The video campaign, which started this month, is the latest volley in a fierce battle being fought online between the French government and jihadist groups. What’s at stake is nothing less than the lives of the country’s youth.
It’s an idea that’s catching on. Online recruiting by extremist groups was among topics discussed this week at a White House summit on countering violent extremism. Several online initiatives to combat those recruiting efforts are being launched by various countries, including France.
“This is clearly a communication war against jihadist groups,” Jean-Charles Brisard, head of the independent French Center for the Analysis of Terrorism, told CNN. “And it is going to be a long-term endeavor.”
And even though the latest “battlefields” are social media platforms and no real bullets are being fired, there are French civilians already caught in what amounts to a cyber-crossfire.
A new campaign
Precise figures on the number of Europeans who have gone to Iraq and Syria — and which jihadist groups they have joined — are hard to come by. The consensus among counter-terrorism analysts is that more than 3,000 have traveled, of whom 500 have returned.
In France, officials say the stakes are high.
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The French government insists that its campaign is legitimate and is to “prevent young people from turning to terrorism activities.”
“We know that 90 percent of French young jihadists started on the Internet,” Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said at a press conference the day the government launched the website.
Some terrorism experts agree with the French government’s strategy.
“It is not supposed to stigmatize the Muslim community, it is supposed to stigmatize terrorists. The French government needed to be shocking and had to make a powerful statement,” says terrorism expert Jean Paul Ney. “This needs to be fought the same way intelligence services would fight against a sect — with mass mind control through propaganda.”
Experts say it’s too early to tell whether the new campaign is producing results, but they point out that France is not the first country to have started an online platform against ISIS propaganda. The U.S. State Department launched the campaign “Think Again Turn Away” last September, which also used a graphic video using ISIS’s own pictures.
“All governments involved in the war against terrorism are trying to find new tools to stop jihadists’ online recruitment,” Brisard told CNN. “Internet recruiting is new, we all grope around and see what could work best.”
