• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • About
    • Our Mission
      • Political Islam
    • Areas of Expertise
      • Economic Warfare
        • Cyber Security
      • U.S. Policy
      • Anti-Corruption
      • Foreign Election Observing
      • Supporting Free Speech
        • Legislation
      • Impact of ACD’s Work
      • Free Speech Celebration, U.S. Senate
    • Board of Directors & Advisors
    • Our Team
    • Contact Us
    • Subscribe
  • Our Impact
    • Endorsements
    • Additional Praise
  • Media
    • Recent Interviews
    • Events
      • Coming Events
    • Radio
    • Television
    • Rumble / Youtube
  • Publications
    • All Posts Archive
    • ACD Presentations
    • Articles
    • Books
    • Papers
    • Recommended Readings
  • Free Speech
    • Legislation & Support
    • Impact of ACD’s Work
      • FREE SPEECH Act Celebration, U.S. Senate, September 20, 2010
      • Some Congressional Testimonies
  • Economic warfare
    • The Impact of Purposeful Interference on U.S. Cyber Interests
    • Cyber/Space, EMP Insecurity- Current and Future Threats
    • The Existential EMP Threat
    • New Strategies to Secure U.S. Economy from Cyber Attacks
    • Economic Warfare Subversions July 9, 2012
    • CyberSpace Security – Papers And Articles
    • Cyber Security
    • Da’esh “lite” North America Islamist – Sources
    • The Muslim Brotherhood and Da’esh “Lite” in North America
  • Support ACD
    • Donate
    • Subscribe
    • Contact
American Center for Democracy

American Center for Democracy

  • facebook
  • twitter
  • youtube
  • linkedin
  • Free Speech
  • U.S. Policy
    • U.S. Foreign Policy
  • Political Islam
    • Canada
    • Hamas
    • Iran
    • Islam
    • Muslim Brotherhood
    • Palestinian
    • United States
  • Narco-Terrorism
  • Middle East Conflicts
    • Iran
    • Israel
  • Global Conflicts
    • China
    • North Korea
    • Russia
    • Ukraine
  • Soros
You are here: Home / Jihad / Of Mosques, Moms and Mayhem*

Of Mosques, Moms and Mayhem*

June 26, 2016 by Norman Simms*

Nancy Hartevelt Kobrin. The Jihadi Dictionary: The Essential Intel Tool for Military, Law Enforcement, Government and the Concerned Public. Mamaroneck, NY: Multieducator Press, 2016. 286 pp.

Regular readers of Family Security Matters will be familiar both with Nancy Hartevelt Kobrin and her discussions of the family origins of contemporary Jihadist terrorism. The current extended glossary of key terms and concepts grows both out of her many contributions to FSM and from her seminars, lectures and other presentations to the groups mentioned in the subtitle to this book, that is, the professionals charged with the monitoring and control of potential terrorist agents, protection of citizens and institutions from such attacks, and providing government officials with information on present and future dangers. This collection of several hundred entries forms both the “Intel” (necessary detailed and practical terms in an historical and cultural context) and the “tools” required for quick reference, immediate application and middle- to long-term strategic planning.

The concerned public includes readers of FSM. For them (us) The Jihadi Dictionary is a book to dip into, to follow the cross-referenced entries, and to look up specific matters that turn up in the news or during the reading of other books. The dictionary presupposes that anyone reading it has some basic knowledge of recent history, experience of trying to deal with terrorists and terrorism, and has the knowledge and skill to understand complex ideas. This not an “idiot’s guide” to anything. The issues to be dealt with are too urgent and dangerous to be trifled with.

It is no “easy read” because there is no clear argument developed or plot line to a narrative: the entries are points of discussion and debate, perhaps best appreciated during or after a seminar . However, there are some entries which break out into short essays and allow the reader to understand the basic structures underlying Kobrin’s psychohistorical approach. There are, of course, many guides to the historical, political, strategic and social matters; but these tend to be, not superficial or facile in the sense of glossing over essential points; rather they are rooted in positivism, the notion that what can be seen and measured objectively is real and all the rest irrelevant, secondary or even unreal. Such books search for the way in which young men and women “are radicalized” by their parents, mentors or online associates, as though becoming a jihadi terrorist were a conscious, rational choice. The journalists and professional experts called in to advise governments and police forces try to point to incomplete assimilation, abandonment by social engineers, or poverty and neglect as the root causes of such anti-social behaviour. Though hardly as crude as leaders who call for “bombing them into submission” or “defeating them so soundly they will lose their appeal to other would-be jihadists”, the usual approach to the problem is to “educate” and “calm” them down, give them useful things to do, bribe them with more social programmes.

Each entry in this dictionary consists of four parts: a short introductory description of the term, concept or action, a breakdown of the etymology and development of the word or phrase (most in English, some in Arabic), a psychological or psychoanalytic explanation of the phenomenon, and a brief discussion how the keyword or phrase is applied by Jihadi terrorists and why, the last three paragraphs marked by a symbol (the mathematical sign for root, the Greek letter psi to indicate the psyche, and crossed scimitars standing for the Jihadi function. The entries are anywhere from one to several pages long, occasionally extending into important analyses of key issues, providing personal details from the author’s field and clinical work, and providing a wealth of examples from newspapers and historical texts. Her range of professional reading is extensive, her understanding deep, her insight into the real nature of the contemporary problems urgent.

Though it may appear that some of the “root” sections on etymology and current syntactical usage are off-target or irrelevant, they do serve several important functions. First, they “root” the discussions into an historical matrix: where words come from, how their meanings have changed over time, and when they took on specific modern technical meanings. Second, they indicate that our experience of terrorism, in all its depth of fear and anxiety, did not emerge out of the blue, but was preceded in many crucial turning points of history and in different cultural contexts. Third, they provide a substantial matrix of background information to help clarify how our own normative mental apparatus in western civilization came into being, and why it is so important to understand its dimensions, be prepared to protect and enhance its defensive mechanisms, and shine a light on those weak spots where the emotionally undeveloped Jihadis, consciously or more likely unconsciously, feel most offended and try hardest to annihilate.

The kind of terrorists who appear in this dictionary are those who come from dysfunctional homes, where especially the mother is abused and the child consequently made to feel of his dependence on her. Detached from normal developmental stages of infancy and early childhood, the potential Jihadist absorbs from the immediate environment a sense of shame rather than guilt that has to be wiped away violently in order to regain a sense of honour for himself, his family and the coreligionists he identifies with. Whereas guilt marks the person with a sense of having done a wrong that can be somehow-by self or some supernatural agency-atoned for, shame occurs only because others see the offender as deficient, weak and tarnished: the shame is imposed rather than generated from within by moral and ethical standards, and because the future terrorist is so alienated from the persons, things and ideas that constituter reality that shame comes back again and again, requiring ever more destructive actions against the outside world upon which the faults and failures can be temporarily projected.

All this constitutes a language of violence always expressed in appearances and deeds, no matter what words are spoken to justify, extenuate, explain away or deny the destruction, maiming and killing. Kobrin calls this language sometimes Desperando (playing on the once popular artificial language Esperanto_ and sometimes Jihadese (which she models on “motherese” the phenomena of adults modulating their voices into jaunty rhythmic patterns to communicate with infants). But this language of the terrorists appears in violent actions, often symbolic of their repressed dysfunctional mental state in relation to their mothers and the hard and soft, external and internal objects that constitute their experiences infantilized lives.

Consequently attempting to prevent such events by dealing with superficial and rational motivations proves ineffective in almost every case, leaving law enforcement, military and judicial authorities frustrated; at best they can take out a Jihadist before he or she acts or close one venue or another where the terrorism was planned but never get to the root causes. Like the Hydra: cut off one head and other grows back. By learning to decode the secret language of the Jihadis, however, Kobrin claims, we will have the epistemological edge: we will know what they are saying and doing even before they get up to the point of blowing themselves up in a crowded pizza parlour or setting off a bomb in their shoes or anus while riding in a passenger jet. It is fine to monitor and measure the “chatter” of known would-be terrorists to determine where and when they may be planning their next attack, but parents, religious leaders, teachers and social workers should train themselves to pick up the signs much earlier in the lives of those who are susceptible to so-called radicalization.

While this Dictionary is not easy to read at first glance, it might help if one begins with the Coda, a section that as much as anything sums up and puts in order the main psychological arguments of the book. Picking and choosing some of the long entries will also make navigating this work easier.

*This review was first published by Family Security Matters by Norman Simms

Filed Under: Jihad, Latest News, Terrorism

Primary Sidebar

Spotlight

website capture islamist incitement quote by j.woolsey obama signing Rachel's law chemical terrorism transportation terrorism nuclear threats on the rise winning the cyberwar gps concepts and misconceptions libel tourism

Search ACD

Recent Appearances

[5/1/2025] National Talk Radio with Shawn Moore

[3/11/2025] Shaun Thompson Interview

[3/10/2025] Larry Conners Interviews Rachel Ehrenfeld

[2/3/2025] The Truth About George Soros - Grey Matter Podcast

[1/22/2025] Fighting Terrorism Funding - SAM Podcast

[1/8/2025] COUNTER NARRATIVE Interview on PATRIOT.TV

[10/2/2024] The Shaun Thompson Show: Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld

[9/30/2024] Counter Narrative: Soros Power Grab: Media Takeover & Election Manipulation |

[8/28/2024] SOS Blinken warns U.S. allies that Iran may attack Israel in the next 24-48hrs

[8/9/2024] Purham & Associates Show Special Guest: Rachel Ehrenfeld

[7/26/2024] Dr. Ehrenfeld on The Andy Caldwell Show

[6/12/2024] Dr. Ehrenfeld on The Shaun Thompson Show

[5/29/2024] Interview on Bill Martinez Live

[5/24/2024] CAEF presents "Soros is No Dreyfus: The Soros Agenda to Change America & his Anti-Israel Crusade"

[5/16/2024] Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld on Jayne Carol Tonight - Portland, OR

[5/9/2024] How deep do the Soros ties go?

[5/6/2024] Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld: The College Intifada-How Jew Hunting Became a Left Wing Blood Sport On Campus

[4/15/2024] Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld on The Vic Poricini Show

[4/11/2024] The Andy Caldwell Show

[4/10/2024] Always Right Radio with Bob Frantz

[4/3/2024] Kacee Allen & Rachel Ehrenfeld - The Pelle Neroth Taylor Show

[3/12/2024] Rachel Ehrenfeld | Gunther Rewind - Podcast on iHeart Radio

[2/18/2024] תעלומת ג'ורג' סורוס ותרומתו למאבק נגד ישראל - פוקוס על אמריקה - Podcast on Spotify

תעלומת ג'ורג' סורוס ותרומתו למאבק נגד ישראל - פוקוס על אמריקה | Podcast on Spotify

[2/7/2024] Are We in World War III and Don't Know It? - Laura-Lynn Tyler Thompson

[1/23/2024] The Chris Smith Show - TNTRADIO.LIVE

[1/22/2024] 'Soros Agenda' Author Warns That Global Elites Could Steal '24 Election - One America News

[1/12/2024] Stacy Washington NOW Rachel on from 24:10 – 31:46.

[12/23/2023] Propagaza – Laura-Lynn Tyler Thompson

View ALL

The Soros Agenda

g. soros

Soros: The Man Who Would Be Kingmaker, Part I

Rachel Ehrenfeld & Shawn Macomber

Soros: The Man Who Would Be Kingmaker, Part II

Soros: The Man Who Would be Kingmaker, Part III

Soros: The Man Who Would be Kingmaker, Part IV

More about Soros...
ORDER THE SOROS AGENDA →
Buy The Soros Agenda

Tags

antisemitism Caliphate Canada capital punishment China Christians Daniel Haqiqatjou Dawah Disinformation genocide Hamas Iran ISIS Islam Islamic Party of Ontario Islamic Relief Canada Islamic Relief Worldwide Islamization Islamophobia Israel J. Millard Burr Jews jihad Justin Trudeau LGBT liberalism Muslim Brotherhood Muslims NCCM Norman Bailey Palestine Political Islam Quran Russia Salaheddin Islamic Centre Saudi Arabia Sharia Sol W. Sanders SOROS Syria Terrorism Toronto US USA women's rights

Footer

About ACD

ACD is a New York-based 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization, which monitors and exposes the enemies of freedom and their modus operandi, and explores pragmatic ways to counteract their methods.

Endorsements

"The ACD/EWI ability to predict future threats is second to none"

- R. James Woolsey, former Director of Central Intelligence

- - - More Endorsements - - -

Follow ACD!

  • facebook
  • twitter
  • youtube
  • linkedin

Copyright © 2025 | The American Center for Democracy is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. Your contribution is tax-deductible to the fullest extent of the law.