While the fighters for the Islamic State may be devout Muslims, their motivations are far from being dictated by the radical movement and its dream of a worldwide caliphate, writes Lydia Wilson in The Nation magazine (Oct. 21). Wilson and her colleagues interviewed imprisoned ISIS fighters in Iraq and found that they were “woefully ignorant about Islam and have difficulty answering questions about Sharia law, militant jihad, and the caliphate.” She adds that “there is no question that these prisoners I am interviewing are committed; it’s just their own brand of Islam, only distantly related to that of the Islamic State. Similarly, Western fighters traveling to the Islamic State are also deeply committed, but it’s to their own idea of jihad rather than one based on sound theological arguments or even evidence from the Qur’an.”
Wilson cites Erin Saltman of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue as saying that there is now less emphasis on Islamic knowledge in the recruitment stage, and that there is a movement away from strict religious ideological training as a requirement in this process. “If we were looking at foreign fighter recruits to Afghanistan 10 or 20 years ago, there was intensive religious and theological training attached to recruitment. Nowadays we see that recruitment strategy has branched out to a much broader audience with many different pull factors…[such as] desires of adventure, romance, power, belonging, along with spiritual fulfillment,” Saltman says. In her interviews with these Iraqi prisoners more “rage against America and their own government. They are not fueled by the idea of an Islamic caliphate without borders; rather, ISIS is the first group since the crushed Al Queda to offer these humiliated and enraged young men a way to defend their dignity, family, and tribe. This is not radicalization to the ISIS way of life….”
(The Nation, http://www.thenation.com/article/what-i-discovered-from-interviewing-isis-prisoners/)