tisdag, december 14, 2010

Taimour - ensamvarg eller jihadsoldat ?

Det välinformerade nyhetsbrevet

Jihadica analyserar om bomb-

mördaren Taimour Abdulwahab

är en ensamvarg eller tillhör Al-Qaeda:

***

Forum readers woke up this morning to

find Taimour’s picture on the top banner

of Shumukh (the main jihadi forum).

The banner advertises a poem by a

certain “Sha’ir al-Ansar” (Poet of the

Ansar) praising Taimour Abdalwahab.

At first sight this might seem like the

work of an accomplice, but the poet

explicitly states that he did not know

Taimour personally.

**

More interesting is the posting of a new

audio message by a certain Abu Sulayman

al-Nasir titled

“Warning to NATO Countries Following

the Stockholm Raid.” The message echoes

an earlier statement by the same person

issued on 20 November.

What’s interesting here is not so much

the messages as the messenger, because

Abu Sulayman al-Nasir is the same person

who first mentioned Taimour Abdulwahhab’s

name on Shumukh. This obviously raises

the possibility that he has some connection

to the Stockholm attack.

**

The problem is that the earliest public

reference to Taimour’s name was made on

11 December at 10.24 pm on a non-Islamist

Swedish forum, based on private pictures on

the license plate of the bombing vehicle.

Abu Sulayman al-Nasir’s Shumukh post

mentioning Taimour’s name was published

at around 6pm on 12 December, ie almost

20 hours after the name had entered the

public sphere. Al-Nasir could therefore very

well have found Taimour’s name on the web.

**

In this connection it is worth noting that

Shumukh has a LOT of readers in Sweden.

Aaron recently posted traffic data for

Shumukh for the month of November,

according to which a full 3.6 percent of

non-proxy IP addresses were based in Sweden.

If you adjust for population size, this

means Sweden had over 20 times as

many Shumukh readers per 1000 inhabitants,

and over 33 times as many readers per

1000 Muslims as the United Kingdom.

**

This is admittedly back-of-the envelope

calculations using on population data from

Wikipedia, (here and here), but the proportions

are striking.

As expected, the freelance jihadi media

machinery has started churning out

material glorifying the Stockholm bomber.

In addition to the abovementioned poem,

someone posted a Youtube production of

Taimour’s martyrdom will, along with a

cheesy photo montage with Taimour

surrounded by lightning.

Mainstream media has also started digging

into Taimour’s life in Luton, showing,

among other things, that he was rad-

icalised by at least 2007, when he revealed

militant anti-Western views to an imam in

a local mosque.

**

There is also a lot of interesting commen-

tary in the blogoshpere, with Aaron at

Haganah providing the most interesting

information, as usual. Anyone who doubts

the radicalising influence of Youtube should

take a look at Taimour’s Facebook profile,

retrieved by Aaron. Taimour wallowed

in jihadi Youtube videos.

**

On a final note, let me clarify my view

on the question of Taimour’s associations,

as some readers seem to have mis-

interpreted my earlier post.

I do not believe Taimour was a pure

lone wolf.

What I am saying is that he was most

likely either alone or helped by at most

two people in the final stages of - i.e.

last few weeks before - the attack.

The point here is that I think the initiative

for the operation came from Taimour

himself; I don’t think he was instrument-

talised by a large, established organization.

There could be a couple of people in

Sweden or in Luton who were directly

involved, but I would be very surprised

if Taimour took orders from AQ in

Pakistan or from ISI in Iraq.

**

Moreover, I don’t believe Taimour

radicalised in a complete vacuum;

people almost never do, as I stressed

in my Canadian Senate testimony last

week. Taimour, like most other home-

grown militants, must have interacted

with other people during his radica-

lization process, even if the interaction

occurred mainly on the Internet or

in very small social circles.

****

Jihad Watch tillägger:

Last night, Abu Suleiman al-Nasser,

the man who posted the will on

Shumukh al-Islam, issued another

statement that said: "It seems that

you haven't understood the message,

and you remain insistent in your stance,

and the battle of Stockholm isn't

but the start of a new era in our

Jihad; through which Europe

will become the field for our battles."