Year: 2013

This Is A Religious War II

This quote from the user of the YouTube account called Tamerlan Tsarnaev seems important to me:

You are not a grand Michael but the same Misha that you were before Islam. You accepted Shiism not because it convinces you, but because of the fears, and interests (about which Allah knows) which you’ve followed. Just like you entered into Islam, so to you flew out of it. You betrayed yourself, Misha. Well anyways…farewell.

This is the mark of fundamentalist religious fanaticism. Notice the total abandonment to God and the contempt for the moderate forms of religion. Serwer homes in here:

The YouTube page includes religious videos, including one of Feiz Mohammad, a fundamentalist Australian Muslim preacher who rails against the evils of Harry Potter. One playlist includes a video dedicated to the prophecy of the Black Banners of Khurasan, which is embraced by Islamic extremists—particularly Al Qaeda. The prophecy states that an invincible army will come from the region of Khurasan in central Asia.

“This is a major hadith (reported saying of the prophet Muhammad) that jihadis use, it is essentially an end-time prophecy,” says Aaron Zelin, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy “This is definitely important in Al Qaeda’s ideology.” In The Black Banners, the book by former FBI agent Ali Soufan that is named after this prophecy, Soufan describes the prophecy this way:

Khurasan is a term for a historical region spanning northeastern and eastern Iran and parts of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, and northwestern Pakistan. Because of the hadith, jihadists believe that this is the region from which they will inflict a major defeat against their enemies—in the Islamic version of Armageddon.

In many ways, this is enough to explain a huge amount. Why does someone do something like hold up a 7-11? What’s the point of all this? America has not occupied Chechnya. Chechnyan terrorists have targeted Russia in the past almost exclusively. The point of this is that you can be liberated into violence by the Apocalypse.

A little lost in modernity; finding meaning in the most extreme forms of religion; in many ways assimilated by the West but finding new ways to feel deeply, internally alienated by it: this is a classic profile of an Internet Jihadist. And there is nothing traditional about this religion. It’s hyper-modern, spread online and combustible with any other personal dramas.

And if you think you are enacting God’s will at the end of the world, why not go out with guns and bombs blazing?

Who Got It Right?

Ryan Chittum applauds the MSM:

From everything I saw all night from the West Coast, the press performed admirably. The Boston Globe had reporters on the scene and set up a liveblog to collect their tweets and pictures. It scooped that the suspects being pursued were indeed the marathon bombing suspects. The local TV news that I watched was measured and responsible, but broke news. WHDH was first to report, well before anyone else, that one of the suspects was dead.

… And then there were the keyboard crimefighters at Reddit. At one point a police dispatcher, apparently incorrectly, said that the suspects’ names were Sunil Tripathi, a Brown student who disappeared last month, and Mike Mulugeta. Reddit, still smarting from the backlash to their amateur sleuthing, took a very premature victory lap.

Matthew Ingram argues that, despite some missteps, “having more sources is ultimately better”:

Yes, users of Reddit made mistakes — plenty of them, including identifying the wrong person as a suspect a second time on Thursday after erroneous information emerged from police scanners and other sources. But CNN and the NY Post have made plenty of mistakes as well, something Ryan Chittum of the Columbia Journalism Review doesn’t really mention in his post about how brilliant the traditional media was and how wrong Reddit has been. The larger point is that this isn’t an either/or situation — crowdsourcing is valuable, and has been valuable for journalism and will continue to be.

This Is A Religious War

We’re getting warmer. The YouTube page reveals the deep religious affiliation of a man called Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Max Fisher:

One of the “favorite” videos lists “7 steps to a successful prayer.” Another denounces Sufism, a more mystical branch of Islam. Another, with the title “one of the signs of Allah,” shows a chameleon changing colors at will as a man sings Arabic prayers in the background.

Several of the videos under “Islam” are by a man named Abdülhamid Al Juhani, who is listed by a Salafist Web portal as a scholar. His videos include Arabic audio and Russian text and show photos of Grozny, the Chechen capital. Another video under the “Islam” heading shows young men carrying assault rifles through a forest as a narrator intones, “They demonize as terrorists anyone who supports Islam.”

Update: Mother Jones’s Adam Serwer also looks at the YouTube page. He says it includes “a video of Feiz Mohammad, a fundamentalist Australian Muslim preacher who rails against the evils of Harry Potter” as well as a video “dedicated to the prophecy of the Black Banners of Khurasan, which is embraced by Islamic extremists — particularly Al Qaeda.”

The fact that they are brothers also suggests to me that this could well be just the two of them, with the younger brother controlled by the older one. But where did they get guns capable of holding off the police last night? Their uncle is emphatically horrified by what happened. But he hasn’t seen them since 2006. He’s accusing them simply of being “losers” and that religion has nothing to do with it. “We’re ashamed” he says passionately. I believe him.

The Psyche Of The Jihadist

What’s really striking to me as a psychological matter is how mellow and sweet Djohar Tsarnaev seemed to his friends. What’s also striking is how both assimilated and yet not assimilated both brothers appear. Their peers are expressing utter disbelief. From one of the captions on Tamerlan’s boxing photo-essay:

Tamerlan says he doesn’t drink or smoke anymore: “God said no alcohol.” A muslim, he says: “There are Screen shot 2013-04-19 at 11.27.05 AMno values anymore,” and worries that “people can’t control themselves.”

Tamerlan says he doesn’t usually take his shirt off so girls don’t get bad ideas: “I’m very religious.”

Tamerlan says he loves the movie “Borat,” even though some of the jokes are a bit too much.

If he wins enough fights there, Tamerlan says he could be selected for the US Olympic team and be naturalized American. Unless his native Chechnya becomes independent, Tamerlan says he would rather compete for the United States than for Russia.

The only suggestion that this is connected to international terrorism is from the shooting and explosive tactics used by the Tsarnaev brothers last night. That may have required some kind of training. But the testimonies from those who knew Djohar – including credible sources like a former teacher-friend of his – suggest nothing of the kind. “There is no way in the world …” is the general reaction. “Nothing in his behavior or comportment; he was a great athlete, a great sportsman … a typical kid.” A former teacher: “This is beyond unbelievable.”

But notice the sexual prudery that is sometimes found among Jihadists: “There are no values anymore” … “People can’t control themselves.” And the Amazon wish-list suggests a very careful and radicalized mindset. But it also feels geeky and loner-y and webby to me. You don’t need formal training to become a Jihadist. You just need the Internet.

This is a reminder that we live in a new world: where the Internet can give people ideas, can turn mellow stoners into paranoid mass-murderers. And a reminder that we live in the same world. You never truly know what’s going on inside the minds of others.

A New Low

[tweet https://twitter.com/AnnCoulter/status/325196470716334080 ]

There’s already an effort by right-wingers to connect the Boston bombers to immigration reform:

According to law enforcement sources, the brothers entered the U.S. in 2002 or 2003, and at least one of them has been a legal permanent resident since 2007. Some on the right are already pouncing on the news to cast doubt on the desirability of immigration reform.

Tyler Cowen thinks there “is a good chance these events doom immigration reform.” McArdle agrees:

I suspect that they’ve … wrecked the chances of immigration reform.  And immigrants from the Caucasus can expect much greater scrutiny from INS.

Sargent is waiting to see if this attempt to smear immigration reform moves beyond the fringe:

It’s unclear thus far how widespread the effort among conservatives will be to connect the Boston bombing suspects to the immigration reform debate. But it’s certainly something that bears watching. If this argument picks up steam, it will be another indication of how ferocious the resistance on the right to immigration reform is going to get.

The Questions We Need Answered

Benjamin Wittes hopes authorities can take the remaining suspect alive:

The most important thing, of course, is to apprehend and stop the remaining suspect before anyone else is killed or hurt. … But it is critically important to understand what, if any, connection these suspects have both to overseas terrorist groups and to domestic folks not yet tied to the bombing, and that project will be far easier if the surviving Mr. Tsarnaev is not killed. The question is important both for obvious reasons—if some group is attacking the United States, we need to understand with maximum precision who that is and who is involved—and for less obvious legal reasons: Is this a home-grown terrorist problem that’s purely a matter of criminal law? Is this a feature of the US’s existing armed conflict with Al Qaeda and its associated forces? Or is this some new overseas terrorist threat—an extra-AUMF threat—against the United States playing out in the streets of Cambridge and Watertown? Or is this an example of a blurry line between categories? The chance to interrogate a Mr. Tsarnaev who can still talk is the quickest and easiest way to answer these questions.

What’s The Deal With Chechnya?

There are reports that the brothers are originally from Chechnya or near Chechnya. CFR has a useful 2010 primer on terrorism inside the country:

From 1994 to 1996, Russia fought Chechen guerillas in a conflict that became known as the First Chechen War. Tens of thousands of civilians died, but Russia failed to win control of Chechnya’s mountainous terrain, giving Chechnya de facto independence. In May 1996, Yeltsin signed a ceasefire with the separatists, and they agreed on a peace treaty the following year.

But violence flared again three years later. In August 1999, Chechen militants invaded the neighboring Russian republic of Dagestan to support a local separatist movement. The following month, five bombs exploded in Russia over a ten-day period, killing almost three hundred civilians. Moscow blamed Chechen rebels for the explosions, which comprised the largest coordinated terrorist attack in Russian history.

The Dagestan invasion and the Russian bombings prompted Russian forces to launch the Second Chechen War, also known as the War in the North Caucasus. In February 2000, Russia recaptured the Chechen capital of Grozny, destroying a good part of the city center in the process, reasserting direct control over Chechnya. Tens of thousands of Chechens and Russians were killed or wounded in the two wars, and hundreds of thousands of civilians were displaced. Since the end of the second war, Chechen separatist activity has diminished, and the July 2006 death of separatist leaderShamil Basayev–in an explosion many see as the work of Russia’s internal security services–seems to have stifled the movement.

But USA Today points out that, in recent years, Chechen terrorists still “committed sporadic large-scale attacks in Russia”:

In March 2010, Chechen terrorists claimed responsible for bombings on the Moscow subway system that killed more than 40 people. In June 2010, the State Department added Chechen rebel Doku Umarov, who claimed responsibility for the March subway attack, to its terrorist list and froze his assets. The reduced turmoil inside Chechnya has been the result of massive efforts by the Russian security forces.

Hayes Brown adds:

Unfortunately, this does not tell us very much at the moment. An ethnicity does not indicate any sort of defined motive or ties to any possible group or groups and law enforcement has yet to provide any confirmation of the current reporting. Chechen groups also have traditionally focused their ire on Russia rather than targeting the United States. Finally, given their lengthy residence it is difficult to discern what — if any — ties or sympathies the two brothers have to Chechen terrorist groups. The older of the brothers — Tamerlan Tsarnaev — has been in the United States since as early as 1992 as a refugee and in 2002 hoped to box for the United States at the Salt Lake City Olympics.

Who Are The Tsarnaev Brothers?

Suspects Together- High Res

David Kenner finds a photo album featuring the suspect who died in a firefight last night, Tamerlan Tsarnaev:

One of the most interesting insights into Tamerlan’s personality so far comes from a photo album, titled “Will Box For Passport,” that photographer Johannes Hirn took of the slain suspect. Tamerlan was apparently a boxer who hoped to gain citizenship by being selected for the U.S. Olympic team: “Unless his native Chechnya becomes independent, Tamerlan says he would rather compete for the United States than for Russia,” Hirn wrote.

Other captions paint Tamerlan as a devoted Muslim. “I’m very religious,” he says at one point, noting that he does not smoke or drink alcohol. “There are no values anymore,” he says, worrying that “people can’t control themselves.”

Tamerlan also appears isolated and bewildered by American life. “I don’t have a single American friend,” he laments, despite living in the United States for five years. “I don’t understand them.”

He also apparently had a YouTube channel. Serwer explains:

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the 26 year-old brother of the second Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, had a YouTube page where he posted religious videos, including a video of Feiz Mohammad, a fundamentalist Australian Muslim preacher who rails against the evils of Harry Potter. Among those videos is one dedicated to the prophecy of the Black Banners of Khurasan which is embraced by Islamic extremists—particularly Al Qaeda. The videos posted on what appears to be Tsarnaev’s YouTube page may shed light on the motivations for the attack on the Boston Marathon. The prophecy states that an invincible army will come from the region of “Khurasan,” a large portion of territory in central Asia.

Weigel points to what appears to Tamerlan’s Amazon wishlist:

Among the hits:

– How to Make Driver’s Licenses and Other ID on Your Home Computer

– The I.D. Forger: Homemade Birth Certificates & ​Other Documents Explained

– Secrets Of A Back Alley ID Man: Fake Id Construction Techniques Of The Underground

– The Lone Wolf And the Bear: Three Centuries of Chechen Defiance of Russian Rule

– Organized Crime: AN INSIDE GUIDE TO THE WORLD’S MOST SUCCESSFUL INDUSTRY

And, of course…

– How to Win Friends & Influ​ence People

The Showdown In Watertown