Why jihad is bad

Koufa himself wields a great deal of authority. A second tier of leaders comprises his original disciples and Islamic scholars who joined him later. An advisory council majlis as shura discusses important social and political decisions, including the liberation or execution of hostages and prisoners. As a fighting force, the Katiba Macina comprises a core group of combatants who have received military training, carry weapons and live in the bush.

They often serve as intermediaries between the yimbe ladde and others, whether locals or humanitarian NGOs seeking to work in areas under jihadist control. While only men can be yimbe ladde , women play a major role in the dormant cells, helping collect intelligence, facilitate recruitment and deliver supplies to the bush. The Katiba Macina has a cohesive chain of command but is decentralised. The rank-and-file jihadists in each markaz are generally from nearby villages.

Hide Footnote That said, it is unclear precisely how this works in practice and how much autonomy each markaz enjoys. It seems, for instance, that markazes outside the inner delta enjoy more freedom than others. Hide Footnote A number of affiliated groups with varying levels of attachment to the core also operate in the areas surrounding the Delta, notably in the Haire in the cercle of Douentza , Seno in the cercle of Koro Bankass and Bandiagara , Kareri, Mema and Farimake.

On one hand, peacemaking efforts that exclude Koufa may well prove — and indeed thus far have proven — ineffective. Nor does it appear likely that trying to weaken the movement by prising away mid-level commanders or entire markaz will work. On the other hand, the cohesive leadership means that the state would have a credible, authoritative interlocutor were it able to engage Koufa himself. The jihadist insurgency in central Mali is fuelling ever deadlier intercommunal violence.

This violence originates in the historical mix of competition and collaboration among ethnic groups over access to natural resources. Peul, Bambara, Dogon, Bozo and other groups share the same land and water and pursue vocations — farming, fishing and herding — that can coexist but also come into conflict, for instance when farmers seek to plant land previously used as pasture for livestock. In reality, some Peul sub-groups practice farming, while Dogon, Bambara and Bozo own livestock as well.

Hide Footnote Tensions have sharpened in recent decades as both human and livestock populations have burgeoned while natural resources have dwindled due to environmental change.

Hide Footnote Bandits increasingly roam the countryside as traditional livelihoods erode. More people in central Mali are learning to live by the gun. The jihadist insurgency stems from intra-ethnic as well as inter-ethnic rivalries. Communities are themselves divided along lines of social status: noble, common and slave lineage; sedentary and nomadic lifestyle; and autochthonous and settler heritage. These cleavages have also produced tensions over political representation and access to resources, leading intermittently to small-scale intra-communal violence.

While the Katiba Macina mainly attacks the military and other state institutions, militants also target civilians whom they accuse of collaboration with security forces.

As the conflict has evolved, however, some of them have diverged from their original mission to become something more like a militia. Hide Footnote D ozos , traditionally armed with hunting rifles, now carry submachine guns. Until recently, direct confrontation between jihadists and dozos was rare; instead, dozos tended to respond to jihadist attacks on villagers with indiscriminate reprisals against Peul civilians.

Hide Footnote Direct clashes have become more common as violence has escalated and jihadists more openly claim Peul identity. Dozo militias have helped Malian troops with intelligence gathering, though of late their reprisals against other groups have compelled the army to scale back cooperation. The death toll in Mopti has risen steadily since the insurgency began, with civilians caught in the crossfire.

From to , the number of conflict-related fatalities grew more than tenfold. ACLED data. See also the map in Appendix A. Hide Footnote Over a thousand people have died, hundreds been injured and thousands more displaced.

The Katiba Macina initially distanced itself from identification with any one community but that has changed. In the past, the movement emphasised its multi-ethnic composition and focus on fighting what it called the enemies of sharia.

Our fight is a fight between faith and disbelief, democracy and the book of God, idolatry and monotheism. Hide Footnote Yet Koufa has recently shifted his discourse to claim Fulani identity and called upon all Peul to join the jihad.

You have seen from the outset of our jihad to this day what the unbelievers have done to Peul — massacres and extermination, as France, the UN and the Arabs looked on. Mali has changed its law to legalise the massacre of Peul. Burkina Faso has also legalised it. The Malian government and its foreign partners, including France, have privileged a military response to address the jihadist insurgency in central — as well as northern — Mali, though they admit that stabilising the country requires more than that.

French Defence Minister Florence Parly also recognised the limitations of the military approach in her Twitter thread announcing the alleged killing of Koufa.

The Plan envisages four steps: retaking territories captured by the Katiba Macina; bringing back state officials; enabling economic development; and, lastly, communication to explain the strategy to people living in areas affected two additional initiatives, a disarmament program and intercommunal dialogue, were subsequently added and are examined in Section V.

In reality, efforts have focused primarily on the military campaign. The goal of increasing the number of military posts is to achieve better military coverage of central Malian territory. Hide Footnote These operations have scored local successes. In some garrison towns, for instance, schools have reopened, the state administration is gradually returning, and economic activities, including those the jihadists banned, have slowly resumed. Barkhane has no official presence in central Mali, as it concentrates resources further north, particularly on the Malian border with Burkina Faso and Niger.

Nonetheless, between March and February , it has conducted at least six operations in Mopti, often combining airstrikes with ground action, sometimes in collaboration with the Malian army. Parly claimed the death of Koufa before the French National Assembly. Four months later, however, Koufa appeared in a video, apparently safe and sound. Other foreign forces also play a role. But in that month a jihadist attack destroyed the building, forcing the G5 Sahel command to relocate to Bamako.

Hide Footnote Recently, in reaction to the upsurge in intercommunal violence, UN peacekeepers have stepped up operations, notably in the Koro, Bankass and Bandiagara districts.

Thus far, neither has succeeded in halting violence in central Mali. Indeed, insurgents have shown considerable agility in the face of pressure, moving into the bush, where they can better hide out, and adopting guerrilla tactics like ambushes, roadside bombs and landmines. While the Malian army controls towns and their immediate vicinity, the jihadists rule the countryside, erecting checkpoints on rural roads and patrolling rivers.

In this manner, they have effectively placed garrison towns under siege. They killed dozens, mostly military personnel, looted military equipment and set what remained of the garrison on fire. Hide Footnote They impose embargoes on villages they accuse of collaborating with security forces, forbidding the movement of people and goods in or out.

See also fn Hide Footnote They have also developed networks that allow them to rule villages without having to maintain a physical presence, limiting their exposure to military crackdowns. Militants tend to allow in humanitarian groups but refuse access to development agencies.

An increasing number of outside experts, including Crisis Group, have recommended at least testing the waters to see whether negotiations might complement military action. Hide Footnote In Mali itself, several civil society activists, politicians and Islamic scholars, began already in calling on the authorities to start a dialogue with the jihadists. At the conference, dialogue advocates gave various reasons for their stance. Others cited it as a means for the government to assert its sovereignty in the face of foreign pressure against such initiatives.

Still others promoted dialogue with jihadists as a matter of consistency, since Malian governments have talked with leaders of past rebellions. Indeed, Bamako has attempted to end successive insurgencies through negotiations.

Over the last thirty years, Mali has endured three periods of uprising, in , and present, resulting in repeated peace agreements. The last such deal, the Bamako Agreement, which followed French-led operations that ousted jihadists from northern towns in early , formally excluded ag Ghaly and other jihadist leaders. That said, some of the armed groups that signed the Bamako deal enjoyed close ties to ag Ghaly or other militants; indeed, many fighters formerly with jihadist groups rehatted themselves as members of the signatory armed groups.

Those who favour dialogue with jihadists argue that if the government is willing to talk to separatists — particularly separatists who themselves have close links to jihadists — why not talk to jihadists themselves? Yet both the Malian authorities and jihadist leaders themselves have resisted talking. They just want to kill us. Crisis Group interview, January On the other side, the hardest-line among the jihadists view the Malian government as not only illegitimate but infidel.

See also fn 3. Hide Footnote Between these two extremes lies a spectrum of officials and insurgents who, to one degree or another, are more amenable to dialogue. But thus far the less compromising attitudes have prevailed. Three factors complicate prospects for dialogue with the Katiba Macina: its ideological program and the ambiguous support it enjoys locally; its transnational ties; and strong domestic and foreign opposition to such talks.

Hide Footnote The first is that Malian state institutions and the whole democratic system of government are un-Islamic and illegitimate. It is incumbent upon all Muslims to overthrow the system by force and replace it with theocratic governance based on sharia — as the Katiba Macina interprets it. We have given up our families, parents and homes. They are thus legitimate targets, though state officials can spare themselves if they break ties with their Western allies.

Hide Footnote Thirdly, militants believe that they represent the purest form of Islam and that they must teach local Muslims to adopt their stricter approach. They consider Muslims who collaborate with the Malian government to be apostates murtaddin , and they apply the same label to some of their local theological rivals and critics. What should we conclude?

He considers Muslims who accept secular laws to be apostates. But he has not called for indiscriminate attacks on these Muslims. At first glance, this discourse appears to set aspirations well outside the realm of what the Malian state can offer. The Malian state is ostensibly committed to secularism understood as the separation of religion and politics , representative democracy based on elections and strong relations with Western countries, particularly France.

True, the movement has shown pragmatism. Its discourse and practices have evolved over time as local conditions have changed. As discussed in Section IV, the jihadists often have to juggle both being true to their ideology and making compromises in order to avoid alienating those whom they seek to rule.

Yet if the grievances that motivate many to join Katiba Macina — shrinking pastoral land, abusive government officials and socio-economic neglect — are not religious, Koufa frames them within a religious discourse that would make reaching a negotiated settlement more difficult.

When proselytising, jihadists say their ideas emanate from God but also strive to tie these ideas to human well-being. While Koufa himself self-identifies as jihadist and claims to be fighting for the establishment of sharia in Mali, his success in mobilising local support owes more to his ability to exploit ingrained socio-economic and political discontent in central Mali and fill the gap left by a largely absent state.

Hide Footnote During its early years, and , the Katiba Macina focused on delivering public goods and services where it held sway. In reality, it struggled to provide much more than rough dispute resolution, attempts at regulating access to land, water and pasture, and a reduction in cattle theft.

Hide Footnote But given decades of government mismanagement and abuse, and the corruption and inaccessibility of the Malian court system for people in rural areas, even that won the jihadists some local support. Over the course of , as the movement consolidated control over larger areas, militants began to collect zakat , the alms regarded by Muslims as a religious obligation, and impose a draconian moral code that banned several local customs and severely restricted freedoms, in particular for women and youth.

They outlawed playing music or football, consuming alcohol and social mixing between the sexes. They imposed a dress code requiring women to cover their bodies head to toe; though most women in central Mali have traditionally worn headscarves, covering the full body was uncommon. Not all women reject such a code; indeed, some approve of it. Hide Footnote But many others chafe at a requirement that complicates daily practices like washing clothes in the river and farming.

They often enforced this code violently, including by whipping, abduction and even killing offenders. The brutal enforcement of ultra-conservative mores has meant that some of — though by no means all — the sympathy the jihadists initially won has dissipated. Hide Footnote Some locals approve of strict Islamic law as a concept. Many still appreciate the reasonably predictable dispute resolution, the degree of security especially the tough measures against cattle theft , and the absence of corrupt and predatory state officials.

Many people in central Mali would likely oppose any notion that jihadists speak in their name. Even were the state inclined to make such concessions — and nothing suggests that it is — it would risk running up against local resistance. Hide Footnote The transnational connection poses problems.

For some Malian officials, political talks with members of a movement, al-Qaeda, that at least rhetorically recognises no borders and claims to be fighting for establishment of a global caliphate make little sense.

Hide Footnote But starting in , anti-French rhetoric and references to Crusaders started to predominate. He considers the Malian president himself to have been chosen by France. It has created concerns that Koufa may now be less interested in negotiating over local grievances and that, in any case, he could not enter dialogue unless authorised by more transnationally motivated jihadist leaders.

He is Malian. It is undeniable. Most of his discourse remains locally focused, despite the al-Qaeda ties he nominally enjoys via ag Ghaly. His participation in the JNIM may well have been motivated by his long association with ag Ghaly and the desire to garner training, funds and expertise, rather than a commitment to its transnational aspirations. The Katiba Macina has shown some flexibility toward dialogue.

In August Koufa mentioned that he would be ready to speak with religious leaders, in particular three well-known Salafi scholars, including Mahmoud Dicko. He said:. Our wish is that you send us the scholars, they are more able to understand what we are looking for. If you send us the ulama [a body of Muslim scholars], they are welcome to come discuss with us.

These are Mahmoud Dicko, Mahi Banikane, Cheick Oumar Dia and others so that they can see how we live here, and we will appreciate it together. In addition, as recently as early , the Katiba Macina has shown willingness to engage in transactional negotiations with the government, such as to exchange hostages for militants held prisoner. Hide Footnote That the militants whom the Katiba Macina wanted released included men from outside central Mali, notably a high-profile fighter and former jihadist police chief from Gao, suggests that the JNIM may have condoned the transactional negotiations.

Pressure from both domestic and foreign actors who oppose the idea of dialogue or fear its possible outcomes also militates against talks. Secular elites view it as part of a larger threat to the separation of religion and politics in Mali.

They point to increasingly assertive attempts by Islamist activists to carve out a place for themselves in the political arena. Hide Footnote This concern is all the more resonant given that Mahmoud Dicko, whom many secular leaders regard with suspicion, is a key figure both in promoting the role of Islam in politics and in pushing for dialogue with jihadists.

Many clerics also reject the Katiba Macina and its intolerant tenets — perhaps not surprisingly given that the insurgents oppose the Islamic establishment as much as the state. Hide Footnote Sufis from Mopti are particularly hostile to dialogue with jihadists, believing that any compromise struck with them would likely privilege Salafi strands of Islam to the detriment of others. Hide Footnote In , when the jihadists conquered northern Mali, the Malian Association for Unity and Progress of Islam in Mopti considered sending a delegation to debate the jihadists on religious matters.

But most association members rejected the idea. Even today, several members of such associations continue to oppose the idea of dialogue. Then we can talk about negotiation. Among central Malians, views toward dialogue are mixed, though predicting how they would respond to talks is hard.

Thus far, debate about dialogue with jihadists occurs mostly among Bamako elites. How can these people who claim to be Muslims justify killing of the innocents as part of their Jihad? For that cause we decreed for the Children of Israel that whosoever killeth a human being for other than manslaughter or corruption in the earth, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind, and whoso saveth the life of one, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all mankind. Terrorism, in fact, is completely the opposite of Jihad.

Any act of violence that instills fear in the minds of innocent people is an act of terror, particularly because this fear is not a fear against anything wrong, like corruption or theft.

Instead, it is a fear of the powerful who wish to become more so. The right direction is henceforth distinct from error. And he who rejecteth false deities and believeth in Allah hath grasped a firm handhold which will never break.

Allah is Hearer, Knower. Yes, Islam does provide guidelines for war. But in those guidelines, the killing of women, children, the old and the weak is expressly forbidden. Even destruction of a standing crop or a tree is not allowed, as Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, the first Caliph, told Islamic armies:.

The Prophet also said that no non-combatant can be killed by a Muslim army in any circumstances. Some, however, did refer to signs of living in the last days. The signs are there. Clear signs. It is not only in Islam but in Christianity that judgment day is on its way, and in Judaism. The second part of her statement distances her from the fundamentalist standpoint: by connecting the coming of the last days to other monotheistic religions, she broadens the base of her narrative authority and simultaneously signals that she is tolerant of these religions and feels a connection to them.

Ismail, too, described signs that the last days were approaching but with a more overt anti-jihadi twist. Ismail: Before the Day of Reckoning people will hate each other, people will trust those that lie and will not believe in those that tell the truth. You can see a son killing his own mother, cruel stuff. Ismail: Yes, of course, it has happened. For example, IS is a sign of the Day of Reckoning, that it is close. They become the representative of the devil rather than his opponents.

The majority of the interviewees did not claim to see signs of the last days, but the Day of Reckoning was nonetheless part of their religious beliefs. For many, it was an important motivation for living as good Muslims, but their theological knowledge of and personal engagement with the idea varied.

Esra for example described a recurring dream:. I have dreamt about it a couple of times. I had a dream when we were in the living room, me and my cousins. Then some big people came and knocked on the door and said that it was the Day of Reckoning. We had to get up and there were flames everywhere.

And we have heard that on the Day of Reckoning everybody rises from the graves and becomes sand. They weigh what is positive and negative and if you have done a lot of bad things you go to hell.

In these accounts, the ideas of judgment, heaven and hell give meaning to death and motivate the narrators to live as good Muslims. There were few signs of the extremist narratives of the last days, except where the narrators wove rejections of the jihadi stories of the Day of Reckoning into their accounts. Some repudiated the judgmental approach of the jihadists, declaring that it was for Allah or God to punish evildoers and not for human beings.

Afrah, for example, opined:. I think the only person who should judge someone is God. The attribution of final authority to God echoes the narratives of kuffar and the Caliphate. Another familiar technique was turning the narrative tables on extremist rhetoric in predictions about who would be punished. Account is taken of everything you have done.

Because everything you have done will come up again. Hitler is a clear and powerful trope of criminal leadership. Equating IS and Al-Shabaab with Hitler and emphasizing that they will all be held equally accountable not only implies that justice will prevail but also that it is already clear via the historic example of Hitler that IS and Al-Shabaab will be judged negatively.

Stories about the last days, fear of the final judgment and an apocalyptic worldview have long fuelled jihadi rhetoric and have been especially important for IS McCants The everyday religious beliefs of the young Muslims in this study included a certain tendency to see signs that the final days are approaching Cook , but their interpretations and expectations of the Day of Reckoning explicitly ran counter to extremist rhetoric.

They presented it primarily as a call to be a better person and a better Muslim and not as a call to arms against infidels Sandberg et al. There is a danger of contributing to a perception that they are somehow responsible for jihadi terrorism or peculiarly vulnerable to extremist rhetoric.

Our experience, nonetheless, was that young Muslims in Norway were keen to talk about the issues—they wanted a voice to present another image of Islam than the one they faced daily in the mainstream media and popular discourse.

Of the different research projects we have run over the years, this was by far the easiest to recruit participants to. When interviewed, the participants were emotionally engaged and voiced their opinions with great commitment. Given the groups of young Muslims travelling to Syria from Norway, this was not an abstract or theoretical matter for them.

Most knew or knew of someone who had been fascinated by or drawn to jihadi narratives. The Salafi-Jihadi interpretation of jihad emphasizes the duty of armed struggle against anyone opposing Islam.

Embedded in an apocalyptic narrative, the promise of eternal life, or of life in a perfect Muslim State, motivates sacrifice and justifies violence. Some interviewees said explicitly that they were averting harm by telling these stories in their communities and social networks Mohamed and Sandberg Additionally, their accounts showed an impetus to limit hate crime against Muslims perpetrated by anti-Islamists or xenophobic members of the majority population.

While the formal teachings of Islam have been thoroughly addressed, there is little systematic knowledge about what young Muslims actually believe in.

That is part of their narrative exclusion Plummer ; Colvin in press. Attending to everyday stories can counter, or at least help reveal, narrative exclusion and epistemic injustice. The young Muslims in this study used the strategy of empowering incredulity Joosse et al. The moral and credibility deficit that attends narrative exclusion is thus shifted on to jihadi narrators, while the interviewees are positioned on the side of the peaceable mainstream as acculturated citizens.

The boundary is implicitly no longer between the mainstream and all Muslims but divides a mainstream that includes peaceable Muslims from violent jihadi extremists. Interestingly, the Western media is often seen to be narratively in league with the extremists in its persistent presentation of Islam as a religion of war and violence.

The young Muslims in the study offered narrative resistance to an excluding mainstream, rejecting its characterization of Islam as a religion of aggression.

They simultaneously joined forces with that mainstream in seeking the narrative exclusion of jihadi extremists. They thereby reinscribed themselves into a religiously tolerant, peaceable mainstream community, disavowing membership of the subcultural community of values invoked by the jihadi fighters and imputed to all Muslims by cultural stereotyping.

This study shows, for example, how criminology can learn from studies of everyday religion Ammerman , especially when trying to understand how everyday religious narratives can arouse, but also counter, violence and harm. Criminological research on political and religious extremism is necessarily interdisciplinary and must put criminology into dialogue with religious studies, the sociology of religion, terrorism scholarship and political science.

Narrative criminology has emphasized the particularities of stories that motivate and constrain crime and harm. Here, our underlying aim was to understand how storytelling seeks to resist both violent jihadism and the prejudices about Muslims and Islam that can lead to violence against Muslims. The young Muslims interviewed for this study offered founded rejections of jihadi stories and rhetoric.

Within Muslim communities, everyday beliefs and narrative resistance to violence seem likely to influence behaviours. One must hope that the mainstream is also listening. The ongoing discussions during the two years when we were conducting interviews, coding and writing a book in Norwegian were of great value for this paper.

We are also grateful to Levi Geir Eidhamar and Marius Linge for sharing their broad knowledge of Islam when commenting on this paper. Finally, we would like to thank the two anonymous referees for British Journal of Criminology for their insights and input.

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