is shown holding a knife and waving the ISIL flag as he stands atop a destroyed Iraqi Army tank. ISIL action (through conventional military means) as a response to the foreign policy decisions of world governments also seeks to elevate ISIL to the interactional plane of “state vs. state.” The Execution Act The executions themselves are framed in two distinct ways: (1) A stated consequence to coalition action and Western foreign policy in the Middle East and (2) An effort to illustrate a failure of world powers, their coalition partners, and regional powers to adequately protect their citizens. A statement in the execution of British aid worker Alan Henning [video 6] alludes to this political cause and effect: “Because of our parliament’s decision to attack the Islamic state I [Henning], as a member of the British public, will now pay the price for that decision.” The Sotloff video [video 3] names President Obama and references United States
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bombing of the Mosul Dam despite ISIL’s “serious warnings” as an impetus for the execution, while a Peshmerga fighter execution [video 2] refers to President Obama as a “Roman dog,” again drawing from the crusader analogy. The Haines video [video 4] mentions Britain’s alliance with the United States and the bombing of the Haditha Dam. The Gourdel video [video 5] names French President Fran¸c ois Hollande and states that the execution was carried out to “avenge the victims in Algeria.” The Yukawa [video 12] and Jogo [video 14] executions blame Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the Japanese government’s failure to negotiate the release of failed AQI suicide bomber Sajida al-Rishawi, while the al-Kaseasbeh video names King Abdullah II and the Jordanian government for supporting coalition operations. Finally, perhaps the most extreme example of framing the execution as a response to government policy appears in the execution of two residents of the Kot District of Nangarhar Province, Afghanistan (video 58): As revenge [for the death of an ISIL-affiliated fighter at the hands of the Afghan government], these two apostates who are residents of Kot District, have been captured by the mujahideen of the Islamic Caliphate […] God has commanded us to kill them and we will kill them.
Differences in the presentation of the execution itself are also significant. Variation in the act of execution between Western and Arab hostages suggests a distinct audience segmentation strategy. Thirteen of the beheading videos do not show the act of execution at all, but rather display a “before and after” sequence of the execution, in the case of beheading, the disembodied head of a hostage is often placed on the back of the body. Nineteen of the videos show only the beginning of the execution and not the complete act. The most complete display of beheading is present in twenty-eight of the videos, none of which include the executions of the hostages from non-Arab states. Rather, out of the twenty-eight videos of “full” executions, sixteen are of individuals affiliated with Arab militaries or militias, seven are of alleged spies, two are of groups of Christians, two feature criminals, one includes civilians, and another includes the execution of the eighteen Syrian soldiers, in which the act is almost entirely shown, as in the Al-Kaseasbeh immolation. This deliberate differentiation across religious and ethnic groups is likely intended to highlight the harsh nature of ISIL’s retribution against Arabs and Muslims88 who aid coalition action. To audiences outside of the Middle East, the differentiation in execution display may not be as significant as the display itself. The more graphic and shocking the presentation (e.g., the use of children in parts of the production or as executioner in four videos), the more media coverage and subsequent public awareness of ISIL’s willingness to engage in extreme violence. Such coverage and public awareness of the brutality of ISIL’s execution methods may also prompt a departure from mainstream media outlets89 in search of complete versions of the videos, alluded to, but not shown by major news sources or hosted on websites such as YouTube or Twitter.
Conclusion ISIL’s use of execution video productions provides important context to the ways in which an emergent terrorist group frames its execution videos in terms of narrative, images, and ideology in order to set its political and religious agenda by relying on global and digital media to be spread and accessed. This empirical study has shed light on the complexity of the relationship between terrorism and the digital media age.
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Our data suggests that ISIL deliberately attempts to counter restrictions imposed by global media deontology when reporting on terrorism and hostages (derived from the United Nations Hostages Convention of 1979). It is simultaneously despite and because of the extremely graphic nature of these videos that ISIL strives to bypass these restrictions; the violence depicted in the executions satisfies newsworthiness criteria, thereby edifying the “Islamic State” as a valid source of information. Regarding source authority, our data illustrate a framing pattern highlighted by Al-Ghazzi90 according to which media efforts, similar to those of ISIL, can “blur the lines between witnessing an event and staging it, between professional and amateur productions, and civic and violent intentions.” Forcing media institutions and governments to quote the “Islamic State” as a valid source of information is a requisite step in ISIL’s larger strategy of imposing and communicating its political and religious agenda on and through global media institutions, and ultimately, world governments. Moreover, to circumvent the media and government boycott of jihadist input, ISIL has adjusted the content of its execution videos in order to display or allude just enough graphic content to induce terror and attention, but not enough to be censured or boycotted by global media and governments. Such suggests that ISIL’s production of executions is informed by an organizational understanding of normative values governing global, social and digital media production and transmission. This research also focused on understanding how the production of execution videos is used to set a political agenda. Our content analysis spanning ISIL’s first year as a declared “Caliphate” sheds light on what we term the “agenda spreading” of political as well as religious content. It is clear that ISIL attempts to advance an image of itself as a proto-state as well as a legitimate state entity and religious authority through the video production of public executions. Furthermore, the data reveal that by setting a political agenda with graphic executions, ISIL aims at spreading its religious agenda via a narrative surrounding the action of execution itself, which is systematically staged, translated, and aimed at a specific audience. This is part of a “Cosmic War”91 that refers to the evocation of a historical struggle,92 abstract conflicts between good and evil,93 ideas that are at the same time personal and societal.94 This study has shown that this absolutism is systematically communicated via the Media Battle, the core tenet of ISIL’s political as well as religious agenda, set and spread within global, glocal, and digital media. This data sheds a different light on the digital media and terrorism literature by showing the relevance of audience segmentation95 in terrorist output to global media, and by demonstrating that this segmentation is also relevant for ingroups. Audience segmentation allows ISIL’s execution videos to act both as an official state production for global media and governments as well as a political and religious threat for Muslim audiences that would refuse to be part of the Umma, which ISIL aims to create by staging ingroup political and religious purges. Indeed, the psychological dimensions of ISIL’s media productions, created through the packaging of execution acts and the manner in which they are communicated to multiple local, regional, and global audiences, suggest that the use of terrorism and state legitimization are not mutually exclusive. Terrorist communications in the digital age should not exclusively be understood through the nexus of a state, nonstate authority, or “proto-state.” Rather, as our data suggests, terrorism communications strategy relies on a specific framing of reality, in this case by a jihadist ideology, which is simultaneously and indistinctly communicated to set and spread its political and religious agendas via digital and glocal media, relying on graphic violence to be considered newsworthy.
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Further research is needed in order to grasp the conditions in which the global media and governments can most effectively engage with ISIL and prevent the latter from spreading and advancing its religious and political agenda as well as setting the agendas of media outlets and governments. ISIL’s execution videos have been rich in providing direction in understanding the dynamic between media and terrorism in the digital age. As such, examining how ingroup media as well as glocal media institutions engage with ISIL’s propagation tactics may aid in further understanding of terrorist entities in the digital media age.
Acknowledgments The authors thank Melanie Goebel, Christian Carlisle, Elizabeth Cotter, Denis Cotter, Zohar Kampf, Moran Yarchi, Julien Loiseau, Isabelle Garcin-Marrou, and Abbes Zouache for their helpful comments on earlier draft of this article, as well as Sandra Laugier, Laurence Mouchino, Lyse Baer, Matt Paradise, Tom Barr, and Reid Sawyer, without whose support and encouragement this project would not have been possible.
Funding This research has been funded by the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) as part of the “Comite attentats-Recherche” Grants and the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Notes 1. Harleen Gambhir, “ISIS’s Global Strategy: A War Game,” Institute for the Study of War (2015). 2. Menahem Blondheim and Tamar Liebes, “Live Television’s Disaster Marathon of September 11 and Its Subversive Potential,” Prometheus 20(3) (2002), pp. 271–276. 3. James Carey, Communication as Culture: Essays on Media and Society, (New York: Routledge, 2009); Stuart Hall and Paul Du Gay, Questions of Cultural Identity (London: Sage 1996); Teun A. Van Dijk, ed., Discourse Studies (London: Sage, 2011); Jorgen Westerstahl and Folke Johanson, “Foreign News: News Values and Ideologies,” European Journal of Communication 9 (1994), pp. 71–89. 4. Kylie Morris, “Online is the new frontline for Syrian Fighters,” Channel 4 News. 28 October 2014. 5. Zizi Papacharissi and Maria de Fatima Oliveira, “News Frames Terrorism: A Comparative Analysis of Frames Employed in Rerrorism Coverage in US and UK Newspapers,” Harvard International Journal of Press-Politics 13(1) (2008), pp. 52–74. 6. Arab Salem, Edna Reid, and Nsinchun Chen, “Multimedia Content Coding and Analysis: Unraveling the Content of Jihadi Extremist Groups’ Videos,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 31 (2008), pp. 605–626. 7. The article adopts Awan’s definition of “Islamism” as the “religion of Islam interpreted and reformulated as a modern ideology to support political and social activism, often allied with attaining temporal power” and “radical Islamist” or “jihadist groups” as “those which have a propensity towards violence or promote violence as an integral part of their ideology.” See Akil N. Awan, “Virtual Jihadist Media: Function, Legitimacy, and Radicalizing Efficacy,” European Journal of Cultural Studies 10(3) (2007), p. 390. 8. James Calvert, Islamism: A Documentary and Reference Guide. (2008). Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. 9. P. Norris, M. Kern and M. Just, “Framing Terrorism.” In P. Norris, M. Kern, and M. Just, eds., Framing Terrorism: The New Media, the Government, and the Public (New York: Routledge, 2003), pp. 75–92. 10. Papacharissi and Oliveira, “News Frames Terrorism,” pp. 52–74.
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11. J. Turner, “Strategic differences: Al Qaeda’s Split with the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham,” Small Wars & Insurgencies 26(2) (2015), pp. 208–225; and T. Kfir, “Social Identity Group and Human (In)Security: The Case of Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL),” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 38(4) (2015), pp. 233–252. 12. James P. Farwell, “The Media Strategy of ISIS,” Survival 56(6) (2014), pp. 49–55. 13. Simone Molin Friis, “‘Beyond Anything We Have Ever Seen’: Beheading Videos and the Visibility of Violence in the War Against ISIS,” International Affairs 91 (2015), pp. 725–746. 14. Hatem N. Akil, “Cinematic Terrorism: Deleuze, ISIS and Delirium,” Journal for Cultural Research 20(4) (2016), pp. 366–379. 15. A. Herfroy-Mischler and A. Barr, “Execution as a Strategic Tool: Fear and Legitimization in Daesh’s Media Agenda-Setting.” First annual Conference of the International Journal of Press/Politics, hosted by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, the University of Oxford, England (2015). 16. Robert M. Entman, “Framing Bias: Media in the Distribution of Power,” Journal of Communication 57(1) (2007), pp. 163–173. 17. Salem et al., “Multimedia Content Coding,” p. 621. 18. Steven R. Corman, “Weapons of Mass Persuasion: Communicating Against Terrorist Ideology,” The Quarterly Journal 5(3) (2006), pp. 93–104. 19. Blondheim and Liebes, “Live Television’s Disaster Marathon,” pp. 271–276. 20. Omar Al-Ghazzi, “‘Citizen Journalism’ in the Syrian Uprising: Problematizing Western Narratives in a Local Context,” Communication Theory 24(4) (2014), pp. 435–454. 21. Cristina Archetti, Understanding Terrorism in the Age of Global Media: A Communication Approach (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012); Cristina Archetti, “Terrorism, Communication and New Media: Explaining Radicalization in the Digital Age,” Perspectives on Terrorism 9(1) (2015), pp. 49–59. 22. Phillip Hammond, “The Media War on Terrorism,” Journal for Crime, Conflict and the Media 1 (1) (2003), pp. 23–36; Scott Atran, “The ‘Virtual Hand’ of Jihad,” Jamestown Terrorism Monitor 3 (10) (2005), pp. 8–11; Gary R. Bunt, Islam in the Digital Age: e-Jihad, Online Fatwas and Cyber Islamic Environments (London: Pluto Press, 2003). 23. Bradley S. Greenberg, ed., Communication and Terrorism: Public and Media Responses to 9/11 (New York: Hampton Press, 2002). 24. Michael A. Noll, ed., Crisis Communication: Lessons from September 11 (Lanham, MD: Rownan and Littlefield Publishers, 2003). 25. S. Venkatraman, Media in a Terrorized World: Reflection in the Wake of 9/11 (Singapore: Eastern Universities Press, 2004). 26. Leen D’Haenens and Susan Bink, “Islam in the Dutch Press: With Special Attention to the Algemeen Dagblad,” Media Culture & Society 29(1) (2007), pp. 135–149; Brigitte.L. Nacos and O. Torres-Reyna, “Framing Muslim-Americans before and after 9/11,” in Pippa Norris, Montague Kern, and Marion R. Just, eds., Framing Terrorism: The News Media, the Government and the Public (New York: Routledge, 2003), pp. 133¡158; Elizabeth Poole, “Framing Islam: An Analysis of Newspaper Coverage of Islam in the British Press,” in K. Hafez, eds., Islam and the West in the Mass Media: Fragmented Images in a Globalizing World (New York: Hampton Press, 2000), pp. 157–179; Elizabeth Poole, “The Effects of September 11 and the War in Iraq on British Newspaper Coverage,” in Elizabeth Poole and J. E. Richardson, eds., Muslims and the News Media (London: IB Tauris, 2006), pp. 89–102. 27. Everett M. Rogers, “Diffusion of News of the September 11 Terrorist Attacks,” in Michael A. Noll, ed., Crisis Communication: Lessons from September 11 (Lanham. MD: Rownan and Littlefield Publishers, 2003); Blondheim and Liebes, “Live Television’s Disaster Marathon,” pp. 271–276. 28. G. H. Stempel and T. Hargrove, “Media Sources of Information and Attitudes about Terrorism,” in B. S. Greenberg, ed., Communication and Terrorism: Public and Media Response to 9/11 (Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, 2002), pp. 17–26. 29. A. J. Hussain, “The Media’s Role in a Clash of Misconceptions: The Case of the Danish Muhammad Cartoons,” Harvard International Journal of Press-Politics 12(4) (2007), pp. 112–130. 30. Entman, “Framing Bias,” p. 167.
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31. Gabriel Weimann, Terror on the Internet: The New Arena, the New Challenge (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2006). 32. S. Ulph, “A Guide to Jihad on the Web,” Global Terrorism Analysis: Terrorism Focus 2(7) (2005), pp. 5–7; S. Ulph, “Mujahideen to Pledge Allegiance on the Web,” Global Terrorism Analysis: Terrorism Focus 2(22) (2005), pp. 1–2. 33. Atran, “The ‘Virtual Hand’ of Jihad,” pp. 8–11. 34. Awan, “Virtual Jihadist Media”; Bunt, Islam in the Digital Age. 35. Awan, “Virtual Jihadist Media.” 36. Bill Berkeley, “Bloggers vs. Mullahs: how the Internet Roils Iran,” World Policy Journal 23(1) (2006), pp. 71–78. 37. Lela Mosemghvdlishvili and Jeroen Jansz, “Framing and Praising Allah on Youtube: Exploring User Created Videos About Islam and the Motivation for Producing Them,” New Media and Society 15(4) (2012), pp. 482–500; Liesbet Van Zoonen, Farida Vis, and Sabina Mihelj. “YouTube Interactions Between Agonism, Antagonism and Dialogue: Video Responses to the Anti-Islam film Fitna,” New Media & Society 13 (2011), pp. 1283–1300. 38. Salem et al., “Multimedia Content Coding”; Al-Ghazzi, “‘Citizen Journalism’ in the Syrian Uprising.” 39. Awan, “Virtual Jihadist Media.” 40. Gabriel Weimann, “Terror on Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube.” The Brown Journal of World Affairs 16(2) (2010), pp. 45–54. 41. Ibid., p. 396. 42. David Talbot, “Terror’s Server. Fraud, Gruesome Propaganda, Terror Planning: The Net Enables It All. The Online Industry can Help Fix It,” Technology Review, 1 February 2005. 43. See Shahira Fahmy and Wayne Wanta, “What Visual Journalists Think Others Think the Perceived Impact of News Photographs on Public Opinion Formation,” Visual Communication Quarterly 12(3–4) (2005), pp. 146–163; and Erica Scharrer and Greg Blackburn, “Images of Injury: Graphic News Visuals’ Effects on Attitudes toward the Use of Unmanned Drones,” Mass Communication and Society 18(6) (2015), pp. 799–820. 44. Doris A. Graber, “Seeing is Remembering: How Visuals contribute to Learning from Television News,” Journal of Communication 40(3) (1990), pp. 134–156. 45. Fahmy Shahira, Sooyoung Cho, Wayne Wanta, and Yonghoi Song, “Visual Agenda-Setting After 9/11: Individuals’ Emotions, Image Recall, and Concern with Terrorism,” Visual Communication Quarterly 13(1) (2006), pp. 4–15. 46. See Barbie Zelizer, About to Die: How News Images Move the Public (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010). 47. Such as Salem et al., “Multimedia Content Coding.” 48. Andrew Hoskins and Ben O’Laughlin, War and Media: The Emergence of Diffused War (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2010). 49. Bruce Hoffman, Inside Terrorism (2nd ed.) (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006). 50. Brigitte L. Nacos, Mass-Mediated Terrorism: The Central Role of the Media in Terrorism and Counterterrorism, 2nd ed. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2002). 51. Papacharissi and Oliveira, “News Frames Terrorism,” pp. 52–74; On “terrorist” and “freedom fighter” see Raphael Cohen-Almagor, ”Media Coverage of Acts of Terrorism: Troubling Episodes and Suggested Guidelines,” Canadian Journal of Communication 30 (2005), pp. 383–409. 52. See Turner, “Strategic Differences” and Kfir, “Social Identity Group and Human (In)Security.” 53. White House Office of the Press Secretary, “Statement by the President on ISIL,” Briefing Room,10 September 2014. Available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/09/10/ statement-president-isil-1 54. Matt Dathan, “‘I Wish the BBC would Stop Calling It Islamic state’—David Cameron Unleashes Frustration at Broadcaster,” The Independent—UK Politics (Independent), 29 June 2015. Available at http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/i-wish-the-bbc-would-stop-calling-itislamic-state-david-cameron-unleashes-frustration-on-10351885.html 55. Pauline Landais-Barrau and Camille Wormser, “Daech, Isis, Isil, Etat islamique (EI) … Pourquoi une guerre des noms?” Geopolis 26 September 2014.
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56. Reuters, “ISIL Islam’s Enemy No.1, Saudi Grand Mufti Says,” 19 August 2014. Available at http:// gulfnews.com/news/mena/iraq/isil-islam-s-enemy-no-1-saudi-grand-mufti-says-1.1374063 (accessed 30 December 2016). 57. Al-Ghazzi, “‘Citizen Journalism’ in the Syrian Uprising,” p. 449. 58. Hussain, “The Media’s Role in a Clash of Misconceptions,” p. 112. 59. Bernard Lewis, Islam and the West (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1993); Muhammad Reeve, Muhammad in Europe (New York: New York University Press, 2000). 60. Uriel Shavit, “Is Shura a Muslim Form of Democracy? Roots and Systemization of a Polemic,” Middle Eastern Studies 46(3) (2010), p. 352. 61. Asghar Ali Engineer, The State in Islam: Nature and Scope (Gurgaon: Hope India Publications, 2006), p. 91. 62. Al-Ghazzi, “‘Citizen Journalism’ in the Syrian Uprising.” 63. Steven R. Corman and Jill S. Schiefelbein, “Communication and Media Strategy in the Jihadi War of Ideas,” Consortium for Strategic Communication, Arizona State University (2006). 64. Ibid. 65. Florence Gaub, “Can ISIL Be Copied?” European Union Institute for Security Studies 1(4) (2015). 66. Charles. R. Lister, The Islamic State: A Brief Introduction (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2015). 67. According to Gaub, five factors have facilitated ISIL’s rise to power: (1) Exploitation of the political alienation of Iraq’s Sunnis and the high rate of youth unemployment; (2) Consistent resource flow from extortion, ransoms, bank robberies and the sale of stolen antiquities, estimated to be $2.6 billion in total; (3) Power vacuums in Iraq and Syria resulting from a lack of regime political and military control; (4) ISIL’s military capacity; (5) ISIL’s use of Sharia law as a means of governance and control. See Gaub, “Can ISIL Be Copied?,” p. 1. 68. Corman and Schiefelbein, “Communication and Media Strategy.” 69. K. Foy, “Framing Hostage Negotiations: Analysing the Discourse of the US government and the Islamic State,” Critical Studies on Terrorism 8(3) (2015), pp. 516–531. 70. J. Boesman et al., “The News is in the Frame: A Journalist-Centered Approach to the FrameBuilding Process of the Belgian Syria fighters,” Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism 18(3) (2017), pp. 298–316. 71. T. Grebelsky-Lichtman and A. A. Cohen, “Speaking Under Duress: Visual and Verbal Elements of Personal and Political Messages in Captive Videos,” Visual Communication 16(1) (2016), pp. 27–56.. 72. A. Herfroy-Mischler, “Silencing the Agenda? Journalism Practices and Intelligence Events: A Case Study,” Media, War and Conflict 8(2) (2015), pp. 244–263. 73. Barney G. Glaser and Anselm L Strauss, The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research (New York: Chicago, Aldine Pub. Co, [1970, c1967], 1999). 74. Entman, “Framing Bias.” 75. Glaser and Strauss, The Discovery of Grounded Theory. 76. Entman, “Framing Bias.” 77. M. Touri, M. and N. Koteyko, “Using Corpus Linguistic Software in the Extraction of News Frames: Towards a Dynamic Process of Frame Analysis in Journalistic Texts,” International Journal of Social Research Methodology 6(18) (2015), pp. 601–616. 78. Boesman et al., “The News is in the Frame,” p. 301. 79. Alex P. Schmid, “Al-Qaeda’s Single Narrative and Attempts to Develop Counter-Narratives: The State of Knowledge.” The International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT), The Hague. The Netherlands (2014). 80. On local and international framing of the news, see T. Cooke, “Paramilitaries and the Press in Northern Ireland,” in P. Norris, M. Kern, and M. Just, eds., Framing Terrorism: The New Media, the Government, and the Public (New York: Routledge, 2003), pp. 75–92. 81. Lewis, Islam and the West and Reeve, Muhammad in Europe. 82. Juergensmeyer, Terror in the Mind of God. 83. Hussain, “The Media’s Role in a Clash of Misconceptions.”
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84. Qur’an 9:14. (“Fight them, and Allah will punish them by your hands, cover them with shame, help you (to victory) over them, heal the breasts of Believers”) 85. Ibid., 3:28. 86. Ibid., 5:51. (Partial verse.) 87. Corman, “Weapons of Mass Persuasion.” 88. Although the religious affiliations of the eighteen Syrians soldiers remains unknown, Muath alKaseasbeh has been identified as a devout Sunni Muslim. See BBC, “Profile: IS-Held Jordanian Pilot Moaz Al-Kasasbeh,” BBC Middle East (BBC News), 3 February 2015. Available at http:// www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-31021927 89. On audience fragmentation see James G. Webster and Thomas B. Ksiazek, “The Dynamics of Audience Fragmentation: Public attention in an Age of Digital Media,” Journal of Communication 62 (2012), pp. 39–56. 90. Al-Ghazzi, “‘Citizen Journalism’ in the Syrian Uprising,” p. 438. 91. Mark Juergensmeyer, Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (Berkeley: University of California, 2000). 92. Such as the Crusades, see Lewis, Islam and the West and Reeve, Muhammad in Europe. 93. On ingroup and outgroup polarity, see Gadi Wolsfeld, The Media and Political Conflict (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997). 94. On Umma, see Uriel Shavit, “Is Shura a Muslim Form of Democracy?” 95. Webster and Ksiazek, “The Dynamics of Audience Fragmentation.”
Date
8/19/14 8/30/14
9/2/14 9/13/14 9/24/14 10/3/14 11/16/14
1/13/15
1/13/15
1/14/15 1/25/15
1/25/15
1/29/15
1/31/15 1/31/15
1/31/15 2/1/15
2/2/15 2/3/15 2/4/15 2/7/15
2/9/15
Video number
1 2
3 4 5 6 7
8
9
10 11
12
13
14 15
16 17
18 19 20 21
22
4422
4388 4389 4391 4417
4381 4385
4378 4379
4376
4352
4309 4359
4306
4294
3917 3934 3968 4000 4114
3881 3916
IntelCenter ID
Table 1. Execution Video Index.
“Liquidating One of the Apostates who Betrayed the Mujahideen”
“Raid of the Striker #1” “Burning of Jordanian Pilot [Working Title]” “If You Return to War, We Will Return” “Establishment of the Limit Upon the Corrupt in the Land”
“Implementation of the Rule of God Against an Apostate Commander of the Awakening” “Men of the Hisbah 2” “Bombing the Muslims in Mosul and Poisoning Dozens of Them” “Slaughtering a Japanese Captive and Appeal of Second to His Family and Government” “Killing an Apostate in Place of the Allied Bombing in alShaddadi” “A Message to the Government of Japan” “The Security Apparatus of an Agent of the Jordanian Intelligence” “Storming the Barracks of the Peshmerga” “Liquidation of a Subsidiary Cell of the Awakening”
“Uncovering An Enemy Within”
“A Message to America” “Message With Blood to the Leaders of the AmericanKurdish Alliance” “A Second Message to America” “A Message to the Allies of America” “French Hostage Beheading [Working Title]” “Another Message to America and Its Allies “Although the Disbelievers Dislike it”
Title
Beheading Shooting
Two Kurdish fighters Isma’il Abd-al-Karim al-Khalaf, Abd-al-Hamid al-Haj Khalil, Khalil Abd-al-Hamid, Taha al-Shannani, Husayn Ahmad al-Ali, Ali al-Habib (Anti-ISIL Syrian paramilitary fighters) Iraqi Army Soldier Muath al-Kasasbeh (Jordanian Air Force Pilot) Twenty fighters affiliated with Shiite Popular Mobilization Muhammad al-Jiran, Khalid Ibrahim and Sulayman Muhammad (Criminals) Jaysh al-Islam fighter
Shooting
Shooting Immolation Shooting Shooting
Shooting Beheading
Shooting
Beheading
Beheading Beheading
Shooting
Shooting
Beheading Beheading Beheading Beheading Beheading
Beheading Beheading
Execution type
Kenji Goto Jogo (Journalist) Husayn Ibrahim Shuqayran (Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighter)
Abd-al-Latif Khidr al-Jawhar (Syrian Army soldier)
Haruna Yukawa (Civilian)
Two men accused of Sorcery Kurdish fighter
Steven Sotloff (Journalist) David Cawthorne Haines (Aid worker) Herve Gourdel (Civilian) Alan Henning (Aid worker) Peter Kassig (Aid worker, former U.S. Army Ranger) and eighteen Syrian Army Soldiers Mamayev Jambuley Yesenjanovich and Ashimov Sergey Nikolayavich (Alleged Russian spies) Sa’d Yusuf Kadhim Matr al-Jaburi (Syrian Army Soldier)
James Foley (Journalist) Peshmerga Fighter
Hostage name(s)/type
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2/10/15 2/11/15 2/14/15 2/15/15 3/2/15 3/10/15 3/13/15 3/17/15
3/19/15 3/23/15 3/26/15 3/29/15 4/2/15 4/6/15
4/9/15 4/17/15 4/19/15 4/19/15 4/22/15 4/30/15
5/4/15 5/4/15 5/9/15
5/15/15 5/16/15 5/29/15 6/1/15 6/4/15 6/4/15 6/7/15 6/8/15
23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36
37 38 39 40 41 42
43 44 45
46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53
4868 4885 4932 4944 4966 4967 4974 4988
4821 4830 4844
4688 4744 4736 4738 4752 4811
4595 4601 4615 4684 4654 4669
4445 4447 4454 4443 4513 4544 4562 4676
“The Battle for the Liberation of Yarmouk Camp” “Harvest of the Spies” “Amputation of the Corruption with the Judgement of the Lord of Mankind 2” “From Prisoner to Sacrifice” “Killing a Spy of the Awakening Apostasy” “Messages from the Lions of the Penninsula” “The Men of Hisba 3” “Implement Hadd on a Man Who Killed His Aunt” “Slaughter of Safavid Soldier” “Clans of Fallujah: A Thorn in the Eyes of the Enemies” “Battle of Abu Malik al-Tamimi 2”
“Liquidization of a Cell from the Popular Mobilization” “Joy of the Knights with the Bayah of Wilayat Khorasan” “Vivid Messages from the Bacillus City of Baiji 2” “A Message Signed With Blood to the Nation of the Cross” “A Lesson to be Learned 2” “And Wretched is that Which They Purchased” “Seizing a Spy Cell in Fallujah” “Slaughtering of One Individual of the Awakening of Apostasy Rad al-Jasim” “Defiant Response upon Bombing of the Tyrant 1” “A Message to the People of Kurdistan” “Battle to Liberate al-Asjaria” “Strike Their Necks” “Message to Nusayris Soldiers” “Amputation of the Corruption with the Judgement of the Lord of Mankind 1” “Liquidation of Safavid Criminal” “Defiant Response Upon Bombing of the Tyrant 2” “Until There Came to Them Clear Evidence” “Here is My Warning, So You Have No Excuse” “Kurdistan’s Tyrants Kill Their Soldier” “Liquidating the Apostates”
(Continued on next page)
Beheading Beheading Shooting Beheading Beheading Beheading Shooting Beheading
Beheading Shooting Beheading
Beheading Beheading Beheading/shooting Beheading Shooting Beheading/shooting
Beheading Shooting Shooting Beheading Shooting Beheading
Three Kurdish fighters Ahmad Mirza Ibrahim (Kurdish fighter) Iraqi Army Soldier Eight Syrian Army soldiers Syrian Army soldier Four alleged criminals Iraqi soldier Salim Hamud Ibrahim Hammud Juburi (Alleged spy) 30 Ethiopian Christians Three Syrian soldiers Ibrahim Salah Muhammad Husayn (Kurdish fighter) Abd-al-Razzaq Muhammad Abdallah (Houthi fighter), Mukhtar Abdallah Tarman (Houthi Fighter), Third unnamed Houthi fighter Group of Nusaryi-affiliated prisoners Alleged spy Haytham Yunus Muhammad and Muhammad Mahmud Salih (Criminals) Iraqi Army soldier Ziyad Abd-al-Al (Alleged spy) Two Yemeni soldiers Two criminals Criminal Nabil Muhammad Ubayd Sha’lan al-Zubaydi (Iraqi soldier) Iraqi soldier Syrian Shabiha fighter
Shooting Beheading Beheading/shooting Beheading Shooting Shooting Shooting Beheading
Three Shi’a militiamen Iraqi Army soldier Iraqi Soldier and Ten Popular Mobilization Forces fighters 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians Alleged spy Mohammed Said Ismail Musallam (Alleged Mossad agent) Nine alleged spies captured in Fallujah Iraqi “Awakening” Soldier
964 A. BARR AND A. HERFROY-MISCHLER
Date
6/10/15 6/8/15 6/11/15 6/17/15 6/18/15
6/23/15
6/23/15
6/30/15 6/30/15
Video number
54 55 56 57 58
59
60
61 62
Table 1. (Continued )
5104 5106
5066
5055
4994 5012 5001 5025 5026
IntelCenter ID
“And For You a Punishment of Life, Oh Men of Understanding” “Harvest of the Spies 2” “And That He Will Surely Substitute for Them, After Their Fear, Security”
“If You Return, We Return”
“The Glorious Rebellious Castle” “War of the Minds” “Healing the Souls by Beheading the Spies” “Implement Hadd of Apostasy on Nusayris Agent” “Qariban Qariba” [Soon, Soon]
Title
11—Civilians
33 beheadings
32—Military-affiliated, 13 of which are wearing jumpsuits, 11 in civilian 11—Alleged spies 8—Criminals
24 shootings 3 shooting and beheading 1 Immolation/ explosion/ beheading 1 Immolation Total—62 videos
Beheading Beheading
Shooting
Immolation/drowing/ beheading
Shooting Shooting Beheading Shooting Shooting
Execution type
Jasim Hamid Asim al-Halawi (Alleged spy) Criminal
“Popular Mobilization” fighters Ahmad Hamdi Shams al-Din (Alleged Spy) “Khadekal” aka “Khamar” (Alleged spy) Syrian soldier Two residents of Kot District in Nangarhar Province, Afghanistan Wisam Salih Muhammad Ibrahim al-Jaburi, Ahmad Uthman Mahmud, Khalid Id Ujayl, Amin Sulayman Ali, Baraa Ahmad Mahmud, Sami Sa’di Allawi, Wisam Salih Ibrahim, Muhammad Sabah Nuri, Ahmad Uthman Mahmud, Faris Ahmad Jasim, (Alleged spies) Hadr Hussein (Criminal)
Hostage name(s)/type
STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 965
(B) Rhetoric
Type (A) Production
(3) Statement by captive (4) Stated audience
(2) Political
(1) Religious
(4) Music (5) Use of Western media
(3) Special effects
(2) Subtitles
(1) Language
Table 2. Video Coding Structure.
(a) The Crusades (b) The City of Dabiq (c) The Jews and the Christians (d) The law of retaliation (a) ISIL as a Caliphate or Islamic State (b) ISIL as an Islamic army (c) Mention of ISIL governmental infrastructure (d) Justification of act as response to Western action: (1) U.S.-led intervention in Iraq; (2) Foreign intervention elsewhere? Yes or no (a) U.S. (b) Allies of U.S. (c) Japan (d) France (e) Specific Western leader
Yes or No (a) Western government rhetoric (b) Western military images
(a) English (b) Arabic (c) Pashto (d) Kurdish (e) French (f) Russian (g) None (a) English (b) Arabic (c) None (a) Logo (b) Cinematic elements (title slides, clip transitions)
Video coding structure
Audience specified in video
(Continued on next page)
Does the video make reference to ISIL state enterprises, legitimize or justify the organization as a state? Note the type of reference. Does ISIL justify the execution/action as a response to U.S., or U.S.-led action, or justify it in other terms?
Does the video include media images, quotations, or images from Western news sources to refute, indict, or mock the image/idea? Does the video include religious iconography, images, historical or theological references to advance a master narrative?
Are logos present in the video beyond group watermark? Does the video make use of cinematic elements? Indicates production sophistication.
Does the video include subtitles, if so which language is utilized? The presence of subtitles indicates target audience.
Definition What language(s) is used by the ISIL speakers in the video?
966 A. BARR AND A. HERFROY-MISCHLER
(C) Act
Type
(4) Victim Nationality (5) Act described as response to a crime
(3) Victim type
(3) Immolation
(2) Shooting
(1) Decapitation
(7) “Us vs. them” themes
(6) Quotation of ISIL leadership
(5) Threat
Table 2. (Continued )
(a) Shown (b) Not shown (a) Shown (b) Not shown (a) Shown (b) Not shown Humanitarian/NGO, Military Personnel, Religious Figure, Top Government Official, Health Care, Diplomatic, Civilian, Businessman, Reporter, Government Personnel, Other, Unknown American, British, French, Japan, Arab Yes or no
(a) Against another hostage (b) Call for killings of enemy military personnel by populace (a) ISIL: Al-Baghdadi (b) AQI: Al-Adnani/Al-Zarqawi Yes or no
Video coding structure
Is the execution framed as punishment for a crime? Is there reference to the victim(s) as criminal(s)?
Is the conflict framed in absolute terms? (e.g., ISIL opposition to west as a monolith) Does the video show the act itself, a partial depiction of the act, or the aftermath of the act?
Does the video quote past or present leaders of ISIL or (AQI)?
Definition Does the video present future threats against either another hostage or generalized threats against a state?
STUDIES IN CONFLICT & TERRORISM 967
