Tore Refslund Hamming Profile picture
Senior Policy and Risk Advisor | Author→Jihadi Politics | Sen Fellow @ICSR_Centre | PhD @EuropeanUni | Risk · Tech · Policy |🕵️‍♂️ Refslund Analytics
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Nov 3, 2023 11 tweets 2 min read
Sammendrag af Nasrallahs tale:
- Nasrallah starter med at snakke lykønske martyrer (Hezbollahs ord - ikke mine), der er døde i krigen indtil nu og deres familier. De er døde i kampen for gud, siger han. - "Denne krig er en af de tydeligste eksempler på at kæmpe for Gud."

- "Jeg vil fokusere min tale i dag på den nuværende situation"

- Der vil komme en mere detaljeret tale senere, siger han
Dec 14, 2022 13 tweets 3 min read
[THREAD]
On 3 July 2020, Safiyya Sheikh (b. Michelle Ramadan) but better known by her online pseudonym ‘Greenb1rd’, was sentenced to life imprisonment for her plot to bomb St Paul’s Cathedral in London. Safiyya remains one of the most fascinating cases of the Islamic State’s online supporters in the West. A convert to Islam in 2007, Safiyya came under surveillance as early as 2016 (she radicalized in 2015) and was referred to Prevent on several occasions, but...
Aug 3, 2022 7 tweets 2 min read
A short 🧵 on al-Qaida's leadership succession:
The general argument these days is that al-Qaida now finds itself in a leadership crisis that might risk leaving the global al-Qaida organization fragmented. I see it slightly different Yes, it is true that electing a new leader and the process for him to take on leadership across a scattered secretive organization is always challenging. Especially for al-Qaida who only had two leaders in its 34 years history. The organization is simply not used to this.
Jul 21, 2022 7 tweets 3 min read
The UN’s monitoring unit has releasef a new report on the Islamic State and al-Qaida based on member states information. It is always a very interesting read. Here’s a running thread on points I find particularly interesting. The report states that IS has suffered serious leadership losses. That’s a fact. But it is interesting that we actually DO NOT KNOW if that has an impact on its operational health
May 18, 2022 7 tweets 2 min read
A short 🧵 on a key difference betw RMVE & Jihadi terrorism

The other day I sat down to read the Buffalo shooter's manifesto. Besides being disgusted by his ideology/motivations, I took myself thinking: Imagine if a jihadi terrorist left behind a similar personal literary corpus Thing is - they don't. Perhaps a minute and a half video pledging allegiance or some comrade will issue a eulogy, but you don't see several hundreds of pages of the person's inner thoughts and motivations.
Feb 8, 2022 20 tweets 5 min read
[Thread]
The UN monitoring team has published its 29th report on al-Qaida and the Islamic State. Over the past years, the monitoring team's analytical reports have developed into key sources on militant groups. This edition is no exception. Here's a summary of the report. On Central Africa:
The report concludes that member states still don’t see a direct command line between the IS leadership and the group in #Mozambique. Although the group in Mozambique has experienced setbacks, the report says it appears to be “displaced rather than defeated”
Dec 9, 2021 5 tweets 2 min read
A really interesting message from an al-Qaida supporter from #India. He asks for support from al-Qaida's regional branch AQIS to help militants like himself in 'mainland' India who are otherwise left 'disillusioned /thread Discussing the situation in India, he says the country's mushrikeen are planning a genocide against the Muslims. Taking inspiration from AQ and the Taliban's fight in Afghanistan, they want to fight in India as well.
Sep 2, 2021 8 tweets 3 min read
With the Taliban's imminent announcement of a new government to rule its Islamic emirate and the prediction that its amir Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada will lead the emirate, I thought it was fitting with a little bio of the future leader of #Afghanistan. While I'm no expert on Haibatullah, I managed to gather some information over the years.

A Pashtun born in 1961 in Panjwai district in Kandahar Province, Haibatullah grew up in a very religious family with his father occupying the position of imam in the local village mosque.
Jun 4, 2021 8 tweets 2 min read
One of my primary interests for a while has been online pro-Islamic State supporter networks. Why? Because I believe they're important and gives unique insight into what resonates among supporters. The Islamic State agrees. This week's editorial in al-Naba is about these networks The editorial explains how the military battle against the Islamic State is accompanied by a digital battle to destroy its virtual component. No surpriser here, the Islamic State claims to have won this digital battle.
Dec 16, 2020 9 tweets 3 min read
On Monday, 1 July 2019 Kenyan national Cholo Abdi Abdullah was in his room in the Rasaca Hotel in the city of Iba, northwest of Manila, when he was arrested. In his possession, police found a pistol, a homemade bomb and a hand grenade. Yet Abdullah's primary aim involved a plane ImageImage Reminiscent of 9/11, Abdullah's plan was to hijack an airplane and crash it into a skyscraper, prosecutors speculate. In preparation he had been training for years in the Philippines and already obtained his pilot license. The attack was to be carried out on behalf of.. Al-Shabab
Nov 1, 2020 25 tweets 14 min read
After 5 years and 3 months of work I finally defended my PhD thesis earlier this week. It was an extremely emotional experience and I am overly happy and proud with the result.

The thesis tells the much neglected story of Jihadis' internal conflict and here's what it is about. First about the defence. Defending in front of a committee comprised of all my academic idols Olivier Roy, Stéphane Lacroix, Thomas @Hegghammer and Virginie Collombier was in itself rather frightening but also the most incredible way to conclude the research. Thank you!
Sep 13, 2020 5 tweets 1 min read
The idea that led to 9/11 as narrated by al-Qaida: The original idea came from an Egyptian pilot who migrated to Peshawar and stayed at one of the Jihadi guest houses. In an informal sitting, he would first air his idea to hijack airplanes to strike iconic building in the US This idea was shared with AQ's military leader at the time Abu Ubaydah al-Banshiri (also Egyptian) and later recounted by senior AQ figures Abu Hafs al-Masri and Abu al-Khayr. When in Sudan, UBL arranged for two AQ members to attend flight training.
Dec 11, 2019 7 tweets 3 min read
On 21 Nov, @Europol strongly assisted by @telegram initiated a campaign to ban and delete Jihadis and their material on the platform in the hitherto most successful online counter-offensive. But, as described by several of my colleagues, it also kickstarted several new dynamics! At first, the crackdown was mainly focused on Telegram and targeted both AQ and IS elements - official and supporter accounts.
This led Jihadis to experiment with and migrate to new platforms: @tamtamchat, Hoop, Rocket.chat etc..
Dec 10, 2019 7 tweets 3 min read
Ét spørgsmål disse dage er, hvorvidt vestlige foreign fighters skal hjemtages til retsforfølgelse. Et andet spørgsmål er forholdene for terrordømte, som blomstrede op efter det seneste angreb i London. Denne tråd omhandler sidstnævnte. I den seneste måneds tid er der kommet to forskellige svar fra forskningsverdenen: John Horgan diskuterer vigtigheden af re-integration og de-radikalisering af terrordømte. Se disse:
economist.com/britain/2019/1…
theconversation.com/amp/what-makes…
foreignpolicy.com/2019/02/28/tee…
Aug 13, 2019 6 tweets 3 min read
I'm tremendously thrilled to see the publication of my report "Polemical and Fratricidal Jihadists: A Historical Examination of Debates, Contestation and Infighting Within the Sunni Jihadi Movement" by the @ICSR_Centre
icsr.info/wp-content/upl… @ICSR_Centre Some of the findings/conclusions of the report are summarised in this infograph
Jul 5, 2019 6 tweets 3 min read
Quickly browsing through the Azan magazine published by the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) between March 2013 and Summer 2014. Lots of great stuff in their and need to study it closer at some point. Here's a few initial interesting observations though: Some of the stuff really shows the difference between the AFGHAN Taliban and the PAKISTANI Taliban. These two posters for instance
Jun 12, 2019 5 tweets 2 min read
So, what countries have so far repatriated foreign fighters and their families?

Join in guys... The US have repatriated 2 women and 6 minors

newyorker.com/news/news-desk…
Apr 4, 2019 8 tweets 2 min read
An interesting case is unfolding at the moment, revealing that a Dane (Danish-Lebanese) was heading the Islamic State's drone unit and a central figure in its amn khariji (external operations).

Here's a summary. The man, Basil Hassan, has been a wanted figure in Denmark since 2013 when he attempted to assassinate a Danish Islam critic Lars Hedegaard and afterwards fled to Turkey where he was arrested. At some point, Hassan was released by the Turks and he entered Syria to join IS.