The propaganda war

A MASKED man stands behind a kneeling victim preparing to slit his throat, put a bullet in his head, or slice it off with a sword. Islamic State (IS) did not invent this gory bit of stagecraft, but it has now, in effect, taken ownership of it. Televised murder—all too often mass-murder—is the main trademark for the group’s particular brand of jihadism. Its most recent appearance was on August 12th, when it circulated macabre pictures showing the body of a Croatian hostage purportedly beheaded in Egypt. Such images are appalling; that they have become familiar is even more so.

The success that IS has had in winning followers with such messages perplexes its enemies, who are many. Indeed it has no friends at all; loathing for IS is about the only thing that unites Shias and Sunnis, Saudi Arabia and Iran, America and Russia, Turkey and the Assad regime in Syria. Within this motley coalition there is a growing belief that the battle of ideas and imagery may prove as important as war on the ground. After all, governments have repeatedly succeeded in eradicating terrorist groups, only to find that new ones, often similar but worse, pop up to replace them.