Jihadi Generations - Part I

Weaponizing Children**

Girls training to be “Pearls of the Caliphate”-Photo from Islamic State (ISIS) released on the anonymous file sharing website “JustPaste.it

SUMMARY: Violent extremist groups are using all methods possible to wage a successful long term caliphate campaign using children. These groups infiltrate existing systems, threaten important community and national players to support the radicalization and ongoing weaponization of children. They use trauma based forms of conditioning to indoctrinate their members.

These methods are employed to break their will and individuality, and force them to “submit”. They will attack those they perceive as non-compliant, or demand their peers and even their families turn on those who dare to resist. The word “Islam” in Arabic means submission - as in submission to the will of God-in Arabic-Allah means God.

No foundation of society is off limits be it: schools, religious organizations, hospitals, legal institutions, law enforcement, orphanages, charities, businesses, transportation, recreation, communication sites or family homes. Every means is justified for their stated aim of a worldwide Islamic caliphate under Sharia law.

The scope of this ambitious movement has increased in the past two decades. It is spreading over much of the world. Using social media, AI tools and controlling media outlets makes bombardment of Islamist extremist actions and messages easier to disseminate to literally billions of human beings within minutes.

Coffins of the Bibas family babies paraded by Hamas and the Palestinian Mujahideen Brigade in Gaza, February, 2025. The Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) were also involved.

The strategies implemented to effect this global caliphate movement were originally interwoven in the texts of the Koran and Hadiths, as well as the history of Islam. However the more sophisticated martial and psychological tactics evolved after WWII. These are refined/ updated continually using tech tools for conversion, recruitment and attacks.

The focus is on capturing and inculcating the next generation-the children. The younger the better.

No child is left behind if they can be exploited.

Their children are taught to hate and exterminate all “infidels” especially the Jews and Israelis. They are inculcated with vengeful revulsion for Israel, for Judaism, Christianity and any other religious practice/belief other than their version of Islam. They are taught they will be righteous if they perpetrate atrocities including rape, torture and ritualistic murder in the name of Allah.

They “glorify” these events by recording them on video and photographing their “jihadi acts”. Their communities praise them for these horrific behaviors.

Training children in execution using human hostages and prisoners. Photo from Islamic State (ISIS) released on the anonymous file sharing website “JustPaste.it 2016

Islamist Training within the USA and funded by the USA

A significant ‘branch’ of Islamic education is predicated on the foundation of sharia law from the Gulen Foundation and the Hizmet Movement, founded by Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish exile living in the USA. Gulen directs branches of his form of Islamic education in many parts of the world, especially in Central Asia and the USA.

The U.S. Department of State described Fethullah Gulen as, “a radical Islamist’whose moderate message cloaks a more sinister and radical agenda.” Gulen is reputed to be worth roughly $25 billion. As the proprietor of the largest network of charter schools in the United States, he and his organization receive hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars for their tax exempt non-profit organization. Vast sums are spent on facilitating the entry of young Turkish men to the United States.

“These men, disciples all, are brought to the United States to replace qualified and credentialed American teachers and to proselytize American children into a Turkey-centric, Islamist movement — a sort of fifth-column seeking to infiltrate American society through children in an attempt to transform America into a Shariah state. These men account for over 5,000 highly questionable H-1B visas”.

ATF ( ATF stands for the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives) and other agency investigations, reveal that Gulen is an Islamist who plans to transform the United States and many other countries (if not the entire world) into shariah states as part of the ummah-(the community of Islam), the world wide caliphate.

While Gulen is not yet furnishing militant training or directly aligning publicly with ISIS/Daesh, the Taliban, the Muslim Brotherhood or other known terrorist groups, he is deliberately targeting and infiltrating countries through their children and swaying allegiance in Gulen schools to his worldwide shariah law - strict Islamist viewpoints.

This is concerning as it is one of the ‘steps on the ladder’ to a worldwide Islamic caliphate, and to conducting jihad-holy war. This “step” promotes cultivating ‘holy warriors’ to wage a religiously justifiable ‘holy war’.

AF/PAK Connections

The United States efforts to fund mujahideen groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan under President Carter and President Reagan, were sponsored by government agencies and their contractors, including: the US Department of State, the ICA-[predecessor to USAID], the CIA and USAID.

Some of the declassified activities in these countries include: Operation Cyclone, Operation Enduring Presence, Operation Mockingbird, the MYSTIC Program, Operation Greystone, Task Force 21, Operation MIAS, Vaccination Drives Programs and Operation C-Chase.

“The US organized the Afghan Jihad and that informed its central objective: to unite a billion Muslims worldwide in a holy war, a crusade, against the Soviet Union, on the soil of Afghanistan”.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s government also played an important role in funding the training of the jihadis. The CIA used a clever ploy in integrating the teachings of Islam with guerrilla warfare. Over 2 billion dollars in addition to the income generated from the opium trade promoted by the CIA, was injected into a program of militant Islam”.

Schools (madrassas) and training camps were/are established in a number of countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.

“These schools were taught by trainers from the extreme sects of Wahabism from Saudi Arabia, and Deobandi Islam from Pakistan. The CIA funneled weapons to the Afghan mujahideen through Pakistan’s ISI.” [intelligence service]. (Excerpts from Ahmed Rashid’s book, Jihad, 2002)

Photo from Islamic State (ISIS) released on the anonymous file sharing website “JustPaste.it

In 1989, Mr. Mohammed Ali (an Egyptian, also a US Special Forces Green Beret soldier) came to the New York area to train mujaheedin on their way to Afghanistan. Mr. Mohamed Ali met the men [mujahedeen recruits] at the Al-Kifah Refugee Centre in Brooklyn's Atlantic Avenue, a place of pivotal importance to Operation Cyclone, the American effort to support the mujaheedin. The Al-Kifah Centre and the associated Afghan Refugee Services Inc were raising funds and, crucially, providing recruits for the struggle, “with active American assistance.”

Al-Kifah means “to fight for” or “to struggle for” in Arabic.

“The Taliban (in Central Asia) has been named as a recruiter of children since 2007, according to the United Nations. Children recruited by the Taliban and other insurgent groups in Afghanistan have been used as messengers and lookouts, as well as for espionage and even for suicide attacks…”

The US is still funding the Taliban and other terrorist groups in Central Asia and the Middle East.

“A report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) cited SIGAR’s {Congress created this Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction under the NDAA-2008 National Defense Authorization Act} findings, that the Taliban have:

“…siphoned or benefited from a considerable amount of humanitarian aid.” According to the report, the group has done so by infiltrating non-governmental organizations (NGOs) partnered with the United Nations, imposing “fees and taxes” on aid workers, and directing relief efforts toward Taliban officials, their families, and allied groups. Afghan civilians receiving aid have reportedly been forced to hand over as much as 60 to 100 percent of the [humanitarian aid and funds] assistance in “taxes”. An obligatory payment to the Islamic terrorist groups in their locations.

While the Middle East remains a hotbed for terrorists, we have our own jihad training compounds set up in rural areas across the United States. They are run by an organization called Muslims of America (MOA). Law enforcement describes these compounds as “classically structured terrorist cells”. MOA is a branch of the Pakistani group Jamaat ul-Fuqra.

This is the end of the first part of my four part series.

Part II is entitled “Jihadi Generations-”Madrassas-Schools for Creating Holy Warriors”

**This four part series evolved from a two part series first published by Small Wars Journal in 2018, by Joanne Patti Munisteri. The original article with citations is archived under Arizona State University which acquired Small Wars Journal after Small Wars Journal founder and editor USMC David Dilegge died in 2020.

I shall include direct citations in links to texts underlined in these posts, and at the end of part four as a separate document for those who would like to follow up on these reports. You are welcome to comment.