No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.
Digital Media and Violent Extremism in Bangladesh: Profiles and Narratives
Abstract
Despite the visible presence of violent extremist groups, and evidence of their connection with transnational groups such as Islamic State and Al-Qaeda, the number of empirical studies on this topic is limited in Bangladesh. There have been over 50 violent extremist attacks in Bangladesh in recent years (2013-2017) and digital media was used in different ways in most of these attacks. There appear to be no scholarly articles addressing this phenomenon in Bangladesh. To fill this gap, this project sheds light on the subject by analyzing life stories of Bangladeshi violent extremists. The data for this project was collected from content analysis of newspaper reports, Jihadi online magazines, and videos. Besides presenting current trends on how extremists are using digital media, this paper identifies challenges for counter-terrorism efforts in Bangladesh and provides suggestions to mitigate these challenges.
... The Holey Artisan attack not only motivated law enforcement personnel to conduct operations but also piqued the interest of security and terrorism scholars in studying Islamist militancy in Bangladesh. Some researchers are particularly interested in exploring the intersection between ICTs and Islamist militancy (Parvez, 2017(Parvez, , 2019b. However, there is a dearth of empirical evidence concerning the role of social media in this context. ...
... Facebook is often used as a means to search for supporters, and reliable supporters are then invited to join other secretive online platforms (Swapan, 2018). Research has also highlighted the significance of Bangladeshi Islamic Facebook groups and pages, which primarily share religious content without explicitly endorsing violent extremism, in promoting online radicalisation, particularly during the involvement phase when targeting and influencing potential militants (Amit et al., 2020;Parvez, 2019b). Facebook pages and groups are exploited for the dissemination of religious extremism, with extremists distorting religious interpretations to attract susceptible youth to Islamist militancy (Ghatack, 2018). ...
This paper aims to explore the role of social media in promoting Islamic extremism in Bangladesh. It also tries to contribute in the growing debate on the negative use of social media. As like as many other developing countries most of the people of Bangladesh are poor and illiterate. Apart from this fact, the neoliberal market policy is encouraging extremism in the country. As a new means of communication, social media is widely being used by youths and it creates a significant online community in Bangladesh. In this Bengali online community ‘believer-atheist debate’ has become one of the most discussed issues. Besides of this, different online groups tend to promote Islam diminishing the images of other religions. A group of Islamic extremists also declare progressive writers and politicians as atheists very often and call upon people to kill them as a holy duty. Following the call at least six progressive writers and online activists have been killed and some others were injured. Attacks on minority communities are also becoming common phenomena in the country. As social media is being greatly used to call on such kind of attack, it is important to know the exact role of this new media in promoting Islamic extremism. To explore the fact following empirical questions are addressed in this study. Who are the main users of social media in the country? How is the social media being used in promoting Islamic extremism? How do the extremists use Islam to promote extremism? What language do the extremists use to motivate people? To answer these questions content of two Facebook pages and a Facebook group have been analyzed in this study. The Facebook pages and group have been selected through purposive sampling method. It is found that a group of Bengali online users, who are involved in different Islamic parties, promote Islamic extremism by distorting the core of Islam in the Bengali online community. Circulating the sufferings of Muslims across the world, they try to motivate youths to join extremist groups. I argue that apart from playing the role of fifth estate, in Bangladesh, social media is being used as a new weapon by Islamic extremists to implement their political agenda.
... Furthermore, previous studies have also demonstrated the role of extremist groups and social media in shaping young people's attitudes toward secularity and how this impacts the practice of secularity in the country. By enabling ongoing communication towards the creation of a collective identity, digital media can perpetuate radical ideologies (Parvez, 2019). For instance, in Ahsan's (2017) study, Sohan's ongoing connection with his recruiters Aminul and Ozaki after the initial period of involvement as an enthusiast, led to Sohan's transformation into an aspirational violent extremist. ...
The rise of radicalised religious beliefs in Bangladesh has impacted the country’s political and social environment, posing a threat to the practice of secularity, a fundamental value of the country’s Constitution. As 57 instances of “religious sectarianism” were reported by the Bangladesh Peace Observatory in 2021, there has been a growing concern about the rise of radicalised religious beliefs among the youth in Bangladesh and its potential impact on the practice of secularity in the country. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to investigate the impact of radicalised religious beliefs on the practice of secularity among youths in Bangladesh. The study examined the influence of extremist groups on students using social constructivism to explore the experiences of individuals impacted by the rise of radicalised religious communities. The findings of this study bring to light the complex relationship between radicalised religious beliefs and the extraction of the ideas of secularity from the youth analysing the role of policymakers and practitioners on how best to address the risks that arise from these dynamics. This study enabled the exploration of the status quo in the context of practicing secularity through the lens of social realities.
This paper explains how do terrorist organisations evolve with the development of new communication technologies, with a particular focus on Bangladesh.
In 2018, Bangladesh and India both experienced a
significant decline in terrorist attacks compared to the
previous five years. Hard CT measures coupled with
community-based ‘soft’ approaches have proven useful.
However, new challenges, particularly the Rohingya
refugee crisis, could jeopardise recent success, as
terrorist groups could regain their strength by exploiting
the grievances of the Muslim Rohingyas. A recent
development provided support for that assumption
when Bangladeshi law enforcers arrested a number
of operatives of Ansar ul-Islam, a terrorist group
affiliated with Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent
(AQIS), in a Rohingya refugee camp. Law enforcers
claimed that these operatives were active in the refugee
camps under the guise of NGO workers.1
According
to an estimate by the International Organization
for Migration in December 2017, 655,000 Rohingyas
had arrived in Bangladesh in just four months,2
bringing the number of Rohingyas in Bangladesh to
867,500. Both local and global terrorist outfits, such
as al-Qaeda, Islamic State (IS), Jaish-e-Muhammad
and New Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, have
been trying to cash in on this humanitarian crisis and
exploit the issue of ‘Muslim oppression’ for propaganda
and recruitment.
With the advent and availability of new communication
technologies, terrorist groups are increasingly changing
their operational tactics and using social media
and other online platforms. Although IS is losing its
influence in this region after its losses in Syria, al-Qaeda
could capitalise on local grievances and political
instability and re-emerge as a threat. The long-term
success of CT in these two countries will depend
on how adroitly their CT programs address these
new challenges.
The Islamic State (IS) is going through a shift in its strategy and tactics with a major organisational restructuring in the post-Caliphate phase. Instead of controlling a territory with a centralised system, the jihadist organisation is attempting to expand its ideologies via local affiliates, exploiting existing local grievances. Although South Asia receives priority in IS' ambition of expansion, the extant literature on the role of the jihadist outfit in the region, especially in Bangladesh, is scant. To address this lacuna, this study explores the development of IS affiliated groups in Bangladesh and portrays its origin, leadership, target, goals and international connections. It also explains how Bangladeshi foreign fighters were recruited for IS and who the key persons were behind Bangladeshis' IS connections. This study shows that while the Bangladesh government squarely refused to acknowledge the presence of IS in Bangladesh, IS claimed responsibilities of several attacks and indicated their long-term plan to control the region in the future. This study also analyses jihadist content, including IS' flagship magazine Dabiq, Rumiyah, their videos and Telegram channels, and finds their violence justification narrative employed in Bangladesh. It finds that there are mainly three themes in the Bangladeshi jihadist narrative: perceived crisis construct, solution construct, and justification of jihad as the only way to reach the solution from the existing crisis.
This Research Paper explores how militant Islamists use propaganda to appeal to and radicalise supporters. It offers an alternative to the view that ideology is the key to understanding and countering the appeal of militant Islamism. Drawing on studies from the behavioural and social sciences, it analyses how strategies of meaning, credibility and behavioural change are deployed in militant Islamist propaganda citing a range of primary source materials – from the speeches and writings of charismatic figures like Abdullah Azzam, Osama bin Laden and Anwar al-Awlaki to messages released by the likes of al Qaeda, its affiliates and so-called “Islamic State”. This study particularly focuses on how such messaging leverages psychosocial forces and strategic factors to: (i.) provide its supporters with a system of meaning that shapes how they perceive the world, (ii.) demonstrate that it is a credible source of information and authority, and, (iii.) deploy pertinent behavioural levers designed to compel its audiences to legitimise and engage in violence. This Research Paper concludes by outlining some crucial lessons for understanding both the siren call of militant Islamist propaganda and counterterrorism strategic communications design.
Since the events of March 1971, Bangladesh has seldom been free from violence. While much of the recent attention revolves around religious extremism and militancy, political violence, as this paper argues, is a larger problem for Bangladesh. At every level of society, Bangladesh has had to confront with acts of violence. Lack of governance impedes the polity from effectively controlling violence, organised and unorganised, against different sections of society. Prolonged military rule, the perennial problem of political intolerance and growth of religious extremism have contributed to this trend. Violence is prevalent across the society but the state remains inert.
This study aims to investigate how Al Qaeda uses the Internet for military training and preparation. What kind of training material is available on jihadi webpages, who produces it, and for what purpose? The article argues that in spite of a vast amount of training-related literature online, there have been few organized efforts by Al Qaeda to train their followers by way of the Internet. The Internet is per today not a “virtual training camp” organized from above, but rather a resource bank maintained and accessed largely by self-radicalized sympathizers.
Political violence is one of the major features of the political landscape of Bangladesh. This chapter proposes a three-tier approach, macro, meso, and micro, to understand what prompts violence and offers explanations of the nature and patterns of political violence in Bangladesh in the past decade and a half. The 2001–2017 period is used for analysing political violence in Bangladesh for two reasons. First, this period covers significant variations; the presence of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), Awami League (AL), and interim government regimes, both flawed and fair elections, widespread government repressions and the rise, fall, and resurgence of an Islamist militancy. Second, the trial of war criminals and consequent emergence of two competing social movements, Shahbagh and Hefazat, are the crucial landmarks of this period that may help to understand the increasing political polarization and violence in contemporary Bangladesh and perhaps, in the future as well.
Bangladesh is currently facing an incremental growth of radicalization. This radicalization can be traced back to the country’s early post-Independence years. Over time, political violence, ideological clashes between secular and right-wing ideologies, and weak governance have created conditions for the growth of radical Islam. The public rhetoric on corruption, weakening of democratic institutions, inadequate law enforcement agencies, fragile justice delivery system, fledgling educational and social institutions and growing unemployment provides further space for alternative narratives by extremist ideologues. Home-grown extremist outfits have received ideological and tactical supports from transnational terrorist network such as Islamic State (IS) and Al-Qaeda in Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), but only in a limited manner. The supply and demand side of radicalization in Bangladesh has not yet been addressed by actors such as the government, private sector, civil society and media. The failures in multiple sectors in the state governance have led to a situation where IS and AQIS now see Bangladesh as a potential ground for exerting their supremacy as flag bearers of radical forms of Islam.
This book provides the first empirical analysis of lone-actor terrorist behaviour.
Based upon a unique dataset of 111 lone actors that catalogues the life span of the individual’s development, the book contains important insights into what an analysis of their behaviours might imply for practical interventions aimed at disrupting or even preventing attacks. It adopts insights and methodologies from criminology and forensic psychology to provide a holistic analysis of the behavioural underpinnings of lone-actor terrorism.
By focusing upon the behavioural aspects of each offender and by analysing a variety of case studies, including Anders Breivik, Ted Kaczynski, Timothy McVeigh and David Copeland, this work marks a pointed departure from previous research in the field. It seeks to answer the following key questions:
Is there a lone-actor terrorist profile and how do they differ?
What behaviours did the lone-actor terrorist engage in prior to his/her attack and is there a common behavioural trajectory into lone-actor terrorism?
How ‘lone’ do lone-actor terrorists tend to be?
What role, if any, does the internet play?
What role, if any, does mental illness play?
This book will be of much interest to students of terrorism/counter-terrorism studies, political violence, criminology, forensic psychology and security studies in general.
The jihadists in Iraq strategically deploy emotional narratives to construct the myth of heroic martyrdom, demonize their intended targets, and appeal to potential recruits from around the Muslim world. These culturally astute jihadists know well the themes that resonate with the wider Muslim public, and have done an extraordi-nary job in harnessing three narratives to mobilize for martyrdom: humiliation of Muslims at the hands of foreigners, impotence of official Muslim governments in the face of hegemonic powers, and redemption through faithful sacrifice. This study explores how jihadists weave together these three narratives to suggest a deleterious condition that requires an immediate action, offer an explanation of the causes of this persistent condition, and present the necessary solution to overcome the problem.
Terrorist in 10 months, The Daily Star
- Z Ahsan
Ahsan, Z. (2016). Terrorist in 10 months, The Daily Star.
July 24.
Dhaka-Syria-Dhaka, The Daily Star
- Z Ahsan
Ahsan, Z. (2017). Dhaka-Syria-Dhaka, The Daily Star,
February 12.
You Can't Prevent Terrorism by Singling Out Muslims. The Telegraph
- J Bartlett
Bartlett, J. (2015). You Can't Prevent Terrorism by
Singling Out Muslims. The Telegraph, February 19.
Singapore: S. Rajarathnam School of International Studies
- I Bashar
Bashar, I. (2013). Violent radicalisation in Bangladesh: a
second wave?. RSIS Commentaries. Singapore: S.
Rajarathnam School of International Studies,
Nanyang Technological University.
Who are they? The Daily Star
- The Daily
The Daily Star (2016). Who are they? The Daily Star, July
4.
Police gets nationwide antiterrorism unit. The Daily Star
- The Daily
The Daily Star (2017). Police gets nationwide antiterrorism unit. The Daily Star, September 21.
Attack on Zafar Iqbal: Foyzur, his family charged. The Daily Star
- The Daily
The Daily Star (2018a). Attack on Zafar Iqbal: Foyzur,
his family charged. The Daily Star, July 26.
President approves Digital Security Act. The Daily Star
- The Daily
The Daily Star (2018b). President approves Digital
Security Act. The Daily Star, October 9.
From missing young men to murderers
- S I Bhuiyan
Bhuiyan, S. I. (2016), From missing young men to
murderers, Prothom Alo, July 04, 2016, available at
https://en.prothomalo.com/bangladesh/news/110799/
From-missing-young-men-to-murderers.
Radicalisation: The Role of the Internet. Policy Planners' Network Working Paper. London: Institute for Strategic Dialogue
- R Briggs
- A Strugnel
Briggs, R. and Strugnel, A. (2011). Radicalisation: The
Role of the Internet. Policy Planners' Network
Working Paper. London: Institute for Strategic
Dialogue.
terror, anti-terror took a cyber turn
- M K Hasan
Hasan, M.K. (2018). In 2016, terror, anti-terror took a
cyber turn. Dhaka Tribune, January 2.
Drawn into Militancy by Mufti Jashim. The Daily Star
- R Hasan
Hasan, R. (2016). Drawn into Militancy by Mufti Jashim.
The Daily Star, July 21.
Bangladesh criticized for slow progress in blogger murders', VOA
- M Hussain
Hussain, M. (2017) 'Bangladesh criticized for slow
progress in blogger murders', VOA, March 1,
available at https://www.voanews.com/a/bangladeshcriticized-for-slow-progress-blogger-murders/37448
33.html
Quick disposal of antiterrorism cases: special tribunals yet to be fully functional. The Daily Star
- S Islam
- M J Khan
Islam, S. and Khan, M.J. (2018). Quick disposal of antiterrorism cases: special tribunals yet to be fully
functional. The Daily Star, May 26.
The evaluation of Islamist radicalization and violent extremism in Bangladesh
- M H Kabir
- A Banik
Kabir, M.H. and Banik, A. (2018). The evaluation of
Islamist radicalization and violent extremism in
Bangladesh. BEI Journal, 1(1): 127-146.
82pc of them radicalized thru' social media, finds a police study on detained 'militants'. The Daily Star
- J Khan
- S Islam
Khan, J. and Islam, S. (2017). 82pc of them radicalized
thru' social media, finds a police study on detained
'militants'. The Daily Star. March 10. Available at
https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/82pc-militant
s-radicalised-thru-social-media-1373665
Detained terrorist tells the whole story of his 372 days in hideouts
- N Labu
Labu, N. (2017). Detained terrorist tells the whole story
of his 372 days in hideouts, Dhaka Tribune, August
11.
How Rashed got involved in terrorism
- N Labu
Labu, N. (2017). How Rashed got involved in terrorism,
Dhaka Tribune, July 29.
Bangladesh Attack: Searching for the Affluent Jihadists
- S Majumder
Majumder, S. (2016), Bangladesh Attack: Searching for
the Affluent Jihadists, BBC, July 05, 2016
How successful will the new madrasa education system be? Dhaka Tribune
- S Mamun
- A I Shaon
Mamun, S. and Shaon, A.I. (2018). How successful will
the new madrasa education system be? Dhaka
Tribune, January 19.
Mobilizing to Martyrdom: A Narrative Theory of High-Risk Mobilization
- R Pape
- D Rovang
- K Ruby
- J Decety
Pape,R., Rovang, D, Ruby,K., and Decety, J. (2018).
Mobilizing to Martyrdom: A Narrative Theory of
High-Risk Mobilization. University of Chicago:
Program on Security and International Politics (PISP).
Bangladeshi IS Fighters in Raqqah commend Gulshan Attackers in video, Threaten more operations to come
SITE (2016), Bangladeshi IS Fighters in Raqqah
commend Gulshan Attackers in video, Threaten more
operations to come. SITE Intelligence Group, July 5.
Available at: https://news.siteintelgroup.com/Jihadi
st-News/bangladeshi-is-fighters-in-raqqah-commend
-gulshan-attackers-in-video-threaten-more-operation
s-to-come.html
Radicalisation in the Digital Era: The Use of the Internet in 15 Cases of Terrorism and Extremism
- Von Behr
- I Reding
- A Edwards
- C Gribbon
Von Behr, I, Reding, A, Edwards C. and Gribbon, L.
(2013). Radicalisation in the Digital Era: The Use of
the Internet in 15 Cases of Terrorism and Extremism.
Brussels and Cambridge: RAND Europe.