MLM: "Fugitive Bangladeshi Ideologue Tamim al-Adnani Spearheading Virtual Jihadist Campaign"

In August 2013, a Bangladeshi court in Barguna district jailed several members of the extremist outfit Ansarullah Bangla Team (ABT), including its spiritual leader Mufti Jasimuddin Rahmani, for subversive activities in the country. These ABT members were accused of widespread violence and targeted killings during the Shahabag protest movement held earlier that year. The incarceration of Rahmani brought his fellow cleric Tamim al-Adnani to the forefront of the terrorist group as its spiritual head. In 2013-2014, the ABT was a relatively new grouping whose activities were not widely known. Tamim al-Adnani rose to prominence as a firebrand ideologue and preacher, and subsequently became more notorious than Rahmani. He came to be known for his vitriolic criticism against Bangladeshi and Western governments, and for his exhortations for violence and jihad.

The subsequent investigations into ABT’s inner circle revealed that the group was modelled on the lines of al-Qaeda and that it existed with the blessings of ideologues like Ayman al-Zawahiri and Anwar al-Awlaki (Dhaka Tribune, May 25, 2015). The ABT, which eventually morphed into Ansar al-Islam-Bangladesh, has been operating based upon al-Zawahiri’s call for a popular uprising (intifada) against the Bangladeshi government, and has worked to support ‘scholars of Islam. It has become the official branch of al-Qaeda’s South Asian chapter, al-Qaeda in Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) (Dhaka Tribune, March 5, 2017). Between 2013 and 2016, ABT, aka Ansar al-Islam, began carrying out machete attacks, killing 12 mostly-secular or progressive scholars, writers, and LGBT activists. According to Bangladeshi police, Tamim al-Adnani and Rezwanul Azad Rana, the chief architects of these targeted attacks, fled Bangladesh perhaps at different times following the countrywide crackdown against the Ansarullah militant network. While Rana fled to Malaysia in February 2014, the exact time and other details of al Adnani’s escape to Malaysia was not known (Daily Star, February 24, 2017).

Elusive and Vociferous Fugitives

The Bangladeshi police learned that al-Adnani was functioning as the spiritual head of the group in November 2014, when they intercepted a Skype call between two militants in Pakistan and Bangladesh as part of their investigations into the ABT network. The investigators also gathered information on Saiful Islam, who had just taken over as chief of the ABT operations team. During that time, both al-Adnani and Rana were present in Bangladesh (Jugantar Report, November 7, 2014).

Although al-Adnani’s real name and identity remains a mystery, the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) of the Bangladeshi police believe that he is one of the five founding members and the top three current leaders of the group. He is presently believed to be hiding in Malaysia and engaged in broadcasting jihadist sermons via online social media platforms (Dhaka Tribune, April 9, 2017). The other fugitives who fled Bangladesh were Maj. Syed Ziaul Haque and Rezwanul Azad Rana. While Rana, a death row convict, was deported from Malaysia in early 2017 in connection with the 2013 killing of blogger Ahmed Rajib, the locations of al-Adnani and Ziaul Haque are still unknown (Daily Star, February 21, 2017).

Limited information exists about the early life and education of al-Adnani in Bangladesh. However, various interrogation reports shed light on his entry into the world of Islamic extremism and jihad. In 2014, the ABT’s media branch chief Morshed Islam released some vital information about the elusive al-Adnani. According to him, al-Adnani and Jasimuddin Rahmani have close ties with the Jordanian-born British citizen Sheikh Abu Issa Ali, who was the leader of the international organization Jamaat ul-Muslimeen. During Abu Issa’s visit to Bangladesh in 2002, both al-Adnani and Rahmani met with him, and later they all travelled to the Pakistani city of Karachi on the invitation of the online extremist forum Bab-ul Islam. These events could have instigated the visiting Bangladeshi Islamist clerics to later focus on virtual jihadist propagation (Jugantar Report, November 7, 2014). It should be noted that the Bab-ul Islam online forum was a pioneer in promoting and hosting al-Qaeda’s jihadist literatures and related extremist content on the internet in regional languages, including Urdu and Bengali.

Lure of al-Qaeda

Al-Adnani explained why he joined al-Qaeda and why a true Muslim should only join this terrorist group in online speeches published in late 2014. Aiming to recruit young Bengalis into Ansarullah or al-Qaeda’s fold, he gave 12 reasons for joining al-According to him, everybody should join al-Qaeda since it has chosen the path of armed jihad to defend persecuted and oppressed Muslims across the globe. Al-Adnani praised Osama bin Laden and explained how the martyred terrorist leader had renounced a life of luxury in Saudi Arabia to wage jihad to protect Muslims. Invoking Qur’anic verses, al-Adnani justified al-Qaeda’s pursuit of ‘jihad’ as the way to establish and defend the religion. In his speech, he quoted several Islamic eschatological epithets to defend and justify al-Qaeda’s version of jihad, citing for example, the Day of Resurrection, the final Victorious Group, (At-Taifatul Mansura), and al-Ghuraba (Strangers, or foreign fighters). Al-Adnani stressed that al-Qaeda truly follows the Salafist creed (Aqeedah) of Al-Wala Wal Bara (Loyalty and Rejection).

Al-Adnani argued that al-Qaeda respects and remembers true Islamic warriors and scholars, and wages jihad following the paths shown by them. He named several Islamic scholars who were part of al-Qaeda and guided the organisation, including Abdullah Azam, Yahya al-Libby, Sami al-Oraydi, Anwar al-Awlaki and Asim Umar, the first leader of al-Qaeda’s South Asian branch. [1]

Virtual Ummah 

Al-Adnani has produced and disseminated his Islamist content through various online social media platforms, which include YouTube, Facebook, and SoundCloud. His messages are mostly presented in a preaching style, and involve explanations of the core beliefs and practices of Islam. Other videos are motivational, encouraging Muslims to be true to the religion in accordance with the Qur’an and Sharia. One of his earliest messages discuss the benefits of dawah (the invitation to Islam) and Islamic prayers, and explain how individual piety would help Muslims and Islam at large (YouTube, August 27, 2016; YouTube, September 7, 2016).

Al-Adnani’s extremism becomes evident when he speaks on defending Islam and exhorts Bangladeshi youths to fight against the government, or monologues about the final battle for India (Gazwatul Hind), civil wars in Yemen, Syria and about atrocities committed against persecuted Muslim minorities such as the Rohingya in Myanmar and the Uighurs in China. Two of his dedicated YouTube channels are particularly popular: ‘Ummah Network’ which has almost 200 posts, is followed by 382,000 subscribers. The newer ‘Ummah News’ channel has over 25,000 subscribers as of the time of writing. Both channels regularly publish new Islamist materials. The Facebook page of ‘Ummah Network’ has over 17,000 followers. [2]

Al-Adnani’s most recent post, which is about sectarian unrest and rioting in the Indian capital of New Delhi, is titled “Muslim Genocide of Delhi: ‘Gazwatul Hind can be heard in the footsteps’” (translation), and was published on February 29. The video discusses anti-Muslim violence, shows selected footage of Muslims being targeted, mosque desecration and speeches from Hindu right-wing leaders (YouTube, February 29; Facebook, February 29). Another anti-Indian lecture, published in April 2019, called on Muslim youths to take up arms to prevent anti-Muslim violence in India and elsewhere. The video further exhorted Muslims to rise against “apostate” forces working against Islam in regions perceived to be under attack. (YouTube, April 13, 2019).

A video published on March 29, 2019 focuses on how the Crusades have been forgotten by Muslims today (YouTube, March 29, 2019).  Al-Adnani often urges Muslim believers and clerics to raise their voices against both the Indian and Bangladeshi governments and to target rising Hindu nationalism.

These incendiary messages are often cross-posted to the YouTube channel ‘Ummah News.’ This channel became active in early 2019 and has nearly 40 posts that mostly discuss alleged regional anti-Muslim activities, in places such as Kashmir and Xinjiang. There are also many videos critical of the governments of the United States, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, which are referred to as ‘taghut’ and ‘kuffar’ (unbelievers and infidels).

In the Crosshairs: UN and NGOs

One of al-Adnani’s recent videos vehemently criticised UN peacekeeping forces. Al-Adnani  condemned the UN’s mission, as well as the Bangladeshi army’s active participation in UN-sponsored missions “against Muslims” across the world. The video was peppered with images of officials in the Bangladeshi peacekeeping contingent and cited official UN documents. It criticized the Bangladeshi government for making the Bangladeshi military personnel “team up with enemies.” The video specifically referred to Bangladeshi peacekeepers and military as taghut for working in the interest of Western powers (described in the video as “crusaders”) (YouTube, November 22, 2019).

Al-Adnani’s messages have also targeted Bangladeshi civil society organizations such as the Move Foundation and BRAC. On the Ummah Network channel, al-Adnani targeted the Move Foundation last October for allegedly carrying out the work of Western governments, and accused it of working with ‘infidels and crusaders’ (YouTube, October 23, 2019). Note that the Move Foundation has two overseas partners—the Counter-Terrorism Capacity Building Program (CTCBP) of the Canadian Department of Global Affairs, and the German Embassy in Dhaka. The Move Foundation works to promote religious tolerance among Bangladeshi youth. Al-Adnani’s diatribe against the Move Foundation was later featured in the pro-al-Qaeda Bengali language periodical Al-Balagh (Issue No. 7). The 88-page magazine focused on jihad and the importance of establishing Sharia law in Bangladesh. On January 6, al-Adnani posted another video on the topic of BRAC and its founder Fazle Hasan Abed, criticising Abed for playing into the hands of Western governments. The Dhaka-based BRAC organization works to assist underprivileged people and raise awareness about human rights issues in Bangladesh (YouTube, January 6).

Conclusion

Social media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook have emerged as powerful, far-reaching platforms for extremists like al-Adnani. A cursory look at the subscription statistics on his YouTube videos suggests that al-Adnani is an alarmingly effective voice for AQIS in Bangladesh, able to reach large numbers of Bengali-speaking Muslims in the region and internationally. Al-Adnani is among the most influential of the online extremist propagandists who continue to post on Western social media platforms, despite recent efforts by these companies to censor hateful and extremist content. With his typical style of preaching laced with emotional narrations of events, al-Adnani tries to capture the imaginations of disparate Muslim youths, and urges them to ‘rise up’ against perceived atrocities aimed at their community. Tamim al-Adnani is now considered al-Qaeda’s most vociferous Bengali language propagandist and influencer, who has spearheaded extremist campaigns by exploiting online media platforms with impunity. He has achieved this while continuing to remain in hiding. 

Notes

[1] “Why I joined al-Qaeda,”  Tawhid and Jihad, October 19, 2014, https://tawhidandjihad.wordpress.com/2014/10/19/কেন-আমি-আল-কায়েদাহকে-বাছা/

[2] Tamim Al Adnani’s Facebook page announces the purpose is to spread the correct information of Islam to everyone, See, https://www.facebook.com/ummahnetwork.un/

 "Fugitive Bangladeshi Ideologue Tamim al-Adnani Spearheading Virtual Jihadist Campaign," ​Militant Leadership Monitor, (Jamestown Foundation),  Vol. XI (2), February 2020.