Islam,institutions and insurgency: territorial and network jihad

Contemporary research and policies often reduce Islamic insurgency to a simpli?ed notion of jihad, and, simultaneously, the religious doctrine of jihad to pure militancy. Such an approach fails to consider the complexities that de?ne and di?erentiate Islamic insurgents, and hinders further understanding of when, how and if they implement jihad. This paper attempts to address these shortcomings by considering how the ideological histories in?uencing territorially-based movements yield either an adherence to a modern jihad doctrine or a secular nationalist doctrine. Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian Territories provide the case studies wherein this distinction is manifest in their respective popular bases, institutions and military relations. Responding to assumptions of an emergent ‘third form’ of jihad—the network—this study applies the inverse model of the territorial doctrines to the Arab-Afghans and al-Qaeda (the network headed by Osama bin Laden) in order to elucidate its potential explanatory limitations, as well asto o?er some insights.