Al-Qaeda & Islamic State: Some Ideological and Strategic Differences

There have been various efforts to understand the relationship between Al-Qaeda (AQ) and the Islamic State (IS). Most notably, there have been flagrant inaccuracies from politicians. John Kerry purposefully conflated the two groups in order to use pre-existing AUMF as legal justification to bomb IS in Syria, describing the intra-jihadist conflict as a ‘publicity stunt’ and arguing that they consisted of ‘the same people’.

To clarify, this discussion shall focus on the broader ‘Al-Qaedaism’ of AQ central (AQ/C), not specific franchises — although Jabhat An-Nusrah (JAN) will be of interest at points. Also, I assume a certain continuity across previous incarnations of the Islamic State, and will demonstrate a consistency between Zarqawi’s words and deeds to current activities in Iraq and Syria.

Ideology

It’s regularly asserted that IS and AQ ideology are essentially one and the same. Obviously, they are both firmly rooted in Salafi-Jihadism, and the groups’ repeatedly interconnected history can be used to demonstrate an ideological affinity. However, while they share many ideological aspects, the two groups are anchored to different worldviews, as delineated by ‘bin Ladenism’ and ‘Zarqawism’.

When analysing a specific ideology, it’s useful to dissect it into separate ‘frames’. Diagnostic frames — those which identify a problem and those responsible — are the starting point of any ideology. Following on from them, prognostic frames prescribe a specific course of action to remedy the diagnosed factors.

Core Al-Qaeda Frames

Al-Qaeda identifies ‘the West’ (or ‘the Zionist-Crusader alliance’) as the origin of all problems facing ‘Muslim lands’. Bin Laden explains this aptly in a document retrieved from his Abottabad compound:

the plague that exists in the nations of Muslims has two causes: The first is the presence of American hegemony and the second is the presence of Islamic rulers who have abandoned Islamic law and identify with this hegemony, serving its interests in exchange for securing their own. The only way for us to establish the religion and alleviate the plague which has befallen Muslims is to remove this hegemony… The way to remove this hegemony is to continue our direct attrition against the American enemy until it is broken and too weak to interfere in the matters of the Islamic world.

Here, OBL clearly identifies a top-down, external imposition as being the primary causal factor for what he saw as an Islamic civilisational decline. He also establishes a prognosis: the West must be fought until it is drained of its military and economic resources. (It is noteworthy that the Afghan-Arab experiences in the anti-Soviet jihad led many zealots to presume that they had been granted some ability to defeat superpowers. It is possible this ‘religious determinism’, to use Kandil’s terminology, had impacted bin Laden’s judgement to some degree.) Bin Laden clarifies that civilisational progress can only be made through jihad against the US, then its regional allies.

Elsewhere, he stressed the necessity for a united Islamic world, and spoke at length against fitnah (civil strife) — infighting between Muslims, including sectarianism. In his 1996 fatwah he specifically ruled against ‘an internal war’, asserting that ‘there is a duty on the Muslims to ignore the minor differences among themselves’.

Of course, Al-Qaeda does adopt a ‘with us or against us’ approach. A general principle of Salafi-Jihadism is that its adherents consider themselves the ‘saved sect’ and function on the notion of al-walā’ wa-l-barā’. This results in ‘in-group love’ and a corresponding ‘out-group hate’ that defines and directs collective action along clearly understood ‘us-them’ boundaries. It ultimately leads to a declaration of takfir for their enemies, but the leadership hesitant to kill anyone perceived as being innocent. There was dissent towards Zawahiri for this reason during a Q&A on a jihadi forum some years ago. An important part of AQ ideology is da’wah — ‘inviting’ others to their cause. All Muslims, even those of the out-group, are potential supporters or recruits. Interestingly, this results in a disconnect between the da’wah and al wala’ wa-l-bara’ that is generally ignored in the academic literature on Salafi-Jihadism.

Similarly, to deny the presence of sectarianism within AQ thought would be absurd. The current geopolitical climate has encouraged sectarian division, and several AQ affiliates are engaged in conflict along such an ethno-religious divide. Furthermore, Bin Laden himself is accused of participating in a massacre of Shi’a civilians at Gilgit in Pakistan — apparently at the behest of Zia Ul-Haq. (The Inter Service Intelligence trained and armed the Afghan Arabs.) But it’s important to note that AQ did not originally diagnose non-Sunni Muslim as factor that had to be battled and overcome at the heart of its ideology. Most interestingly, his mother, with whom he maintained a good relationship, was an ‘Alawite from Latakia. As this thorough history of Zarqawi explains: ‘Al-Zarqawi came across to bin Laden as aggressively ambitious, abrasive, and overbearing. His hatred of Shiites also seemed to bin Laden to be potentially divisive — which, of course, it was’.

Core Islamic State Frames

The above can be contrasted clearly with the ‘Zarqawism’ that has paved the way for the various incarnations of what is now IS. Fishman wrote of Zarqawi that he ‘believed society itself was corrupt, and he therefore used violence to terrify, radicalize, and purge it’. A more recent Quilliam report notes how ‘IS has made its first priority internal purification’.

Both AQ and IS want to control society and make it conform to their interpretation of Islam. However, AQ believes that society requires liberation from imperialist powers and their secular puppets. Unshackled by these ‘enemies of Islam’, Muslims will rally to the cause. IS, on the other hand, has a more pessimistic view of society. Seeing sin as omnipresent in society with, Zarqawism places takfir at the centre of its doctrine. Even Maqdisi — the AQ ideologue with whom Zarqawi spent four years in a Jordanian prison, and from whom he learned much of his theological and political grounding — rejected the approaches being put into action in Iraq, urging him to ‘not issue sweeping proclamations of takfir’ or ‘proclaim people to be apostates because of their sins’. IS extends AQ ideological justifications of al-wala’ wa-l-bara’ until inter-group boundaries and dynamics advocate an ‘out-group’ omnicide.

This manifests most plainly in an aggressively sectarian framing that has been at odds with AQC. In 2004 Zarqawi wrote to OBL that the Shi’a are ‘the most evil of mankind’, ‘the lurking snake’, and ‘the true challenge’. Most notably: ‘The danger from the Shi’a … is greater and their damage is worse and more destructive to the ummah than the Americans’. That the US-led coalition was then occupying Iraq shows how removed Zarqawism is from bin Ladenism; this was the perfect opportunity for AQ to put its plan of unity against the US into action. Rather, Zarqawi focused on initiating a civil war and various campaigns of ethnic cleansing. Zawahiri responded lamentingly to Zarqawi: ‘why kill ordinary Shi’a, considering that they are forgiven because of their ignorance?’ The AQ then-deputy advised focusing on US troops, warning against unpopular and unhelpful ‘scenes of slaughter’. He continued: ‘My opinion is that this matter won’t be acceptable to the Muslim population however much you have tried to explain it, and aversion to this will continue’. He even mocked: ‘And can the mujahedeen kill all of the Shia in Iraq? Has any Islamic state in history ever tried that? … And what loss will befall us if we did not attack the Shi’a?’ Zarqawi was not deterred.

A decade on, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi sent the following message to Saudi Arabian followers: ‘Deal with the rāfidah [Shi’a] first, wherever you find them, then Āl-Salul [House of Saud] and their soldiers, before the Crusaders and their bases’. He also refers to the Shi’a as ‘the head of the snake’ — rhetoric generally reserved by AQ for the US. In terms of diagnostic and prognostic frames, IS has thus continued to prioritise this ‘internal enemy’ above the ‘near’ or ‘far’.

Another way in which IS ideology appears to differ from AQ is the importance it ascribes to eschatological narratives. With constant references to Dabiq, for example, it attaches a strong significance to its interpretations of apocalyptic theology. This aspect does exist within AQ ideology — similarly, JAN’s media outlet Al-Manarat Al-Baydah (The white minaret) is a reference to the location of Jesus’ return during the end-times, thought to be in Damascus. But Islamic State believe that ‘the Hour’ is imminent, and that they themselves are able to directly aid its arrival by fighting and defeating ‘Rome’ in the Syrian countryside. It is also very clear that IS’ apocalypticism is intimately tied to territory. While OBL used apocalyptic ahādith more conceptually (such as ‘The Last Hour would not come until the Muslims fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them’), this IS frame is clearly connected with other, more tangible aspects of its ideology — most notably the caliphate and its physical presence.

Strategy

As with ideological assumptions, such as the mutual grounding in Salafi-Jihadism, there are similarities among their strategic visions. Both groups target the West—although they ascribe a different precedence, in accordance with the above ideological frames—and they do so with the same strategic understandings and imperatives. These similarities will be discussed before moving onto some more notable strategic deviations.

First and foremost, the central notion of strategic terrorism is that it achieves nothing in terms of political goals in and of itself. It’s power is in predicting and encouraging a response from the target audience, in the understanding that it will in turn advance the desired agenda. Roughly, this can be dissected as follows:

(1) Isolate Muslim communities within Western societies to generate more recruits. Both IS and AQ seek to achieve this civilisational division within target societies. After 9/11, bin Laden believed this had been achieved, stating: ‘The most important positive consequence of the attacks on New York & Washington was that they showed the truth about the fight between the crusaders and the Muslims. They revealed how much the crusaders resent us, once these two attacks stripped the wolf of its sheep’s clothing and showed us its horrifying face. The entire world awoke…’

In this same strategic light, IS attacks such as Paris, San Bernardino, etc., seek to initiate a negative response towards local Muslim communities. It is important to note the jihadist framing holds that the West is already ‘at war with Islam’, so they are essentially trying to get them to show their true colours. For this reason, US Republican candidate Donald Trump’s suggestion to ban all Muslims from entering the country was welcomed by Jihadists, and soon featured on a number of propaganda items. Such rhetoric simply reinforces their position, providing further ‘evidence’ and ‘proof’ that non-Islamic civilisations are their sworn enemy.

But, more so than governments, this aspect appeals to Western societies. ‘Counter-Jihadist’ movements such as Pegida, EDL, etc. contribute greatly to creating the desired divisive recruiting environments. Islamophobic sentiment always rises after jihadist attacks. For example, mosques were attacked in the UK and France respectively following the Lee Rigby and Charlie Hebdo incidents. This ‘us and them’ mentality, as well as the moral outrage and personal grievances that follow such acts, are central to radicalisation processes that will bring in new sympathisers and members.

(2) Active target response. This aspects seeks to coerce the target government into taking a heavy-handed approach, ideally provoking repression in order to generate sympathy among the desired constituency. Naturally, this target constituency is predominantly Muslims in the West (as above), but it also caters for non-Muslim citizens who will perceive their governments as being ‘part of the problem’, thus lowering legitimacy.

The speech by bin Laden cited in the ideological dissection points plainly to his strategy of ‘attrition’. The assassination of Ahmad Shah Massoud by Al-Qaeda operatives just two days prior to 9/11 is suggestive that AQ strategists accurately anticipated an active response in Afghanistan. His assassins, pretending to be Belgian journalists, insisted on meeting with him no later than September 10 and threatened to leave the country if they would not be seen by then. Massoud, the influential Northern Alliance leader, would have likely coalesced resistance to the Taliban regime that protected AQC and provided the US-led coalition with ever-needed partners on the ground. So, while this strategy was conducted with the eventual objective of removing Western influences, it first sought to draw the ‘enemies of Islam’ out into the open to be drained and defeated in the ‘graveyard of empires’. As mentioned earlier, it is possible that the Afghan-Arab understanding of the anti-Soviet jihad contributed to the strategic vision.

This is also recognisable as an IS strategy. IS repeatedly attempts to lure Western militaries into action to conclude their apocalyptic mission in Dabiq. Of course, while they frame this in terms of Islamic eschatological mythology, IS strategists are behaving rationally. They are fully aware that dropping bombs on them will entail civilian casualties, which will produce more sympathy and recruitment possibilities. This is especially plausible where they control territory and thus narratives. (Anti-Western sentiment is easily tapped into; consider for a moment the decades of Ba’athist propaganda). For IS, their ‘propaganda of the deed’ is generally conveyed via death-porn videos. It is noteworthy that the commencement of US-led bombing campaigns against the group coincided with, and predicated on, such propaganda releases, rather than any mainland attacks. The fact that IS have escalated to full-blown terrorist attacks in Europe is perhaps indicative of their desire to encourage Western troop deployments.

Similarly, both groups benefit from the double-sided narrative of (a) victimisation at the hands of the Crusader-Zionists, and (b) presenting themselves as stalwart saviours of the Sunni world. Entering an asymmetric conflict with US-led coalitions is thus beneficial to their overall brand image. In this way, for IS, being targeted by the West could have been — and may yet prove to be — highly beneficial in terms of coopting competition, potentially ushering in a collective focus on the ‘great satan’ of the US-Zionist-Crusader-Imperialists and setting aside their differences. Essentially, IS leaderships’ experiences in post-invasion Iraq demonstrated the potential for mass-mobilisation that accompanies foreign military presence/occupation.

(3) Passive target response / withdrawal. In complete juxtaposition to the above, IS propaganda also urges Western governments that the fight is not worthwhile. Videos featuring Muhammad Emwazi (“Jihadi John”) repeatedly asserted that the West is being targeted because of its involvement it “Muslim lands” and “Muslim affairs”. If such interventions were to stop, and an isolationist foreign policy was assumed, the implication is that terrorism against the target nations will cease. While the most unlikely response (and the opposite of what has happened over the past 2 years), and it is ultimately unrealistic to expect disengagement from IS towards the West, the end goal is still a Middle East free from foreign influence. The real goal is to establish and consolidate power over Sunni-majority areas in Syria and Iraq, which is why drawing recruits to that region (i.e. point 1) is crucial. The (mostly Iraqi and former Ba’athist) leadership craves a return to power first and foremost, not necessarily the demise of the West and all things kuffr.

This is the repeated message of AQ statements surrounding 9/11. While an aggressive response was expected, planned, and prepared for, the expressed desire is to remove Western regional hegemony. The notion that ‘they hate us for our freedoms’, or that the West is targeted by AQ because of its liberal democratic nature, is out of touch with a textual understanding of Al-Qaedaism. To be sure, these concepts are incompatible with jihadist ideology, but they are not the imperative behind this strategy of international terrorism.

The difference between AQ and IS with regards to this strategy lies in the dedication of each. IS is able to encourage such activities with almost no commitment of finances, intelligence, manpower, or other resources. The San Bernardino shooting is demonstrative here. It is unlikely that IS command was even aware that the attack was going to take place — much less so that they actively participated in its facilitation or instruction. The couple were definitive ‘self-starters’, attaching themselves to an ideological cause without any significant network ties. Even the costs of the Paris attacks were low enough to have been fielded privately (~30,000 Euros). This is incomparable with the time, effort, and resources dedicated to attacking America by OBL and AQC. The September 11 attacks that still define Al-Qaeda to this day were the product of at least two or three years planning and up to 500,000 USD.

Other strategies differ on a conceptual level, rather than simply on matters of implementation.

Al-Qaeda Strategy

As we have seen, the AQ goal of liberating Muslim lands is to be achieved by removing un-Islamic foreign influences and toppling un-Islamic local governments. For this reason, AQ strategy shifted following 9/11, after which it began its phase of what Kilcullen terms ‘global insurgency’ — a global network of disparate groups that translate AQC’s goals into (g)local action. In this way, the world order can be undone and replaced across the entirety of the Islamic world (and indeed beyond). The desired result of this military strategy, as stated above by bin Laden, was to drain the West during a protracted counter-insurgency war of attrition, spreading their attention, forces, and resources as widely and thinly as possible.

In this sense, Al-Qaeda uses the concept of the Caliphate in a discursive and motivational capacity. By promising the return of a united Islamic super-state, it binds together insurgents and terrorists from Asia to the Americas into a single utopian vision. Al-Qaeda’s Caliphate will not come about through ‘remaining and expanding’ from one central focal point. Rather, separate ‘emirates’ will be established by local partners and representatives on the ground. Al-Jolani has ostensibly founded such an emirate in Idlib, as has AQAP in Yemen’s Hadramawt region. There is no immediacy to the declaration of a caliphate. Indeed, bin Laden did not expect to see such a proclamation in his lifetime.

In the meantime, pragmatic relations are deemed acceptable. Bin Laden had a practical working relationship with Hezbollah — something utterly inconceivable at the present. In the current Syrian context, JAN is willing to cooperate with other groups on the ground, even embedding itself among other units. Complementing its doctrine of da’wah, Zawahiri advises to ‘cooperate on what we agree and advice and correct each other on what we disagree’. The Jaysh Al-Fatah operations room is just one example of collaboration with competing groups. JAN regularly puts aside ideological or methodological differences in order to fulfil local mid-term strategic gains. While governance in such shared areas is collective, JAN is able to maintain a level of influence over shari’ah rulings and other matters of governance. JAN has thus secured a future within the opposition; it has become a reliable and essential fighting force that acts as a military and political vanguard. This also ties in with the glocal and narrow-casted AQ strategy. JAN centres its marketing and branding on the idea of being a ‘local cause’ and championing the Syrian revolution, while also adhering to Al-Qaeda’s transnationalism.

On the other hand, while ‘bin Ladenism’ may have discouraged sectarianism, Al-Qaeda has clearly fallen victim to its circumstances in this regard. JAN, like other franchises, is undeniably engaged in a conflict with sectarian overtones, and anti-Shi’a or anti-‘Alawi rhetoric is commonplace within its ranks. For example Al-Jawlani has previously threatened a genocidal stance towards the ‘Alawites of Latakia. Yet, the purposeful stoking of sectarian tensions, and excessive violence against Muslim civilians and/or potential allies does not constitute a strategic decision that AQ has made on the whole. For example, AQAP was swift to denounce IS’ Wilayat Sana’a attack on a Yemeni Shi’a mosque in accordance with Zawahiri’s guidelines that reject ‘targeting mosques, markets, and public places out of concern for the lives of innocent Muslims, and to prioritize the paramount interests’.

Islamic State Strategy

In contrast, as Lister writes, the ‘central facet of IS’ military strategy aims to spark or sustain sectarian conflict’. While AQ’s strategy of targeting the West brought it infamy on 9/11, IS has gained notoriety largely due to its massacring of religious minorities.

The historical origins of IS are important here. Zarqawi gave birth to what is now IS in the wake of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. As we know, the de-Ba’athification programme of Paul Bremer’s CPA ‘Order Number 2’—the ‘Dissolution of Entities’—utterly disenfranchised the previously dominant Sunni minority. This cemented the necessary motivation for a sectarian outlook and strategy of revenge and recapture.

It also led to the incorporation of former Ba’athist elements. Operating out of Syria, where the leadership endorsed and enabled jihad against coalition troops across the suddenly unmanned border, a ‘pragmatic association’ of command and control emerged almost immediately between Iraqi Ba’athists and Zarqawi’s AQI. This strategic alliance has survived the test of time; Ba’athists are thought to make up the majority of IS leadership cadres. Significantly, when Mosul and Tikrit were captured, former Ba’athis generals were installed as governors.

Viewed from this perspective of ‘re-Ba’athification’, the decision to declare a Caliphate compliments a strategy to draw fighters and support into its territories in order to advance what is essentially a nationalistic agenda. For this reason, territorial gains are of paramount importance, and it is through such geographical control that IS derives its legitimacy among transnational jihadist communities. As mentioned previously, eschatological frames also contribute to the strategy of drawing people into IS heartlands.

It is also only through such control that IS can implement its ideological impulse of societal purification. IS has spent much of its manpower and resources eliminating its ‘internal enemies’, such as its campaign against the Yazidis, massacres of Iraqi soldiers, and civilian executions. For the Iraqi Ba’athist components of IS, this hyper-takfirist and genocidal doctrine is likely more to do with revenge and a reminiscence of Saddam-era totalitarian power than the religious justifications that motivate fanatical and zealous foreign fighters.

Similarly, in Syria, rather than fighting the ‘near enemy’ of Bashar Al-Assad, IS has spent significant energies on absorbing previously rebel-held territories and entering a campaign of ‘outbidding’. In contrast to a) AQ’s cooperation with other Salafists and b) IS’ willingness to accept Ba’athist elements, IS has refused to cooperate with rival Sunni rebel groups since 2014 unless they give bay’ah to its leadership and become part of its pyramid structure. Failure to do so results in being branded as a member of the Sahwāt. All others have been actively fought, allowing it to prey off weaker, non-state actors and make rapid gains in the Levant during 2014. Indeed, documents released by Der Spiegel revealed a long-term intelligence-led infiltration of rebel-held areas that were later subsumed in an operation comparable to the Night of the Long Knives.

In short, AQ’s diagnosis of an external, top-down problem requires a pan-Islamic ‘glocal’ solution and according strategies; IS’ internal ‘bottom-up’ diagnosis requires a corresponding totalitarian response in order to control a corrupted society.

Does this matter? Understanding an enemy’s motivations and strategies are paramount to effectively combatting them. While Kerry’s aforementioned speech was a legal argument used in order to bypass opposition to airstrikes—and as such should not be taken too seriously—our understanding of IS has nevertheless been viewed through the prism of the War on Terror with Al-Qaeda. In fact, their motivations, methodologies, and ambitions are divorced from one another. If the aim is to defeat both groups, there must be separate strategies to deal with them—strategies that also cater for the fact that they both exist within, and recruit from, the broader Global Jihadist Movement.