ISIS' Online 'Training Manual' Teaches Sympathizers How to Disguise Themselves as Westerners and Build Bombs to Carry Out Attacks
A detailed Islamic State "secret agent" training manual has been distributed on the Internet and is designed to provide prospective ISIS supporters in Western nations with ways to disguise themselves and their motives when trying to plan and carrying out "lone wolf" attacks and espionage missions.
The 71-page e-book, which was originally published in March and has recently resurfaced on the Internet, includes wide-ranging suggestions for the group's radicalized sympathizers in the West who are looking to make significant contributions to the terror group's jihad, Radio Free Europe reported.
The ebook, which contains 11 chapters, advises extremists in the west not to show any signs that they're devout Muslims so that they do not raise suspicion from national and local law enforcement agencies.
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The book's first chapter, titled "Hiding the Extremist Identity," tells extremists in the West not to grow their beard out, if they haven't already, which is contradictory to the law the group enforces inside its caliphate. But if supporters have grown their beards out, they are advised not to shave their beard completely because that would drive suspicion from friends and family. The book instead suggests that supporters should trim their beards into fashionable goatees to fit in better with society.
For female jihadis, the book advises them not to wear black hijabs and suggests that they wear colored hijabs, because women wearing black hijabs are more likely to be searched in an airport.
The e-book continues by offering advice on how jihadis in the West can disguise their communications. It suggests that if supporters need to communicate over the phone or Internet, it's important for them to use codewords in order to throw off authorities. If the sympathizers are communicating by letter, they should write in lemon juice, which the recipient can read by warming up the paper.
The book suggests in Chapter 2, "Disguise," that ISIS supporters should change their Muslim names to something more Western and should act more friendly to help increase the chance that they get some kind of inside government job that will help them carry out their espionage objectives. For instance, a supporter named "Ali" should change his name to "Al."
"People with Islamic names get less jobs than those with [Western] names. This alias might be important if you need an important position in a specific job, i.e. Mujahideen send people to work in power plants or enemy governmental positions to spy on and leak reports to the Islamic State leadership (as double agents)," the Middle East Media Research Institute quoted the book as stating.
"Making yourself look more friendly and open minded to the Western public, for example: Muslims who call themselves by a Western nickname gain more acceptances by their non-Muslim colleagues."
In the third chapter, the guide advises Western sympathizers on how to illegally get money so that they can help finance the terror organization or finance their migration to the caliphate.
"If you are an expert in credit card fraud, Paypal/Ebay scams, phishing, [or] hacking, or you know the secret of a big company, then take advantage of your skills. If you can claim extra benefits from a government, then do so. If you can avoid paying taxes, then do so," the e-book suggests. "There is a report that a Muslim accountant 'took' $50 million from his boss and fled to the Islamic State. Other Muslims 'borrowed' a loan as maximum as they could and used it to emigrate to the Islamic State. Another Muslim hacked some Israeli credit cards and used the money to go to the Islamic State."
The book states in Chapter 5 that it's important for jihadis to exercise. It explains that jihadis in Iraq and Syria jog in the mountains for a few hours every morning before breakfast to stay in shape and build stamina. It encouraged Western jihadis to hit the gym or a treadmill.
The book gets very detailed in Chapter 8, which is titled "Bomb-Making at Home." The chapter teaches supporters how to make six different types of deadly homemade explosives, such as nail bombs, Molotov cocktails, microwave airbag bombs, gas canister bombs, remote controlled bombs and car bombs.
The chapter also discusses how to use mobile phones as bomb detonators.
As an example of what kind of impact homemade bombs can have, the e-book states that the Boston Marathon bombers in April of 2013 used a microwave bomb, which killed three people and left over 170 injured.
"When the microwave was on, it would heat up the airbags or aerosol cans. The airbags or aerosol cans would explode due to the intensity of the heat and pressure, forcing the microwave door to open forcefully," the e-book explains. "The nails/sharp rocks etc., in the microwave would come flying out of the microwave in the direction of the target."
The e-book assured that just because ISIS sympathizers are not full fledged members of the caliphate, that doesn't mean that they are not entitled to carry out attacks in the name of jihad.
The guide encouraged more "lone wolf" attacks in Western nations, such as the attack carried out by gunmen on a Muhammad cartoon contest in Texas earlier this month, which ISIS claimed responsibility for.
In the final chapters, the book discusses what jihadis are supposed to do when their homes get raided by authorities and how they can escape their countries to migrate to the Islamic State. The e-book states that there are numerous places of refuge for Muslims to take safety in throughout the world, not just in Iraq or Syria.
"Now that the Islamic State has been established in the Muslim world, believers can celebrate, because we are living in a unique time in history," the manual asserts. "Muslims can now do an act of terrorism and escape the country secretly and find places of refuge in the world. ... So if the Muslim finds it hard to flee to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria through Turkey, he can escape to the Islamic State in Libya, or Khorasan [Waziristan in Pakistan], or in Nigeria [under Boko Haram territory.]"
