This paper provides insight in the methodologies utilized by leaders of jihadist terrorist organizations who create a dedicated following in their pursuit of establishing a global caliphate. The research in this project illustrates a linkage from these charismatic leaders to the…
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This dissertation explores why some Muslim clerics adopt the ideology of militant Jihad while others do not. I argue that clerics strategically adopt or reject Jihadi ideology because of career incentives generated by the structure of cleric educational networks. Well-connected …
What motivated members of al-Qaeda to hijack commercial airliners and crash them into the sides of buildings? Is it similar to what motivated Japanese fighter pilots to crash their jets into the sides of American aircraft carriers? If so, what can these two seemingly disparate p…
This dissertation examines the processes through which Beirut, a town on the periphery of the Early Islamic Empire (7th -9 th century C.E.), was integrated into a nascent Islamic landscape. Chapter 1 describes the role of Umayyad naval policies in the creation of communal and ad…
This dissertation explores the use of media in the recruitment of people from Muslim backgrounds into radical Islamic movements. Though rare in its occurrence, it is important to understand the processes by which some people turn toward extremism. This research seeks to address …
Within the international relations and political science literature about violent non-state actors claiming inspiration from the Islamic faith (frequently referred to as "jihadists"), there is a debate about whether religious ideas are a causal factor in motivating people toward…
Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Islamic terrorism has been propagated as a seemingly unavoidable threat to our daily lives. However, the globally oriented anti-Western jihad movement peaked in the late 1990s and early 2000s and has since been in decline. Acros…
In 2006, sixty-one percent of the young adults of America felt that Islam was a peaceful religion. Fifty-six percent had a favorable opinion of Islam and fifty-one percent feel Islam teaches respect of others. Only ten percent felt prejudice against Arabs and Muslims.1 Some, per…
La protection des populations civiles en cas de conflits armés, internationaux ou internes est au centre des préoccupations du droit international humanitaire contemporain. C'est un sujet digne d'intérêt et d'études plus approfondies. Dès lors, la recherche ici entreprise concer…
This thesis examines the late Muslim theologian Bediuzzaman Said Nursi's ethics of nonviolence. It argues that the non-violent ethics of Bediüzzaman Said Nursi based on the Qur'an might aid in finding solutions to the global problem of religion and violence, particularly as it i…
On February 6, 1985, Ronald Reagan presented the first State of the Union address after his landslide reelection to a second term as President of the United States. Although most of the speech focussed on the his domestic agenda, the president issued a call to arms in the fight …
This dissertation analyzes the writings of Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahhab and challenges popular stereotypes of him as a militant extremist. A combination of quantitative and qualitative analyses of a variety of written works, including theological and legal treatises, was undertake…
Between March 1977, and February 2020, there have been 78 instances of ideologically motivated murders and attempted murders in the United States. These instances were characterized as individual-based attacks against other individuals and treated as local crime. However, in eac…
The oral traditions in the Islamic world presented only the moral benefits of Jihad. Yet, the fact is that, though the moral benefits continued to exist before and after the First Crusade, though the interest seemed to have been present and the necessary intellectual theories co…
In the wake of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, America was reeling on multiple fronts. While experiencing a collective wave of bereavement, Americans struggled to understand a phenomenon that they had been uniquely shielded from--that of holy war or the Islamic variant, jihad. De…
The influence of the role identity expectations of Turkish Hizbullah's leadership on actual members' terrorist identities was documented in this dissertation. This study explored the leadership's identity expectations from members through content analyses of four books written b…
One of the most important questions captivating researchers on the relation between religion and war is the doctrine of just war, which centers upon justifications of war in religious traditions. Islamic tradition has an elaborate doctrine of war called jihad. Our dissertation f…
This thesis analyses the phenomenon of suicide bombings as manifested in the Palestinian landscape of conflict and attempts to construct a theoretical framework of analysis to study the phenomenon. It investigates Hamas, and most specifically its resort to suicide bombings, from…