A comparative content analysis of the extremist magazines 'Dabiq' (IS) and 'Inspire' (AQAP) Master Thesis Crisis and Security Management Supervisor: Prof. Alex P. Schmid Second reader: Prof. Edwin Bakker Student: Eelco van Dongen (s1439979) 11-1-2016 „I [al-Zawahiri] say to you [al-Zarqawi]: that we are in a battle, and more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media.‟ 1 1 Al-Zawahiri, A. (2005). Letter from al-Zawahiri to al-Zarqawi. Retrieved September 1, from http://fas.org/irp/news/2005 /10/letter_in_english.pdf Abstract In recent years, jihadist organisations have increasing utilized the internet to spread their extremist narratives in order to win the hearts and minds of their followers and to scare their enemies. AQAP and IS are very aware of the power of online propaganda. For this reason, both organisations publish professional-looking online magazines that echo their worldview and draw idealistic pictures of the organisations. In this thesis, the differences and similarities between the magazines of IS (Dabiq) and AQAP (Inspire) are researched in order to create a better understanding of the relationship between world‘s most powerful jihadist organisations. The study focuses in particular on four different themes: women, targeting non-combatants, violence against coreligionists and descriptions of each other. In order to derive conclusions from the fourteen editions of Inspire and the eleven editions of Dabiq, content analysis is used as a methodological tool. The findings show that although Inspire and Dabiq differ significantly on several points, the magazines have a lot of common ground. The differences between the two magazines are often rooted in IS‘s higher degree of violence, megalomania and extremism regarding the methods for achieving a certain goal, rather than in conflicting opinions regarding the goal as such. Keywords: Dabiq, Inspire, Al-Qaeda, IS, propaganda, content analysis Content 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 1 1.1. Inspire.............................................................................................................................. 2 1.2. Dabiq ............................................................................................................................... 2 1.3. Research question ............................................................................................................ 3 1.4. The method ...................................................................................................................... 4 1.5. Relevance ........................................................................................................................ 4 1.6. Structure .......................................................................................................................... 5 2. Theoretical Framework ....................................................................................................... 5 2.1. The origins of AQ ........................................................................................................... 5 2.1.1. The structure of AQ. ................................................................................................. 7 2.1.2. The narrative of AQ. ................................................................................................ 8 2.2. From Jamaat al-Tawhid wal-Jihad to IS ......................................................................... 8 2.2.1. The structure of IS. ................................................................................................. 10 2.2.2. The narrative of IS .................................................................................................. 12 2.3. The ideology of Islamist extremism .............................................................................. 13 2.3.1. Salafism. ................................................................................................................. 13 2.3.2. Qutbism.. ................................................................................................................ 14 2.3.3. Wahhabism. ............................................................................................................ 14 2.3.4. Jihadi-Salafism ....................................................................................................... 15 2.3.5. Takfirism. ............................................................................................................... 15 2.4. State of the art ............................................................................................................... 17 2.4.1. Inspire ..................................................................................................................... 18 2.4.2. Dabiq ...................................................................................................................... 19 2.4.3. Similarities .............................................................................................................. 20 3. Qualitative content analysis .............................................................................................. 21 3.1. Definition ...................................................................................................................... 21 3.2. Quantitative vs. Qualitative ........................................................................................... 22 3.3. Changing methods ......................................................................................................... 23 3.4. Inductive vs. deductive .................................................................................................. 23 3.5. The data ......................................................................................................................... 23 3.6. Manifest content and latent content .............................................................................. 24 3.7. Reliability and validity .................................................................................................. 24 3.8. The different steps of qualitative content analysis ........................................................ 25 4. Results ................................................................................................................................. 27 4.1.Women in Inspire ........................................................................................................... 28 4.1.1. Criticising the West ................................................................................................ 28 4.1.2. The ideal woman. ................................................................................................... 29 4.1.3. The female figure as a motivation for men to join the jihad. ................................. 30 4.2. Women in Dabiq ........................................................................................................... 32 4.2.1. Sex-slaves. .............................................................................................................. 32 4.2.2. Criticising the West. ............................................................................................... 35 4.2.3. The ideal woman .................................................................................................... 35 4.3. Targeting non-combatants (Inspire) .............................................................................. 38 4.3.1. Criticising the West for killing Muslim civilians. .................................................. 38 4.3.2. Killing civilians. ..................................................................................................... 39 4.4. Targeting non-combatants (Dabiq) ............................................................................... 42 4.4.1. Criticising other regimes for killing Muslim civilians. .......................................... 42 4.4.2. Killing civilians. ..................................................................................................... 43 4.4.3. Differences and Similarities. .................................................................................. 43 4.5. Descriptions of each other (Inspire) .............................................................................. 44 4.6. Descriptions of each other (Dabiq) ............................................................................... 46 4.6.1. Differences and similarities .................................................................................... 52 4.7. Violence against coreligionists (Inspire)....................................................................... 52 4.7.1. Rejecting takfiri and Khawarij ideology. ............................................................... 53 4.7.2. Conflicting messages. ............................................................................................. 55 4.7.3. Houthis.................................................................................................................... 55 4.8. Violence against coreligionists (Dabiq): ....................................................................... 57 4.8.1. Takfiri. ..................................................................................................................... 57 4.8.2. Rejecting Khawarij ideology. ................................................................................. 58 4.8.3. Criticising