Al Qaeda and its affiliated groups offer the analyst a highly complex challenge. The current literature classifies Islamic terrorist organizations as either networked or hierarchical. Yet, this classification fails to account for the appearance on the international stage of a new type of global terrorism. Most notably, it does not capture the structure and mode of operation of Al Qaeda as it em...

This paper will briefly examine how Al Qaeda evolved from an insurgency assistance group to a terrorist network of sophistication and global reach. It argues that Al Qaeda filled the needs of Islamist insurgencies and then developed into a complex system of networks by coopting other groups, hijacking their agendas and transforming their ideologies. Al Qaeda thus has global and local aspects. L...

Using a random sample of 243 Muslims in Lebanon and Syria, we examined whether support for Hezbollah or for Al Qaeda is predicted by functionallyrelevant emotional responses to specific threats perceived to be posed by Americans. In line with the sociofunctional approach, perceived resource domination threat from Americans elicited anger, and perceived value contamination threat elicited disgus...

Despite being the most hunted movement in history, Al Qaeda and its associate organisations will pose a significant threat in 2003. Al Qaeda per se will fragment, decentralise, regroup in five zones of the world, work with like?minded groups, select a wider range of targets, focus on economic targets and population centres, and conduct most attacks in the global south. Although the group will b...

After the 9/11 attacks, The United States of America (USA) destroyed al Qaeda’s established training bases and removed the Taliban from power in Afghanistan. Thus, al Qaeda is forced to find new havens to continue operating safely as well as new sources of recruits. Unfortunately, if the conditions in the ground do not change, West Africa will be the next recruiting front for Osama bin Laden’s ...

Studies of terrorism in general and suicide terrorism in particular tend to view terrorist groups independently+ However, what if the propensity for a terrorist group to adopt suicide tactics depends in part on its external linkages and the relationship between the organizational capabilities required to adopt the innovation and the organizational capabilities of the group? This article shows t...

How can we tell if an Al Qaeda cell has been broken? That enough members have been captured or killed so that there is a high likelihood they will be unable to carry out a new attack, and military resources can be redirected away from them and toward more immediate threats? This article uses order theory to quantify the degree to which a terrorist network is still able to function. This tool wi...