eQaeda before Congress

The "eQaeda" meme appeared before the United States Congress this week, and also moved into new territory.  A presentation by MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute, before the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia described jihadis using the internet for organizational and training purposes, for "electronic jihad", and for propaganda.  But the point of the presentation was that MEMRI sees much of this web content as hosted in the West, especially the United States, hence the talk's title: "The Enemy Within."

Some of the Arab countries in which Islamic extremists are most active employ highly restrictive supervision measures against individuals and groups involved in online terrorist activity. As a result, Islamist organizations and their supporters prefer to use Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in the West - and especially in the U.S., which is a key provider of Internet services - and thus exploit Western freedom of speech to spread their message.

In many cases, Western countries even host websites of organizations that have been officially designated by these very countries as illegal terrorist organizations.

MEMRI recommends that ISPs be informed of their content, since many are probably unaware of the details.  The group also suggests legal action against ISPs, and the formation of a database for information sharing.  They also offers a reporting service, promising to share information about an ISP's hosted content with anyone who inquires ("If you want to know the content of an Arabic-language website hosted by your company, please fill out the following form...").

In response to this report, some bloggers suggest boycotting, informing, or otherwise pressuring such ISPs.  Others recommend not moving against such sites, because they will simply move elsewhere (and perhaps become more difficult to find), and so that jihadi activities there can be better monitored.

A MEMRI video presentation hosted on YouTube and presumably shown to Congress offers a compilation of jihadi media content copied from such websites.  This consists largely of video clips of speeches and demonstrations, along with some animations and screen captures.

In terms of the fearsome internet theme, some notes.  First, scanning the blogosphere for notes on the MEMRI report (via Memeorandum, Technorati, IceRocket) indicates that only conservative bloggers have noted this.  Liberal or leftist sites aren't interested.  The current polarization of American political culture maps onto eQaeda pretty clearly, so far.

Second, this discourse reframes eQaeda in terms of national identity, which hasn't previously been the case  Whereas some discourses about Islamicist terrorism have spoken in terms of ideology, the West, or modernity, MEMRI's report triggers a strong sense of nation.  For example, one blogger is quite clear about seeing such ISP hosting practices raises the possible that such hosting could be considered as treason (only to see that interpretation vitiated by a lack of intentionality).  The notion of eQaeda as "the enemy within" is based on a sense of one's nation being subverted (as opposed to ideological conflict, or religious comparisons, which are transnational, and hard to, well, get within).

Third, building on the second, this might return to the American theme of popular justice and vigilantism.  The calls for responding to these ISPs often summon individual or group action beyond law enforcement - MEMRI will reply to your own individual query, for instance.  The question of boycott or not inform is a social one, not a national security apparatus one.  Will anti-eQaeda popular action appear in pop culture?  Will current groups engage with this, such as the Guardian Angels or the Minutemen?

   The obverse of this is smartmobbing, or the Army of Davids idea, where new forms of collective action enabled by mobile networked technology complement law enforcement.  Blogospheric conversations about the MEMRI report could be, in retrospect, the beginning of such action.

Previous Infocult posts on eQaeda have touched on online gaming, modding, municipal WiFi, online learning, online training camps, the Orkut social networking platform, radicalized Canadian youth, blog hosting services, al-Zarqawi's tactics, Google Video and data security, and a "virtual caliphate."  People have been imprisoned for this.

(via Memeorandum)

Comments

[Randy McCall]

Very interesting, thanks Bryan. This is being passed on to the members of our various networks.

[MichaelW]

For example, one blogger is quite clear about seeing such ISP hosting practices as treason.

Are you stupid? Let me just take a guess at your reading-for-comprehension scores in grade school etc. They didn't reach the "average" range. If I'm wrong, then how is it possible that you missed this (well, really the entire post):

(1) They are not committing treason. As I laid out above, it is easy to assume that the ISP’s are doing so, but only if you look at it superficially. It’s highly unlikely that the ISP’s are even aware that these are jihadi websites, so the way you enlist their help is by raising their awareness. If you want the ISP’s to stop hosting the jihadis, then what you don’t do is accuse of them of treason. The ISP’s will be much more co-operative if you don’t.

Seriously. That's the worst reading of a blog post that I've seen in some time. I guess, in a way, you should feel proud. At least you accomplished something.

[Arash]

Very Interesting indeed ....

[Bryan Alexander]

Thanks, Arash and Randy.

MichaelW:
First, my apologies for misreading. I found your post in a flurry of others, read it in haste (focusing on the first bit), and linked too quickly. I've corrected the text in my blog post; please refresh the browser to check.

Second, in return, perhaps you can respond to the rest of my post? The very next paragraph after I link to you mentions nongovernmental responses to the MEMRI report. Your post ends with a reflection on US federal actions, and you return to that theme in the post's second comment. I would be interested, quite seriously, in learning what you think *other* actors might, or should, do. For example, I didn't mention this earlier, but tracking ISP hosting could be an open source intel effort.

[peter naegele]

This whole situation is a complete mess. There was a piece In May which found that MySpace is a hotbed for recruitment and glorification of jihad.

When the investigator reported her findings to the FBI, she was told that they were protected as "protected free speech". Their response confirms what MichaelW & McQ wrote in their blogs about the need for grass roots efforts.

In this case, I am not so sure that they will be effective, given MySpace's previous fight to not disclose sex predator profiles.

[MichaelW]

Bryan:

MichaelW: First, my apologies for misreading. I found your post in a flurry of others, read it in haste (focusing on the first bit), and linked too quickly. I've corrected the text in my blog post; please refresh the browser to check.

Noted and appreciated. I should apologize for being so derisive with my initial comment as well. I found your post late last night and went for the quick'n easy response instead of polite prodding. So, sorry for that.

Second, in return, perhaps you can respond to the rest of my post? The very next paragraph after I link to you mentions nongovernmental responses to the MEMRI report. Your post ends with a reflection on US federal actions, and you return to that theme in the post's second comment. I would be interested, quite seriously, in learning what you think *other* actors might, or should, do. For example, I didn't mention this earlier, but tracking ISP hosting could be an open source intel effort.

I really can't say what others "should" do, other than to raise a fuss with one's own ISP if it is hosting such websites. IMHO, it is best if we can somehow push these websites outside our jurisdictional borders where they can be fought on a military/intelligence basis rather than from a legal one where they would be given significant advantages. With respect to non-governmental actors, it seems to me that the only effective means to do that is to deny the jihadis a foothold. Threatening boycotts and the creation of a PR nightmare for the hosting ISP's would accomplish the task.

I'm not really too sure what sort of "smartmobbing" or "Army of Davids" techniques could be employed to deal with the sites themselves. If there is some open-source way to track the sites, as you suggest, it probably wouldn't hurt. However, my guess is that such activity would either yield much more information than is really useful, or information that is already generally known (e.g. that the jihadis are based in Pakistan, Indonesia, or Egypt). Nevertheless, there may be some benefit.

Overall, I think that the issue just needs a healthy dose of sunlight. The more people are aware that the jihadis are looking to set up propaganda shops here in the US, the harder it will be for that propaganda to flourish. By the same token, too much attention may be counter-productive. The worst case scenario that I see is the creation of a mob mentality, leading to unjustified and irresponsible attacks on any Islamic website people can find. What I don't want to see is an O'Reilly driven attack that is aimless and indiscriminate. Rather, I think MEMRI has the right idea of informing American ISP's of the problem, and perhaps going after any legally that knowingly host the jihadis.