Jihadi Culture on the World Wide Web

Description

This volume examines “jihadi” content on the Internet by drawing on both Arabic and English primary source materials. After examining this content as digital media, the work looks at how it is productively consumed by online communities, including how “jihadi” individuals construct themselves online and how jihadism is practiced and represented as an online activity. The work also discusses the consumption of such jihadi media by those who are hostile to radical Islam and the relation between fantasy, pleasure, ideology, and ordinary life. This unique survey features case studies, such as the cyberjihadi “Irhabi 007,” pro-US and Israeli “patriots” who are often openly Islamophobic, and “Infovlad”--a forum that became the meeting place for radical Islamists and radical freelance “counter terrorists.” This innovative approach to studying violent content on the Internet is a significant contribution to the literature that will appeal to anyone interested in political violence, terrorism, and political communication. Title Page Copyright Page Contents Acknowledgements 1 Terror on the internet? 2 Alternative media and its alternatives 3 Jihadi content on the World Wide Web Jihadiyyat and ideological partisanship Realizing ‘the Jihadi’ Explaining ‘synthetic’ and ‘integrated’ Jihadism 4 Jihadi forums in their own words 5 Disagreeable disagreements 6 Being a jihadi on the internet How do jihadis resolve this contradiction? 7 Some other ‘jihadi’ consumption cultures: Crusaderism, war porn, shock 8 Jihadism between fantasy and virtuality, a tentative conclusion Notes Glossary of Arabic terms Bibliography Index