Western Female Migrants to ISIS

Abstract

Women have long been a blind spot for security, academic and think tank sectors in relation to the growing threat of global extremism. The recent spike in female recruitment to the terrorist organisation, Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), is a strong indicator of this dangerous trend. While often assumed to be passive agents, women continue to play strong roles in online and offline recruitment to violent extremist organisations. However, women can also act as strong counter-extremism agents in the fight against radicalisation and terrorism. Looking at the issue of gender, there is a new ability through online research to retrieve valuable insight into terrorist strategies around recruitment of women from online propaganda. This chapter aims to address questions of gender within current radicalisation trends through an analysis of online data, and through tracking Western females who are migrating to territories under the control of ISIS.