The Jihadi Forums: An Open Forum with Abu Muhammad Al-Maqdisi
The online Jihadi community constitutes a central component in the Jihadi propaganda array and is an important target audience for the messages sent by Al-Qaeda’s leadership and other Jihadi organizations.
The renowned Jihadi Sheikh, Abu Muhammad Al-Maqdisi, recently discussed their great importance: “The Jihadi forums fulfill an important role in defending Jihad and the Mujahideen, in spreading their messages and documentary publications. They have become a true partner of the Mujahideen…”
This role does not go unnoticed by the forum managers, who work to strengthen the ties between the surfers and the forums, while at the same time expanding the boundaries of the forum’s “virtual community”. One of the main means for achieving that end is found in the allocation of an open forum to surfers for a predetermined period of time, through which they get the rare opportunity to address questions on various subjects directly to a senior Salafi-Jihadi Sheikh, who is a guest of the forum.
This document will focus on such an “open forum” with Sheikh Abu Muhammad Al-Maqdisi.