• Over the course of just one month, jihadists carried out 664 attacks, killing 5,042 people– the equivalent of three attacks per day on the scale of the London bombings in July 2005.
• The overall picture is that of an increasingly ambitious, complex, sophisticated and far-reaching movement – one that seems to be in the middle of a transformation:
GEOGRAPHY: Though Islamic State is the most deadly group and the conflict in Syria and Iraq the ‘battle zone’ with the largest number of recorded fatalities, jihadist groups carried out attacks in 13 other countries. In just one month, they were responsible for nearly 800 deaths each in Nigeria and Afghanistan, as well as hundreds in Yemen, Somalia, and Pakistan.
VICTIMS: Excluding incidents of jihadist infighting, 51 per cent of jihadist fatalities were civilian. If government officials, policemen and other non-combatants are included, the figure rises to 57 per cent. Based on context and location, the vast majority of victims is Muslim.
TACTICS: While jihadist violence used to be associated with mass casualty bombings – such as the ones in New York, Madrid and London – today’s jihadists employ a much greater variety of tactics, ranging from classical terrorism to more or less conventional operations. In our data, ‘bombings’ were outnumbered by shootings, ambushes, and shelling, reflecting the increased emphasis on holding territory and confronting conventional forces.
GROUPS: More than 60 per cent of the jihadist deaths were caused by groups that have no formal relationship with al Qaeda. Though al Qaeda and its affiliates – especially Jabhat al Nusra in Syria and al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) – still play an important role, the data shows that treating ‘jihadism’ and al Qaeda as one and the same is less true than ever.
• The scale of jihadist activity that is captured in this report reminds us to be cautious in our judgment of historical trends. Less than four years ago, jihadism – then predominantly in the form of al Qaeda – was widely believed to be dead or dying.
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