European Interior Ministers met Thursday in Luxembourg, after the attacks in Arras and Brussels. Gérald Darmanin denounced a “naivety” within European institutions in the face of “atmospheric jihadism”.
A “atmospheric jihadism” Who “allows radicalization” and the “acting out”. These are the words of Gérald Darmanin on Thursday October 19 in Luxembourg, during a meeting with his European counterparts. The Minister of the Interior then deplored a “naivete” European in the face of this “ecosystem” which, according to him, favored the two jihadist attacks which cost the lives of a French teacher, in Arras, and two Swedish supporters, in Brussels.
The day after the assassination of Dominique Bernard in Arras, Gérald Darmanin had already mentioned “an atmosphere of jihadism, of taking action evident since last Saturday”, date of the attack on Israel by Hamas. And on October 11, after this attack, the same accused Jean-Luc Mélenchon and LFI of doing “atmospheric jihadism” by his reactions considered ambiguous, “a kind of thought crime strategy” which creates “an atmosphere conducive to anti-Semitism.” But what is the Minister of the Interior talking about?
A concept theorized by Gilles Kepel
This formula of “atmospheric jihadism” was used by the academic Gilles Kepel, notably in The Prophet and the pandemic (Gallimard), published in February 2021. According to the specialist in the Middle East and contemporary Islam, this new threat was born after the destruction of the Islamic State. “There are no more order givers”, he explains in a video on the website of the Interministerial Committee for the Prevention of Delinquency and Radicalization. This “atmospheric jihadism” this is the idea that jihadism “spreads in bits and pieces”by “small doses”And “without a charismatic leader and without an organization behind it”summarizes Abdelasiem El Difraoui, political scientist, specialist in jihadism and author of What do I know about jihadism at Presses Universitaires de France.
The French police and intelligence services believe that this “new threat” is much more diffuse, and less detectable. According to Gilles Kepel, there will be “on the one hand, ‘anger entrepreneurs’ who will designate targets, for example Professor Samuel Paty or Charlie Hebdo, whom they will not themselves call to kill”. On the other side, there are “people who have already been radicalized in this sense, on the web or through particularly virulent sermons and others, and who will decide to take action, without belonging to an organization.”
“The ‘anger entrepreneurs’”as Gilles Kepel describes them on Europe 1 using a formula from Bruno Rougier, will constitute “a culture of rupture with the Republic and its values, something which will then quite naturally create the designation of the other as an infidel, who it is legal to make disappear”.
In the “8h30 franceinfo”, Saturday October 14, the academic believes that there was also “a shared vision” between the attacker of Arras and the Islamist organization Hamas. “The people of Hamas claim to have the same ideology as the killer, the assassin” by French teacher Dominique Bernard, in front of the Gambetta middle and high school in Arras. These comments are in line with those of the Minister of the Interior. The day after the Arras attack, Gérald Darmanin declared that there was a “link between the action in Arras and what happened in the Middle East” with the attack on Israel by Hamas. The assertion was finally denied by the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office the following Tuesday, when the main suspect Mohammed Mogouchkov was indicted.
“We are no further ahead”
This idea of radicalization and taking action by “an atmosphere created by angry entrepreneurs” is not shared by everyone. “To speak of ‘atmospheric jihadism’ is to explain the rain by a ‘rainy atmosphere’. We are no further aheadcriticizes political scientist Olivier Roy in an interview with the magazine The Obs. Although current tensions may allow disturbed individuals to become part of the grand narrative of jihad, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict does not fall within the framework of global jihad.” Olivier Roy, professor at the European University Institute in Florence, has already strongly disagreed with Gilles Kepel in the past.
The Minister of the Interior, for his part, is convinced. “We must fight without naivety against this ecosystem, against this atmospheric jihadism”explained Gérald Darmanin, from Luxembourg, targeting for example associations dissolved in France, but still financed by European institutions. “We must fight against all those who maintain this atmosphere, he elaborates. There are radicalized places of worship, it’s true, few in number, but there are some, we must fight them. There are associations that act against the interests of values (…) Europeans, we must fight them.”
“The policy of taking any sign of religious visibility as a premise for transition to terrorism is statistically false […] and above all is ineffective: real terrorists pass through a sieve that is not adapted to their trajectories.”
Olivier Roy, political scientist and professor at the European University Institute in Florenceat “L’Obs”
For Gilles Kepel, “between wearing the abaya at school and the abuses we observed, there is a continuum”. The academic knows that this analysis “will make you scream” but he specifies that “the school is the place in which secularism is taught, and therefore it is perceived by the proponents of political Islam as an institution which dilutes the strength of the community. This does not mean that everyone who wears an abaya will take action, and vice versa, but there is an intellectual and mental continuity in this affair.
“Politicians use it as a slogan”
More generally, numerous criticisms emerge when this notion of “atmospheric jihadism” is reused by politicians. “It is a useful term and a precise phenomenon which is misused by politicians who use it as a slogan”deplores political scientist Abdelasiem El Difraoui. “Politicians use it to make sterile accusations as with Darmanin’s statements on Benzema. It misses the point, and adds to the ambient hysteria.” The Minister of the Interior accused the footballer on Monday October 16 on Cnews of maintaining links with the Muslim Brotherhood, just after a message posted on X (formerly Twitter) by Karim Benzema addressing “all [ses] prayers for the inhabitants of Gaza, victims once again of these unjust bombings which spare neither women nor children”. Gérald Darmanin then assures that Karim Benzema is “in notorious links with the Muslim Brotherhood”, a “hydra” Who “gives an atmosphere of jihadism”.
“Through this speech, politicians polarize the debate and distract from the real problems by creating sterile controversies.”
Abdelasiem El Difraoui, political scientist, specialist in jihadismat franceinfo
This is not the first time that this theory of “atmospheric jihadism” has been used by a politician. Marlène Schiappa, at the time Minister Delegate to the Minister of the Interior, responsible for Citizenship, was worried about the “terrorism, atmospheric jihadism” on franceinfo, March 14, 2021, after the arrest of two radicalized young people. After the beheading of Samuel Paty, the minister created a Marianne fund to finance associations promoting the values of the Republic. But several journalistic investigations, notably France 2, have revealed disturbing elements concerning the use of the 2.5 million euros with which he was endowed. This fund “either part was diverted or it failed to carry out its mission”, estimates Abdelasiem El Difraoui. A report from the Senate commission of inquiry denounced the “drifts from a political blow” for a system supposed to fight against separatist speeches.