Online Library

The primary objective of this paper is to map the online presence of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s (HTS) media branch – Ebaa News Agency (ENA) – on the surface web. It also measures three years of propaganda output of the group and its viewership, as well as outlines the thematic landscape of its productions based on the content analysis of a sample. It argues that Ebaa’s messaging pattern constitutes a peculiar mixture of opposing priorities. It paid a great deal of attention to portraying itself as an independent news agency that has nothing to do with violent terrorist organizations (VEOs). In effect, its productions are easily available on the surface web. A closer look, however, proves that since 2017 ENA has been dedicated to supporting HTS’s radical Islamist agenda. This paper provides evidence of this. Moreover, Ebaa adopted a two-vector distribution strategy of its productions, composed of standalone websites and Telegram channels. In this context, the output of this media cell appears to be quite impressive. Between 2017 and 2020, it was capable of releasing more than 13,000 pieces of propaganda on its websites. At the same time, however, their viewership was lower than initially expected.

This paper aims to provide an overview of digital environments and draw insights from qualitative research and monitoring of RWE online subcultures that reveals a shift towards a post-organisational reality, whereby online structures and subcultural milieus could be equally important for inspiring violence as connections to groups in the physical world. 1 In order to understand this emerging trend, it is important to recognise the online communities that violent right-wing extremists (VRWE) use to produce a sense of belonging, spread dehumanising propaganda and promote acts of violence.

Recent right-wing extremist terrorists were active in online fringe communities connected to the alt-right movement. Although these are commonly considered as distinctly hateful, racist, and misogynistic, the prevalence of hate speech in these communities has not been comprehensively investigated yet, particularly regarding more implicit and covert forms of hate. This study exploratively investigates the extent, nature, and clusters of different forms of hate speech in political fringe communities on Reddit, 4chan, and 8chan. To do so, a manual quantitative content analysis of user comments (N=6,000) was combined with an automated topic modeling approach. The findings of the study not only show that hate is prevalent in all three communities (24% of comments contained explicit or implicit hate speech), but also provide insights into common types of hate speech expression, targets, and differences between the studied communities.

In Part I, this Note will look at the European Union’s current Internet Forum and their proposed Terrorist Content Regulation. The proposed regulation focuses on countering terrorist content on social media by placing much of the burden on the social media companies themselves. Part II will focus on the Material Support of Foreign Terrorist Groups Statue: 18U.S.C.§ 2339(b).

How does the internet affect the radicalisation of extreme-right lone actor terrorists? In the absence of an established theoretical model, this article identifies six mechanisms seen as particularly relevant for explaining online radicalisation. Having first reviewed a larger set of relevant lone actor terrorists, the study traces these mechanisms in three selected cases where the internet was reportedly used extensively during radicalisation. The findings show that the internet primarily facilitated radicalisation through information provision, as well as amplifying group polarisation and legitimising extreme ideology and violence through echoing. In all three cases, radicalisation was also affected considerably by offline push-factors that through their presence made extreme online messages more impactful. The results challenge the view that offline interaction is necessary for radicalisation to occur but also the view that online influence itself is sufficient.

This article claims that the visual image contributes to, reflects and supports the dominant discourse of two powerful armed groups that have operated in Iraq and Syria: the US military and the Islamic State (IS). This research uses multimodal discourse analysis to explore two crucial insights into the ideological power of the visual image: the power of the image as spectatorship or spectacle and the sublime or transcendental nature of the visual image. The authors conclude that US and IS recruitment and propaganda videos share these two crucial ideological elements: pride in the spectacle of their military power, discipline and technologies, and sublime commitment to the act of killing and dying for the cause. In this sense, the US military and IS are brothers in arms.