Jihadi Competition and Political Preferences

While known and feared as the most dangerous global jihadi group, since 2014 al-Qaida has only been involvedin one attack in the West. In the same period, al-Qaida’s renegade affiliate and current competitor, the IslamicState, has organised or taken responsibility for as many as 38 attacks, thus legitimately positioning itself as theprimary threat against the West and pioneer of the global jihad movement. This article argues that the contestationand competition that emerged between the two groups as a result of their split in February 2014 is part of theexplanation of the dramatic change in the enemy hierarchy, or political preferences, of the two most dominant Sunnijihadi groups. Furthermore, the article explains how the inter-group competition also prompted the definition ofother jihadi actors, identified as the internal enemy, into the enemy hierarchy of al-Qaida and the Islamic State,although to a different extent.