RESTRICTED
AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY
Overview
R //
AUS CAN GBR NZL USA
6. (R) When women commit or support acts of violent extremism or join terrorist groups, their
family, friends, the media, and political leaders often portray them as brainwashed victims,
passive participants, or misguided romantics. While these narratives may hold truth for some
women, they are incomplete representations which can strip women of their agency and
accountability when they associate with violent extremism. In turn, security services and law
enforcement agencies may mischaracterise and possibly underestimate the security threat
these women pose.
Challenges to law enforcement agencies and security services
R //
AUS CAN GBR NZL USA
7. (R) Extremist women with a capacity for violence can present chal enges to the current
detection, prevention, and disruption methods relied on by security services and law
enforcement that have in the past largely responded to threats from male extremists.
Addressing these chal enges wil involve the fol owing:
Understanding how women are involved with violent extremism
8. (R) To confront any unconscious bias that women in extremist circles are typical y non-
violent and passive, law enforcement agencies and security services need to understand how
women and girls have actively contributed to violent extremism in recent history. Women
have engaged in violent extremism as planners, fundraisers, recruiters, couriers,
propagandists, spies, alibi providers, and supporters. Women have also physical y carried out
violent extremist acts themselves as suicide bombers and combatants.
9. (R) There is no al -encompassing profile for women who support terrorism and engage in
violent extremism. Their backgrounds vary widely in education, wealth, religion, culture, and
ethnicity. In the previous half-century women have supported a range of extremist causes
and groups from the secular and nationalist to the religious and sectarian.
10. (R) The locations of these extremist activities are similarly diverse; women have conducted
suicide attacks in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cameroon, Israel, Iraq, India, Lebanon, Nigeria,
Pakistan, Russia, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Syria and Turkey. s6(a), s6(b)(i)
Rethinking gendered stereotypes as a result
11. (R) Although terrorist groups may rely on gender stereotypes of women as non-violent,
women participate in such groups in ways that are clearly far from passive. If the general
public, security services, and law enforcement uphold these stereotypes, women and girls
are afforded greater strategic and covert potential than their male counterparts to undertake
violent extremist behaviour. As a result of these stereotypes, women and girls may attract
less suspicion and face less chance of being detected and disrupted in their violent extremist
activities.
RESTRICTED
Page 2 of 6
RESTRICTED
AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY
12. (R) For example, clothing associated with Muslim women such as the niqab or burka can
effectively conceal suicide vests and other weapons. Gender and cultural sensitivities that
prohibit male security officials from looking under, or patting down such female clothing,
can al ow for women—or men dressed as women—to gain unchecked access to areas of
public, political, security, or religious significance in ways that male counterparts are less
able.
Boko Haram
i.
(U) In August 2017, a Taliban militant dressed in
a burka killed a NATO soldier and two civilians
(R) Boko Haram is a prime example of a
terrorist group exploiting perceptions of
in a suicide attack outside of Kabul, Afghanistan. women to enable terrorist attacks and
capitalise on the resulting media attention.
ii. (U) In June 2015, the government of Chad
Over the past several years in West Africa, the
banned the burka fol owing two suicide bomb
ISIL-affiliated
terrorist
group
has
attacks conducted by male militants wearing the
systematical y deployed hundreds of women
garment to obfuscate their intentions.
and girls as suicide bombers, inflicting
thousands of fatalities. While many of these
Cameroon enforced a burka ban in July 2017,
women are assumed to have been coerced,
fearing similar attacks.
some are believed to have volunteered.
13. (R) Through understanding women and girls who
engage with violent extremism as diverse actors who are sometimes wil ing and enthusiastic
agents of violent extremism, law enforcement agencies can more accurately assess the
potential threat they pose. In turn they can be held appropriately responsible for their
actions.
Identifying possible differences in radicalisation and mobilisation by gender
14. (R) To improve the chances of identifying, preventing, and disrupting violent extremist
activity carried out by women and girls (for example, travel to join a terrorist group, or attack
plotting), it is critical to understand how women and girls may differ when radicalising or
mobilising to violent extremism.
15. (U) Questions to consider include:
i.
(U) How important is the role of the Internet in radicalising women and girls?
ii. (U) Are women and girls more or less likely to radicalise or mobilise alone?
iii. (U) Are women and girls more or less inclined to voice their violent extremist beliefs and
intentions to others?
16. (R) Security services that have long focussed on male extremists may find that such
differences in the radicalisation and mobilisation of women and girls to violent extremism
are an intelligence gap.
Example: the threat from ISIL-affiliated women
R // AUS CAN GBR NZL USA 17. (R) In the contemporary security environment, violent Islamist extremism is the dominant
violent extremist narrative, despite there being many forms of violent extremist ideologies,
such as right-wing violent extremism. In particular, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
(ISIL) succeeded in inspiring many men and women to travel to the (now near-dissolved)
‘caliphate’ that the group declared in parts of Iraq and Syria in June 2014. Marriage, child-
bearing, recruitment, and propaganda dissemination were key functions asked of and
performed by women in the caliphate. These roles have not been passive; ISIL women have
RESTRICTED
Page 3 of 6
RESTRICTED
AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY
been explicit in their support and encouragement of violence, and have been instructed to
raise the next generation in accordance with ISIL’s violent extremist doctrine.
18. (R) Although ISIL’s conservative ideology initial y dictated domestic roles for women within
the ‘caliphate’, the imminent territorial defeat of ISIL in Iraq and Syria appears to have
altered this stance. Foreign national women in ISIL-held territories have received weapons
training, carried out patrols, worked as couriers, supported attack planning, and conducted
suicide attacks against counter-ISIL checkpoints and forces.
i.
(R) In October 2017, in a marked shift away from ISIL emphasising the domestic role of
women in its territories, the 100th edition of ISIL’s official media publication
Al-Naba encouraged women to fight on the battlefield alongside men in defence of the
‘caliphate’.
ii. (U) An Iraqi security official reported to media that ISIL had deployed dozens of women
as suicide bombers during the battle for the city of Mosul in mid-2017.
19. (R) As ISIL is increasingly pushed out of the territories it seized in Iraq and Syria, it is likely
that some women wil continue to take on operational and combat roles to mitigate ISIL’s
ongoing loss of male fighters, and contribute to any ISIL insurgencies in lost territory.
20. (R) Other ISIL-affiliated women have attempted the difficult feat of leaving ISIL-held
territories, sometimes with family or friends. Many women seek to leave the region
altogether, either to return to their home countries or travel to a third destination. Some
ISIL-affiliated women departing Syria and Iraq wil likely retain extremist links and possibly
continue to undertake activities in support of ISIL or violent extremism in the name of Islam,
including by the commission, planning, or undertaking of terrorist acts.
21. (R) However, women do not need to spend time in ISIL territories in order to commit to ISIL’s
ideology and seek to support the group. Some women who have not travelled to the
caliphate have planned and executed attacks in support of ISIL in several countries. Future
planning and attacks by women are likely.
i.
(U) In December 2015, a woman and her husband conducted an attack at an event for
the husband’s workplace staff in
San Bernardino, USA, killing 14 people and seriously
injuring 22. The couple was praised by ISIL official media for their attack.
ii. (U) In September 2016, three women attacked the Central Police Station in
Mombasa,
Kenya, with a petrol bomb and knives. The attack injured two police officers and was
assessed as ISIL inspired.
iii. (U) In December 2016, an Indonesian woman was arrested and accused of planning to
commit a suicide bombing in the name of ISIL at the Presidential Palace in
Jakarta.
iv. (U) In July 2017, British authorities charged a 17-year-old girl with terror offenses for
planning a mass-casualty attack in
London, with the online counsel of a Syria-based ISIL
fighter.
ENDS
NZSIS Contact: Intelligence Publications Manager s6(a)
Distribution
International
s6(a)
AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY
RESTRICTED
Page 4 of 6
RESTRICTED
AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY
RESTRICTED
Page 5 of 6
RESTRICTED
AUS/CAN/NZ/UK/US EYES ONLY
HANDLING AND SECURITY INSTRUCTIONS
GENERAL
This report is issued for intel igence purposes only, and remains the property of NZSIS. No action may be taken on this intel igence
without prior reference to the originator. This intelligence MAY NOT be used evidential y.
This report MAY NOT be distributed to, nor may its contents be discussed with any person who is not authorised to read SIR reports at
the appropriate level (SECRET or TOP SECRET), unless the consent of the originator has first been obtained. It also MAY NOT be passed
to other Departments, but the originator wil consider promptly any request for additions to the distribution.
s6(a)
ATTACHMENTS Photographs, plans, sketches and tables attached to SIR reports MAY NOT be reproduced without the consent of the originator.
FISA
Any material marked as FISA is subject to additional restrictions on its use. Please contact
for further enquiries in
s6(a)
this regard.
RESTRICTED
Page 6 of 6
