Jihobbyist

A “jihobbyist” is a term coined by Jarret Brachman to characterise a person who is not an active member of a violent jihadist organization such as Al-Qaeda or the Somali Al Shabaab, but who has a fascination with and enthusiasm for jihad and radical Islam.

The term was coined by Jarret Brachman in his 2008 book Global Jihadism: Theory and Practice. Brachman is the former director of research at the United States Military Academy's Combating Terrorism Center. He explains in his introduction to the book that he coined the new term to describe people who, without the support of al-Qaeda or other jihadist organizations, come of their own accord to support the aims of those groups. Jihobbyists "are fans in the same way other people might follow football teams. But their sport is Al-Qaeda,” he explained in an interview after the 2009 Fort Hood shooting by Nidal Malik Hasan, a Muslim American soldier who showed an interest in jihadist websites and views in the months prior to the shooting. In Global Jihadism: Theory and Practice, Jarret Brachman says they "may be an enthusiast of the global Jihadist movement, someone who enjoys thinking about and watching the activities of the groups from the first and second tiers but generally they have no connection to al-Qaida or any other formal Jihadist groups."

He explained in a PBS NewsHour interview by Gwen Ifill in January 2010 that a jihobbyist is usually "somebody who cheers from the sidelines as nothing more than a hobby". A few have perpetrated actual attacks as well.

The Jawa Report used the term "eHadis" to describe such people, suggesting that it was a better term.

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