What is “jihad”? The debate over the meaning of the word was reignited after the Palestinian group Hamas provoked a new war by massacring 1,400 people in Israel. The group, which is designated by the US and Europe as a terrorist organization, uses the word to describe its violent campaign to destroy Israel. But Hamas differs in significant ways from the most notorious jihadi groups of the past two decades, al-Qaeda and Islamic State.
Literally meaning “to make an effort” in Arabic, jihad can encompass spiritual, rhetorical, scholarly or military exertion in the name of serving God. The use of the term by al-Qaeda, which was responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks on the US in 2001, and Islamic State, which controlled parts of Iraq and Syria for five years until 2019, spurred the last debate about its meaning. Some Muslims argue that jihad is mostly a spiritual obligation involving internal struggle. In this view, violent jihad is permissible only in extreme cases when sanctioned by legitimate authorities. Like all Islamists, jihadis support rule by sharia, the precepts laid out mainly in the Koran and in the record of the prophet’s life. But unlike most Islamists, jihadis embrace violence.
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