New Trends in Global Jihadi Terrorism

Good afternoon and welcome to today's meeting of the Commonwealth Club of California. I am Jeff Farber, Chief Executive Officer of the Koret Foundation and a member of the Commonwealth Club Board of Directors and I am pleased to serve as your chair for today's program. Today's program is underwritten by Koret. It is now my pleasure to introduce our guest speaker. This afternoon we are privileged to host Dr. Boaz Ganor, Founder and Executive Director of the Institute for Counter Terrorism in Israel and a member of Israel's National Committee for Homeland Security Technologies. Dr. Ganor is also deputy Dean of the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy at the inter disciplinary Center in Herzliya where he leads seminars on terrorism and counter terrorism policy. Dr. Ganor is an expert on combating terrorism. He has served as a consultant to several government ministries in Israel as well as in other countries. Among his many books are The Counter Terrorism Puzzle, dilemmas in counter terrorism decision making, published in both Hebrew and in English. Dr. Ganor earned his PhD at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and has made his life's work making the world a safer place. And a personal note, I had the pleasure of meeting with Dr. Ganor at the inter disciplinary school in Israel. Ladies and gentlemen please join me in welcoming Dr. Boaz Ganor. Thank you very much Jeffrey, its pleasure to be here today and I would like to thank the Commonwealth Club for hosting me here. I see this as an honor and a privilege and I would like to spend the time that I have with you today speaking about the threats of international terrorism, the threat that international terrorism pose to the safety of the world, to the safety of different countries all over the world including United States and to discuss some new trends of these specific threats of international terrorism. First and foremost I would say that I see the situation that all of us are facing today is a war, it's an irregular war but it's a war with a huge magnitude. It's a war as as we saw the Second and the First World War this - this might be the Third World War. Why it's a world war, because there is no one state which is out of the risk arena. Every state world wide is facing the threat of international terrorism these days. And when we talk about international terrorism let's call a spade a spade. This is not the threat coming from the IRA. It is not a threat that coming from ETA the Basques. It's not even a threat that coming from the Palestinian terrorism. This is a threat that refers to a very specific niche of terrorism and the most dangerous one and as you felt with the global Jihadi phenomenon. When we speak about international terrorism today we refer to global Jihadi terrorism. And I would like to argue as one of the first arguments of this afternoon is that the global Jihadi terrorism today pose such a grave threat to the safety of humanity which is incomparable to any other threats that was - that human kind was exposed in the recent years. I know that if I am using big words, how could this be great threat? May be the Cold War was a bigger threat than that. Other threats that all of us are facing bigger than that. I would argue that there are some characteristics that makes this threat the global Jihadi terrorism such a great threat to humanity. And let me go over the main characteristic of these threats. The first characteristic of these threats is the global reach of the phenomenon. There is no one state which is immune today to the problem of terrorism to the danger of terrorism. I am traveling all over the world; I am meeting decision makers, members of the Parliament, heads of Security Services and so and so forth. And I discuss this matter with them for the last few years at least since 9/11 for sure, even before that, and I have to say that in some cases, marginal cases, but some cases I had this notion is if the counterparts, the people that I discussed the matter with them, they felt as if they are immuned to this phenomenon of terrorism. One case was in Australia, prior to the attacks in Bali, as you remember the attack in Bali, this attack in Indonesia, was such an attack that many Australians died there. Actually the Australians refer to this attack as if it was against Australia itself. So they definitely changed their evaluation of the danger of the global Jihadi terrorism after Bali. But before Bali, one of the person that I discussed this matter with him, told me that you know, I understand the magnitude of the problem but it's not really our concern. And I asked him why is it not your concern. He said because we are so far, the distance will protect us, we are down under. And my answer to him was you know, at the Second World War when wining or loosing the war was an outcome of the deploying armies, armored battalions, tanks and so and so forth, then distance have a meaning. But when the war is being conducted by five, ten fifteen suicide attackers, there is no meaning of distance. Especially when you talk about the new trend of global Jihadi terrorism and this is home grown terrorism which we might have the time to discuss later on. Another decision maker which I met about an year ago in Canada also gave me the statement as if yes it's a problem but it's not really our problem. And when I asked why? He said because we have an open liberal society, we are letting in many Muslim immigrants from all over the world and we are giving them our citizenship, you don't really believe that they are going to spit into the well in which they are drinking the water from. My answer to him was you know, you are right, 90 percent of the Muslim immigrants to Canada has nothing to do with terrorism and would ever would have anything to do with terrorism in the future. No, I am wrong, not 90 percent 95 percent you know what, 99 percent. But if there is only 1 percent who thinks differently you are in a big trouble out there. A few weeks after that they found the plot of the 17 - second generation Hong Kong terrorists that wanted to launch a huge operation complying of attacks a all over Canada. The said case which I remember vividly, the - this notion of immunization was a meeting that I held in a Switzerland with one of the decision makers there. He told me, yes it's a problem but not our problem and when I asked why, he said because we are neutral. So my answer to him was, my friend there is no meaning of neutrality here, I mean you can stand in the middle of the street and shout time in again I am neutral, I am neutral, I am neutral but your opponent doesn't respect your neutrality. The opponent, the global Jihadists actually divide the world into two sections. In Arabic they call it "Dar Ul Harb" or "Dar Ul Islam" which mean the area that Islam control, and when they talk about the area the Islam control they refer to their own niche or their own radical version of Islam, and rest of the world, the rest of the world is a war zone. Dar Ul Harb, it's either you are with us or against us. It's I either you are an Islam radical or you are an infidel, no in between. So you as a Swiss person can stand and shout and I am neutral but nobody respects this neutrality. So there is no one state which is immune to the phenomenon today. Actually the phenomenon has spread from Afghanistan, to refresh our mind, between 79 and 89 there was the war in Afghanistan, the USSR invaded into Afghanistan in order to support the pro-Communist regime, but for the Islamic radical activists the Mujahudeen and for ten years they fought them but the Mujahudeen called for mercenaries, Islamic radical activists from all over the Arab and the Muslim world, to join the fight against the second super power in the world. They came by there were hundreds, actually a few thousands. When the war ended, with the victory of the Jihadists, the Mujahudeen against the second super power in the world, USSR, when the war ended they asked the they actually the the mercenaries were divided into three groups. The first group after the war stayed in Afghanistan and they were recruited by Bin laden to create the nucleus group for Al Qaeda. The core group of Al Qaeda is based on these Afghan veterans, Islamic activities coming from different countries, different nationalities within the whole Muslim world. By the way in a nutshell we have the same problem to Iraq, where we see those mercenaries coming through Iraq and after the war; probably we would see the same ramification which I described right now. So that's the first group, the second group when the war ended those mercenaries wanted to go back to the homelands and that's what they did. They went back to the places they came from Egypt, Jordan, Pakistan, Indonesia you name it, there they rejoined or first time ever joined to the local Islamic movements and actually spread first of all in the Arab and the Muslim world. The third group of mercenaries when the war ended, wanted to go back also to their homelands but since they were so notorious, the regime there didn't let them come. Based on this official refusal, they asked for the political asylum from home, from the western society, from United States, from Britain, from Canada, from Europe, Australia and so forth. So we see how this phenomenon has spread also to the western society. There is no one state which can really believe and say that they are free of these problem and they are immune to this problem. The next characteristic of the threat is the experience in the battlefield that these guys have. These are not the bourgeois, are not the middle class students that pop up in the campuses of Europe in the 70s and without under estimating those terrorists that minor the brigades and so and so forth, there is no comparison between the level of expertise that the 70s the network of International terrorism of the 70s was posing to the safety of the world and the threat that you have from these guys, Afghan Veterans which has a long experience in all types of modus operandi of terrorism, guerilla warfare, insurgencies and so and so forth. When 9/11 occurred I was here, actually I was here itself in San Francisco. I gave a lecture under the title "Stopping Suicide Terrorism" in Palo Alto on the 11 of September 2001. Two days before before 9/11 I gave a lecture to the FBI in DC. While I was going to the auditorium I saw at the corridor, on both sides of the wall, I saw leaflets of International terrorists, I stopped next to the picture of Bin Laden and I read what was written there. Every thing you would like to know about the guy was there, the color of his hair, his height and so and so forth. Then I have noticed it is written there, occupation unknown. I said, guys are you crazy, this is a full time terrorist. That's what he is doing 24/7, that's a profession today, you cannot be an amateur and be a global Jihadi terrorist. So that's the second talk of characteristic of this threat. The third one is the extreme ideology and the unique strategy that they hold in order to achieve those goal. First of all let's talk about the goal, what's the goal? I mean you don't need to be a counter terrorism expert in order to understand what's the goal of the global Jihadists? They say time and again, you just have to listen, by the way not just Arabic but also in English. The goal is to spread the version of Islam all over the world and create an Islamic radical republic, Khalifah state, all over the world which is monitored, which is controlled by the Shari'a Law. Now this by the way unites all groups of Global Jihadi terrorism by the way they are Shiites like Hezbollah or they are Sunnites like Al Qaeda, the Jihadi groups and so forth. Of course the Shiites would like to see this Khalifah state being a Shiite Khalifah state and they and the Sunnis would like to see this as a Sunni Khalifah state, never the less it's the same goal. But it's very important to me, to emphasis the following. Being a counter terrorism expert, being an Israeli and being a Jew I would like to stress and I am saying that not in order to be politically correct in the Commonwealth Club, I do not see this war and as I said it is war, but I do not see this war as many of my colleagues see that all over the world, as a war between religions. This is not a war between Islam against the rest of the world as many are trying to understand that that way. This is a war between cultures. This is a war between the culture of Islamic radicalism against the rest of the world and the rest of the world includes the vast majority of the Muslims. The vast majority of the Muslims which are not Islamic radicals, in the eye of those Jihadists, they are no less infidels than any Jew or Christian world wide. This is not the war between religion, it's first of all a war within religion, the religion of Islam and we have to acknowledge that. And we have to understand that and we have to understand may be we will get to that later on, that the key factor for this problem lies on the on the shoulder and the responsibility first of all of the Muslims themselves. They have to deal with it because it's a war of ideas, it's a war of education, it's a war of cultures and they have to deal with these internal problems that they have. Of course international committee has to back the moderates. But this is first of all the responsibility of the Muslims themselves. I do not see the Koran more dogmatic than the Bible or the New Testament. I do believe that you can find very harsh article in the Koran or in the Bible or any other literature of any religion. The question is not if you have harsh articles there or not because you have all sorts of many merciful articles in every religion. The question is what do you choose in order to preach to your constituency. And the global Jihadists are looking for these harsh statements in the harsh articles. And therefore I think it's crucial to understand that there is a war between cultures. Now I would say further more than that, when you analyze the different grievances that motivated terrorist organization world wide in the recent century the last 100 years, you see different organization which is been motivated by different grievances altogether. Socio economical grievances, nationalistic grievances, extreme ideology, Communism, Fascism, Anarchism, I would argue when somebody is being motivated by religious grievances, by what he believe is a divine command is much more dangerous than any other type of terrorist organization all together. Now Bin Laden is not the fault, Bin Laden doesn't really believe that he could conquer the world. Bin Laden doesn't believe that he can conquer a one state if you ask me. So how can we understand his strategy, we should understand his strategy as a stagiest strategy. I was talking about this stagiest strategy way back but about a year ago, number two in command Zawahiri was writing that actually that this is a stagiest strategy and the first stage is not the United States, its not Britain, its not Europe. The first stage is the Arab and the Muslim world itself. Check this, where were most of the attacks since 9/11? Did they occur in the United States, in Europe, in Australia, no. Most of the attacks since 9/11 occurred in Egypt, in Jordan, in Turkey, in Indonesia in Saudi Arabia, in north of Africa, Arab and Muslim countries. That's the first target, that's the first goal. The idea here that Al Qaeda and the global Jihadists are trying to shake the stability of those regimes in the Arab and the Muslim countries and by that to create the circumstances which would make it possible for the local Islamic radical movements to revolt against the regime and to take the control in these countries. Even 9/11 I would argue was meant to that. How come? Well, if you analyze what was the statements that this spokesmen of Al Qaeda gave to the public, gave to the American public immediately 9/11. There were two concrete demands from the Americans. One was take your troops out of any Arab soil, Muslim soil; two don't spend your tax payer's money on corrupted Arab regime in Israel. Now you know what, it makes sense. I mean for an American to say to himself, wait a minute, to protect myself and my family from these atrocities of terrorism, to fly all over world, to be tourists with no fear and in order to do all of the above I have to pay so called just by saving the life of my kids, bring them home and save my money, not spend it on corrupted Arab regime in Israel why not, it makes sense. They want me to be a little bit isolationist, okay you know the history of United States had some isolationism in as a factor in the foreign policy. Now think about it, what would Kuwait do without American military presence or other gulf countries. What would Egypt do without American monetary or Jordan, or Israel for that matter? This would shake this stability of these regimes and that's exactly what the terrorists are trying to achieve. By the way the most of the attacks that I described in the Arab and Muslims countries were against what? Against tourism, by that you are holding stick from both ends. On one hand you actually kill foreigners, kill westerners on the soil of the Arab and the Muslim country but on the other hand you prevent one of the main source of the income of the state, Turkey, Egypt, Jordan relies a lot in their budget on tourism, if you stop tourism you actually hurt the income, if you hurt the income, the government cannot give the services that they use to give, the great public tension, political tension which can be used or misused by local Islamic radical movements that by the way give all of these services in many cases free of charge by buying hearts and minds. So that's the strategy. The next characteristic of the threat is the modus operandi, the tactic that these guys are using. And the modus operandi, they have different types of attacks that they use but the trademark of the global Jihadists is suicide attack, actually simultaneous suicide attacks. That's the trademark of the global Jihadists. Now we have to say something about this modus operandi in order to understand that, I don't want to invest too much time in explaining it. But I would argue in this respect that suicide attack is the most effective tactic of modern terrorism. The suicide attacker is no more than a platform that actually carries on the explosives but this platform can think and therefore like a smart bomb this platform can decide even more than a smart bomb, this platform can decide two things. First when, second where to explode itself in order to commit the maximum number of causalities and damages. To give you some numbers, in Israel between 2000 and 2004, we had thousands of attacks, actually approximately 5000 of attacks altogether, not suicide attacks, all types of terrorists attacks. The number of suicide attacks from the overall incidence was less than a half percent, the number of causalities the suicide attacks post in Israel in those four-five years is more than 50 percent of the overall casualties. Just showing you how effective suicide attack is, half percent of the incidence cause more than 50 percent of the casualties. That's what the global Jihadists are using and they are very effective in doing that. Also, its really frightening much more frightening than a regular attack, knowing that there is a guy there ready to kill himself and by doing that to kill others, to kill you is much more frightening, its greatening anxiety and that's exactly what the terrorism modern terrorism is trying to achieve. The next characteristic is what I would argue the probability of the global Jihadists using non conventional terrorism. What's non conventional terrorism? We call it CBRN, chemical, biological, radiological god forbid may be even nuclear. Now, as you can understand I argue that these guys will probably would be the platform which will introduce post modern terrorism to us, to us to the west society, to the Arab and the Muslim world as well. Them and not other terrorist organizations, now how can I say? How can I say that most probably these guys would use non conventional terrorism? For that, let me share the basic understanding that I believe that I have in the method of terrorism. I researched the phenomenon of terrorism for approximately 25 years and if you ask me if I can summarize anything I know about terrorism into one sentence, I can do that, the sentence would be the formula of terrorism. What's the formula of terrorism? The formula of terrorism is a formula which has two factors, motivation plus operational capability. Which means when a certain group of people has both, motivation to launch attacks and they have the personal capability that allows him to materialize these motivation then a terrorists attack would occur. From this basic formula of terrorism we can understand by the way what's the basic formula of counter terrorism is or should be? Basic formula of counter terrorism should be lower down the operational capability of the terrorists, or lower down the motivation of the terrorists. By the way it's enough to deal with one factor, because if you have a group of people that has motivations but they don't have the personal capability to materialize the motivation you are not going to suffer from terrorist attacks and vice versa. If you have people that have motivation what did I say probably the other side the other side has the personal capability and lack the motivation there is not going to be a terrorist attack. This is a temporary solution for terrorism; it's not an ultimate solution for terrorism. The ultimate solution for terrorism is dealing with both factors at the same time. Lowering down the personal capability of the terrorists and lowering the motivation of the terrorists. Unfortunately there is a contradiction between the two. In the literature of terrorism it's called the boomerang effect. What's the boomerang effect? If you try to lower down your personal capability of the terrorists, in most cases it would be by using offensive activity, like it or not you raise the motivation to retaliate. That's the boomerang effect. It's not impossible to deal with it, you can deal with that you can deal with that. Some only if you read my book, The Counter Terrorism Puzzle. Now, having this in mind let's try together to analyze what's the motivation do they have the motivation and do they have the operational capability, the global Jihadists, to use non conventional terrorism? I am afraid that the answer is positive on those two factors. Motivation, Bin laden was asked publicly in the 90s would you ever use non conventional ingredients in your attacks and the answer is I would regard it as a sin not to use every mean that I would have in my hands in order to defend the Muslims from the infidels. So the motivation is there, but you would say wait a minute, he knows that by launching biological attack, nuclear attack many Muslims would be hurt as an out come of it. This probably will prevent him from doing so, will deter him. My colleagues and my staff that are working at my institute at ICT in Israel which are monitoring the Arabic speaking websites of Al Qaeda and the supporters and the affiliated groups and so and so forth have found this question about three years ago, which was asked in one of the forms of the global Jihadists and it was designated to one of the religious cleric, is it right or wrong to use non conventional ingredients in your attacks knowing that many Muslims might be hurt as an outcome of that? And the answer was you can do that because you defend Islam and when you defend Islam you can sacrifice a lot of Muslims as well. So they have the motivations, they have the religious permission, do they have the personal capability? I am afraid that my answer is probably yes as well. And why is that? First of all we saw several attempts to use first of all chemical terrorism. This is most the easiest task. We saw attempts to use resin poisoning gas in Europe in the recent two years. We saw attempt to use cyanide in Amman, in Jordan. And let alone the recent weeks which we saw Chlorine bombing attacks or bombing attacks together with Chlorine which created a lot of causalities much more than regular bombing attacks, in Europe. And I am afraid to say that terrorists in general when they understand that there is a new tactic, a new modus operandi that works, they imitate each other. And from my point of view it is only a matter of time until we are going to see chemical non conventional attacks being conducted in the western society. I gave this lecture in Florida a few days ago. When I finished my lecture talking about the threat from Chlorine as as one ingredient which is easy to put your hands on it, I learned from from the media that on that very day there was a huge theft of Chlorine in California and the FBI is investigating them. So what we see actually that this is another concrete threat that we have to take under consideration. But you know what, even if you calculate every thing I have said until now the, global reach of the phenomenon, the extreme ideology that these guys are holding, they believe in a divine command, their readiness to kill and to be killed, to commit a suicide attack, the experience in the battle filed, the the possibility of use of non conventional ingredients, you should tell me my friend Boaz, you exaggerated. How could these what you described right now how could these be more dangerous than the Cold War? In the cold war you had two super powers, the USSR facing the USA. Each super power held 100's of nuclear war heads that could destroy the world several times all together. How could the global Jihadist phenomenon be a bigger danger than that? Because of the last factor that I would like to discus with you and the last factor is a different type of rationality, different type of rational decision making process. Many people all over the world refer to the global Jihadist that they refer to other terrorist organizations, as irrational actors. I beg to differ. I do believe that terrorists, whoever they are, terrorist organizations and global Jihadi terrorist organization are rational actors. Now, what's a rational actor? What's rational actor decision making all together? A rational decision making is calculation of cost and benefits and choosing the alternative which in the eye of the beholder more beneficial than costly. That's a rational decision making, that's what you are doing everyday, almost every minute, that's what I am doing. That's exactly what the terrorists are doing as well. They are calculating cost and benefits and they are choosing the alternative which in their eyes is more beneficial than costly to achieve their goals and so and so forth. This is by the way a good news, I don't see you smiling but this is good news. This is good news because if that's the case once you understand the rationality of the other side you can know how to deal with them. Stick, carrots or whatever but you know how to deal with it. The problem is and that's what I am arguing, the problem is that unlike the case of the Cold War, when you had the two super powers facing each other, you had the USSR threatening the United States and may be vice versa which they have this they had the same rationality, when you have the same rationality you can communicate, you can negotiate, you can threaten, you can deter, you can even make concessions. But when you have an opponent, an enemy which have a different rationality and you don't understand his rationality and he doesn't understands yours, you cannot communicate with him, you cannot negotiate with him, you cannot threaten him you cannot deter him and you cannot make concessions to him. Why, because by making concession you would like to send the one message but he understands the message differently because he has a different rationality. That's the biggest problem that we face. So having all of this in mind I would like to discuss for one minute the new trend of global Jihadi terrorism. You know we saw Al Qaeda until 9/11 being constructed in a very high (radical) [0:32:50] terrorist organization, like any other type, you had the leadership, Bin Laden, the deputies and then down there in the pyramids you had the activists that conducted the attacks. 9/11 was an outcome of this structured framework highly (radical) [0:33:06] framework, it was a very well planned terrorist attack that was an outcome of this chain of command altogether. After 9/11 and especially after the campaign in Afghanistan Al Qaeda was forced to change its modus operandi, to change its structure. Why, because Al Qaeda lost, first of all the autonomous territory that they had in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda lost all the infrastructure that they had in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda lost their training basis, the offices and so and so forth. Al Qaeda lost the support of the regime, the Taliban regime that supported them. Al Qaeda - Al Qaeda - I see its okay - Al Qaeda also lost the freedom of their leadership running from shelter to shelter and Al Qaeda also lost about 50 percent of their man power. These forced Al Qaeda to move and to rely much more on proxies, on affiliated terrorist organization. What we saw since 9/11, in many cases Al Qaeda initiated the attack but other Islamic radical with the organization like the GSPC, like the Zarqawi, Al Qaeda in Iraq and so and so forth conducted the attack at the end of the day. Today in the last year or two we are facing a new trend in this dynamic development of the global Jihadists of terrorism at large. The new trend is relying much more on home grown terrorism. In in that case the Al Qaeda becomes much more organization which does not initiate the attack necessarily but inspires others to do so. And they do that using different types of communication, but mainly the internet, virtual communities, phone, blogs, chats, websites. today as I opened it. We the international community, Muslims, Arabs, Westerners, several countries, we are not going to win this war unless the Muslim world will acknowledge the level of the threat that global Jihadism pose to the Muslims first of all. Unless they will be recorded as an - not as an altruistic step toward anybody else, as an egoistic step to all the religion, to all the beliefs, to all their regimes and they would take the responsibility to fight this phenomenon, to deal with it. And fighting that it's not just and not necessarily only offensive measures and so and so forth. It's education, it's welfare the international community should create a Marshall Plan, like after the second world war, to help the welfare and to help the education for moderation, for liberalism, for democracy and so and so forth with in the Muslim world, help them in monetary terms. And I do believe that the same responsibility that lies to them in the today on the shoulder of states, Arab and Muslim states, lies also on the shoulder of the lay leaders of the Muslim communities in the western society because this radicalization process is not happening just in Jordan or in Pakistan. It happens in every backyard of every big city of every state. And it is the responsibility of the community itself to deal with these radicalization processes with the help, with the support of the state and the country. Thank you very much.