Dialogue, restricted speech, or infiltration?
A former terrorist and the NYPD officer responsible for his arrest spoke at CSIS Monday about strategies for countering violent extremism in today’s world. The Unmaking of Jihadism: The Current Effort to Combat Violent Extremism featured:
- Jesse Morton: Leader of Parallel Networks, former leader and co-founder of Revolution Muslim
- Mitch Silber: Former Director of Intelligence Analysis for the New York City Police Department
- Seth G. Jones: Harold Brown Chair and Director of the Transnational Threats Project at CSIS (Moderator).
Morton and Silber worked on opposite sides of the extremism/CVE divide. Morton said that his traumatic upbringing spawned resentment towards his family and the working class town he grew up in, and that radical Salafi Islam became the outlet through which he expressed this acrimony. The Salafi movement also gave him a community. Morton co-founded Revolution Muslim with his friend Youssef Al-Khattab, a fellow convert to Islam. Abdullah Al-Faisal, a Jamaican cleric who encouraged the killing of Americans, Jews, Hindus, and Christians in his teaching, became Revolution Muslim’s spiritual leader.
Revolution Muslim pioneered the use of Web 2.0 platforms to radicalize individuals without forcing them to travel to terrorist hotbeds around the world. This tactic, which has become a popular recruiting tool for ISIS, involves using social media video lectures to teach large audiences to teach about the militant brand of Salafism. Interested individuals are then contacted by group leaders through end-to-end encrypted messaging services such as Telegram. Morton stressed that Revolution Muslim’s success in evading US law enforcement came through its recognition that the Salafi ideology itself was powerful enough to radicalize individuals without Revolution Muslim having to specifically endorse violent extremism. The group thus remained within its First Amendment rights even though 15-20 terrorist plotters around the world traced their roots back to Revolution Muslim.
Silber furthered Morton’s point, emphasizing that the reason why Revolution Muslim survived in the US for four years was Morton’s exquisite knowledge of First Amendment case law. Morton “frequently danced on the First Amendment line” in his public statements, preventing the authorities from arresting him. Further, Revolution Muslim moved away from the top-down hierarchical approach espoused by Al-Qaeda, allowing individuals around the world to plan and execute their own plots. According to Silber, these factors revolutionized recruiting for terrorist groups around the world. Even Al-Qaeda began publishing an English-language magazine in 2010 that included articles such as “How to make a bomb in the kitchen of your mom.” The Islamic State takes this approach even further. In addition to publishing an English version of Dabiq, ISIS fully embraced Revolution Muslim’s decentralized, web-based strategy, allowing its ideology to continue spreading on the internet even as its territorial caliphate in Iraq and Syria has weakened.
It should come as no surprise that ISIS is in the midst of a resurgence in Iraq, despite Prime Minister Al-Abadi’s declaration of victory over the caliphate last December. Morton stressed that the ideologies associated with extremism always outlive the groups that embody them in a particular time period. ISIS technological prowess also allows it to shift from leaderless resistance back to a command/cadre model at any time, enabling the organization to regroup quickly despite frequent military defeats in recent years. According to Silber, ISIS’ fluidity poses a threat particularly for Europe. For instance, 370 Austrians have traveled to Syria and Iraq since ISIS’ establishment, some of whom have returned to Europe. Further, the threat of other terror organizations cannot be discounted, particularly as Al-Qaeda has reemerged as a “moderate” alternative for terrorists turned off by ISIS’ extreme brutality.
For future US counter-terrorism strategy to be effective, Morton believes that more attention must be paid to the internet’s power to sustain extremist ideologies. He does not believe, however, that restricting free speech on social media platforms is the solution. Social media represents a great outlet for people to voice their opinions, and more should be done to encourage dialogue between people with different views to foster the mutual understanding required to bring people from the poles to the center. To this end, Morton stressed that Islamist extremists and the far right need each other, since both ideologies rely on demonization of the other to survive.
Silber disagreed, arguing that updating social media terms of use agreements to restrict certain types of speech would significantly support CVE efforts. Further, Silber highlighted the valuable role human intelligence played in infiltrating Revolution Muslim and documenting its activities. For Silber, training local officers who possess the technical and linguistic ability to penetrate extremists’ digital networks is the model for the future.
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