This Rand study from 2002 is available as PDF downloads. Of particular interest are:
Chapter 1: "The Advent of Netwar"
Chapter 2: "The Networking of Terror in the Information Age"
Chapter 8: "Activism, Hacktivism, and Cyberterrorism: the Internet as a Tool for Influencing Foreign Policy"
Chapter 10: "What's Next for Networks and Netwars?"
Quite a substantial list at the site, including soldier blogs. Navigate from the links on the right.
[Iraq Blog Count]
Al Battar is the leading publication extending the training mission of Al Qaeda online.
"The global terrorist network al-Qaida has published a new Internet magazine providing Muslim youth the opportunity to be trained as holy warriors in the comfort of their own homes. The first issue of the publication, called Al-Battar Training Camp, concludes with an emphasis on the virtual program's convenience. 'Oh Mujahid [holy warrior] brother, in order to join the great training camps you don't have to travel to other lands,' the magazine states. 'Alone, in your home or with a group of your brothers, you too can begin to execute the training program. You can all join the Al-Battar Training Camp.'"
[WorldNetDaily]
The Northeast Intelligence Network has published a translation and analysis of Issue 8, "Al Qaeda Maps Plans for Assassinations from Camp al Battar," published via Internet on April 14, 2004. "Al Batar takes its name from the 'Sword of the Prophets.' The original Al Battar is an ancient relic [a sword] that is said to have originally belonged to Kind David of Biblical fame, and was used to cut off the head of Goliath, and was later taken as booty in battle by the Prophet Mohamed. Islamic traditions claim that this sword will be used by Jesus when he returns to earth to defeat Dajjal, the Islamic Anti-Christ."
This issue includes operational guides for automatic weapons, physical fitness programs, guides to assasination, propaganda techniques and other guides for terrorists. It is a representative example of the way insurgents are using to internet to spread their ideas.
[Al Battar Issue 7—Executive Summary of the document]
[Al Battar Issue 7—Translation]
[On the historical al-Battar]
[Middle East Media Research Institute]
[SITE Institute]
Mamoun Fandy is a columnist for two daily newspapers, Asharq al-Awsat in London and al-Ahram in Cairo. He is a senior fellow at the United States Institute of Peace. This commentary discusses trends in reporting by Arab media.
"As I scanned Arab satellite channels and Arabic newspapers, I found a lot of reporting on the brutal attacks, but very little condemnation and a widespread willingness to run the stomach-turning video and photos again and again. [...] I have watched perhaps a dozen Arab channels and read countless newspapers in recent weeks. I found that few Arab commentators and journalists noted either that major shift or its significance. [...] I am aware of only a handful of columnists, most notably the Kuwaiti journalist Ahmed al-Rubai, who condemned the killings unequivocally. Some reporters and analysts intimated to me that they were afraid to denounce the beheadings; others provided distorted coverage that blurred the line between terrorism and Iraqi resistance to the U.S. occupation. [...] Al-Jazeera is the same network that calls every Arab suicide bomber a shaheed, or martyr. And yet its anchors take care to refer to Abdul Aziz al-Maqrin, who claimed to have beheaded Johnson, as the 'man who Saudi Arabia and Washington call a terrorist.' [...] I went directly to Abdul Rahman Rashed, the head of al-Arabiya, and asked him why most Arab commentators remain silent about these horrific acts of violence and why his channel and al-Jazeera give so much airtime to the terrorists. Rashed blames both contemporary Arab culture and the culture of Arab newsrooms. [...] I also talked with fellow Arab writers and journalists to seek further answers, and it became obvious that many were outraged over how the beheading stories had been handled and why so many Arab journalists are afraid to express their anger publicly or put it in writing. [...] Islamic radicals have killed writers in Algeria, Egypt and elsewhere whose work challenged the logic of martyrdom and 'random jihad,' or killing foreigners in the name of Islam. But the lack of condemnation of the beheadings, despite their barbarism, is a direct result of a broad and dangerous trend in Arab media and in Arab culture broadly. The Arab world today swims in a sea of linguistic violence that justifies terrorism and makes it acceptable, especially to the young. [...] In each country, I was struck that al Qaeda and its ideas are no longer perceived as extreme. Indeed, al Qaeda has become mainstream and being part of the movement is 'cool' in the eyes of young people. Why? Arab culture is being corrupted by the media that glorify violence, but also by schoolbooks that present only one role model for Arab children: the Jihadists and those who excelled at battling non-Muslims. [...] This trend must be reversed -- and the responsibility for doing so lies not just with the media. Unless Arabs themselves muster the courage to speak out against these heinous acts and those who perpetrate them, very little success can be made in the war on terrorism. [...] The American media should also stop replaying images of violence from al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya, because when the Arab media air these gruesome images, they animate the logic of terror. They export fear to America. If the Americans did not import these pictures, the Arab media would stop manufacturing them. That could be a first step toward defeating the terrorists who kill not just for Allah and jihad, but for airtime."
[Washington Post]
[Reprinted by Houston Chronicle]
"During some of the most turbulent weeks of the Iraq war nearly one quarter of Internet users (24%) went online to view some of most graphic war images that were deemed too gruesome or horrific for newspapers and television to display. Further, of those who have seen the images, 28% actively sought them out. Overall, however, Americans are conflicted about the idea of these disturbing images being available online. By a 49%-40% margin, Americans disapprove of the posting of such images. A strong cultural divide emerges between Internet users and non-users: Internet users approve of the images being online by a small margin of 47% - 44%, while non-users disapprove by an overwhelming 58% - 29% margin. These are some of the results of a nationwide phone survey done between May 14 and June 17 - a period just following massive world coverage of the murder and dismemberment of American contract workers in Iraq's strife-torn town Fallujah, pictures taken at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, and the capture and beheading of U.S. civilian Nicholas Berg. The horrific nature of many of the war-related images that have appeared online have left Internet users with a range of feelings. The data show that millions of Internet users want to be able to view the graphic war images and they see the Internet as an alternative source of news and information from traditional media. But many who do venture outside the traditional and familiar standards of the mainstream news organizations to look at the images online end up feeling very uncomfortable. Women are particularly opposed to the display of the images and are much less likely than men to have viewed the images online."
[Pew Internet & American Life Project]
[Report in PDF format]
"Dirty Kauffar" is a rap video—here in English—apparently used by al-Qaida to recruit terrorists. This movie carries the CNN logo, suggesting that it originally ran there as part of a news story. [MSNBC— Link to video on the right of this article.]
As the South Korean government seeks to halt the spread of Kim Sun-Il's beheading video by blocking major blog portals, this backgrounder offers valuable perspective the history of South Korea's distribution of images and video from Iraq:
"The government and media of South Korea have reacted swiftly to a newly perceived "threat" to the country. No, not new revelations concerning North Korea's nuclear weapons program, but the video of Kim Sun-il's beheading. Since its release, the government has arrested at least 12 people for "illegally" downloading the gruesome video. [...] The video of Americans Nick Berg and Paul Johnson being executed are not only widely available in South Korea, but the Berg video, in its gory entirety, was shown on the Seoul-based MBC network during its prime time news cast. [...] As far as support for the troop dispatch is concerned, the death of Kim Sun-il has so far had almost zero effect on public sentiment."
[Asia Times]
"When militants used to want to make a point, they would send faxes or videotapes to international news agencies. But now, al Qaida is putting its graphic messages and images straight up on the web—with maximum effect. Technology has become their latest weapon in their Holy War [...] According to Paul Eedle, media expert, “Al Qaida is as much media machine as military organization. These messages are what they want the world to see.” [...] militants are cleverly staying one step ahead of the law, even able to hijack websites, like one belonging to a Silicon Valley survey and mapping company to briefly upload its images of the captured Johnson. [...] But some analysts say al Qaida’s use of digital technology to spread their bloody message can backfire. Intelligence sources think that al Qaida’s former top operative in Saudi Arabia—Abdel Azziz al-Muqrin was found and killed last week, because of leads picked up by police experts on websites al-Muqrin used to show Johnson’s execution."
[MSNBC]
"Terrorism has often been conceptualized as a form of psychological warfare, and certainly terrorists have sought to wage such a campaign through the Internet. There are several ways for terrorists to do so. For instance, they can use the Internet to spread disinformation, to deliver threats intended to distill fear and helplessness, and to disseminate horrific images of recent actions, such as the brutal murder of the American journalist Daniel Pearl by his captors, a videotape of which was replayed on several terrorist websites. Terrorists can also launch psychological attacks through cyberterrorism, or, more accurately, through creating the fear of cyberterrorism. "Cyberfear" is generated when concern about what a computer attack could do (for example, bringing down airliners by disabling air traffic control systems, or disrupting national economies by wrecking the computerized systems that regulate stock markets) is amplified until the public believes that an attack will happen. The Internet—an uncensored medium that carries stories, pictures, threats, or messages regardless of their validity or potential impact—is peculiarly well suited to allowing even a small group to amplify its message and exaggerate its importance and the threat it poses. Al Qaeda combines multimedia propaganda and advanced communication technologies to create a very sophisticated form of psychological warfare. Osama bin Laden and his followers concentrate their propaganda efforts on the Internet, where visitors to al Qaeda's numerous websites and to the sites of sympathetic, aboveground organizations can access prerecorded videotapes and audiotapes, CD-ROMs, DVDs, photographs, and announcements. [...] The Internet has significantly expanded the opportunities for terrorists to secure publicity. Until the advent of the Internet, terrorists' hopes of winning publicity for their causes and activities depended on attracting the attention of television, radio, or the print media. These traditional media have "selection thresholds" (multistage processes of editorial selection) that terrorists often cannot reach. No such thresholds, of course, exist on the terrorists' own websites. The fact that many terrorists now have direct control over the content of their message offers further opportunities to shape how they are perceived by different target audiences and to manipulate their own image and the image of their enemies."
[Gabriel Weinman: "www.terror.net: How modern Terrorism Uses the Internet"]
[See also: "Examining the Cyber Capabilities of Islamic Terrorist Groups" from the Technical Analysis Group at the Institute for Security Technology Studies at Dartmouth College]
"When you install cameras in telephones, for instance, photography shifts from a producer of flat illustrative artifact into a means of communication. The ease of distribution becomes a force in itself, pushing networks to handle more bandwidth. And the sudden addition of hundreds of millions of instant eyes to the global network provides its own challenges (thus the devices are banned in locker rooms and at the U.S. Supreme Court). All over the planet, wireless is making waves, from the text-message-mad teenagers outside Tokyo's Shibuya station to a Wi-Fi-equipped McDonald's in New York City to Everest climbers calling home from the summit. With dizzying rapidity, wireless innovations move from the cutting edge to the routine."
[Newsweek]
"The government and Internet portal sites said yesterday they would take stern measures against the possible spread on the Internet of the video showing the beheading of the Korean hostage. [...] Yahoo Korea: "Considering Korean people's condolences toward the deceased, we are going to delete any pictures or video footage that show the killing of the Korean hostage...As the beheading of the hostage was not aired, it is less likely that the footage would proliferate on the Internet as it did in the Nicholas Berg case." [...] With its emergency monitoring system running for 24 hours, the Ministry of Information and Communication said it would advise Web sites to get rid of the clips as soon as they discovered them. "The Web sites that fail to follow through the instructions will be subject to shut-down or police investigation," an official at the ministry said."
[Asia Media]
"Police assume either the Iraqi armed group distributed the tapes to the site or the site purchased them from other Muslim sites, considering the site put out an ad seeking videotapes of Kim Sun-il’s beheading since June 22. The videotapes contain a scene showing a masked man beheading Kim after declaring “Allah is great.” Netizens who saw the tapes showed strong emotional responses, saying, “It was too cruel and I couldn’t help myself from bursting out into tears. [...] Many netizens are holding a campaign not to watch the videotape at all. Opinions such as: “Please, let’s not watch the videotape even though it may be just us Koreans who don’t watch it. It is the same as allowing Kim Sun-il to be killed twice. Imagine how painful it would be if his family and friends watch it. Let’s not watch it and delete it even when it is in your hand,” have been posted on most Korean internet portal sites. Kim Ho-ki, Professor of Sociology at Yonsei University, pleaded with the government, citizens’ groups, and netizens to control unnecessary expressions of emotion and impulsive behavior, saying, “I am concerned that the videotape may provoke sentiment against Iraq and intensify the dispute on the army dispatch.”"
[Donga]
[Ogrish.com]
"The message from news consumers to the traditional news outlets, from the daily papers to the cable news channels and the Big Three networks, is becoming increasingly clear: "If you don't deliver what we want, we'll find it elsewhere. Ignore us at your own risk." This isn't a new message, but it's one that poses a growing risk that consumers will go elsewhere -- and not return. [...] The point isn't so much what is proper but what is available. Despite the awareness the mainstream press has of the Internet, talk radio and even e-mail, traditional media outlets have yet to grasp a simple fact of today's information landscape: They are no longer the prime gatekeepers of news. No longer can we say that if it's not in the New York Times or on "CBS Evening News," a story does not matter. When information is out there now, it's out there. Not only is it easier to find, it also can be spread instantly with a click of the mouse or a read on a radio show. To ignore what millions have heard is arrogant at best, harmful at worst. [...] Instead of acting as gatekeepers, the traditional press should become the ratifiers of news. Take on those rumors and prove them to be without merit. Show those pictures and give the consumer the kind of context that isn't so prevalent on the Internet. Get out in front and lead the way on some of these stories -- and before long, the buzz will be that what's energizing the Internet is old news. [...] Journalists who choose not to cover a story simply because "those who wish to view such things can find them on the Internet" are risking their own demise. Once "such things" are found, the people who sought them may never come back."
[National Journal]
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