While many experts say the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria is on the decline, you wouldn’t know it from the organization’s public narrative.
ISIS aggressively promotes the attacks it directs, supports or inspires. The extremist group recently took credit for attacks in Orlando and Brussels, reinforcing its image of being an unstoppable and legitimate network. And it has built that image through a troublingly savvy combination of traditional and new media.
The ISIS propaganda strategy compels people to action: ISIS has persuaded an estimated30,000 people from more than 85 countries to travel to hostile war zones in Iraq and Syria and inspired other supporters to commit acts of violence on ISIS’ behalf in their home countries. And ISIS propaganda does not only focus on its military activity: ISIS also tries to portray itself as an effective government, but that effort rarely gets the same level of attention in the mainstream U.S. press as its military activity.
1. ISIS knows its target audience
2. ISIS saturates the market
3. ISIS adapts to modern media
4. ISIS grooms brand ambassadors
