Mirror, Mirror:

How Framing Conflicts through Propaganda Serves to

Legitimize Violence and Challenge Existing

Perspectives in the Case of Daesh and the West

Aviva Stein

Student Number: 4235150

Utrecht University

3 August 2015

A Thesis submitted to the Board of Examiners in partial fulfilment of the

requirements of the degree of Master of Arts in Conflict Studies and Human

Rights

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Supervisor: Luuk Slooter

Date of Submission: 3 August 2015

Programme Trajectory: Research and Thesis Writing Only, 30 ECTS

Word Count: 20,258

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Acknowledgements

First of all, I would like to thank my mother, Leslie. Without her support I would never have had

the confidence and fortitude needed to pursue this program, let alone complete this thesis. She was

also kind enough to help me edit in the final stages of producing this thesis.

Secondly, I would like to thank Luuk Slooter, my adviser, who spent countless hours working with

me to revise my topic, work out research strategies, and more. Without his assistance, I would have

been lost in a sea of quantitative research.

Thirdly, I would like to thank Hallie Wasserman, Jaya Bajaj, and Alexis Hicks for their support and

help in editing my text.

Fourthly, I would like to thank Mario Fumerton, for presenting me with the opportunity to take part

in helping organize a conference on Kurdistan and the Islamic State this past spring, which helped

me greatly in determining the research I wanted to pursue.

Finally, I would like to thank Jolle Demmers, along with the rest of the Center for Conflict Studies

staff, for supporting all of us in our endeavors to contribute something meaningful to the world.

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Map of Territory Controlled by Daesh as of 19 June 2015

Map of Daesh’s Evolution as an Organization

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Acronyms

AQI - Al Qaeda in Iraq

IS – Islamic State

ISI - Islamic State of Iraq

ISIL - Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

ISIS - Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

JTJ - Jama’at al’Tawid wa al-Jihad

Arabic Terms

Ba’yah – A pledge of allegiance or loyalty given by individuals to leaders (i.e. kings, caliphs, leaders

of organizations)

Daesh – A common name for the Islamic State used by opposition groups. It is a play on the initials

of the name “Islamic State” in Arabic (Dawla Islamiyya).

Hijra – The obligatory migration to Mecca for all Muslims. Also the call of Daesh for Muslims to join

the Caliphate.

Istishhadiyyun – The brigade of suicide bombers who volunteer for martyrdom

Jannah – Arabic term for paradise

Jihad – Arabic term for holy struggle

Jihadi – Singular noun for a fighter of jihad

Khalifah – Arabic term for Caliphate

Kuffr/Kuffar – Singular and plural, respectively, terms for nonbelievers of Islam

Mujahideen – Plural for the members of the army waging jihad

Mujtahidun - Arabic term for industrious, applied to the army of supporters active in spreading the

online presence of Daesh

Rafidah – Specifically non-Sunni Muslims

Sharia – The branch of law set forth in the Koran and implemented by Daesh in controlled

territories

Zakah/zakat – The tax levied on all Muslims as one of the five pillars of Islam, used to fund charities

and help those in need

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgements 2 Maps 3 List of Terms and Acronyms 4 Introduction 6 Chapter One: Understanding the Western Perspective and Varying Frameworks 8 1.1 New War Theory 8 1.2 Naming and Framing 14 Chapter Two: Methodology 17 2.1 Research Design 17 2.2 Data Collection 18 2.3 A Note on Terminology 21 Chapter Three: Daesh’s Propaganda Network – A Brief Contextualization 22 Chapter Four: Analyzing the Story, As Told by Daesh 29 4.1 Presenting the Narratives 29 4.2 Representing the Performances 36 4.3 Interpretation of Inscriptions, and the Big Picture 43 Chapter Five: Conclusion 50 5.1 Conclusion 50 5.2 Reflections 52 Bibliography 54 Appendices and Tables 63 Appendix 1 63 Appendix 2 64 Appendix 3 65 Table 2.1 67 Table 2.2 68 Table 2.3 68 Table 2.4 69

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Introduction

Since World War II, the United States has been considered something of a heroic nation, having saved

Europe and the rest of the world from the influence of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. During the

Cold War, that status of hero was further solidified as politicians painted the Soviet Union as yet

another evil to be defeated by the good of Western values. This framing of a divide between good

and evil, hero and villain, protagonist and antagonist, has carried on informing the Western view of

the world, shaping Western perspective to portray any nation or organization at odds with American

values as a threat to the righteousness of American influence and power.

Following the end of the Cold War, as various non-Western conflicts emerged, the West not

only continued to employ policies in line with this black and white division of good and evil, but took

a further step. Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, they began to identify any group or nation which

did not align itself with the Western values of freedom, democracy, and capitalism as backwards

terrorists and criminals. As this viewpoint continued to infiltrate and influence policy, the perfect

term awaited modern conflicts erupting in non-Western regions: “new wars”. New War theory,

developed by Mary Kaldor, created a framework through which to analyze modern third world

conflicts, claiming a new perspective that could help policy makers understand how to deal with

these wars. The theory, since its introduction in the 1990s, has become widely accepted by Western

officials, and fully indoctrinated into the Western perspective when it comes to forming policies on

non-Western conflicts.

One such conflict perceived by the West to be a new war is the current turmoil in Iraq and

Syria, with the organization that calls itself the Islamic State at the forefront. The Islamic State, or,

for the purposes of this thesis, Daesh, has been deemed by the West a terrorist organization filled

with criminal elements intent on wiping out everything inherently Western in the world, from

freedom to secular government. U.S. President Barack Obama has actively used the term “terrorists”

in his descriptions of the group and U.S. policies concerning Daesh, saying in one speech, “We will

hunt down terrorists who threaten our country, wherever they are1.” However, Daesh has launched

its own propaganda campaign that takes aim at the perception the West seeks to proliferate. Rather

than accepting the role of villain in the classic new war framework, Daesh is actively disseminating

massive amounts of propaganda in order to spread its own perception through creating a new

narrative to legitimize its actions and goals. This reframing is done through inserting specific

1 CNN 2015

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patterns of information into the propaganda released by the organization, which serve to bolster the

portrayed story, and in turn, legitimize Daesh’s actions. This alternate frame may be just as black

and white as its Western counterpart, casting the roles of hero and villain like a children’s storybook,

but as Daesh continues to garner support and gain substantial victories, it is imperative to

understand the perception the group has put forth and how this perception legitimizes the

organization’s resort to violence.

In order to understand Daesh’s portrayal of itself and the conflict, we must first understand

the existing new war frame which the West currently operates under. Once we understand the

existing framework, we can then examine the propaganda distributed by Daesh, with the intention

of discovering patterns existing across various mediums of propaganda which serve to portray and

enhance Daesh’s perception of the conflict and legitimize Daesh’s violent actions. The core of this

thesis is the argument that Daesh utilizes patterns and themes intertwined throughout its various

mediums of propaganda which serve to normalize and legitimize Daesh’s violent actions through an

interwoven framework of narratives, performances, and inscriptions.

The structure of this thesis is as follows; in the first chapter, a thorough discussion of both

new war theory as it relates to Western perception, and the theories of framing, naming, and violent

imaginaries as pertaining to Daesh. Following the discussion of theory, the main question is specified.

The second chapter puts forth the methodology used, as well as any and all limitations and

restrictions associated with the research conducted. In the third chapter, a contextual background

of the conflict is presented, with special focus paid to the creation of Daesh’s vast propaganda

network. The fourth chapter examines and analyzes the data collected as subdivided into the

categories of narratives, performances, and inscriptions, in order to understand how Daesh uses

these tools to legitimize its actions. Finally, a discussion of the implications of this research is

considered in the conclusion, and reflections for further research are suggested in the fifth and final

chapter.

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Chapter One: Theory and Perspectives

The purpose of this chapter is to examine the theoretical assumptions and concepts which serve to

assist in the analysis of Daesh propaganda and the legitimization of violence. The first theory

examined is that of new war theory, which is necessary to understanding the current Western

perspective of the conflict. Considering new war theory allows us to first convey the perspective

most adhered to by the West, before deepening the examination of the conflict to more fully

understand how Daesh legitimizes the use of violence through propaganda. The second part of the

chapter explores frame theories, combining collective action framing within the frame of violent

imaginaries with the intent of explaining plausibly how propaganda is utilized as a tool to portray the

conflict in a particular way. Through unpacking these theories, this section demonstrates the way in

which analytical tools may be exercised to answer the resulting sub-questions, and ultimately, the

main research question.

1.1 New War Theory and the Western Perspective

Functioning under the assumption that new war theory is currently the most influential theory

shaping Western foreign policy concerning post-Cold War conflicts in the third world, we must

understand the debate surrounding the theory and the western narrative constructed from it in order

to understand why it is problematic. The ‘new war’ is a phenomenon that has been widely accepted

by policy makers in the western world regarding conflicts in the third world, defined here as any non-

western, underdeveloped nation. The current theory is derived from Mary Kaldor’s original “new

war theory” that non-western wars following the end of the Cold War, such as those in Bosnia,

Somalia, and the like, were a new breed of war that had never been seen before, with actual changes

in the ways in which warfare is waged on the ground. Kaldor later refined her views following large

amounts of criticism to portray new wars as a shift in thinking rather than actual warfare, a new

perspective to allow for new policies that could better aid in resolving these conflicts. This shift in

policy makers’ perspective has shifted the way in which the world views conflicts in the non-western

world, delegitimizing motivations, criminalizing actors, and falsely categorizing the wars themselves,

according to Helen Dexter2. Dexter contends that this false categorization of war is one of the main

reasons that new war theory was able to develop, as multiple critics of the theory have pointed out

precedents for almost every so called new war3. While categorizing war may be a useful tool for

2 Dexter 2007: 1058 3 Ibid: 1060

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academics and policy makers seeking to understand the roots of conflict, false categorizations can be

as threatening as the conflicts themselves, leading to misunderstandings, mislabeling, and in extreme

cases ill-advised intervention. Intervention by the western world in non-western conflict has been

an all too common result of the adoption of new war theory, thought to be by Dexter because of the

moral aspect that comes along with criminalizing actors and focusing on the human rights abuses

endured by victims4. However, understanding the debate around new war theory and how this shift

in logic and perspective came about is imperative to understanding the evolution of modern day

conflict, from new wars, to the war on terror, to advances against organizations such as Daesh, and

the continuing development of wars outside of the western world.

The term “new war” was coined in order to make sense of conflicts that did not seem to fit

into the category of traditional warfare. These conflicts were mostly internal clashes, often between

non-state actors and governments with a whole assortment of supporting characters, and often

deemed low-intensity, with little effect on the rest of the world outside of immediate neighbors. As

the number of these smaller, civil war-esque conflicts began to grow rapidly following the end of the

Cold War, the West began to take notice. Academic Mary Kaldor devised the term ‘new war’ in her

1999 work “New and Old Wars”, which forms the basis of the new war theory debate. Kaldor’s “New

and Old Wars” asserts that a new understanding of war is needed, and that the logic of war has shifted

from ideological or geo-political clausewitzean wars to the identity politics based ‘new wars’ as a

result of the end of the Cold War and “the erosion of the autonomy of the state and…the erosion of

the monopoly of legitimate organized violence,”5 combined with globalization. She also claims that

‘new wars’ and two main characteristics are linked to globalization, namely the national and

transnational wave of identity politics, and the changed ‘mode of warfare’6. While she asserts that

these ‘new wars’ are shifting away from the traditional forms of politics, specifically geopolitics and

political ideology, this is not to say they are not of a political nature. On the contrary, she stresses the

term ‘war’ to “emphasize the political nature of this new type of violence”7. While ‘new wars’ blend

various types of violence, blurring the lines between state sponsored military action, organized

crime, organized non-state political violence, and human rights violations, they do remain, in fact,

wars with political goals. Kaldor argues that these ‘new wars’ came about from the power vacuum

left by the collapse of the Soviet Union, with the erosion of state power giving way to globalization,

4 Ibid: 1061 5 Kaldor 1999: 4 6 Ibid: 7 7 Ibid: 2

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and in turn to global war economies which benefitted so immensely from the new opportunities

springing up in the opening of Eastern Europe. In addition, she examines these new war economies

as an additional large contributing factor to the shift in the logic behind ‘new wars’. Kaldor sees ‘new

wars’ based on identity politics of a necessarily fragmentary nature, as identity politics is an

exclusionary narrative, and an ideology that lends itself to the tactics of guerilla warfare and

insurgency. Because these tactics are often aimed at capturing populations rather than territory,

abandoning the former geo-political goals, civilian populations are often targeted, with “the new

warfare [borrowing] from counterinsurgency techniques of destabilization aimed at sowing ‘fear and

hatred’”8 in order to remove everyone of a different political identity, rather than seek control over

them. Focusing on the clausewitzian model of traditional wars as a contrast to her ‘new war’ theory,

Kaldor describes clausewitzean wars as civil affairs with distinct differentiation between warring

parties, public and private, and state and non-state activity. She also stresses that the role of civilians

was much different; they were not targeted by the state militaries which characterized clausewitzean

wars, but rather militaries fought militaries, and wars were far less asymmetric. Kaldor uses the war

in Bosnia and Herzegovina to examine these changes through an in depth case study looking at the

indicators of goals, actors, methods, and financing of the conflict.

Both the academic and political communities latched on to this idea of new wars and Kaldor’s

new war theory, and a debate was started over whether post-Cold War warfare has genuinely

changed, or whether new wars are not new at all, simply rehashing old methods in ways not seen

recently. The literature existing on the topic of conflict classification is a large pool. Since the 1980’s

and 90’s, when analysts began to dig deeper into internal conflicts, especially in Africa and Eastern

Europe, there has been a growing list of terms to identify conflicts, clashes, wars, etc. If Mary Kaldor

is the most important voice behind new war theory, Stathis Kalyvas is the most formidable

opposition. One of the main critics of “new war” theory, Kalyvas, in his article “’New’ and ‘Old’ Civil

Wars: A Valid Distinction?” equates all new wars to civil wars. He claims that the perceived

differences between new and old come down to the three main categories of causes and motivation,

support, and violence. He then identifies the supposed distinctions between categories, asserting

that “new civil wars are characteristically criminal, depoliticized, private, and predatory; old civil

wars are considered ideological, political, collective, and even noble”9. He also asserts that many

scholars claim that ‘new wars’ are “wars about nothing at all”10 and that there is no political

8 Ibid: 8 9 Kalyvas 2001: 100 10 Enzenberger 1994 in Kalyvas 2001: 103

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motivation, but rather the financial gains of looting and banditry which characterize ‘new wars’, as

well as claiming that the ideological basis of clausewitzean wars has been “greatly overstated”11.

Drawing on the lack of attainable data on pre-Cold War civil wars and the lack of evidence that

contemporary conflicts are more uncontrolled and gratuitous in their violence, Kalyvas claims that

overall there should be no great distinction placed between new and old wars, and that more

research is needed to see whether there truly are any differences at all between so called ‘new’ and

clausewitzean wars. He suggests that there is a “clear epistemic bias”12 towards the idea that old civil

wars were justified by respectable ideological grievances, and goes on to show through multiple

cases the local considerations which come before such grandiose ideologies in old civil wars. He

similarly critiques the garnering of popular support, thought by new war theorists to have

fundamentally changed from the winning of “hearts and minds” to sowing “fear and hatred”, by

examining cases of old civil wars in which civilian populations were decidedly unsupportive of

rebellions and insurgents. Kalyvas does, however, encourage the continuation of debate and

research regarding civil wars, especially concerning types of actors, warfare, resource extraction, and

patterns of violence, but he concludes that while further research is necessary, there is no

fundamental difference between so called “new” and “traditional” wars. Kalyvas’ critique once again

demonstrates the importance of the continuation of debate concerning the categorization of warfare,

and different voices to balance out the various perspectives on modern conflict, as well as establish

a common ground on the most appropriate frame for best understanding conflicts on a case by case

basis.

Kalyvas further explores motivations and goals of civil war violence in his article “The Logic

of Violence in Civil War”, which does not differentiate between traditional and new types of conflict

but rather points to the similarities between conflicts throughout history, such as selective violence

against civilians. He claims that most civil wars are fought by irregular means, such as guerilla

warfare, and that there are often more than two sides in a civil conflict13. His approach to attempting

to understand all sides of a conflict employs different framing devices which allow this more holistic

perspective, rather than relegating conflicts to motivations such as simple identity or ethnic politics,

a simplification often used in examining new wars under the assumption that new wars are mainly

identity based rather than geopolitical.

11 Kalyvas 2001:106 12 Ibid. 13 Kalyvas 2000

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However, Kaldor’s work remains arguably the most influential of the lot. Since her 1999

work, following extensive criticism and critique, she reevaluated her thesis in the second edition of

“New and Old Wars”, examining in detail the “globalized war economy”, and the way in which

fragmentation, asset transfer, and changing modes of warfare contribute to the logic of ‘new wars’14.

In 2013, Kaldor published an article called “In Defence of New Wars”, which defended her original

thoughts on the changes that conflicts in the 1980’s and 90’s have undergone, but reinforces the idea

that “new war” thinking is a change in the logic and understanding of war, rather than a change in

actual on-the-ground methods of how warfare is waged. While actors, goals, methods, and financing

have shifted away from the old state versus state style wars, “new wars” are still politically minded

conflicts, just with a different set of assumptions15. Kaldor maintains the differentiation between

“traditional” and “new” wars as distinctly different categories; however, those categories are

redefined to be understood by differing sets of logic rather than fundamental changes in actual

physical methods of warfare. She maintains that “the problem with existing [categorizations] of

conflict…is that they do not easily fit contemporary reality.”16 Therefore, despite the similarities

which may exist between “new” and “traditional” wars, this new logic, approach, and understanding

of contemporary conflicts is necessary in order to adapt to a changing world where old policies are

no longer feasible or yield desirable outcomes. There may be historical precedents for every sort of

violence we see now, says Kaldor, but unless we understand the goals and motivations behind such

violence, we cannot create effective and efficient policies and solutions to deal with them. Therefore,

Kaldor considers “the contrast between new and [clausewitzean] wars, put forward here, [to be a]

contrast between ideal types of war rather than a contrast between actual historical experiences.”17

She credits the ongoing debate with helping to continue the refinement of the conceptual

interpretation of new wars, and supports continuing the debate in order to open new avenues of

dialogue and thought to allow for better understanding of all conflicts, whether new or traditional.

These changes and adaptations in logic and perspective are an incredibly important part of

understanding conflict, from the motivations of each actor to the best approaches to resolving issues.

While Kaldor’s new war theory has allowed a new wave of understanding to permeate Western

political thought, it is imperative that the evolution of perspective not become stuck in this stage, or

any other, and that debate continues in order to welcome new thoughts, ideas, and approaches.

14 Kaldor 2007 15 Kaldor 2013 16 Ibid: 5 17 Ibid: 13

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While the new wars debate focuses mainly on determining whether or not a new

categorization of war is needed to understand modern third world conflicts, the academic debate

does not exist in a bubble, and greatly influences the political landscape around it. While the majority

of the academic community agree that Kaldor’s new war theory has made a positive contribution to

both the scholarly and policy-making communities in creating new perspectives from which to

approach modern conflicts. Dodeye Uduak Williams, in her article entitled “Relevance of Mary

Kaldor’s ‘new wars’ thesis in the 21st Century” comes to the conclusion that while there may be

limitations, Kaldor’s theory ultimately contributes not only as a way to describe data, but “as a way

of explaining the nature of contemporary war that can offer both analytic/academic and policy

relevance...Its usefulness lies in its capacity to direct research and provoke policy changes relevant

to the realities of contemporary warfare.”18 She also asserts that Kaldor offers a new analytic

framework to be utilized in researching modern conflicts which takes into account the existence and

participation of non-state actors. It is this crossover between academia and politics that makes

Kaldor and her new war theory so important to the community at large; despite critiques of the

theory and continuing debate, new war theory has been essentially implemented as the security

paradigm and narrative of the West, and as such has considerable power in affecting the world at

large. However, this power comes with considerable risk when employed in the way that Helen

Dexter argues, dissolving the notion of inalienable state sovereignty in favor of the idea of the

obligation to honor the ‘responsibility to protect’, and the transference of warfare from its traditional

sense of a struggle for power or resources to an obligatory moral response to injustice and human

rights violations19. The examination of war and debate on classification are important to increasing

our understanding of the modern world, but when politics usurp academic findings in order to justify

a means to an end and serve political purposes, we must reexamine the existing theory to determine

whether bias and preconceived notions can be diminished.

However, as we examine the existing new war theory, it is essential to remember that new

war theory itself is a framework through which conflicts can be analyzed. The tools of analysis in

new war theory, namely goals, actors, methods, and finances, are ways in which to examine a conflict,

but new war theory lends itself only to a particular version of the story, as portrayed by the West. A

major component of applying new war theory to policy and adopting the new war perspective is the

reification of the division between the “good” West and the “bad” rest of the world. The new war

perspective requires that the West portray itself as the morally justified heroes of the world in order

18 Williams 2013: 4 19 Dexter 2007: 1055

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to successfully claim that actors in new wars are criminals with no legitimate claim to violence. One

tool utilized for this purpose is that of naming.

1.2 Naming and Framing: Moving Away From a Western Perspective

In the battle for the justification of and legitimate claim to violence, naming plays a large role. As

Michael Bhatia claims in his article “Fighting Words: Naming Terrorists, Bandits, Rebels, and Other

Violent Actors”, “these groups seek to refute or even appropriate the words and names used against

them in order to win the hearts, minds and support (either tacit or active) of the population.”20 It is

with this aim in mind that new war theory can be examined; the West seeks to utilize the strategy of

naming enemies criminals, terrorists, rebels, and other illegitimate titles to reify the idea that new

wars are fought by groups with no legitimate claim to violence. New war theory has indeed expanded

the perspectives used to view modern third world conflicts by the West, but in doing so it has allowed

the West to reinforce the portrayal of itself as the justified, righteous hero, while those on the other

side maintain the role of villainous aggressors, framed this way in order to render them powerless.

Bhatia maintains the importance of naming, asserting that the power lies in a name’s ability

to “identify and object, remove it from the unknown, and then assign it a set of characteristics,

motives, values, and [behaviors]. Names,” he says, “can fulfil a similar role as narratives.”21 This role

implies an especially significant importance of naming within a framework, from its role in solidifying

the West’s moral superiority in the narrative of new war theory, to the way in which Daesh employs

names in its quest to claim legitimacy through portraying an entirely different story. As a tool within

these varying story-building frames, naming functions in two primary roles: “to recruit supporters

by propagating a discourse of belonging and opposition; and to justify action through labelling.”22

Daesh employs naming in these capacities just as the West does, but rather than using the new war

theory framework to portray its story, the organization combines naming with other tools, drawing

on an amalgamation of collective action and violent imaginary frameworks.

In addition to naming, Daesh employs the concepts of diagnostic framing, prognostic framing,

and motivational framing – components of a collective action frame – as building blocks which

support the frame of violent imaginaries. Robert Benford and David Snow, authors of the paper

“Framing Processes and Social Movements: An Overview and Assessment”, give a helpful synopsis of

the most common types of frames used by collective action movements, as well as how these frames

20 Bhatia 2005: 6 21 Ibid: 8 22 Ibid: 12

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are formed and interact with other aspects of social movements. Within the collective action frame,

Benford and Snow break the process of building a framework down into three main steps: the

diagnostic framing, in which the problem is identified and a shared understanding of the issue is

reached, prognostic framing, in which a solution or set of strategies is proposed, and motivational

framing, in which a call to arms is given to achieve actual change through the given strategies23. There

are multiple methods for building each piece of the frame, such as adversarial framing in the

diagnostic process, in which a clear delineation between good and evil or protagonists and

antagonists is made24. However, even more important than the components of a frame are the ways

in which the frame is actually built from the ground up, spread through a movement, and solidified

into a collective action which people follow. This construction, according to Benford and Snow, is

mainly done through discursive processes, such as speeches, written communications, videos, and

propaganda; strategic processes, which are goal oriented directives designed to achieve specific

purposes within a framework; and contested processes, which are the constraints that come about

in building up a framework due to counterframing by media or dissenters within the movement,

disagreements, or differences in frames and actual events25. Examining the ways in which these

narratives are constructed and sustained through mediums such as propaganda can grant new

insights regarding the methods through which organizations such as Daesh attempt to legitimize and

justify their actions.

However, the collective action frame is only the first step to framing Daesh’s story. Within

collective action frames used by groups during conflicts, such as Daesh, violence often plays a large

role. Building up the framework to include this focus on the legitimation of violence, Ingo Schröder

and Bettina Schmidt, authors of “Introduction: Violent Imaginaries and Violent Practices”, the first

chapter of Anthropology of Violence and Conflict, examine the use of violence as a strategy for social

movements and conscious actors within them26. Schröder and Schmidt make three main statements

about the use of violent acts within a conflict: first, that violence always “expresses some kind of

relationship with another party and…do not target anybody at random”, second, “violence is never

completely meaningless to the actor”, and third, “violence is never a totally isolated act.” In addition,

they claim that violence is not about the act itself, but the power and legitimacy that such acts display

to the larger population; violence without an audience is pointless in this context, where the

23 Benford and Snow 2000: 615 24 Ibid: 616 25 Ibid: 623 26 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 1

16

performative aspect is the most important27. This performative aspect comes into play for more than

sending a message to a controlled population or an opponent. Schröder and Schmidt assert that

“violence needs to be imagined in order to be carried out”28, and that violent imaginaries come from

the memory of violence embedded in the cultural, historical, or other narrative of a people. These

memories of violence can emerge through various means, especially the tools of narratives,

performances, and inscriptions, but when violence does break out in a conflict it is always tied to

something that came before29. While it can be fundamentally difficult to understand an individual act

of violence, by examining a group’s history, culture, and future goals, it becomes easier to situate

violence in a bigger picture of collective action strategies and the frame of a violent imaginary.

Looking at violence as a piece of the puzzle in the case of Daesh, a tool used in the larger picture of

action-oriented goals and the mobilization of a collective force, adds an extra layer to an incredibly

helpful framework which can paint the holistic account that Daesh is attempting to portray as a

means to legitimize and justify its actions as well as an alternative to the Western perspective of

violence as used for the sake of violence, with no greater meaning other than striking fear into the

hearts of enemies. Therefore, through utilizing these tools, we must answer the following sub-

questions:

1. How does propaganda propagate Daesh’s perspective through themes and patterns

prevalent in each layer of the violent imaginary framework?

2. How does Daesh’s portrayal of the conflict through propaganda compare to the Western

portrayal?

3. How do narratives, performances, and inscriptions interact to portray a complete story?

Once these sub-questions have been answered, there will be a plausible explanation of the main

research question, namely:

How does Daesh portray the conflict in Iraq and Syria since June 2014 through

performances, narratives, and inscriptions which challenge the Western new war frame in

order to legitimize itself and its resort to violence?

27 Ibid: 3 28 Ibid: 6 29 Ibid: 10

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Chapter Two: Methodology

The purpose of this chapter is to delve into the details of how and why I conducted my research in

the manner that I ultimately chose. In examining my research design and methods, I hope to make

clear my approach to answering my puzzle statement. I also aim to demonstrate the reliability,

reproducibility, and clarity of the project as a whole.

2.1 Research Design

In examining how Daesh seeks to legitimize its resort to violence and challenge the existing Western

perspective, I have identified a number of steps to take in order to understand and identify key

indicators and concepts. The first fundamental premise which this research is based on is that the

current western security paradigm is an understanding of post-Cold War conflicts in the non-western

world as “new wars”. This lens through which modern non-western conflicts are viewed signifies a

change from traditional war in terms of identity based ideology, a wider array of actors, various non-

traditional methods of warfare, and non-traditional means of funding, according to Mary Kaldor,

founder of new war theory.

In order to first understand the western security paradigm, I executed a thorough review of

the literature on New War theory, to better understand the debate surrounding the theory as well as

to discover how new war theory has become an embedded component of policy making in the West.

From this review, I extracted the main components which characterize a so-called “new war”. The

“new war” is thusly seen as a conflict generally funded through criminal activities or overseas

support, based on identity politics such as ethnicity, and carried out by a variety of actors which blur

the lines between state militaries, non-state actors, civilians, and criminals through an assortment of

methods typically associated with guerilla warfare movements and generally indicative of

asymmetric warfare.

Once I established the Western perspective, I then determined the theoretical framework

which I found best fit the case study of Daesh. Because the main research question seeks to explore

how Daesh legitimizes violence, I approach violence not as isolated incidents, but rather as a part of

a larger strategy and a main resource of non-state actors. Therefore, the framework of Schröder and

Schmidt’s violent imaginaries seemed the best fit for this study. The violent imaginaries framework

claims that “violence is not only a resource for solving conflicts over material issues, but also a

resource in world making, to assert one group’s claim to truth and history against rival claims, with

18

all the social and economic consequences this entails.”30 Thus, I have sensitized the main concepts

outlined in the violent imaginaries framework in order to apply them as analytic tools when

examining data. The first sensitized concept is “narratives”, defined by Schröder and Schmidt as

keeping “the memory of former conflicts alive in stories, either by glorifying one’s own group’s

achievements and benefits or by the perceived injustices, losses, or suffering incurred by one’s own

group.”31 The second sensitizing concept is “performances”, defined as “public rituals in which

antagonistic relationships are staged and prototypical images of violence enacted.”32 The third

sensitizing concept is “inscriptions”, described as “inscribed in the cultural landscape as images

displayed on banners or murals…broadcasting of TV images serves the same purpose.”33

In addition, I apply the collective action movement framework of Benford and Snow, which

examines on a deeper level how “movement adherents negotiate a shared understanding of some

problematic condition or situation they define as in need of change, make attributions regarding who

or what is to blame, articulate an alternative set of arrangements, and urge others to act in concert to

affect change.”34 In accordance with these core framing tasks, I have sensitized the concepts of

“diagnostic framing”, “prognostic framing”, and “motivational framing”, which serve to identify the

problem, display strategies designed to address the problem, and act as a call to arms for supporters,

respectively.35

2.2 Data Collection and Limitations

In order to examine the way in which Daesh portrays the conflict in Iraq and Syria, I studied various

forms of the organization’s propaganda. I grouped data by the medium used, resulting in four

categories:

Video Evidence

Written Evidence

Speeches

Social Media

30 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 9 31 Meeker 1979 and Rosaldo 1980 in Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 32 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 33 Jarman 1997 and Peteet 1996 in Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 34 Benford and Snow 2000: 615 35 Ibid

19

In gathering my data, I focused on collecting propaganda through non-intrusive content

research, gathering data through open source research and coding it according to my sensitizing

concepts. I collected evidence which could be found on the internet, as I did not have access to other

forms of propaganda distributed by Daesh, such as pamphlets released to the populations within

Daesh territory. Therefore, my sampling method was limited to data which had been published

online and remained available after publication. This ruled out many videos and Twitter accounts

which were scrubbed off of the internet by Twitter, Anonymous, GhostSec, and a variety of other

cyber groups fighting the spread of propaganda by Daesh. After browsing forums such as

www.reddit.com, www.LiveLeak.com, www.LeakSource.info, www.archive.org, Twitter, and

www.jihadology.com, I was able to gather a large amount of data through random sampling of non-

interactive primary research36.

However, my data was limited in many ways. First of all, Daesh releases propaganda in a

variety of languages. While I am a native English speaker, am proficient in Arabic, and speak

rudimentary German and French, my data collection was limited to propaganda that I could

understand, which eliminated the large pool of evidence in languages such as Russian, Chechen,

Indonesian, and Spanish. In addition, I was limited to the data I could find and collect online, as

travelling to territory controlled by Daesh was not possible. Furthermore, in compiling data through

methods such as following Twitter accounts, the active and changing nature of the internet, especially

on such a popular and international site as Twitter, meant that accounts were growing, changing, or

moving quite often. There was also a campaign mounted by GhostSec, a subset of Anonymous, to

remove every Twitter account in support of Daesh from the site, which made following constant

accounts difficult. However, I managed to find, follow, and track nine main accounts which were

dedicated to disseminating Daesh propaganda.

In addition, due to the volatile nature of the territory under control of Daesh, I was unable to

travel to the region in order to assess how Daesh’s perspective of the conflict in Iraq and Syria is

affected by, and affects, those living it. However, I have focused my research on understanding how

the organization legitimizes its resort to violence through propaganda and challenges the Western

perspective. Thusly, the lack of local perspective should not hinder my research to too a great degree.

36 Curtis and Curtis 2011: 225

20

Finally, as I grew up in the United States and have spent the majority of my life in western

countries, I do admit my world viewpoint does skew towards a western bias. While I do my best to

observe and analyze from an impartial perspective, I do still maintain western cultures and values

that may impact how I interpret certain data.

In order to best answer my main research question, I focused on collecting a broad set of data

to present a holistic overview of the entire image Daesh seeks to portray. In doing so, I aimed to

collect propaganda which focused on life inside Daesh as well as outside, positive as well as negative

emphases37, and a variety of methods of dissemination. However, this resulted in a massive amount

of data. Therefore, I attempted to pare down the evidence to be analyzed, while maintaining a holistic

picture of the narrative.

Within each category, I pulled a smaller cross-section of data to give a broad overview of the

various means of constructing the narratives, performances, and inscriptions. I chose the data for

this cross-section by identifying evidence released by official Daesh affiliates, such as the media

branches Al Hayat or Al Furqan, and ensured that the evidence to be analyzed was archived and

continuously available online to ensure the reproducibility and credibility of the study, rather than

choose data such as videos that were later taken off of the internet or made extremely difficult to find.

I also chose only propaganda released in May 2014 or later, as to correspond to my main research

question. This data set therefore contains propaganda released during the immediate build up to

precede the declaration of the Islamic Caliphate on 29 June 2014 from May-June 2014, in addition to

propaganda following the declaration until the present time. In addition, I chose data which, in my

opinion, best exemplified the characteristics of the sensitizing concepts. While the vast majority of

my collected data demonstrated these characteristics to some degree, those included in the cross-

section are the most obvious examples.

I have therefore included in the cross-section of data utilized in my analysis twenty-three

videos, three speeches, one issue of Dabiq Magazine, and two newsletters, as well as nine Twitter

accounts. The evidence is divided by medium used and coded for which section(s) of the violent

imaginary framework they support. The code is: N for narrative, P for performing, and I for

inscription. Furthermore, within this division, I code the data once again for a collective action

framework within that of the violent imaginary, to examine for deeper level patterns of diagnostic

framing (d), prognostic framing (p), and motivational framing (m). For tables of the complete list of

37 See Appendix 1

21

data examined, divided by medium, see Tables 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, and 2.4 in the appendix. Using this

method of content research38, it is possible to draw conclusions about the intended messages in

Daesh propaganda from scrutinizing patterns found throughout the propaganda, and examine how

those messages feed into the larger picture of the perspective Daesh seeks to present.

In drawing on these patterns and themes found within Daesh propaganda, I have

operationalized the concepts of narratives, performances, and inscriptions which make up the

framework of “violent imaginaries” set forth by Schröder and Schmidt as analytic tools with which to

dissect the collected data. In addition, I draw on the theory of collective action framing and sensitize

the main concepts of diagnostic framing, prognostic framing, and motivational framing to deepen the

analysis of the common themes and threads found throughout the propaganda. I therefore present

this analysis as a frame within a frame, examining how the story presented is broken down as a

violent imaginary into narratives, performances, and inscription, which serve to reinforce each other

and the perspective as a whole, but also how each of these notions are framed, through the collective

action frame concepts of diagnosis, prognosis, and motivation.

2.3 A Note on Terminology

While this organization has gone through a multitude of names, and currently refers to itself as the

Islamic State, or IS, I have chosen to refer to them as Daesh, in order to reflect the fact that while this

thesis examines how Daesh portrays itself as an actor with a legitimate claim to violence and

sovereignty, the majority of the rest of the world remains of the viewpoint that Daesh is, in fact, a

terrorist organization. As such, I will not lend them any legitimacy as a Western observer through

referring to them by their preferred name. As explained further on in this thesis, the politics of

naming plays an important role in imparting power, and accepting the Islamic State as a name would

serve only to give more power to an organization that most of the world is dedicated to defeating.

38 Curtis and Curtis 2011: 215

22

Chapter Three: Daesh’s Propaganda Network – A Brief Contextualization

Daesh has mounted the most aggressive and wide-reaching propaganda campaign of any non-state

actor in recent memory. They have attempted to reach every corner of the world through every

available medium, from audio recordings and films of speeches, to pamphlets, to newsletters and

magazines, to a constant stream of short videos and images released on as many social media

websites as possible, to full length movies, to vast networks of social media support. Such an extreme

propaganda campaign demonstrates just how strongly Daesh believes in its cause; they are dedicated

to spreading their ideology to followers, enemies, and everyone in between in their efforts to achieve

world domination in the form of an Islamic Caliphate. However, their vast electronic reach came

from humble beginnings, emerging in a similar manner to other extremist organizations before

taking such a different turn in terms of propaganda strategies and tactics.

While the Islamic State appears to have emerged fully formed from the chaos of the Syrian

Civil War, its actual history and formation come from a complicated web of networks, leaders, and

events, beginning with the terrorist organization Al Qaeda. Understanding the history of the Islamic

State is crucial to understanding its goals, methods, and actors, especially in terms of the group’s ties

to and splits with other Islamic organizations in the region. Examining how the Islamic State became

the Islamic State in its current form sheds light on the incredibly complex web of operations currently

occurring in Syria and Iraq, as well as illuminating the perspective which the Islamic State has

dedicated itself to portraying. Through focusing on how the Islamic State developed from a small

offshoot of Al Qaeda to a vast-reaching grassroots network, a much clearer picture can be developed,

and a better understanding of the conflict as a whole can hopefully be obtained.

In 1999, when Al Qaeda was at its peak, a secretive organization headquartered in the

mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan, intent on bringing down the West along with western

capitalist ideology, a young Musab al Zarqawi met Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Zarqawi was a

wanted radical; having discovered Islamic extremism in Afghanistan when he joined the Afghan

resistance to the Soviet invasion, he solidified his dedication to the ideology of violent jihad with the

guidance of Sheikh Abu Muhammad al Maqdisi, a strong supporter of jihadi Salafism, while the two

were imprisoned in Jordan together from 1993 until 1999. Although Zarqawi and bin Laden did not

see eye to eye during their first meeting, coming from vastly different backgrounds and holding

differing ideologies about the best way to approach jihad, bin Laden agreed to finance Zarqawi in his

endeavor to gather support for jihad as a separate branch under the Al Qaeda umbrella. While Al

Qaeda focused on planning the September 11th attacks, Zarqawi slowly amassed support for his

23

vision of establishing a new Islamic Caliphate locally, and as his following grew, the group became a

parallel structure, connected to but independent from Al Qaeda Central.39

In 2002, Zarqawi officially founded the organization Jama’at al’Tawid wa al-Jihad (JTJ), still

considered a distantly connected branch of Al Qaeda, and executed the group’s first recognized act,

the murder of American Lawrence Foley, a USAid worker in Jordan.40 The strong focus on Al Qaeda

Central following the September 11th attacks meant that Zarqawi and JTJ were relatively invisible,

disconnected enough from Al Qaeda to avoid the wrath of the American military. Catapulting off of

this success, JTJ quickly infiltrated Iraq following the American invasion in 2003, and began

recruiting heavily there as well. Still a small organization and now even more distanced from Al

Qaeda Central, JTJ remained below American radar in terms of threats to be destroyed. Because of

the repressive Saddam Hussein regime, which had elevated the Sunni population of Iraq, the US-led

coalition attempted to equalize the power disparity present between Sunnis and Shiites,

subsequently sending huge numbers of newly disenfranchised Sunnis into the arms of the eagerly

waiting Zarqawi, who proceeded to elevate sectarian violence to an even higher level through a series

of attacks on Shia mosques and important individuals. The American invasion and restructuring of

Iraqi politics allowed JTJ to recruit highly educated senior officials from the now deposed Hussein

regime, which gave the group a strong backbone of leadership to establish a highly effective and

efficient organization. This early organizational structure would eventually become a pillar of

strength for Daesh, allowing the group to create a true pseudo-state, able to withstand the death of

leaders and attacks from all sides.

JTJ continued its campaign in Iraq, collecting more and more foreign jihadis looking to follow

the path of violence in order to create a new Islamic Caliphate. However, to ease tensions between

himself and Osama bin Laden, Zarqawi finally declared ba’yah to bin Laden in 2004, renaming JTJ

Tanzim Qaedat ak Jihad fi Bilad al Rafidayn, more commonly known as Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI)41.

However, this pledge of allegiance did not alleviate all tension between the two groups, as bin Laden

and Zarqawi still maintained fundamental disagreements on ideologies and strategies concerning

jihad. AQI continued to operate fairly independently from Al Qaeda Central, increasing the number

of violent attacks to an unprecedented level. AQI under Zarqawi adopted suicide bombings as a main

tactic, as well as increasing the number violent assassinations, attacks, and stirrings of sectarian

violence. In addition, the group began using the tactic of beheadings, with Zarqawi even seen

39 Stern and Berger 2015 40 Cassman. Stanford University 2015 41 Ibid

24

carrying out executions himself on film. These extreme tactics were too much for Al Qaeda, which

dispatched warnings to AQI to order Zarqawi to work with Iraqi leaders rather than alienate them

by killing other Muslims. However, AQI continued to target Shiites, considered by the group to be the

worst kind of apostates as followers of a false form of Islam, through bombing mosques and holy

sites, garnering resentment from Al Qaeda Central and other groups dismayed at such extreme

Muslim-on-Muslim violence. Al Qaeda tried unsuccessfully to reign Zarqawi in until 7 June 2006,

when he was killed in a US airstrike. However, by this point, Zarqawi’s ideology had been solidified

into the foundational structure of AQI, and while Zarqawi himself was gone, AQI and his vision would

live on.

Despite Zarqawi’s ultimate demise in 2006, his ideals lived on, and backlash from the

surrounding community continued to alienate AQI. Now led by Abu Ayub al-Masri, an Egyptian

bomb-maker, AQI joined a coalition of other jihadi organizations and changed its name to the Islamic

State of Iraq (ISI), and installing Iraqi-born Abu Umar al-Baghdadi as the group’s figurehead leader.

This coalition marked the first real step in the establishment of an Islamic Caliphate, bringing to life

the longtime dream of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, passed down from his spiritual advisor, Sheikh

Maqdisi. It also established ISI as an organization that existed beyond its leaders; the ideology was

the backbone of the group rather than any one person, and no matter how many leaders were

martyred for the cause, the organization would endure and continue to thrive as a growing entity.

This evidenced a change from other groups, such as Al Qaeda Central, which followed a charismatic

leader and were unable to regroup successfully if that figure was removed.

The Islamic State of Iraq continued in the same vein as Al Qaeda in Iraq, executing prisoners

in violent, graphic manners, publicizing violence, and committing acts of terror through suicide

bombings and car bombings. However, ISI experienced a small decline in publicity, continuing to

gather footage but not releasing it, and focused more on gathering resources and strength. ISI turned

to various new avenues for raising funds, as the ever expanding group remained incredibly forward

thinking. Leaders Masri and Baghdadi continued measures such as taxation motivated by murdering

members of rich families who did not pay, hijacking fuel trucks, kidnappings for ransoms, and

carjacking’s, all the while continuing the campaign of violence against non-Muslims and Shiites in the

local vicinity.42 In addition, ISI also began engaging in further resource exploitation, from harvesting

wheat to taking over oil fields, and selling these resources mostly on the black market.

42 Project Gutenberg Self-Publishing - eBooks n.d.

25

However, American forces were still active in Iraq, and began to focus their energy on

eliminating ISI, working with local groups and recruiting as many Sunnis as possible to aid American

efforts. ISI recruiting endeavors were also hurt by their isolating acts of violence, as many Iraqi

Sunnis felt they were caught between two evils, and chose to help the American forces as the lesser

of the two. Hostility over the extreme amounts of violence perpetrated by ISI continued to grow, and

eventually led to splits and infighting amongst groups within the coalition. It seemed for a time that

the American eradication efforts were working, and by 2008 ISI was in a self-described state of

crisis.43 In 2009, American forces began to withdraw from Iraq, relinquishing power back to the Iraqi

military and police forces. However, the Iraqi forces were still incredibly weak, and ISI saw this as

an opportunity to resume active antagonism in the region, ramping up violence once again.

Unfortunately for ISI, they took advantage of this opportunity before they had fully vanished from

enemy radar, and therefore remained vulnerable as they once again became active. In early 2010, ISI

suffered a blow in the form of an airstrike which killed leaders Masri and Baghdadi, and led to the

reforming of ISI under the new leadership of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Under this new leadership, the expansion of the group began anew, but this time in a very

different direction. As technology advanced through the years, terrorist groups and extremist

organizations did their best to keep up, utilizing tapes, video recordings, and eventually more and

more available tools on the internet. Al Qaeda used forums liberally as a way of planning,

strategizing, and recruiting, but these pages remained somewhat secretive and suspicious of

outsiders. However, ISI took advantage of technology in a new way; instead of hiding behind deep

web forums and making supporters seek them out, they brought the face of extremism to the

forefront of the internet in a slow grassroots movement to increase the groups reach and visibility.

Social media played an especially important role, with supporters connecting on sites such as

Facebook, posting videos on YouTube, and reaching out to new recruits on Twitter. It was a slow

burn, but a coordinated one – a campaign designed to force world to pay attention. In 2011 as the

Arab Spring began in full force, Twitter became the most-used method of communicating and

following the happenings across the Middle East, and ISI took advantage of the sudden rush of traffic

and newly emerging “official” accounts of groups participating in the revolutions.44 The instant

turnaround and massive audience were appealing factors to a group that sought to reach as many

people as quickly as possible. As more and more ISI-related Twitter accounts began to pop up, with

43 Ibid 44 Stern and Berger 2015

26

Twitter becoming the main tool both because of the Arab Spring and because of the site’s reluctance

to police accounts for terrorist activity, ISI’s following slowly began to amass numbers in the tens of

thousands.45 Even when Twitter finally did begin monitoring users and deleting the accounts of those

linked to terrorist movements like ISI, it was essentially like chopping the head off of a chimera or

playing “whack-a-mole”; every time one account disabled, another would simply pop up in its place.46

The first official ISI Twitter account was created as an official branch of the Syrian Revolution,

with the name al I’tisaamm at the handle @e3tasimo in October of 2013. After a series of the account

being shut down by Twitter, the account reemerged and was seemingly left alone in February 2014,

now going by the handle @wa3tasimo. Though Twitter redoubled its efforts to crack down on these

accounts, by 2014 the damage was done, and a vast grassroots network of ISI supporters was in place,

reaching out to recruit new members through various strategies.47 They even had a name; the army

of online supporters was called mujtahidun48, and they followed very specific strategies to increase

the organization’s visibility, extend their reach to new locations, and recruit new supporters and

active members. The mujtahidun appealed to individuals through peer-to-peer recruiting, focusing

mostly on young people and playing on existing grievances, giving vulnerable recruits a new outlook

on life, promising brotherhood, sisterhood, a happy future in a group that was really more like a big

happy family. Not all of the recruits were the stereotypical poor or loner cases; many came from

middle class, normal circumstances, but did not get along with family, or had already converted, in

some cases.49 While the group also recruited in person, as studies found individuals were more likely

to become radicalized and actively join an extremist group if they knew someone who had already

gone through the process, the vast majority of recruitment was done through online means.50

However, the narrative of brotherhood, sisterhood, comradery, and family was consistently

employed as a method to draw new recruits into the ideology, regardless of the initial way the

connection was established.51

The mujtahidun also played a large role in growing the network itself, to a point where the

rest of the world could no longer ignore the massive online presence. The group even created its own

app, called The Dawn of Glad Tidings, or simply Dawn for short, which automatically tweeted from

45 Ibid 46 Ibid 47 Ibid 48 Arabic word for industrious 49 BBC Online, 23 Feb 2015. MSNBC Online, 27 Feb. 2015 50 International Business Times, 8 Sept. 2014 51 Ibid

27

subscribed users’ accounts at set, timed intervals, as well as keeping subscribers up to date on ISI

news.52 This app was eventually taken down, but not before it helped the group amass an even larger

following. The organization also employed coordinated hashtag campaigns, designed to capitalize

on the “armchair activist” supporters who could retweet these hashtags until they achieved trending

levels or went viral. As the 18 Feb. 2015 article in the International Business Times stated,

“Isis understands only too well how to [utilize] those communications technologies and strategies our

companies have spearheaded, seamlessly combining hard with soft power, violence with

propaganda…They know their strength is derived from their ongoing ability to [radicalize] and recruit

at scale. Indeed Isis could give masterclasses in social media and peer-to-peer marking, using tailored

propaganda, high-production value videos and footage from the field.”53

In addition to this fundamental understanding of how to capitalize on social media technology, it is

also important to note that ISI, while operating under an ideology from the time of Muhammad, had

no qualms about employing every modern means of gaining support and recruiting followers, and

indeed, had full access to every sort of technology that would be found in the West as well.54 Keeping

up with technology was important in that it allowed for a larger reach, touching more and more

people as the online presence continued to grow, but it also meant keeping costs down. Sending out

massive blasts of Tweets and updates online was free, whereas older methods of spreading

propaganda and recruitment were slower and more expensive. It was a simple matter to determine

that increasing the group’s online existence was by far the smartest method of increasing its base of

support.

As Al Baghdadi continued to reshape and restructure ISI in the context of the Syrian Civil War,

the online campaign continued in full force, creating an incredibly vast network of supporters

stretched out across the globe, able to access the movement with the click of a button and help

support its efforts with another click, all far away from the danger of the frontlines. The group

continued its advances inside Syria on the ground as well, as a coordinated effort between every

branch of its army, from the mujtahidun to the mujahideen. As the battle continued, increasing

numbers of images from the frontlines were disseminated across the social media landscape, as well

as videos and links to other official propaganda. The online campaign embraced the violence in these

images, giving the world its first looks at the actions that ISI, now called the Islamic State of Iraq and

Syria or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS/ISIL) glorified and celebrated as advancing the

52 The Atlantic Online, 16 June 2014 53 International Business Times, 18 Feb. 2015 54 Stern and Berger 2015

28

holy cause of the Islamic Caliphate. By the time Al Baghdadi declared the establishment of the Islamic

Caliphate on 29 June 2014 and officially renamed the group the Islamic State, dropping the -of Iraq

and Syria, the grassroots network was firmly in place. Despite renewed efforts by Twitter, YouTube,

and other social media services to police accounts and remove those linked to Daesh, it was

impossible to root out the network completely, as it was so deeply entrenched. The thoroughly

ensconced roots of the system were thus perfectly in place to continue functioning as the propaganda

dissemination branch of Daesh’s army, releasing huge amounts of propaganda on a daily basis in

order to flood the world in such a way as to prove that Daesh was not a threat to be ignored. This

grassroots base of online support would become a crucial element of how Daesh portrayed itself,

both within and without of its territory, as the group made strides in Syria, pushing back against

Assad’s army as well as the other rebel groups, and eventually taking over cities within both Syria

and Iraq, and declaring Al Baghdadi the official Caliph of the newly established Islamic Caliphate.

29

Chapter 4: Analyzing the Story, As Told by Daesh

The objective of this chapter is to present the identified representations of a violent imaginary which

arguably elucidate how Daesh employs propaganda as a tool to portray the conflict in Syria and Iraq

in a way that legitimizes the organization’s resort to violence. “Violent imaginaries” are an

established analytical framework in frame analysis literature, described by Schröder and Schmidt as

“the emphasizing of the historicity of present-day confrontations…represented through narratives,

performances, and inscriptions.”55 The frame operates in a larger structural setting, portraying a

holistic overview of the conflict within the international community. The relevant features of the

greater violent imaginary are distinguished throughout the chapter in order to argue that Daesh

employs propaganda as a main tool of a larger structure designed to portray the conflict as a

legitimate claim to violence through engineering a particular perspective. Each section ends with a

succinct conclusion in relation to its findings.

4.1 Portraying the Narratives

The first concept utilized in the framework of a violent imaginary is the narrative, a glorification of

an organization’s achievements and benefits used to keep the memory of violence alive in the

portrayal of the preferred story56. In order to better understand Daesh’s perspective, we must

answer these sub-questions: What are the narratives that Daesh seeks to portray? How do the

patterns seen in Daesh’s propaganda support these suggested narratives and challenge others?

Daesh takes great advantage of expounding upon and extolling the virtues and victories that they

have achieved since the organization’s inception, playing up these narratives as a common thread

across various mediums of propaganda. This glorification is exemplified in the second issue of the

Islamic State News newsletter, which dedicates not one, but two, pages to commemorating the squads

of istishhadiyyun57. “Join the caravan of istishhadiyyun,” says the headline over the pictures of smiling

men holding up the easily recognizable single finger58 salute in the gesture adopted by a majority of

Daesh supporters. This not only glorifies the men taking part in these suicide missions, but also

portrays the act of suicide itself as a heroic action, as long as it is committed with the intent of serving

Allah and destroying as many of the kuffar as possible. This exaltation of those who achieve Jannah

in this way demonstrates the underlying thread present in every form of Daesh propaganda of the

55 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 9 56 Ibid: 10 57 Arabic term for suicide bombers, considered martyrs. 58 IS News, Issue 2: 8

30

justification of violence in the name of religion. For example, the thread of justification is woven into

Daesh films, seen clearly in the video entitled Foreign ISIS Fighter in Iraq: We Will Conquer Jerusalem,

Rome, and Spain, where the aforementioned foreign fighter states, “By Allah, we shall cleanse the

Arabian Peninsula of you, you filth.”59 This actively aggressive language is justified through the claim

that all violence is enacted due to the will of Allah, that higher power which has ordained the creation

of an Islamic Caliphate. Violence committed in the name of such a supreme being can only be extolled

and celebrated, and interred into a history which consistently commemorates such acts. Through

the continued pattern of glorifying these acts, narratives are created and disseminated as propaganda

which serves to portray Daesh’s perspective of the conflict as a whole.

In addition, the narratives which function to glorify and legitimize the violent acts Daesh

commits also provide motivational framing as a means to continue garnering support and

recruitment. As evidenced by a quote from this speech, among others, by Daesh leader and so-called

Caliph Abu Bakr al Baghdadi,

“Thus it is upon the Muslims to understand well and realize that fighting is obligatory upon

each individual from amongst them, and that jihad is the best of deeds and peak of Islam. Their honor

and sublimity is by it, as is their wellbeing in the Dunyā and Hereafter. Their humiliation, failure, and

degradation are by abandoning it, as well as their torment in the Dunyā and Hereafter. They must also

realize that Allah (‘azza wa jall) will aid the mujahideen; this is inevitable. And thus, for this reason,

the soldiers of the Islamic State fight. They fight in obedience to Allah and to gain closeness to Him

(subhānāh). They will never abandon fighting,”60

Daesh uses religion and the idea that Allah stands behind those who join the mujahideen to gather

support and motivate individuals to join the greater movement and sacrifice themselves in order to

further the movement, achieving Jannah in the process. This motivational framing, a strategy used

as a piece of building a narrative in a collective action frame, is the “’call to arms’ or rationale for

engaging in ameliorative collective action, including the construction of appropriate vocabularies of

motive.”61 In other words, this concept functions as the catapult into action; galvanizing individuals

to act on behalf of the organization as a whole in order to defend the story created through the

diagnosis of a problem and the suggested actions to be taken. The motivational frame’s success

depends a great deal on the glorification of the group itself, as those who fight for the cause must feel

they are doing so for a good enough reason or reward to sacrifice their livelihoods, lifestyles, and

59 Video, Foreign ISIS Fighter in Iraq (1:30) 60 Abu Bakr al Baghdadi. Even if the Disbelievers Despise Such. 13 Nov. 2014. 61 Benford and Snow 2000: 617

31

even their lives themselves. Therefore, portraying a strongly supported narrative of glorified

violence encouraged by Allah is imperative to legitimizing Daesh’s claim to violence and maintaining

a perspective which justifies their actions. In examining various forms of propaganda, it is possible

to triangulate this theme of glorification as a consistent narrative put forth by Daesh, existing in

written propaganda, videos, and speeches, all portraying Daesh as a holy movement supported by

the highest power and heroic in its resort to violence in the name of Allah.

However, Daesh cannot glorify violence and motivate its supporters to give their lives

without specifying the problem that all this action is meant to solve. The ultimate goal of establishing

an Islamic Caliphate goes hand in hand with the goal of destroying all non-believers; therefore Daesh

has mounted a campaign within its propaganda dedicated to the antagonistic discourse of framing

all kuffar, especially the United States-led West and Shia Muslims, as a plague to be wiped out by the

heroic soldier of the Caliphate. This antagonistic discourse, employed in this instance through

adversarial framing, described by Benford and Snow as “[delineating] the boundaries between ‘good’

and ‘evil’ and [constructing] movement protagonists and antagonists,”62 is another common thread

interwoven through Daesh’s various forms of propaganda. For instance, in the fifty-five minute

documentary style film Flames of War, the narrator explicitly calls U.S. former President George W.

Bush and current President Barack Obama liars, claiming that the war has only just begun, and that

though the West claimed troops would not return to Iraq, they were being deceitful and would

undoubtedly return.63 By framing the West and its allies as liars who cannot keep their word even to

their own people, Daesh creates a black and white division between themselves, the heroic and

righteous soldiers, and all others, the lying nonbelievers who cannot be trusted and must be

destroyed in the name of the Caliphate. This demonstrates the profound importance of the words

used in propaganda; terms such as “liars” and “martyrs” are not applied by accident. Rather, the

terms Daesh employs to refer to itself and its enemies are carefully chosen and cultivated to present

a particular image of the conflict as a whole. As Bhatia claims, “movements attach significance to

words…Discourse is thus a tool for armed conflict movements and a battleground and contested

space in contemporary conflicts.”64 Naming themselves heroes and their enemies deceitful liars goes

a long way in reinterpreting Daesh’s collective history. Rather than accept the West’s branding of the

group as terrorists, their propaganda actively fights back to claim the legitimacy of violence that is

not awarded to organizations considered terrorists and criminals. The narratives built by Daesh and

62 Ibid: 616 63 Video, Flames of War. 19 Sept. 2014 64 Bhatia 2005: 6

32

portrayed through propaganda start first and foremost with the meticulous crafting of words which

frame and reflect a particular perspective.

This diagnosis of the kuffar as the problem which Daesh must resolve through collective

action is further exemplified in the video series Lend Me Your Ears, featuring a succession of

addresses by British journalist and hostage of Daesh named John Cantlie, who begins each video by

stating his name, nationality, and the fact that he feels he has been abandoned by his government.65

This further bolsters the use of adversarial framing by Daesh propaganda, painting the West as evil

liars and villains not only by Daesh supporters, but seemingly by Westerners as well. John Cantlie’s

supposed turncoat views support the narrative that Daesh truly does have the moral high ground,

and that even Westerners can see this if they are simply exposed to the truth. While Cantlie’s

addresses may or may not be genuine, since his status as a hostage poses the question of whether his

speeches were made under duress or by free will, his intent matters less than the image of a

Westerner speaking out against the West itself. This consistent diagnostic framing of the West as the

enemy, both by Daesh supporters and captives, supports the narrative of a glorified and holy Islamic

army on a mission to destroy the evil values of the West.

Daesh takes this piece of propaganda even further, featuring Cantlie in a follow up series

called Inside, in which he explore three cities within Daesh territory not as a prisoner, but as almost

a sort of television travel guide. In these three episodes, he wanders through Kobani, Mosul, and

Aleppo, where he claims that despite occasional bombing and attacks from Western, Iraqi, or Kurdish

forces, life generally proceeds as usual. Cantlie claims that within these cities, Sunni Muslims have

been freed from oppression and are now able to live as Allah intended.66 He also claims that despite

Western allegations, Daesh provides well for its population, with plenty of food, open markets,

working hospitals, healthcare, and running schools. These claims are subsequently bolstered

through other forms of propaganda, such as Dabiq Magazine, IS News newsletters, and various other

videos. He even visits a hospital and a school, in Mosul and Aleppo, respectively, to prove that these

amenities are taken care of and that the people are happy and well provided for. The picture that he

paints, of such a happy and well-functioning society under complete control of Daesh, serves to

underline Daesh’s portrayed narrative which positions the group as the heroic saviors, allowing

Sunni Muslims the freedom to be Muslim the way Allah ordained, providing for the people, and

protecting their way of life. It further serves to vilify the West as antagonists bent on destroying

65 Video series, Lend Me Your Ears, Episodes 1-6 66 Video, Inside Mosul. 3 Jan. 2015.

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everything in the sound structural system that Daesh has built up through attacks and affronts on

civilians as well as Daesh militants. This reinforcing of the idea that Daesh is protecting the

livelihoods of innocent Muslims, and freeing them from the oppressive regimes of the rafidah,67

continues the support through propaganda the view of Daesh as heroic holy warriors seeking to

preserve and protect Islam in its truest form. It also serves as a continuation of the casting of the

negative role onto the West and its allies as jeopardizing this ordained way of life, putting innocents

at risk, and ignoring the truth of Sunni Islam.

This places Daesh’s narrative at direct odds with the Western new war narrative, presenting

Daesh as noble warriors defending an ideology and way of life, welcoming of anyone who chooses to

embrace true Islam, rather than a terrorist group which relies on violence to terrify people into

following their oppressive and overbearing rule with the ultimate goals of simply gaining resources.

These looks at life inside Daesh territory serve to humanize the organization, working in coordination

with other forms of propaganda to maintain an image that presents a group dedicated both to their

cause and their followers. It expands the narrative beyond just good and evil, right and wrong, while

still maintaining that black and white adversarial framework, and attempts to break down the

Western tactic of using “nasty names”68 to disparage the organization. This counterframing of the

Western perspective is an attempt to “assert [Daesh’s] claim to truth and history against rival claims,

with all the social and economic consequences this entails.”69 In other words, justifying its own

actions through disparaging those of West is an attempt to declare Daesh’s legitimacy and raise the

organization up to the level of its opponents, as a structurally sound governing system with a

legitimate claim to violence. A prime example of this depiction is the name of the organization itself.

While I have chosen to refer to the group as “Daesh”, they themselves see this name as derogatory,

and an affront against their power and legitimacy. They have gone through a series of names, most

recently the evolution from Islamic State in Iraq (ISI) to the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL)

to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) to simply the Islamic State (IS). This progression of names

demonstrates the level of legitimacy that Daesh seeks to portray; by removing specific geographic

areas from the title, Daesh implies that its legitimacy reaches far beyond the small territory it

currently controls and represents the idea that the Islamic State will one day be worldwide. This

adherence to the name IS, and the continuous reference to the group as the resurgence of the Islamic

67 Arabic term for those Muslims who reject Sunni Islam as the true form of Islam. Daesh applies this term especially to Shia Muslims, but it also applies to all non-Sunni sects of Islam in this context. 68 Video, Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 1. 18 Sept. 2014. 69 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 9

34

Caliphate both reveal the importance of names, just as Bhatia claims. “The actual ability to name,” he

says, “and to have that name accepted by an audience, holds great power.”70 Using these powerful

names, in the same way that the West – and I – delegitimize the group by refusing to acknowledge

them by their preferred name, is an attempt to justify and legitimize themselves through narratives

and discourse. This attempt to raise Daesh’s authority to that of its enemies and beyond is furthered

by the strict adherence to Sharia Law, the Islamic governance system implemented by Daesh. While

often brutal and extreme in its ordinances, such as the removal of a hand for committing theft, the

system is celebrated by Daesh as having been established and decreed by Allah and is seen as a

cultural staple of the organization, continuing the reification of violence as symbolic of culture

through religion and legitimizing Daesh’s violent actions both inside and outside of its territory. This

peek into everyday life does not take away from the need to destroy the West and its allies, but rather

fortifies the necessity of violent jihad to preserve and protect this way of life, this portrayed utopia,

from those who would be rid of it.

Not only does Daesh propaganda claim all kuffar as their current enemy, but they also harken

back to memories of Muhammad’s original struggle, as evidenced in Abu Bakr al Baghdadi’s speech

March Forth Whether Light or Heavy, in which he states, “He was ordered with war until Allah is

worshipped alone. He (peace be upon him) said to the polytheists of his people, 'I came to you with

slaughter.' He fought both the Arabs and non-Arabs in all their various colors.”71 This, along with

various other references to Muhammad’s violent battles to spread Islam scattered throughout Daesh

propaganda, support the narrative that Daesh seeks to portray, keeping the “memory of former

conflicts and past violence alive”72 in order to justify current violent actions. This portrayal of

Muhammad as a soldier as well as a prophet also serves to indoctrinate violence into the cultural

aspects of the conflict, normalizing the spread of Islam through the slaughter of nonbelievers as a

necessary and valid part of jihad. For Daesh, religion, government, and culture are one and the same,

an interwoven backbone to the infrastructure the organization seeks to portray. The violence

enacted in the present day conflict, according to Daesh’s perspective, is simply a continuation of

Muhammad’s ongoing fight to spread Islam across the globe as the one true religion, and constitutes

both a cultural symbol of legitimacy and an “integral element in [Daesh’s] ideology of self-

definition.”73 This link to the past and view of violence as a long-standing element of culture and

70 Bhatia 2005: 9 71 Abu Bakr al Baghdadi. March Forth Whether Light or Heavy. 14 May 2015. 72 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 73 Ibid: 14

35

society is directly contradictory to the Western new war perspective, which ignores the ideological

component of modern conflicts in favor of viewing wars as motivated by criminal interests, war

economies, or identity politics. The ideological motive, however, is considered by new war theory to

be a component of traditional wars, which were considered far more legitimate in regards to using

violence. Daesh portrays this modern conflict as a traditional war in that sense, relying on the

remembered history and glorification of the group’s actions and ideology for justification in a break

with the new war perspective of the West.

Another narrative woven into Daesh’s portrayal of the conflict in Iraq and Syria is the push to

demonstrate the legitimacy of Islam as both a religion and a governing model, while at the same time

displaying other religions and forms of government as untenable and invalid. This narrative is

entwined seamlessly with the others, creating a holistic story that covers as much ground as possible.

It is evidenced in various pieces of propaganda, most obviously in the videos featuring foreigners,

both supporters and hostages. Just as John Cantlie, the British hostage, disparages his government

and its allies for leaving him in the hands of Daesh, foreign Daesh supporters delegitimize the kuffar

in a different way. In one of the videos in the series Stories from the Land of the Living, Abu Khaled

Al-Kambudi, an Australian man of Cambodian descent, tells the story of how he was drawn to Islam

and Daesh. He explains that as a young man, he began to question his background and upbringing as

a Buddhist, wondering why it was necessary to pray to idols and yearning for more out of life. When

no one in his family could give him the answer, he turned to Islam, which, he claims, provided him

with a meaningful existence dedicated to Allah.74 Al-Kambudi’s story serves multiple purposes in

terms of propaganda. First of all, he shows a human side to the mujahideen, especially the foreign

members, which plays an important role in Daesh’s grassroots efforts to demonstrate that people

from all religions, countries, and backgrounds find true meaning in the Khalifah. Secondly, this

narrative continues to support the theme that Daesh is a legitimate, heroic organization which does

indeed seek to help all those who come willingly under its protection. Thirdly, and perhaps most

importantly, this narrative functions to further legitimize Islam as the only religion with a true

purpose, showing supporters, in this case Al-Kambudi, cast aside other means of worship and other

forms of government in favor of living under Daesh and the rule of Islam in both faith and law. This

narrative is also seen in the video Al-Gharaba: The Chosen Few, in which a Canadian convert to Islam

and member of the mujahideen describes how he too was drawn to Islam and Daesh as the best way

to live.75 Both men in these videos led perfectly content lives in their original countries, and both

74 Video, Stories from the Land of the Living: Abu Khaled Al-Kambudi. 21 April 2015. 75 Video, Al-Gharaba: The Chosen Few. 12 July 2014.

36

come across as happy, well-adjusted members of society rather than the Western portrayal of those

swayed by Daesh as awkward social outcasts and loners. This portrayal lends credence to the claim

that Daesh is indeed a well-oiled machine; the organization represents itself as a solidly functioning

governing body based on Sharia Law of Islam, true to Allah’s will and rendering all other governments

and religions inept and unsustainable in the face of the mujahideen. Daesh portrays itself not as a

group based on identity politics, as Western new war theory would suggest, but rather as a group

united by a morally superior ideology across identities and borders, eager and willing to enact

violence in the name of Allah in order to fight the kuffar and spread Islam. As Schröder and Schmidt

state, there is often a close link between violence and religion76, and in the case of Daesh, religion is

not only a justification for modern violence set by a historical precedent, but also a uniting factor in

bringing people from all over the world together to support the legitimacy of the group and fight on

its behalf.

Concluding Remarks

Daesh portrays itself as a morally superior, glorified holy struggle through an interwoven set of

narratives evident in the vast majority of its propaganda. Through establishing themes of religious

justification, violence as a cultural symbol, adversarial framing, and historical precedents, Daesh

rejects the Western labels of terrorists and criminals by depicting a story of a justified Islamic

Khalifah with a stable infrastructure able to provide for its people, on a quest to spread Islam and rid

the world of the kuffar in the name of Allah. Through various mediums of propaganda, this holistic

impression is embedded into Daesh’s discourse and rhetoric, reinforcing itself and lending a sense of

normalcy and legitimacy to the group’s resort to violence as a necessary means of establishing a

violent imaginary.

4.2 Representation through Performance

While narratives are the first step in entrenching ideas to legitimize conflict, Daesh also employs

performances, the second form of representation in a violent imaginary, as a means of justification

and legitimization of violence across mediums of propaganda. But how do performances interact

with narratives to portray Daesh’s perspective? Performances reinforce the established narratives

through normalization and increasing tangibility, embedding violence into the socio-cultural aspects

of Daesh in such a way to reify the importance of violence to the group’s core essence. Described by

Schröder and Schmidt as “public rituals in which antagonistic relationships are staged and

76 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 8

37

prototypical images of violence enacted,”77 these rituals play a key role in Daesh’s portrayal of the

current conflict in Syria and Iraq through propaganda. Daesh separates these rituals into the

symbolic categories of violence against the kuffar as a people, as an idea, and as a geophysical

manifestation. In addition, Daesh also portrays images of happiness and satisfaction from those

living within Daesh territory, quite possibly in an attempt to portray a more complete image of a fully

functioning system.

The first category of performances, enacted violence against people representing the kuffar,

is best exemplified through the multitude of execution videos released by Daesh. The executions

serve not only to strike fear into the hearts of Daesh’s enemies, but also to portray the image of an

organization determined to spread Islam through jihad as part of an ordained holy mission ordered

by Allah. The executions play a role in portraying Daesh as undefeatable, demonstrating the group’s

power and dedication to its cause. While some of the executions, such as those of James Foley and

Steven Sotloff, American journalists captured by Daesh, were carried out by beheading, an apparent

tie to the historical association with Muhammad and the ancient struggle to spread Islam, there have

also been a variety of more modern tactics used. The seemingly traditional means of beheading gives

Daesh the portrayed image of strong links to the memories of violence kept alive by the narratives

the group employs, building on these narratives to normalize the violence enacted as an element of

the group’s culture. These performances seem to take on more of a role of “war ceremonies”, rituals

which play an important role in preparing a nation or group for battle78, sending out the image to the

West and its allies that Daesh is prepared to enact brutal violence in its quest to establish and

maintain the Khalifah. The organization does not hide from the brutality of these methods, but rather

embraces the violence as a means to achieve its goals, glorifying its actions through the consistent

claim that killing any kuffr automatically guarantees a jihadi his place in Jannah through performing

Allah’s will. This claim is further bolstered in other performances; for example, it is stated explicitly

in the video Al-Gharaba: The Chosen Few, as the Canadian jihadi is glorified in death as having run

straight into battle with no fear, as he knew the gift of Allah awaited him in the next life.79 It is

examples such as this which demonstrate Daesh’s perspective towards death as a whole; it is a tool

to be wielded in the name of Allah by the mujahideen. Daesh clearly portrays its soldiers as unafraid

of anything, let alone death, as they have chosen to sacrifice themselves willingly to fight for their

religion and spread Islam to all corners of the globe. This willingness to die, along with their

77 Ibid: 10 78 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 79 Video, Al-Gharaba: The Chosen Few. 12 July 2014

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multitude of propaganda pieces evidencing the executions of kuffar, portray the group as a force to

be reckoned with; they fear nothing, and seek to draw the West into direct confrontation where they

can truly demonstrate their dedication to the Khalifah.

These performances of violence are not only a portrayal of Daesh’s dedication and willingness

to sacrifice, but also an outline of their strategies. Their immense grassroots network of support,

aimed to garner recruits through individuals reaching out across various online means such as

Twitter and Facebook belie a need for increasing numbers of the mujahideen ranks. An eagerness to

die for the cause means a need for a continuous supply of bodies, as Daesh’s methods of motivation

remain hinged on the moral and religious justification of each and every member achieving Jannah

through battling the kuffar. While the performances continue to encourage fighters to give up their

earthly bodies, reifying this violence as a normalized extension of battling the vilified West and its

allies, religion continues to be used as the source of legitimacy behind the commitment to such acts

of violence. This legitimization is also evident in speeches by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The speeches

themselves are performances, given rarely from the mysteriously shrouded leader when a boost to

moral is needed. In the speech entitled March Forth Whether Light or Heavy, delivered 1 May 2014

in the lead up to the declaration of the Caliphate, Baghdadi stated,

“O Muslim! O you who claims to love Allah (the Mighty and Majestic), and claims to love His Prophet (peace be

upon him)… If you are truthful in your claim, then obey your beloved and fight for the cause of Allah, and

emulate your beloved (peace be upon him), and do not die except as a mujāhid for the cause of Allah.”80

This call for Muslims to fight and die only as mujahideen exemplifies the perspective that Daesh

portrays, that Allah and Islam are the most important things on this earth worth fighting for, and that

in joining the holy struggle, the jihad does indeed have a legitimate claim to violence, just as did

Muhammad so long ago. The intensity with which Daesh defends this claim to violence throughout

performances present in propaganda builds support for the stories portrayed in the narratives,

continuing the patterns of glorifying the group’s actions and achievements while keeping the memory

of past violence alive in order to maintain the current justification.

The speeches also act on a motivational level, framing the struggle of Daesh in such a way that

joining and fighting, whether on the battlefield or in building the state, is the only option. This

motivational framing81 sets a “strictly [polarized] structure of ‘we: they’ that no individual can escape

80 Abu Bakr al Baghdadi. March Forth Whether Light or Heavy. 14 May 2015. 81 Benford and Snow 2000

39

and that leaves no room for ambiguity,”82 fulfilling a key requirement of Schröder and Schmidt’s

violent imaginaries framework. The speeches are both polarizing and galvanizing, meant to

stimulate and motivate supporters into action so that they will carry out further acts of violence in

the name of Daesh, all the while portraying the image of Daesh as a legitimate state with strong

leadership, a sound base of followers, and justified actions. In a similar manner to that of Hitler’s

speeches in Nazi Germany, Al Baghdadi’s performances rely on strong language built on Daesh’s

narratives, and are designed to play on the emotions of those listening, drawing them in through the

ritual of reenacting the adversarial relationship between Daesh and its enemies. The speeches

espouse the enactment of violence against the kuffar, going so far as to state that:

"O Muslims, Islam was never for a day the religion of peace. Islam is the religion of war. Your Prophet

(peace be upon him) was dispatched with the sword as a mercy to the creation. He was ordered with war until

Allah is worshipped alone. He (peace be upon him) said to the polytheists of his people, 'I came to you with

slaughter.' He fought both the Arabs and non-Arabs in all their various colors. He himself left to fight and took

part in dozens of battles. He never for a day grew tired of war. He (peace be upon him) passed away during the

period he was preparing the expedition of Usāmah (may Allah be pleased with him). And from his last

instructions – peace be upon him – was, 'Dispatch the expedition of Usāmah.'”83

This quote, along with many other examples present throughout Daesh performances in propaganda,

demonstrate the clear preparatory intentions of Al Baghdadi’s speeches; they are not simply a leader

addressing his people, but rather an inflammatory message deliberately calculated to incite conflict

between Daesh and the organization’s proclaimed enemies. Using history and religion to glorify

these violent memories and embed the idea that this violence is both legitimate and necessary,

portraying Daesh as the morally superior side of the conflict and promising death and destruction to

all those who refuse to see the light of Daesh’s Islam. The use of speeches to increase the legitimacy

of violent acts also reinforces the importance of words in modern conflicts, as espoused by Bhatia. In

every step of portraying Daesh as a justified actor with a legitimate claim to violence, words are

crafted carefully to support each and every truth that Daesh presents.

The second category of performances portrayed in Daesh propaganda is that of violence

against the ideologies of the West and its allies. In portraying a holistic image through propaganda,

Daesh seeks not only to incite violence against the kuffar, but also to destroy their very way of life,

from governments to economies to religions. In breaking down these parts of their enemies, Daesh

82 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 83 Abu Bakr al Baghdadi. March Forth Whether Light or Heavy (emphasis added). 14 May 2015.

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attacks the very ideologies the Western world is founded on, espousing and glorifying the benefits of

Sharia Law and enacting their dedication to the creation of one united people under Islam. For

example, in the first issue of Dabiq, the punishing of criminals found guilty of highway robbery

according to Sharia Law is celebrated alongside battlefield successes and glorified as the Khalifah

performing Allah’s law as intended84. While the violent punishment – execution – may look like a

brutal regime of terror to those not indoctrinated into the culture, these violent laws are an intrinsic

part of how Daesh represents itself, keeping to the exact specifications, however violent, set down as

laws in the Quran. The performance of these laws is a crucial piece of how Daesh legitimizes its

actions, justifying the brutality through the claim that this is a proper government enacting proper

laws, set down by the highest power possible. Through claiming that the group is only following the

orders of Allah, they legitimize their resort to violence as portraying themselves cleansing the world

of the morally inferior, weak, and cowardly. In entrenching these performances in propaganda,

Daesh inherently builds upon the already existing narratives of glorification and legitimacy,

increasing the tangibility of these ideas and embedding them further into the cultural representation

of the organization as a legitimate way of life while at the same time delegitimizing the systems

supported by the kuffar societies.

Another way in which this battle against ideologies is portrayed in Daesh propaganda is

through the literal destruction of ideological symbols. In multiple videos released by Daesh,

supporters can be seen destroying their passports, such as in the short propaganda film Muslims He

Named You85, where Daesh supporters are shown renouncing their former citizenships and ripping

apart their passports to throw into a fire as a ceremonial annihilation of any ties they had to their

former lives and ideologies of the countries they came from. In destroying such a symbol of ideology

through these performances, Daesh portrays the conflict as an intended obliteration of all ways of life

not tied to Sunni Islam, especially those ideologies of nationality or secular governments, as all people

should be united under one Islamic Caliphate. This is a theme played out across various means of

propaganda, the uniting of all people under the flag of Daesh and the removal of objects symbolizing

the imagined divisions created by kuffar governments. The actual destruction of palpable objects

such as passports lends a strong reinforcing factor to the narratives portrayed in rhetoric and

discourse through enacting the performances in a violent manner which bolsters the glorification of

violence by other means. The continued cycle of violent preparatory performances in propaganda

84 “Dabiq: The Return of the Khalifah”, Issue 1. June 2014. 85 Video, Muslims He Named You. 17 May 2014.

41

also serve to augment Daesh’s outlined strategy of direct confrontation, using symbols such as

passports as surrogates for the people who remain tied to such forms of ideological identity.

The pattern of destroying the structures and systems of life built up by the kuffar is further

reiterated in the propaganda which shows the performance of actively demolishing buildings and

borders representing the enemies of Daesh. As evidenced by the video End of Sykes Picot, in which

the destruction of borders and buildings is both described and enacted,86 the damaging of the literal

representations of the history written by the kuffar portrays Daesh as actively challenging these

histories and claiming its own history and legitimacy, using violence as a “resource in world

making”87 to assert its own claim as a legitimate and justified truth. These performances of breaking

down the symbol of the enemy to rebuild a new history may not be enacted against people, but they

still represent a staging of antagonistic relationships on a public stage, simply pitting claims to truth

and legitimacy against each other rather than armies. These symbolic performances portrayed in

propaganda serve to expound upon Daesh’s portrayal of the conflict, continuing the normalization of

violence as a natural extension of the narratives presenting a glorified history which must be

continued. The consistent connections made between the narratives and performances, enacting the

stories told and maintaining the ancient battle that Muhammad began present a perspective quite

different from that of the Western new war perspective. Daesh challenges the Western portrayal of

the conflict as brutal barbarians seeking to impose a twisted version of Islam on a terrorized people,

presenting themselves instead as justified holy warriors seeking to unite the world under true Islam.

This rejection of the terrorist label goes hand in hand with the reinterpretation of history that Daesh

strives to portray through the framework of a violent imaginary. While Schröder and Schmidt note

that “in late modernity the most common currency of violent imaginaries are nationalism and/or

ethnicity,”88 this links back to the distinctly Western perspective of new wars, namely that identity

politics form the basis of all modern third world conflicts, but Daesh’s portrayal of the conflict as a

return to the ideological roots of Islam and attempt to break down identities based on ethnicity or

nationality demonstrate a direct contradiction to new war theory, and a need to broaden the Western

understanding of modern so-called new wars.

In Daesh’s portrayal of the conflict in Iraq and Syria as a complete rejection of the Western

interpretation of history and truth, examples of happy people living as a united front under Daesh’s

control is another theme drawn across mediums of propaganda through performances. As evidenced

86 Video, End of Sykes Picot. 29 June 2014. 87 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 9 88 Appadurai 1998; Kapferer 1988 in Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 11

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by the videos Mujatweets, a series of short videos showing everyday life for those living in territory

controlled by Daesh, people are shown as happy and going about business as usual, from partaking

in cultural festivities such as Ramadan break-fast meals, to shopping in local markets. These

performances of everyday life are strewn about in Daesh propaganda in various perspectives,

included also in first issue of Dabiq, in an article describing the unification of local tribes under the

umbrella of Daesh, and the enthusiastic donation of zakah89 by these tribal members in order to help

the less fortunate regardless of their former affiliations90. These performances by members of this

portrayed society of Daesh play a role in presenting a more complete picture of Daesh as a holistic

community with a thriving socio-economic side, but they also serve to continue the legitimization of

violence through depicting the idea that Daesh is fighting not only to eliminate the kuffar, but also to

protect the society and culture active within Daesh-controlled territory. The presentation of such a

thriving and content population across mediums of propaganda exhibits an inherent strategy of

counterframing to that of the Western perspective, which paints those living within the territory

under dispute as being terrorized by violent barbarians, and forced to live by religious laws that they

do not believe in. While each of these frames represents an extreme, and could be incredibly far from

the truth on the ground, Daesh’s portrayal of the existing socio-economic and cultural conditions

legitimizes the organizations resort to violence as both defending and enforcing their way of life.

Concluding Remarks

As Daesh seeks to portray the conflict in Syria and Iraq as justified and their resort to violence as

legitimate, they build upon presented narratives through enacting performances which serve to reify

and normalize their actions through presentations in propaganda. These performances operate as

rituals staged in public to represent the antagonistic relationships through prototypical images of

violence.91 Daesh propaganda displays these performances through violence enacted against people,

symbols and ideas, and geophysical manifestations of the enemy, as well as through demonstrations

of a fully functioning content society, further legitimizing the use of violence as a means to protect

and defend the pseudo-state structure that Daesh presents itself as. The portrayal of Daesh through

performances in propaganda reinforces the overall presentation as a glorified collective movement

with legitimacy rooted in the memory of violence and historical reinterpretation of Muhammad’s

ancient holy struggle. It is further justified by the ongoing polarization and adversarial framing

89 Zakah is the Arabic term for the designated tax ordained as one of the five pillars of Islam, meant to purify the soul and signify closeness to God through the giving of alms or charity. It is also sometimes transliterated as zakat. 90 “Dabiq: The Return of the Khalifa”. Issue 1. June 2014. 91 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10

43

reified through Daesh’s propaganda to enhance the ideological significance within the framework of

a violent imaginary.

4.3 Interpretation of Inscriptions, and the Big Picture

The third layer of the violent imaginaries framework through which Daesh’s presentation of the

conflict can be viewed is that of inscriptions. How are these inscriptions employed to legitimize

conflict? How do they help challenge the Western perspective? Building on both narratives and

performances, inscriptions are the way in which violent imaginaries are engraved on a cultural

landscape through images and representations.92 Daesh employs inscriptions to further its claims

upon legitimacy by carving out a place within the social space of the territory the group occupies.

Inscriptions upon the cultural landscape are not always of a violent nature, such as the physical

raising of flags, or the countless images of life under Daesh portrayed in various ways on social media

outlets such as Twitter. However, Daesh also employs violent forms of inscriptions, such as the

embellishment of many of its magazines and videos with the imagery of flames, and the destruction

of borders and buildings which carried meaning for the kuffar. Examining the various inscriptions

Daesh utilizes in its propaganda can help solidify an understanding of how the propaganda portrays

a conflict with a legitimate claim to violence, as well as demonstrating the need to expand the existing

Western perspective of new wars to better embrace the “fundamental ‘triangle of violence’ [which]

includes perpetrators, victims, and observers,”93 when endeavoring to advance the understanding of

modern conflict.

The non-violent inscriptions applied to the cultural landscape in Daesh propaganda may not

be actively violent themselves, but they are closely linked to the glorified memories violence that they

represent. For example, the placement of Daesh’s flag in almost every single piece of propaganda,

from standing behind Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi in his speeches and those speaking in videos, to having

prominent placement throughout newsletters and magazines, as well as being consistently scrawled

across Twitter by various supporters, represents Daesh’s imprint on every aspect of life, from social

to cultural to economic to government. This inscription develops the holistic story built up through

narratives and performances of Daesh as having a legitimate claim to violence through their

representation of the group as a Caliphate, ordained by Allah. The symbolism of the inscription in

the form of a flag also serves to normalize Daesh within the cultural landscape; by presenting the flag

alongside such a variety of situations, it becomes accepted as an everyday part of life and an expected

92 Ibid 93 Riches 1986: 8-10 in Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 12

44

visual when Daesh is mentioned or shown. In using the symbol of a flag, generally a mark of a

legitimate state or group seeking the recognition of statehood, Daesh also signifies its perspective of

the group as having the legitimacy of nationhood, with or without recognition from the rest of the

world. At the same time Daesh inscribes symbols like the flag upon the cultural landscape, the group

also works to destroy the inscriptions used by kuffar, for example, disparaging the patches from Iraqi

Army uniforms94 and creating images such as a crumbling Statue of Liberty holding Daesh’s flag.95

Even though these images are nonviolent on their own, they are still closely linked to the violence

enacted by Daesh in its various forms. The flag in the hand of the Statue of Liberty, for instance, sends

a message of intended violence; Daesh aims to one day fly its flag over every corner of the world,

including the United States. Not only does this image present Daesh as a legitimate threat with the

power to defeat the West, and America in particular, it also backs the portrayed image of Daesh as an

army of holy warriors, an unstoppable force backed by a higher power, who believe nothing will

stand in their way. As the Statue of Liberty is a world renowned symbol of freedom and democracy,

the image of Daesh’s inscribed upon the cultural landscape of America serves as both a threat to the

West and as a tool of motivation for Daesh supporters who seek to see the United States and its allies

defeated in their lifetime.

The images Daesh publicizes of life within Raqqa, Mosul, and other controlled territories also

portray a particular perspective through cultural inscription. At almost every opportunity, Daesh

reaffirms how content its people are, how life goes on as usual and everyone has access to everything

they could ever possibly need. This is shown in short bursts of images and quick walk-throughs on

film, for example the short series of Mujatweets, which are compiled of images and clips of people

smiling and laughing, happy in markets and participating in cultural festivities.96 Further

impressions of contentedness among the general population is shown in the video series Inside, in

which British hostage John Cantlie acts as a tour guide in three cities under Daesh’s control, Aleppo,

Mosul, and Kobani, walking through markets, touring schools and hospitals, and explaining how

happy and well-functioning Daesh society is.97 This is a heavily reinforced image of Daesh’s structure;

portraying itself as a happy society with a high quality of life not only negates ideas that life under

Daesh is brutally barbaric with no amenities and little in the way of happiness, but it also legitimizes

the governing system and infrastructure that Daesh has implemented. They take pride in showing

94 Video, End of Sykes Picot. 29 June 2014 95 Twitter; see Appendix 2 96 Video series, Mujatweets, Episodes 1-8 97 Video series, Inside, Episodes 1-3

45

off their schools, which focus on religious education, and their hospitals, which they claim have

everything they need to provide full medical service for the people. They go beyond these quick

snapshots in the first issue of IS Report, with interviews with members of the Consumer Protection

Office.98 Interviews such as this one demonstrate Daesh’s commitment to portraying itself as an

organization truly dedicated to the care of its people, directly combating the Western view that Daesh

is made up of criminal elements taxing people enormous amounts and draining resources to fill its

own coffers with no thought to those living under its control. This portrayal of Daesh as a

conscientious government meticulously protecting the rights of its citizens and advocating for them

across all forms of propaganda reinforces the portrayal of the conflict as the legitimate defense of a

new state. The images continuously broadcast of a happy populous inscribe this idea further into the

cultural landscape, normalizing Daesh’s defense of its land and its people. This also draws on the

traditional ideas of state-making and world making, in which violence has always played such a key

role as a resource with which to assert one’s claim to truth and history.99 While these images of the

population are not necessarily polarizing, they are motivating. In ensuring that all who join will be

taken care of through extensive programs and committees, Daesh uses these images as inscriptions

which create motivational frames to encourage fighters to make hijra, join the mujahideen¸ and to

bring their friends and family with them to grow the organization as much as possible.

In addition to the inscriptions that are not immediately violent, Daesh has also attempted to

engrave a number of outright violent inscriptions within the cultural landscape of the conflict. As the

performances of destroying borders and kuffar buildings build upon the narrative of world

domination as a holy struggle, the images and aftermath of this destruction are inscribed upon the

cultural landscape. As in the video End of Sykes Picot¸ where the narrator illustrates for the audience

how the border between Iraq and Syria historically linked to the imperialist and colonialist

endeavors of the West and the infamous Sykes-Picot agreement100, has been demolished by Daesh,

with the sign of the former border patrol checkpoint lying on the ground.101 The destruction of this

demarcation, a representation of the influence of the West in the Middle East, along with the razing

of government buildings and non-Sunni places of worship in multiple pieces of propaganda

demonstrate Daesh’s commitment to changing the very face of the cultural landscape, legitimizing

98 IS Report¸ Issue 1, Pages 4-6. 3 June 2014. 99 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 9 100 The Sykes-Picot Agreement refers to the secret agreement made by the French and British governments in 1916 to expand both nations’ spheres of influence in the Middle East. The current accepted border between Iraq and Syria, as well as other territories, was decided by this pact by France and Britain, with support from Russia. 101 Video, End of Sykes Picot. 29 June 2014.

46

these destructive acts of violence by claiming the need to wipe the memory and the influence of the

kuffar off of the land itself. The images and descriptions of the newly cleansed land further represent

Daesh as applying the “principle of totality to all aspects of this [adversarial] dichotomy.”102 There is

no middle ground in this depiction; Daesh is quite clear in the assertion that anything and anyone not

explicitly identifying with the organization represents an enemy to be destroyed.

Inscriptions of violence are common across mediums of Daesh propaganda, and are also

exemplified by the vast numbers of images displaying acts of violence disseminated across Twitter

and other means of social media. On Twitter especially, there is a constant stream of propaganda

released by Daesh media outlets, supporters, and even journalists and news sources following the

conflict. While organizations such as Anonymous and GhostSec103 work tirelessly to rid the internet

of images and videos supporting Islamic extremism on behalf of the West, there remains a constant

and steady stream of images released daily to imprint themselves further onto the cultural landscape.

Daesh uses these images, such as those under the hashtags #CubsoftheCaliphate and #IslamicState104

to portray themselves across all walks of life, from the indoctrination and participation of young

children into the ideology, to images of markets filled with fruit, to brutally graphic images of dead

bodies and rubble-strewn streets. These images are used to display the power and reach of Daesh to

the rest of the world; the organization expertly presents itself as having the power and legitimacy to

challenge such world powers as the United States, and continuously backs this portrayal with

invitations and direct messages to the U.S. and its allies, declaring the group ready and waiting for

direct confrontation with its adversaries. The images inscribed across the cultural landscape of the

internet are more far reaching than we have seen in previous conflicts, in large part because of the

advances in technology, including Twitter, which have made such massive populations reachable

with only a click of a button. By spreading so many images so widely, Daesh sends the message that

it is an inescapable threat; it is only a matter of time before they are much closer than your computer

screen.

The flood of images represents a show of power, a claim to legitimacy, and a promise of

further violence, as well as continuing the glorification of Daesh at the same time. Violence is, as

Schröder and Schmidt claim is often the case in violent imaginaries, “an integral element in [the]

102 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 10 103 GhostSec is short for Ghost Security, a subset of the Anonymous group dedicated specifically to eradicating the online presence of Islamic extremism. 104 Collected research from Twitter

47

group’s ideology of self-definition.”105 Daesh sees violence as an inherent ingredient in spreading the

rule of the Islamic Caliphate; the mujahideen fight in order to die for Allah and achieve Jannah, and

the core narratives of the group revolve around sacrificing all in the name of Islam as a holy struggle

resurfacing from the glorified memories of Muhammad. Furthermore, these violent acts are never

isolated instances; as the violent imaginary is portrayed, each and every act of violence carries an

inherent meaning with it that interacts with other methods and acts in order to portray the

perspective of Daesh as an entire holistic view.106 These narratives build upon each other, further

supported by the performances which enact them, and normalized and legitimized additionally

through the images and symbols fostered into the cultural landscape. The inscriptions employed also

serve as auxiliary motivation for Daesh supporters; images of smiling mujahideen and smoldering

bodies of kuffar and rafidah inspire would-be jihadis to carry out attacks wherever they are, as

encouraged in speeches and videos released by Daesh as well. Daesh’s propaganda works in a cyclical

fashion, portraying a narrative, enacting it, reifying it through images and symbols depicted in

performances and normalized through inscriptions, which connect to the original narratives to begin

the cycle anew. Daesh presents its propaganda in this way to spread the most holistic message

possible; it addresses every aspect of life, both within and without of Daesh territory, and works to

inspire and motivate followers just as carefully as it does to disparage and strike fear into its enemies.

Just as the flag and similar symbols of Daesh, such as the gesture of pointing upwards seen in

various images and videos of seemingly happy mujahideen and supporters107, are inscribed across

the cultural landscape, so too is violence itself, as both an idea and an action, embedded as an

inscription. Daesh does not shy away from presenting violence as an integral element of the

organization's society, culture, and ideology; on the contrary, the brutal nature of the group is

embraced and plastered across propaganda as a selling point, something to be celebrated and

revered. From close ups of casualties of war and explicit executions committed on film, to images of

dead bodies - of both enemies and supporters - broadcast across the pages of magazines and

newsletters, to the images of death combined with promises of destruction heaped over social media,

especially Twitter, it is possible to triangulate the inscription of violence as an inherent component

of the cultural landscape that Daesh portrays through propaganda108. This inscription is furthered

by the use of symbols such as fire, which is often referenced or shown in videos or written

105 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 14 106 Ibid: 3 107 See Appendix 3 108 Various collected data from Twitter.

48

propaganda as a representation of Daesh itself: a slow-burning fire consuming everything in its

path.109 The constant stream of acts and results of violence normalize the group's consistent resort

to brutality, and in doing so legitimize these acts in the eyes of the organization and its followers who

see violence not as a means to an end, but as an ingrained part of their system of living.

The cycle of the violent imaginary works to constantly reinforce itself at every level. The

narratives express the stories that Daesh seeks to portray, the performances enact these stories, and

the messages and symbols which represent them are embedded in the cultural landscape through

inscriptions. The reifying nature of the framework addresses every aspect of the conflict, from the

diagnosis of the perceived problem, to how Daesh has restructured life under Sunni Islam and Sharia

Law, to the way in which recruits are garnered and motivated to sacrifice everything for Daesh’s

cause. Thus, at every level and every aspect, the Western perspective of the new war paradigm is

challenged. Daesh portrays itself as a glorified Caliphate ordained by Allah, morally superior to all

other states, rather than accepting the brand of terrorists fighting for an extreme version of Islam

that a tiny minority of Muslims support. The group presents itself as financially stable, with a solid

infrastructure and functioning economy, generating profit through war booty, proper taxation like

any government carries out, and controlling crops such as wheat and oil; this directly contradicts

Western accusations of corruption and over taxation of the population. Furthermore, Daesh presents

its goals and motivations as not related to identity politics or any sort of ethnicity, but rather the

traditional ideological and geopolitical goals that so resemble the classic state-making wars of pre-

Cold War conflict history. While Daesh does embrace extraordinarily violent methods of carrying out

its conflict, these methods range from traditional trench warfare, to suicide bombings, to guerilla

style assaults, and more. This may be the closest association to the Western new war perspective,

but it still maintains close connections to historical precedents set by conflicts considered traditional

style warfare. Thus, as these two perspectives remain so completely at odds, I contend the necessity

of expanding the existing new war theory framework to include varying perspectives. While neither

perspective may represent the entire truth of a conflict, enlarging new war theory to embrace the

perspectives of all sides in a conflict seems an obvious step in better understanding how violence

could possibly be seen as legitimate and justified in cases such as Daesh in Syria and Iraq.

Understanding the bigger picture and how each side approaches legitimizing its actions demands a

larger role in the way in which conflict is studied; only through understanding all perspectives can

the most effective resolution be found. As stated by Schröder and Schmidt, “A holistic interpretation

109 Video, Flames of War. 19 Sept. 2014. Magazine, “Dabiq: The Return of the Khalifah”. Issue 1. June 2014.

49

of any violent event must be based on all three perspectives, at least theoretically,” those perspectives

making up the “fundamental ‘triangle of violence’, [which] includes perpetrators, victims, and

observers.”110 Therefore, as an expanded new war theory, I propose to include each side’s portrayal

of legitimacy as “empirical conflict theory”, a more complete look at the big picture of a conflict, which

may employ various perspectives and differing logics. Thus, by confronting each perspective of a

conflict as a side-by-side comparison, the most relevant truths and most effective resolutions may

hopefully be reached by those with the power to act upon them.

Concluding Remarks

Completing the violent imaginaries framework are the inscriptions placed upon the cultural

landscape by Daesh. In propagating images such as the group’s flag, flames, destroyed kuffar

landmarks and buildings, and a happy populous, Daesh reifies the portrayal presented through

narratives, performances, and inscriptions in every form of propaganda. The organization presents

an incredibly well-rounded overview of its society and structure as well as the conflict itself, drawing

on the themes of moral superiority, religious justification, and adversarial framing throughout its

propaganda in order to present a perspective that maintains a legitimate claim to violence. The

holistic images that Daesh depicts serves not only to legitimize its actions, but to counter the Western

perspective at seemingly every turn. Thusly, I propose that the new war theory shaping Western

perspective be expanded to better understand and address how legitimacy is viewed in conflicts,

taking the name “empiric conflict theory”.

110 Schröder and Schmidt 2001: 12

50

Chapter Five: Conclusion and Reflections

5.1 Conclusion

This thesis has investigated the ways in which propaganda is utilized in order to portray a specific

perspective of a conflict. In focusing on the case study of Daesh in Syria and Iraq, and how the

organization uses propaganda to legitimize its resort to violence, the purpose of this study is not to

generalize all post-Cold War non-Western conflicts, nor is it to emphasize one version of truth over

another. Instead, this thesis is meant to demonstrate the value of in-depth examinations of modern

conflicts from varying perspectives in order to better understand where ideas of legitimacy and

justification of violence emerge from, and to suggest the expansion of existing theory to consider

these perspectives.

In first examining new war theory, which forms the basis of current Western perspective

regarding modern non-Western conflicts, the thesis demonstrates how the debate surrounding the

theory shaped the analytic framework employed to study contemporary conflicts. It also points out

the weaknesses in new war theory’s frame, such as employing a Western bias to delegitimize non-

Western actors and reliance on the idea of moral superiority as justification for many Western

actions. In acknowledging these gaps in new war theory, the thesis sets the stage for examining the

case of Daesh through a different analytic framework, namely that of violent imaginaries, in order to

exhibit the need to expand the interpretations of conflict presented from a new war theory

perspective. Though they use many of the same tools, such as a reliance on naming and the

construction and portrayal of various narratives, new war theory and violent imaginaries present

entirely different perspectives of the same conflict. The differences in these interpretations create a

stark contrast when compared, and show the need for the consideration of multiple perspectives in

the analysis of contemporary conflicts.

The thesis then carries on to show how Daesh legitimizes the resort to violence through its

own portrayal of the conflict in Iraq and Syria, made evident in the vast quantities of propaganda

which the organization has released. The first step in Daesh’s legitimization is the portrayal of

certain narratives embedded into the propaganda. Daesh tells the story of a glorified holy war,

ordained by Allah. Through reclaiming the centuries old conflict of Muhammad himself, the narrative

of a religiously justified campaign and a glorified history lend legitimacy to the group’s resort to

violence as a continuation of an historical struggle. This connection to the historical aspect also

provides a moral superiority to Daesh’s perspective, framing the mujahideen as heroes and martyrs

51

willing to sacrifice themselves for the ultimate cause. This theme of moral justification is combined

with adversarial framing in presenting the West and its allies as kuffar, enemies of true Islam that

must be destroyed in order to complete the ordained task of establishing the Islamic Caliphate. In

addition, Daesh employs an almost constant call to arms as an inherent facet of its narratives, placing

utmost importance on the idea that answering the call of hijra, whether through traveling to Daesh

territory or working to further the cause from elsewhere, is an obligatory aspect of calling oneself a

true supporter of Islam and al Khalifah. This thesis shows how these themes of moral superiority,

religious justification, adversarial framing, and motivation are interwoven to portray narratives

within Daesh’s propaganda that serve to bolster the legitimacy of the group and its actions.

The second element of the violent imaginaries framework this thesis uses to analyze Daesh’s

propaganda is that of performances. Daesh regularly employs performances as a major component

in its propaganda, showing supporters enacting the strategies and tactics espoused by the group. The

thesis demonstrates how these performances are used in conjunction with the presented narratives

to maintain the perspective Daesh seeks to portray. The performances aid in reaffirming and

reinforcing the themes set forth in the narratives through normalizing Daesh’s actions and turning

the group’s ideas into tangible examples for others to follow. This in turn serves to reify the

legitimization of the violence used in the conflict as part of a greater overall vision portrayed by the

organization.

The third layer of the violent imaginaries framework examined is the concept of inscriptions.

By embedding visual displays of antagonism into the cultural landscape through propaganda, Daesh

continues to bolster the legitimization of violent acts through entrenching violence as an inherent

element of both the conflict and the surrounding culture. The inscriptions function to continue the

reification of violence as a normal and expected component of Daesh’s tactics through the enduring

references to the themes of moral superiority, religious justification, adversarial framing, and

motivation found throughout the propaganda released by the group. By continuously reiterating

these themes and patterns in ideas as well as actions, Daesh’s consistent resort to violence is

portrayed as legitimate and justified.

This thesis aims not only to examine the ways in which violence is legitimized by Daesh, but

also the ways in which this legitimization challenges the Western perspective of the conflict. The

thesis shows how Daesh’s portrayal directly contradicts the Western new war perception in a variety

of ways. The findings of this study demonstrate the stark contrast between the perspectives of the

West and Daesh, and signify the need to consider multiple perspectives when examining a conflict.

52

While the West paints Daesh as a terrorist organization imposing its way of life on a helpless

population through criminal means, violating human rights and enacting barbaric acts of unjustified

violence in the process, Daesh portrays an image of holy warriors carrying out work ordained by

Allah and liberating oppressed Sunni Muslims through legitimate acts of violence against the kuffar.

This thesis displays these contrasts and suggests the expansion of existing theory to include the

perspectives of all three sides of the “fundamental ‘triangle of violence’, [including] perpetrators,

victims, and observers” rather than focusing solely on one side of the story. In order to expand the

established new war theory, this thesis suggests the inclusion of such varying perspectives under a

new branch, called “empiric conflict theory”.

5.2 Reflections

In examining the case study of Daesh, this study makes several underlying assumptions in order to

present a careful consideration of perception and legitimacy. One such assumption is that new war

theory is the dominant theory informing Western policy and perspective regarding contemporary

conflicts occurring in non-Western settings. In doing so, this thesis can only discuss the contrasts in

perspective based on the ideal version of new war theory as it is compared to the implemented

framework of violent imaginaries. In addition, it is impossible for this study to assert that any one

perspective holds a stronger claim to the truth, as the data collected is based upon the idealized

portrayal of the conflict by the perpetrators of the seemingly legitimated violence, and the counter

frame of new war theory is the idealized version of what the West considers modern third world

conflicts to look like. Therefore, the data presented can appear deceiving if it is not made clear that

the focus is on perceived truths and methods of portraying legitimacy rather than actual documented

factual events substantiated through fieldwork or other validated and objective data.

This thesis does not aspire to present an entirely comprehensive overview of the ongoing

conflict in Iraq and Syria; that would be much too exhaustive for the limitations of this paper. Instead,

this study seeks to address one aspect of the conflict, namely how the non-state actor Daesh, as the

perpetrators of massive amounts of violence against states, other non-state actors, and civilian

populations legitimizes this violence through an extensive propaganda campaign. In examining how

perception influences legitimacy and challenges differing perspectives, the thesis strives to identify

gaps and weaknesses in existing frameworks and contribute to closing these gaps and expanding

academic knowledge through inclusion of varying perspectives and portrayals of conflicts.

However, while this study seeks to examine how varying perspectives can present and

maintain a sense of legitimacy for those involved in a conflict, there are many avenues down which

53

this research can be extended for future studies. Examining how perceived legitimacy informs policy,

such as how the perceived moral justification evident in new war theory may support the West in

interventionist policies, is one opportunity for furthering this research. The links between

perception and enacted policies present a multitude of possibilities for investigating different aspects

of contemporary conflicts, both Western and non-Western. In addition, if the opportunity should

arise to allow for fieldwork to be conducted within Daesh-controlled territory or in surrounding

areas, further research could be conducted on the success of Daesh’s propaganda campaign on local

populations, as well as how Daesh is perceived by local communities as compared to other non-state

actors, such as various Kurdish groups or Shia militia groups. While there are obvious limitations in

this study, these limitations should be seen as opportunities and possibilities for continuing to

explore this conflict as a case study as well as others, and should be presented not as hindrances, but

as prospects for further research.

54

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http://jihadology.net/2014/07/19/al-%E1%B8%A5ayat-media-center-presents-a-new-

video-message-from-the-islamic-state-mujatweets-episode-6/

Mujatweets, Episode 7. Video, 1:20, posted by Jihadology. 21 July 2014.

http://jihadology.net/2014/07/21/al-%E1%B8%A5ayat-media-center-presents-a-new-

video-message-from-the-islamic-state-mujatweets-episode-7/

Mujatweets, Episode 8. Video, 1:28, posted by Jihadology. 25 July 2014.

http://jihadology.net/2014/07/25/al-%E1%B8%A5ayat-media-center-presents-a-new-

video-message-from-the-islamic-state-mujatweets-episode-8/

New ISIS Video Showing Battle and Execution Footage. Video, 36:07, posted on LiveLeak. 29 June

2014. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=a7f_1406610219

New Video: Islamic State Extreme Combat Footage of Salahuddin City. Video, 13:28, posted to

LiveLeak. 5 April 2015. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=75c_1428261601

Stories from the Land of the Living: Abu Khalid al-Kambudi. Video, 12:35, posted by Jihadology. 21

April 2015. http://jihadology.net/2015/04/21/al-%E1%B8%A5ayat-media-center-

presents-a-new-video-message-from-the-islamic-state-stories-from-the-land-of-the-living-

abu-khalid-al-kambudi/

Win 3dtom 3dna (Alternate translation: As Promised, We Return). Video, 7:30, posted to Jihadology

(redacted, downloaded). 23 June 2015. http://jihadology.net/2015/06/23/new-video-

message-from-the-islamic-state-but-if-you-return-to-sin-we-will-return-to-punishment-

wilayat-ninawa/

57

SPEECHES

Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi. A Message to the Mujahideen and the Ummah in the Month of Ramadan.

Speech, English translation transcript. “Islamic State Leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

Encourages Emigration, Worldwide Action”. Site Intelligence Group Jihadist Threat. 1 July

2014. https://news.siteintelgroup.com/Jihadist-News/islamic-state-leader-abu-bakr-al-

baghdadi-encourages-emigration-worldwide-action.html

Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi. Even if the Disbelievers Despise Such. Speech, Arabic Audio, Arabic

transcript, English translation transcript. Blog. “Audio Message by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi –

Even if the Disbelievers Despise Such”. 13 Nov. 2014.

https://pietervanostaeyen.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/audio-message-by-abu-bakr-al-

baghdadi-even-if-the-disbelievers-despise-such/

Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi. March Forth Whether Light or Heavy. Speech, English translation transcript.

“In New Audio Speech, Islamic State (ISIS) Leader Al-Baghdadi Issues Call To Arms To All

Muslims”. Posted on Memri. 14 May 2015. http://www.memrijttm.org/in-new-audio-

speech-islamic-state-isis-leader-al-baghdadi-issues-call-to-arms-to-all-muslims.html

PUBLISHED AND UNPUBLSHED SOURCES

Cassman, Daniel. 2015. 'Profiles | Mapping Militant Organizations'. Web.Stanford.Edu. Accessed 14

May 2015. http://web.stanford.edu/group/mappingmilitants/cgi-bin/groups.

“Dabiq: The Return of the Khalifah”. Issue 1. Magazine. June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/islamic-state-22dc481biq-magazine-122.pdf

“Dabiq: The Flood”. Issue 2. Magazine. June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-

magazine2e280b3.pdf

“Dabiq: A Call to HIjra.” Issue 3. Magazine. July 2014. (English link redacted, Spanish provided.)

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/the-islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-magazine-

322.pdf

“Dabiq: The Failed Crusade”. Issue 4. Magazine. Sept. 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/the-islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-magazine-

422.pdf

58

“Dabiq: Remaining and Expanding”. Issue 5. Magazine. Oct. 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/the-islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-magazine-

522.pdf

“Dabiq: Al Qa’idah of Waziristan: A Testimony From Within”. Issue 6. Magazine. Dec. 2014.

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622.pdf

“Dabiq: From Hypocrisy to Apostasy: The Extinction of the Grey Zone”. Issue 7. Magazine. Jan. 2015.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/the-islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-magazine-

722.pdf

“Dabiq: Shari’ah Alone Will Rule Africa”. Issue 8. Magazine. March 2015.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/the-islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-magazine-

8e280b3.pdf

“Dabiq: They Plot and Allah Plots”. Issue 9. Magazine. May 2015.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/the-islamic-state-e2809cdc481biq-magazine-

8e280b3.pdf

“Dabiq: The Law of Allah and the Laws of Men”. Issue 10. Magazine. June 2015.

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1022.pdf

Gutenberg, Project. 2015. ' Islamic State Of Iraq | Project Gutenberg Self-Publishing - Ebooks | Read

Ebooks Online '. Self.Gutenberg.Org. Accessed 12 May 2015.

http://self.gutenberg.org/articles/islamic_state_of_iraq

“Islamic State News”. Issue 1. Newsletter. 1 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

22islamic-state-news-122.pdf

“Islamic State News”. Issue 2. Newsletter. 1 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

e2809cislamic-state-news-222.pdf

“Islamic State News”. Issue 3. Newsletter. 7 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

e2809cislamic-state-news-322.pdf

59

“Islamic State Report: An Insight into the Islamic State”. Issue 1. Newsletter. 3 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

22islamic-state-report-122.pdf

“Islamic State Report: An Insight into the Islamic State”. Issue 2. Newsletter. 5 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

e2809cislamic-state-report-2e280b3.pdf

“Islamic State Report: An Insight into the Islamic State”. Issue 3. Newsletter. 13 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

e2809cislamic-state-report-3e280b3.pdf

“Islamic State Report: An Insight into the Islamic State”. Issue 4. Newsletter. 21 June 2014.

https://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-shc481m-

e2809cislamic-state-report-422.pdf

SOCIAL MEDIA

Abdurezak (@abdurrezak95). Twitter. (Account now disabled).

Assadulislam (@Assadulislam). Twitter. (Account now disabled).

Conflict News (@Conflict_News). Twitter. https://twitter.com/rConflictNews/media

Dabiq Witness (@DabiqMartyr). Twitter. (Account now disabled).

Ibn Hussain (@ibnhussain_3). Twitter. https://twitter.com/ibnhussain_3

Islamic State Dawah (@dawah_state). Twitter. (Account now disabled).

Islamic World News (@Amin_Akh). Twitter. https://twitter.com/Amin_Akh

Khattab Turkmani (@Safyudawla121). Twitter. https://twitter.com/Sayfudawla121

Terrormonitor.org (@Terror_Monitor). Twitter. https://twitter.com/Terror_Monitor

.Twitter. (Account now disabled) .(Millatu_abaakum@) أبو ابراهيم

60

Secondary Sources

NEWS ARTICLES

The Atlantic. 2014. 'How ISIS Games Twitter'.

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media-strategy/372856/.

Bbc.co.uk. 2015. 'How Islamic State Extremists Use Social Media To Recruit'.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/31574846/how-islamic-state-extremists-use-

social-media-to-recruit.

CNN. 2015. 'Transcript: President Obama's Speech On Combating ISIS - Cnnpolitics.Com'. Accessed

July 31 2015. http://edition.cnn.com/2014/09/10/politics/transcript-obama-syria-isis-

speech/.

International Business Times UK. 2015. 'Isis Twitter War Shows Tech Giants Have Crucial Role In

Fight Against Terrorism'. http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/isis-twitter-war-shows-tech-giants-

have-crucial-role-fight-against-terrorism-1488557.

Masi, Alessandria. 2014. 'ISIS Recruiting Westerners: How The 'Islamic State' Goes After Non-

Muslims And Recent Converts In The West'. International Business Times.

http://www.ibtimes.com/isis- recruiting-westerners-how-islamic-state-goes-after-non-

muslims-recent-converts-west-1680076.

MSNBC. 2015. 'Grassroots Following Helps ISIS' Online 'Oomph''.

http://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/grassroots-following-helps-isis-online-

oomph-405379139958.

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Bhatia, Michael V. “Fighting Words: Naming Terrorists, Bandits, Rebels, and Other Violent Actors”.

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Accessed April 14, 2015.

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Cockburn, Patrick. The Rise of Islamic State: ISIS and the New Sunni Revolution. Updated ed..

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Western Neo-interventionism." Development and Change 38, no. 6 (2007): 1055-071.

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63

Appendices and Tables

111Appendix 1

111 Terror Monitor. Tweet. 18 July 2015, 3:38. Caption: “Beheading in some places, building roads in others. #ISIS's propaganda strategies aren't same in all the provinces.”

64

112Appendix 2

112 Conflict News. Tweet. 11 June 2015, 6:29. Caption: “#ISIS releases propaganda picture of Statue of Liberty holding its flag along with #NY city on fire - @Terror_Monitor”

65

Appendix 3

113

114

113 “IS Report”. Issue 1, Page 8. 3 June 2014. 114 Mujatweets, Episode 8, 0:15. 25 July 2014.

66

115

115 “Dabiq: The Return of the Khalifah”. Issue 1, Page 7. June 2014.

67

Table 2.1: Video Evidence

Pieces of data included in the cross-section are in bold.

Date Released Title Code 17 May 2014 He Named You Muslims

(Alternate translations: The Muslims He Hears You; Muslims He Named You)

P, p, m

17 May 2014 The Clanging of the Swords IV N, P, d, p, m 19 May 2014 Foreign ISIS Fighter in Iraq: We Will

Conquer Jerusalem, Rome, and Spain N, m

31 May 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 1 P, I, m 4 June 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 2 P, I, m 11 June 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 3 P, I, m 29 June 2014 The End of Sykes Picot N, P, I, d, m 29 June 2014 New ISIS Video Showing Battle &

Execution Footage P, p, m

9 July 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 4 P, I, m 12 July 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 5 P, I, m 12 July 2014 Al-Ghuraba: The Chosen Few of

Different Lands: Abu Muslim from Canada

N, P, d, p , m

19 July 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 6 P, I, m 21 July 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 7 P, I, m 25 July 2014 Mujatweets, Episode 8 P, I, m 18 Sept. 2014 Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 1 N, d 19 Sept. 2014 Flames of War: The Fighting Has Just

Begun N, P, I, d, p, m

30 Sept. 2014 Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 2 N, d, m 4 Oct. 2014 Islamic State of Iraq Combat Operations P, p, m 12 Oct. 2014 Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 3 N, d, m 16 Oct. 2014 Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 4 N, d 28 Oct. 2014 Inside ‘Ayn al Islam (Kobani) N, P, I, m 12 Nov. 2014 Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 5 N, d, m 24 Nov. 2014 Lend Me Your Ears, Episode 6 N, d 3 Jan. 2015 Inside Mosul N, P, I, m 3 Feb. 2015 Healing the Believer’s Chests P, d, p, m 9 Feb. 2015 Inside Aleppo N, P, I, m 5 April 2015 New Video: Islamic State Extreme

Combat Footage of Salahuddin City P, d, p, m

21 April 2015 Stories From the Land of the Living: Abu Khalid al-Kambudi

N, I, d, p, m

18 May 2015 Extend Your Hand to Pledge Allegiance m 23 June 2015 Win 3dtom 3dna (Translation: As

Promised, We Return) P

68

Table 2.2: Speeches

Date Released Title Code 1 July 2014 A Message to the Mujahideen

and the Ummah in the Month of Ramadan

N, P, d, m

13 Nov. 2014 Even if the Disbelievers Despise Such

N, P, d, m

14 May 2015 March Forth Whether Light or Heavy

N, P, d, m

Table 2.3: Written Evidence

Date Released Title Code 31 May 2014 ISN: Islamic State News, Issue 1 N, I, m 1 June 2014 ISN: Islamic State News, Issue

2 N, I, p, m

3 June 2014 IS Report, Issue 1 N, I, m 5 June 2014 IS Report, Issue 2 N, d 7 June 2014 ISN: Islamic State News, Issue 3 N, I, p, m 13 June 2014 IS Report, Issue 3 N, d, m 21 June 2014 IS Report, Issue 4 N, I, m June 2014 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 1: The

Return of the Khalifah N, P, d, p, m

June 2014 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 2: The Flood

N, I, d, m

July 2014 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 3: A Call to Hijra

N, P, I, d, p, m

Sept. 2014 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 4: The Failed Crusade

N, d, p, m

Oct. 2014 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 5: Remaining and Expanding

N, I, p, m

Dec. 2014 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 6: Al Qa’idah of Waziristan: A Testimony From Within

N, P, d, p, m

Jan. 2015 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 7: From Hypocrisy to Apostasy: The Extinction of the Grey Zone

N, p, m

March 2015 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 8: Shari’ah Alone Will Rule Africa

N, I, p, m

May 2015 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 9: They Plot and Allah Plots

N, p, m

June 2015 Dabiq Magazine, Issue 10: The Law of Allah and the Laws of Men

N, I, p, m

69

Table 2.4: Social Media Accounts

Social Media Account Name Code Twitter Terrormonitor.org

(@Terror_Monitor) P, I, m

Twitter Islamic World News (@Amin_Akh)

N, P, m

Twitter Khattab Turkmani (@Sayfudawla121)

P, m

Twitter أبو ابراهيم (@Millatu_abaakum)

P, m

Twitter Ibn_hussain (@ibnhussain_3)

P, I, m

Twitter Dabiq Witness (@DabiqMartyr)

P, m

Twitter abdurezak95 (@abdurrezak95)

P, I, m

Twitter Islamic State Dawah (@dawah_state)

P, I, m

Twitter Assadulislam (@Assadulislam)

P, m

Twitter Conflict News (@Conflict_News)

P, I, d, p, m