Tackling extremist and terrorist propaganda online is vital, but must be done with safeguards in mind.
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ISIS – Analysis and Comment
Syrians are the single largest group of displaced people in the world. How to make sure that the plight of these refugees doesn’t fuel future conflicts?
As the US slows down its troop withdrawal and China increases its involvement in Afghanistan, a warning that if the country is to see peace again, foreign meddling needs to stop.
The failure of African states to adequately address their racial, ethnic, cultural, religious and economic differences provided the fertile ground on which rebel groups now prosper.
ISIS victories in Iraq do not come out of the blue; the group’s military success results from a long history of tensions between Sunnis and Shia and US policies that fostered such tension.
Memories of the killing of Osama bin Laden are fading, but the legacies of al-Qaeda and the war on terror’s many ‘own goals’ haunt us in the form of multiplying threats and lost civil liberties.
Dire government warnings and counter-terrorism raids in our suburbs paint a picture of the worst threat Western nations have ever faced. A little historical perspective is in order.
The terrorist group now calls itself Islamic State, but the many names by which it is known reflect both its own evolution and the deliberate choices others make in how they refer to it.
Islamic State is a project built on solid foundations by jihadist theorists with decades of experience. The savagery of terrorism precedes the next stage of a caliphate that delivers longed-for order.
Tunisia has come further than any post-Arab Spring nation – so it’s no wonder it drew Islamic State’s ghastly attention.
The Nigerian Islamist group publicly made common cause with ISIS earlier this month – but what does it really mean?
ISIS’s destruction of archeological treasures is horrifying but reflects a too-human history of obliterating the past of “enemy” cultures. Moreover, all is not really “lost.”
An eyewitness to Libya’s optimism after the overthrow of Moammar Gadhafi asks how it has become a base for ISIS.
Last week, London’s mayor Boris Johnson generated a largely negative reaction when he described European jihadis as “wankers” – people who feel they are failures and that the world is against them. Now…
The Twittersphere is abuzz about the news on Monday that ISIS or their affiliates are suspected of hacking and compromising the US Central Command’s official Twitter account. As of Monday afternoon in…
After overrunning Mosul in June 2014, Islamic State (IS) hastily and brutally occupied soft targets in poorly protected areas of ethnic minorities – the villages of Kurds, Christians, and Yezidis on the…
ISIS is winning the propaganda war, it’s been said, and top brass from the European Commission, EU member state governments, and representatives of Google, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft have met to discuss…
There are two reasons why we should ignore the growing calls in the United States, Canada and Australia for Western “boots on ground” – meaning ground troops – to fight and destroy the Islamic State (IS…
The black flag of ISIS has been sighted in the Syrian city of Kobanê. For three weeks, heavily armed ISIS gangs have advanced on Kobanê – also known as Ayn al-Arab – steadily pushing back the local YPG…
It’s another hot Australian New Year’s Day, and 1200 people are aboard a train bound for a picnic when a burst of gunfire shatters the festive atmosphere. Police return fire, killing the attackers – but…
On Saturday October 4 we woke up to the news that looked depressingly inevitable. Alan Henning, a taxi driver from Salford, who had been captured in Syria last December while delivering aid to refugees…
A few hours before the UK’s first air strikes on Islamic State targets in Iraq, the home secretary, Theresa May, warned the Tory party conference that IS could become the "world’s first truly terrorist…
President Obama’s address, on the eve of the 9/11 anniversary, was uncompromising, the United States will “degrade and ultimately destroy” the Islamic State (IS) with “a comprehensive and sustained counter-terrorism…
Over recent weeks there has been a constant background noise that Islamic State and its ideology are some sort of throwback to a distant past. It is often framed in language used last week by the deputy…
The difference between the seething realm of Islamic State (IS) and the relatively safe and democratic region of Iraqi Kurdistan is a stark one. Assuming that the combined humanitarian and military reinforcements…