Raad Adayleh\/AP\/Press Association Images. All rights reserved.In the light of the June
\nattacks
\nin Jordan, the Hashemite Kingdom has closed
\nits borders with Syria and continues to imprison its nationals for
\nterrorism-related charges. <\/i><\/p>\n
Jordan has already taken steps to
\nlimit the threat from extremists, but without fully understanding the many
\nreasons why these men have traveled to Syria, effective counter-radicalization
\nand de-radicalization will not be possible.\u00a0Furthermore, understanding why
\nJordanians fight in Syria sheds light on possible motivations for European
\nforeign fighters.<\/p>\n
Each individual has unique circumstances and beliefs
\nthat drew them to Syria. However, the following is a breakdown of the major
\nmotivations, determined through independent research and expert interviews, that have played some role for many of Jordan's
\nvolunteers.\u00a0These motivations were determined through analyses of news
\nreports, scholarly works, and interviews I conducted in Jordan with Salafi
\nexperts and activists.<\/p>\n
Broadly speaking, religious
\nmotivations are the primary draw for Jordanian volunteers in Syria. This can be
\nbroken down into its component parts: generally, for the youth, the
\ndesire to create an Islamic State is a prevailing factor. Concurrent to
\nthis desire is the influence of the legacy of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi among the
\nmost extreme Salafi Jihadists in Jordan and especially among the youth. For the
\nolder generation of Salafi Jihadists, implementing sharia
\nlaw to various degrees is more important than the immediate creation of an
\nIslamic State. However not every Jordanian Salafist has an interest in entering Syria. <\/p>\n
The term 'Salafist' describes a wide range of political and religious beliefs, each with its own
\nsheikh, or leader. Many Salafists traveled after their specific religious
\nsheikh issued a fatwa legitimizing jihad in Syria. The initial
\nwave from Irbid in late 2012 and early 2013 was comprised largely of the
\nfollowers of Sheikh al-Tahawi, whose February 2012 fatwa
\ncalled for Jordanians to fight in Syria while invoking the legacy of Zarqawi as
\nthe protector of Sunnis. Likewise, many of the volunteers from Ma'an are followers
\nof the radical preacher Abu Sayyaf. <\/p>\n
The wide array of Islamist groups
\nfighting in Syria allows for movement between groups as identities and
\nallegiances shift. Each Salafist is likely to have a corresponding group
\nthat espouses their ideology or one similar to it. According to Salafist expert
\nDr Mohammad Abu Rumman, this has led some reform Salafists, i.e. Muslim
\nBrotherhood supporters, who had no history of violent Salafist activities, to
\njoin Jabhat al-Nusra, one of the few organizations willing to accept
\nnon-Syrians. <\/p>\n
Yet Jabhat al-Nusra has\u00a0only
\njust severed its ties to al-Qaeda and Zawahiri, enabling it to also draw
\nvolunteers from Jordan's older, al-Qaeda-affiliated Salafists. These shifting
\nallegiances came into effect again when, according to Salafi activist Marwan
\nShahadeh, many of Jabhat al-Nusra\u2019s more hardline members deserted and joined
\nIS after al-Baghdadi announced the establishment of his Islamic State on 29 June 2014. <\/p>\n
The sectarian nature
\nof the conflict and the desire to protect fellow Sunnis is one of the
\nmost, compelling motivations…<\/p>\n
For everyone, the sectarian nature
\nof the conflict and the desire to protect fellow Sunnis is one of the most compelling motivations, if not the most compelling. It is driven by perceived kinship, whether ethnic or religious, as identified in Cerwyn
\nMoore\u2019s theory of fictive kinship. According to Marwan Shahadeh, some Jordanian Palestinians are
\nenticed by the desire to fight for Palestine and join other Palestinians in
\nSyria.<\/p>\n
Jordan's settled tribesmen who have volunteered have undergone a process in
\nwhich their
\ntribal identity was surpassed by their newly adopted religious identity.
\nThus, the classic social constructs of Jordan\u2019s tribes, where the importance
\nof religion and the broader Arab community come after the family, clan, and
\nsheikh, cease to hold the same weight as among nomadic and semi-nomadic
\ncommunities. <\/p>\n
This has enabled these volunteers to shift their loyalty from their
\ntribal sheikh, none of whom have called for jihad in Syria, to a Salafi
\nJihadist sheikh, such
\nas Abu Sayyaf, who has issued fatwas on Syria.<\/p>\n
Parallel to the desire to protect
\nfellow Sunnis is the more general desire to fight Assad and end his regime\u2019s
\natrocities. However, while this is an underlying factor that surely assisted in
\npushing most volunteers to travel, it is probably not the final factor upon
\nwhich the decision was made. <\/p>\n
At a more tertiary level, economic
\nincentives may have served to push some wavering volunteers over the edge but cannot be
\nascribed as a catch-all motivation, given the high proportion of college degrees among the volunteers and the fact that many were also working in well-paid jobs. <\/p>\n
Acting on all of these
\nfactors are two conditions that have served to enhance the appeal of traveling to
\nSyria: <\/p>\n
1) The ease of entering Syria. According to Dr Abu Rumman, a young
\nJordanian who was not being monitored by the General Intelligence Directorate could easily board a flight from Amman to Turkey and cross
\nthe border there, and there were plenty of access points along Jordan's
\nnorthern border for the older generation of Salafi Jihadists who had more
\ndifficulty moving freely under the watchful eye of the GID.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
2) Recruiters
\ntarget groups, not individuals. A Jordanian who meets the above prerequisites
\nand who has friends or family who have gone or are planning on going is more at
\nrisk of volunteering in Syria. <\/p>\n
This list is by no
\nmeans exhaustive. One broad theory cannot encapsulate every
\npersonal reason why these men and women have left Jordan for Syria. And while the
\nhierarchy presented here may be unique to Jordan, these motivations exist to
\nsome degree across the world. But if measures are taken to understand the fundamental
\nmotivations behind the mass mobilization of Jordanian volunteers, it may be
\npossible for effective counter-radicalization and de-radicalization measures to
\nbe taken both in Jordan and the west. It is hoped that Jordan\u2019s
\nstrong state security apparatus combined with support from the United States will allow the kingdom to weather the fallout of the Syrian Civil War.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Raad Adayleh\/AP\/Press Association Images. All rights reserved.In the light of the June attacks in Jordan, the Hashemite Kingdom has closed its borders with Syria and continues to imprison its nationals for terrorism-related charges. Jordan has already taken steps to limit the threat from extremists, but without fully understanding the many reasons why these men have…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}