Who Favors al-Qaeda? Anti-Americanism,Religious Outlooks,and Favorable Attitudes toward Terrorist Organizations

Introduction

Public opinion polls show that an overwhelming majority of Muslims are very concerned about violent extremism and that only a tiny fraction support terrorist organizations that justify their violent acts in the name of Islam (Esposito and Mogahed 2007; Telhami 2013). ¹ This article explores why ordinary people in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) hold favorable views toward al-Qaeda, the prime example of transnational terrorist organizations. Examining individual determinants of favorability toward al-Qaeda in MENA is likely to improve our understanding of attitudinal and behavioral support for religiously inspired militant groups in Muslim majority societies.

Existing scholarship finds that only a minority of Muslims holding specific religious ideologies support militant organizations (Fair, Littman, and Nugent 2017; Wiktorowicz and Kaltner 2003). Rather than Muslim religiosity (Huntington 1993; Lewis 1990), we argue that a literalist orientation in the legal sphere (i.e., preference for strict implementation of scriptural teachings in law) as a politicized religious outlook generates sympathy toward al-Qaeda. Do other factors carry some weight once we control for a specific religious outlook resonating with al-Qaeda’s ideology? We argue that anti-American orientations matter a great deal for understanding the favorability of groups such as al-Qaeda, but in highly nuanced ways. Common wisdom assumes a positive relationship, and sometimes an overlap, between anti-Americanism and support for terrorist acts against the American targets. ² In our explanation, we first treat the two sets of attitudes as conceptually and empirically distinct. Then, we distinguish between varieties of anti-Americanism and propose that various types of anti-American sentiment will differently inform opinions toward al-Qaeda. Our explanation also addresses the cross-national variation in this relationship and moves away from a “one size fits all” approach.

The empirical analysis uses data from the Pew Global Attitudes Project Survey (2012) conducted in Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, and Turkey. We run a series of conditional mixed process (CMP) estimations that combine seemingly unrelated regressions with a selection model to account for (1) the large number of “no response” categories seen in survey items tapping individuals’ views about militant groups, and (2) the possible endogeneity problem concerning anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda.

Once we control for an individual’s religiosity and religious outlook, a highly nuanced relationship emerges between various types of anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda. Taking into account the missing values and endogenous effects, the association between anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda either disappears (Egypt and Tunisia) or takes a negative sign in some secular polities (Turkey) and client regimes (Jordan). More interestingly, negative views of the United States, the Americans, the American technology, and anti-Americanism as a general attitude decrease favorability of al-Qaeda. However, we find that deeper resentment toward certain aspects of American culture (customs, movies, and music) may breed sympathy toward this organization. These results imply that not all types of anti-American sentiments, and certainly not in every society, generate sympathy toward transnational terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda.

Our analysis demonstrates that individuals who desire the implementation of Islamic law based on a highly distinct interpretation of religious texts (literalist outlook) lean more favorably toward al-Qaeda. Religious individuals, however, are significantly less likely to hold positive orientations about this organization. Therefore, in addition to the highly variable effect of anti-Americanism, certain religious outlooks resonating with al-Qaeda’s interpretation of Islam are the main reasons triggering favorable leanings toward this terrorist network.

Religiosity, Literalist Outlook, and Favorable Views of al-Qaeda

Religion and secular-Islamist cleavage has been central to political struggles since the nineteenth century in MENA (Zubaida 1993). We maintain that, in MENA societies, religion is likely to shape political attitudes toward the state, governance, and violent militant organizations. Religion can have formative effects on attitudes toward al-Qaeda through two mechanisms: personal religiosity and religious outlooks.

One view argues that adherence to Muslim faith may be sufficient in itself to generate favorable opinions about militant groups such as al-Qaeda. This approach builds on Huntington’s (1993) clash of civilizations thesis predicting a fundamental conflict between the “modern” Western civilizations and Muslim world. According to Lewis (1990, 48), the source of “Muslim rage” is the religion of Islam, which, supposedly “inspired in some of its followers a mood of hatred and violence” against the West. There is some evidence showing that religiosity generates favorable views toward al-Qaeda (Mendelsohn 2005; Stern 2003). Others, however, find no relationship between religiosity and support for terrorist acts in several Muslim majority societies (Esposito and Mogahed 2007; Tessler and Robbins 2007). A recent study finds a negative relationship between knowledge of Islam and support for Islamist militant groups (Fair, Goldstein, and Hamza 2016). We test the hypothesis implied by the clash of civilizations theory against the propositions put forward by this recent scholarship.

A second mechanism that may generate favorable views of al-Qaeda is a specific religious outlook concerning the implementation of shari’a (i.e., Islamic law). While most Muslims around the world desire implementation of shari’a in social life, analytical studies show that support for shari’a does not necessarily promote violence or contradict with democratic attitudes (Ciftci 2013; Esposito and Mogahed 2007). In a recent study, Fair, Littman, and Nugent (2017, 3) find that individuals who conceive shari’a as provision of security and government services are more supportive of democracy, but those who view shari’a in terms of physical punishments are more supportive of militancy.

There are significant differences about the meaning and implementation of shari’a among Islamist groups. Salafis, for example, take a literal approach to religious texts and promote strict implementation of scriptural rules inspired by the lifestyle of Salaf al-Saleh (early generation of Muslims; al-Anani and Malik 2013). ³ The rhetoric of violent extremists such as Bin Laden is closer to this literal interpretation. Quentin Wiktorowicz (2005a) argues that al-Qaeda is a radical fringe group promoting violent action within the larger Salafi community. In his notorious “Declaration of War,” Bin Laden criticizes the Saudi government for failing to implement the true Islamic law, and he refers to the rulings of the medieval scholar Ibn-i Taymiyyah, acknowledged by many to be the founder of Salafi thought, to justify the war against the United States and the corrupt regimes in the Muslim world (Euben and Zaman 2009). ⁴

Al-Qaeda and other radical organizations justify the holy war (i.e., jihad) against the United States, the incumbent Arab regimes, and both Muslim and non-Muslim civilians in the name of defending the Muslim lands and establishing true Islamic law. A narrow and literalist interpretation of the Quran and hadith (the sayings of the prophet) underlies this justification. ⁵ Like all Islamist groups, al-Qaeda attempts to establish a monopoly on the interpretation of “True Islam.” Mainstream groups, including a majority of Salafis, condemn al-Qaeda’s ideology and its lethal acts carried against civilians. Nonetheless, al-Qaeda remains intent on gaining an authoritative position as a “defender” of the da’wah (i.e., Muslim cause).

Assuming the role of religious authority is no trivial issue in Muslim majority societies. Not all individuals can read the Arabic scripture, but most Muslims listen to the Quran on tapes, videos, and their phones. The majority of Muslims, like members of most other religions, however, are not well versed in the scripture. To make sense of complex religious doctrines, they rely on the guidance of scholars held in high esteem and regarded as inheritors of prophetic tradition (Fair, Goldstein, and Hamza 2016; Wiktorowicz 2005b). Al-Qaeda uses this knowledge gap to appeal to a small minority of pious individuals by establishing some kind of moral authority in religious matters. We argue that al-Qaeda’s justification of violence for implementing shari’a according to the example of the prophet and his companions might find some resonance among individuals leaning favorably toward such world views. Although a small minority, these individuals may find the religious rulings (i.e., fatwas), issued by al-Qaeda, persuasive. Because al-Qaeda’s interpretation follows the scriptural literalist ways, we can argue that individuals with religious outlooks favoring implementation of Islamic principles based on a literal interpretation of religious texts will lean more favorably toward al-Qaeda than those who hold a flexible approach.

We make note of two caveats in this proposition. First, many Muslim intellectuals advocate the implementation of a flexible and overarching set of Islamic rules in social and political life (Ayoob 2007; El-Affendi 2003; Ramadan 2009). These scholars argue that shari’a can provide a basis for modern legislation and democratic institutions (Ramadan 2009) and, as such, they diverge from the literalist interpreters of Muslim faith. Second, it can be argued that the proposition linking a literalist outlook to favorable views of al-Qaeda is already well established by the existing scholarship and that it is not novel. While we do not discard this criticism, our argument provides a very specific mechanism for explaining the formative effects of religion on Muslim political attitudes. We also believe that it is necessary to control for religious world views before we can assess the effect of other potential factors on favorability of al-Qaeda. For the goal of this paper, then, the question becomes: what role does anti-Americanism play in shaping attitudes toward al-Qaeda once we control for religiosity and a specific religious outlook? ⁶

Anti-Americanism and Favorable Views of al-Qaeda

Anti-Americanism is a rather ambiguous term defined as “a psychological tendency to hold negative views of the United States and of American society in general” (Katzenstein and Keohane 2007, 12). Military intervention, U.S. support for nondemocratic regimes and Israel, and discontent about cultural imperialism are cited among the main causes of anti-Americanism in MENA (Abdallah 2003; Berger 2014; Chiozza 2007; Datta 2014; Furia and Lucas 2006; Jamal 2012; Katzenstein and Keohane 2007). There does not seem to be a singular origin or one type of this tendency, and it widely varies across countries (Chiozza 2007). For example, Katzenstein and Keohane (2007) differentiate between four types of anti-Americanism: liberal, social, sovereign-nationalist, and radical. Scholars commonly make a distinction between policy anti-Americanism (Esposito and Mogahed 2007; Makdisi 2002; Tessler 2003) and cultural anti-Americanism (Paz 2003). The former relates to “what America does” and the latter to “what America is” (Blaydes and Linzer 2012).

Anti-Americanism is not necessarily specific to any given region, but it is important to consider that, in MENA, there has been increased distrust toward the U.S. government and its foreign policies (Jamal 2012), especially following the U.S. involvement in Iraq (Chiozza 2007). This distrust may turn into favorable attitudes supporting militant organizations or, in extreme cases, may lead to violent acts against the United States. As Robichaud and Goldbrenner (2005, 12) noted, “acting on anti-American sentiment is contingent on opportunity. When all else is equal, anti-Americanism is more likely to lead to localized violence where American targets or symbols are pervasive and/or accessible.”

Factors that affect anti-Americanism are likely to also inform attitudes about al-Qaeda. The complex interdependence between anti-Americanism and support for terrorist groups attacking American military and civilian targets makes the testing of this relationship challenging. Existing studies concurrently use survey questions measuring anti-American feelings, opposition to the U.S. policies, or the American culture as independent variables in the same models. ⁷ This scholarship, certainly, provides important insights about the underlying attitudinal drivers of support for terrorist attacks on civilian and military targets. However, we argue that there is merit in separating anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda due to the endogenous character of survey items simultaneously measuring anti-Americanism and support for terrorist groups acting against the American targets.

Does anti-American orientation always generate positive feelings toward al-Qaeda? We know that terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda exploit anti-American feelings to gain followers and to justify their acts against the United States and the governments in Muslim majority societies. The depiction of America as the “far enemy” (Gerges 2005) is the cornerstone of al-Qaeda’s ideology. The image theory (Alexander, Brewer, and Livingston 2005) predicts that such image construction may lead to widespread stereotypes about foreign powers. Bin Laden made ample references to the American foreign policy and exploited anti-American feelings in his rhetoric to obtain public approval for terrorist acts. Over time, most of these acts turned against the regimes in several MENA countries, but the exploitation of anti-American sentiment by al-Qaeda remains unchanged. Individuals with anti-American feelings are likely to rely on this rhetoric and view al-Qaeda positively. Therefore, we hypothesize that,

Notwithstanding this rationale, assuming a homogeneous link between the two sets of attitudes across four MENA societies characterized by different social, economic, and institutional dynamics is not realistic. We should observe different patterns in the relationship between anti-Americanism and support for terrorist organizations. Amaney Jamal (2012) argues that in the client regimes of MENA, anti-Americanism may not lead to favorable views of Islamists due to the fear of losing American aid that benefits certain segments of the population. Islamists will be allowed to serve as drivers of democratization by the regime insofar as they are pro-American and when the state is dependent on the United States in economic and security terms (i.e., Kuwait). This dependence may prevent the opposition Islamists from playing a democratizing role if they hold anti-American attitudes (Jamal 2012). In our sample, Jordan and Egypt are client regimes, and most Islamists may hold anti-American attitudes. In these settings, anti-American feelings may increase favorable views of al-Qaeda in the form of protest against the regime, in relation to the less dependent countries (i.e., Turkey and Tunisia).

Attitudes toward al-Qaeda may also vary according to the type of anti-American sentiments. Ordinary Muslims may hold favorable views of American democracy, technology, and business, but may dislike the American foreign policy (Esposito and Mogahed 2007). Berger (2014), for example, finds that negative perceptions related to American support for Israel or beliefs about a Western conspiracy to weaken and divide the Muslim world are related to support only for the attacks on U.S. military targets. Negative perceptions about the U.S. culture and freedom of expression are likely to derive support for direct attacks on American civilians (Berger 2014, 783). All else equal, we can argue that policy anti-Americanism will be a strong predictor of favorability toward al-Qaeda whereas attitudes toward American democracy, technology, business, and American people will have variable effects. Strong resentment toward American culture leads to support for violent acts against the civilians (Berger 2014), and, by extension, this attitude may generate favorable orientations toward al-Qaeda. Based on this discussion, we propose the following hypotheses to test the nuanced relationship between anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda in MENA societies:

Alternative Explanations

While lack of education as a determinant of support for terrorist groups has been a usual suspect, scholarly research finds little support in that direction (Mousseau 2011). There is some evidence to suggest that individuals possessing higher levels of education are more supportive of violent organizations (Krueger and Maleckova 2003), but research does not correlate poverty with support for terrorist organizations (Krueger and Maleckova 2003; Shapiro and Fair 2010; Tessler and Robbins 2007). Unemployment, particularly among the urban youth, may increase support for militant groups (Robichaud and Goldbrenner 2005, 13). An additional factor explaining successful recruitment by and support for militant groups is related to individuals’ identification with “terrorist organizations” rhetoric promoting traditional values (Mousseau 2011, 45). On the flip side of this rationale, cultural modernization, usually measured by egalitarian gender views (Inglehart and Norris 2003), may decrease anti-American feelings and favorable views of al-Qaeda insofar as it erodes the appeal of traditional values. Finally, individual preferences about the role of religion in politics may inform individual views about al-Qaeda. Because al-Qaeda’s religious discourse promotes a large and highly politicized role for Islam, we expect that individuals who desire a stronger place for religion in politics will lean more favorably toward al-Qaeda.

Data and Variables

We use the Pew Global Attitudes Project surveys conducted in 2012 for empirical analysis. This survey includes items measuring views of al-Qaeda, anti-American sentiment, perceptions of Islamic law implementation, religiosity, and demographic variables. The sample includes Muslim-only respondents in Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, and Turkey. ⁸ These countries differ with respect to state-religion relations, implementation of Islamic law, and religious traditions. For example, Turkey and Tunisia are staunchly secular with moderate Islamist parties whereas the constitutions in Egypt and Jordan refer to Islamic principles. Salafi groups are active in political life in Egypt, but they have contentious relations with the regime in Tunisia and remain marginal in Turkey. Turkey is the most advanced of all countries in our sample, followed by Tunisia in terms of economic development and democratization. Jordan is a client state that is dependent on the Western powers in economic and security terms, whereas Egypt is one of the largest recipients of the U.S. military aid. Anti-American attitudes are more pronounced in Turkey compared with other countries in the MENA (Pew Global Attitudes Project Survey 2012). We present the operationalization strategies for the dependent and independent variables below. The detailed description of these variables is presented in the supplemental material.

Anti-Americanism

We use eight survey questions to measure anti-American sentiment. The first two items asked the respondents, “Please tell me if you have a very favorable, somewhat favorable, somewhat unfavorable or very unfavorable opinion of (Americans and the United States).” The survey in hand also asked respondents whether they like or dislike: the spread of American ideas and customs (Q54), American way of democracy (Q55), American way of conducting business (Q56), American movies and music (Q57), scientific and technological advances in the United States (Q58), and American war on terror (Q59). The first two questions are measured with a 4-point scale, and all others are dichotomous variables (Yes or No). An additive index was created for an overall measure of anti-Americanism ranging from 0 (least) to 7 (most anti-American). ⁹ This index allows us to separate individuals holding unwavering anti-American feelings in all areas from those who may hold favorable opinions in some areas. The distributions for the indicators of anti-Americanism are presented in Figure 1 below.

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Figure 1.

Varieties of anti-Americanism in four MENA societies.

Significant differences emerge within and between the four countries with respect to the varieties of anti-American orientations (Figure 1). Individuals with intense anti-American attitudes (highest values on the index) constitute a small percentage of total respondents in all countries, but especially in Jordan (8%) and Tunisia (5%). Unfavorable opinion about “American customs” and “U.S. war on terror” is remarkably high in all countries (more than 70%). Contrary to the argument that it is the foreign policy, not the culture, that derives anti-American feelings (Esposito and Mogahed 2007), we see very high levels of disapproval toward American movies/music, American way of democracy, the United States, and the Americans in this sample. Anti-American sentiments of all varieties appear to be stronger in Turkey and less prevalent in Tunisia in relation to these figures in the two client states of MENA, Egypt and Jordan. In Figure 2, we present the joint distribution of attitudes toward al-Qaeda along three quantiles (low, medium, high) of the additive index of anti-Americanism.

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Figure 2.

Anti-Americanism and favorability of al-Qaeda.

As seen in Figure 2, very few individuals favor al-Qaeda in all four countries, but especially in Turkey. At the highest level of anti-Americanism, a slightly larger percentage of respondents hold favorable views toward al-Qaeda than those at the low and medium levels in Turkey and Jordan. The favorability of al-Qaeda is very small at the highest quantile of anti-Americanism. Overall, Figure 2 confirms that the relationship between anti-Americanism and favorable views of terrorist organizations may not always be positive and is much more complex than has been previously assumed.

Model and Results

Anti-Americanism and favorability of al-Qaeda have several common underlying covariates. This introduces a problem of statistical dependency in empirical estimation. In addition to this dependency, our main dependent variable includes a large number of “don’t know” or “no response” categories. When asked about al-Qaeda, 15 percent of the sample either did not respond or chose “Don’t Know” for an answer. While the rate of these missing values is less than 10 percent in Egypt and Jordan, this figure reaches 20 percent in Turkey and Tunisia. As previous studies using the Pew surveys demonstrated, the missing cases for the question asking about al-Qaeda are not randomly distributed, because the urban dwellers with higher education are more likely to respond (Fair, Kaltenthaler, and Miller 2014). Our preliminary analysis confirms a significant positive correlation between these nonresponses and literalist religious outlook, education, and income, and a negative correlation with religiosity. To account for this missing value problem along with the statistical dependency between anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda, we use fully observed recursive mixed process estimation, also known as CMP modeling, in Stata (Roodman 2011). CMP allows running two seemingly unrelated regressions with different kinds of dependent variables (e.g., categorical, continuous) while combining one of the models with a Heckman selection model. This strategy alleviates the concerns about a large number of missing cases by incorporating their selection into the statistical estimation. At the same time, it accounts for a possible endogeneity problem between two variables by linking the error terms from the two equations of interest. In the analysis presented below, CMP estimation includes three equations. First, we use a selection model in conjunction with an ordered probit regression predicting favorability of al-Qaeda. Then, CMP runs seemingly unrelated regression estimation by linking the error terms of ordered probit equation with a third model predicting anti-Americanism. For our estimation, this third model is either an ordinary least squares regression or a probit regression depending on the measurement level of anti-Americanism. ¹² As we are mainly interested in explaining favorable views of al-Qaeda, we report the results from the first equation in Table 1 and present the full model estimations in the supplemental material.

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Table 1.

Favorable Views of al-Qaeda: Conditional Mixed Process Estimations (Ordered Probit).

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4	Model 5	Model 6
	Base pooled	Full pooled	Egypt	Jordan	Tunisia	Turkey
Anti-Americanism Index	−0.030*** (0.01)	−0.056 (0.04)	−0.081 (0.39)	−0.049* (0.02)	0.0067 (0.11)	−0.14*** (0.04)
Literalist outlook		0.20*** (0.05)	0.19 (0.30)	0.26*** (0.09)	0.0072 (0.13)	0.43** (0.18)
Religion in politics		0.051*** (0.02)	0.0039 (0.04)	0.091** (0.04)	0.062 (0.05)	0.029 (0.05)
Egalitarian gender beliefs		−0.052*** (0.02)	−0.22*** (0.05)	0.17*** (0.04)	−0.11*** (0.04)	0.035 (0.05)
Religiosity	−0.071* (0.04)	−0.083* (0.05)	−0.22* (0.13)	−0.27*** (0.09)	0.15 (0.10)	−0.088 (0.09)
Personal economic expectations	0.049* (0.03)	0.037 (0.03)	−0.011 (0.10)	0.077 (0.06)	0.055 (0.07)	0.054 (0.09)
Sociotropic expectations	0.087*** (0.03)	0.068** (0.03)	−0.042 (0.10)	0.075 (0.06)	0.013 (0.09)	0.19** (0.09)
Income	−0.025 (0.02)	−0.0087 (0.02)	0.017 (0.12)	0.063 (0.05)	−0.0077 (0.05)	−0.0099 (0.06)
Education	0.035 (0.02)	0.040* (0.02)	0.14** (0.07)	−0.031 (0.04)	−0.071 (0.04)	−0.013 (0.08)
Age	−0.0018 (0.00)	−0.0025 (0.00)	0.013** (0.01)	0.0040 (0.00)	−0.013*** (0.01)	0.00092 (0.01)
Gender (Female)	0.041 (0.05)	0.078 (0.05)	0.31** (0.12)	0.51*** (0.09)	0.014 (0.11)	−0.042 (016)
Jordan	−0.23*** (0.05)	−0.40*** (0.08)
Tunisia	−0.43*** (0.06)	−0.37*** (0.08)
Turkey	−1.07*** (0.08)	−0.86*** (0.12)
Constant	3.68*** (0.24)	4.05*** (0.30)	2.90*** (0.72)	4.21*** (0.49)	2.33*** (0.61)	5.86*** (0.44)
Observations	3,519	3,519	899	894	906	836

Source. Pew Global Attitudes Project Survey (2012).

Standard errors in parentheses. Only the coefficients from first equations are reported. Estimation results for the selection model and anti-Americanism equations are reported in the supplemental material. Egypt is the reference category in Model 1 and Model 2.

*

p < .1. **p < .05. ***p < .01.

Table 1 reports the results from the pooled models and separate country estimations. In these models, we use the additive index. Anti-Americanism is statistically significant and negative in the first model, but once we control for literalist religious outlook, this relationship disappears (Model 2). As for country estimations, anti-Americanism decreases favorability of al-Qaeda in Jordan and Turkey and has no effect in Egypt and Tunisia. We find that individuals who prefer implementation of shari’a based on a literalist understanding of the scripture (literalist outlook) are more favorably oriented toward al-Qaeda in the pooled sample, Jordan and Turkey.

What do these results imply for the MENA countries? Turkey is a secular country with a long history of democratization and is less dependent on American aid, whereas Jordan is a client state where the regime exploits religious symbols for generating legitimacy around the personality of the King. As Jamal (2012) argues, in client states such as Jordan, some individuals may support Islamist opposition to voice their anti-regime and anti-American stance. It appears that Jordanian citizens may be leaning favorably toward al-Qaeda to voice their opposition to the regime insofar as this organization represents an anti-American ideology, or support for it may be viewed as a form of protest. However, because a large number of Jordanian citizens (i.e., regime loyalists) benefit from U.S. aid, they may be more cautious in supporting groups with anti-American orientation (Jamal 2012). In Turkey, however, the findings can be explained by political and institutional factors. First, in Turkey, anti-Americanism is a deep-rooted orientation that is exploited by political parties of both leftist and rightist ideology (Blaydes and Linzer 2012). Anti-American feelings stem from a variety of positions, including the anti-imperialism of socialist groups, resentment about U.S. foreign policies in the Middle East, religious factors, and the public suspicion of American involvement in the military coup of 1980 in Turkey. It is likely that Turkish citizens do not simply provide support to al-Qaeda just because it is an anti-American organization, and they may choose to delineate their views of al-Qaeda from those directed toward American policies.

The positive relationship between a literalist outlook and favorable views of al-Qaeda in Turkey presents a puzzle. At first sight, it seems unlikely that Turkish citizens would support an organization justifying violence based on a narrow interpretation of Muslim sources. Turkish Islamists, including the ruling Justice and Development Party, preach moderate views based on the flexible interpretation of the Hanafi religious school (Mardin 2005). ¹³ However, there are groups that preach a Salafi variant of Islamism, a-la-Turca. These groups were active in the 1990s and an offshoot of these groups, Turkish Hezbollah, carried out terrorist attacks in Southeastern Turkey and Istanbul in the 1990s (Orhan 2010). Albeit marginal, these groups preach a literalist understanding of Islam similar to al-Qaeda’s ideology. We suspect that individuals who sympathize with these messages lean favorably toward al-Qaeda in the Turkish context. It should be noted that, unlike in Turkey and Jordan, we do not see any significant correlation between anti-Americanism or a literalist outlook and favorable views of al-Qaeda in Egypt and Tunisia. We explain this result by the declining appeal of violent groups and the rise of peaceful Islamist movements in Egypt (Wiktorowicz 2005a) in the late 1990s and by the relatively high level of U.S. favorability in Tunisia (40% in 2012) that makes anti-Americanism a secondary domestic issue in political competition.

Results show that religious individuals are less likely to favor al-Qaeda in the pooled sample as well as in Jordan and Egypt. Surprisingly, in two staunchly secular cases, religiosity does not inform attitudes toward al-Qaeda. Individuals who prefer a large role for religion in politics, however, are not more or less likely to hold positive views of al-Qaeda, with the exception of respondents in Jordan. These results imply that neither piety nor political preferences concerning religion’s place in politics inform positive perceptions of al-Qaeda in our sample. To put these findings in perspective, we show the magnitude of these effects on favorable views of al-Qaeda in Figure 3.

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Figure 3.

Predictive margins for the correlates of favorable views of al-Qaeda.

In Figure 3, the diamonds represent the average effect of each variable (predictive margins) on favorability of al-Qaeda. Because the dependent variable has four categories, we present the marginal effects for the lowest (very unfavorable) and highest (very favorable) categories from the ordered probit estimations (first equation in CMP). As shown in Figure 3, we cannot always assume a positive relationship between anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda. On average, an individual with anti-American orientations is less likely to hold very favorable and more likely to hold very unfavorable views toward al-Qaeda in Turkey and Jordan. The predictive margins corroborate the findings in Table 1 by confirming no such relationship in Egypt and Tunisia. Together, these results provide evidence supporting our fourth hypothesis (H4) about the cross-national variation in the relationship between anti-Americanism and favorable views of al-Qaeda.

The results show the opposite pattern for the impact of the “literalist outlook” on favorable views of al-Qaeda, but with larger substantive effects. For example, an individual who prefers the implementation of Islamic law according to the strict interpretation of religious texts is 9 percent less likely to hold a very unfavorable opinion of al-Qaeda in Jordan and 11 percent less likely to do so in Turkey. Ceteris paribus, personal religiosity decreases favorability toward al-Qaeda in the pooled model, as well as in Egypt and Jordan, with relatively large substantive effects. However, the predictive margins are at the margins of statistical significance in Egypt. Therefore, individual preferences about the implementation of law based on strict religious principles may play a role in shaping attitudes toward Islamist militant groups, albeit with significant variation. This effect appears to be prominent not only in secularist Turkey but also in Jordan, where authoritarian regimes and Islamist opposition are in a contentious relation. The negative coefficient of “religiosity” in certain countries provides evidence that it is the religious outlooks prioritizing politicized and strict interpretation of religious text rather than piety that derives positive attitudes toward al-Qaeda in MENA. This is opposite of what the “clash of civilizations” theory predicts (H1), but supports the argument that only those who adhere to a very narrow interpretation of Islam resonating with al-Qaeda’s religious justification of violence will lean favorably toward this organization (H2).

Up to this point, we approached anti-Americanism as a single underlying attitude, neglecting the different types of anti-American orientations. What are the effects of these different kinds of anti-American sentiments on favorability of al-Qaeda once we control for religiosity and religious outlooks? We provide an answer in Table 2.

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Table 2.

Varieties of Anti-Americanism and Favorability of Al-Qaeda: Conditional Mixed Process Estimations (Ordered Probit).

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4	Model 5	Model 6	Model 7	Model 8
	United States	Americans	Customs	Democracy	Business	Music, movies	Technology	War on terror
Anti-Americanism	−0.069*** (0.04)	−0.73*** (0.05)	0.72*** (0.19)	0.19 (0.37)	−0.080 (0.31)	0.61** (0.30)	−1.35*** (0.14)	0.042 (0.14)
Literalist outlook	0.075 (0.05)	0.077 (0.05)	0.13*** (0.05)	0.17*** (0.06)	0.19*** (0.05)	0.14* (0.08)	0.23*** (0.05)	0.17*** (0.05)
Religion in politics	0.033* (0.02)	0.035* (0.02)	0.052*** (0.02)	0.041** (0.02)	0.047** (0.02)	0.048** (0.02)	0.028 (0.02)	0.045** (0.02)
Egalitarian gender beliefs	−0.0047 (0.02)	−0.033* (0.02)	−0.059*** (0.02)	−0.069*** (0.02)	−0.06*** (0.02)	−0.049** (0.02)	−0.091*** (0.02)	−0.07*** (0.02)
Religiosity	−0.17*** (0.04)	−0.15*** (0.04)	−0.16*** (0.04)	−0.14*** (0.04)	−0.12*** (0.04)	−0.18*** (0.05)	−0.11*** (0.04)	−0.099** (0.04)
Personal economic expectations	0.058** (0.03)	0.12*** (0.03)	0.044 (0.03)	0.024 (0.03)	0.020 (0.03)	0.023 (0.03)	−0.0014 (0.03)	0.014 (0.03)
Sociotropic expectations	0.12*** (0.03)	0.095*** (0.03)	0.12*** (0.03)	0.10*** (0.03)	0.083*** (0.03)	0.092*** (0.03)	0.033 (0.03)	0.10*** (0.03)
Income	−0.00088 (0.02)	−0.023 (0.02)	0.00072 (0.02)	0.00062 (0.02)	0.0064 (0.02)	0.017 (0.02)	−0.0094 (0.02)	−0.0055 (0.02)
Education	0.026 (0.02)	0.030 (0.02)	0.033 (0.02)	0.036 (0.02)	0.040* (0.02)	0.057** (0.02)	−0.0021 (0.04)	0.038* (0.02)
Age	−0.0029* (0.00)	−0.0025 (0.00)	−0.0041** (0.00)	−0.0041** (0.00)	−0.004** (0.00)	−0.007*** (0.00)	−0.0011 (0.00)	−0.005** (0.00)
Gender (Female)	0.13** (0.05)	0.13** (0.05)	0.058 (0.05)	0.083* (0.05)	0.050 (0.05)	0.045 (0.06)	0.14 (0.11)	0.052 (0.05)
Jordan	−0.28*** (0.07)	−0.25*** (0.07)	−0.32*** (0.07)	−0.38*** (0.07)	−0.34*** (0.07)	−0.32*** (0.10)	−0.28*** (0.08)	−0.41*** (0.08)
Tunisia	0.26*** (0.07)	0.058 (0.07)	−0.14* (0.07)	−0.20* (0.11)	−0.28*** (0.07)	−0.23*** (0.07)	−0.34*** (0.07)	−0.27*** (0.08)
Turkey	−0.97*** (0.08)	−1.25*** (0.08)	−0.92*** (0.08)	−0.97*** (0.14)	−0.87*** (0.16)	−0.96*** (0.08)	−0.34** (0.13)	−0.92*** (0.09)
Constant	0 (.)	0 (.)	1.36*** (0.23)	−0.16 (0.20)	−0.34* (0.20)	−0.59*** (0.20)	0.020 (0.20)	1.18*** (0.22)
Observations	3,459	3,459	3,459	3,459	3,459	3,459	3,459	3,459

Source. Pew Global Attitudes Project Survey (2012).

Standard errors in parentheses. Only the coefficients from first equations are reported. Estimation results for the selection model and anti-Americanism equations are reported in the supplemental material. Egypt is the reference category.

*

p < .1. **p < .05. ***p < .01.

Table 2 shows the results from the first equation in the CMP estimation for nine different indicators of anti-Americanism. The model names show the type of anti-Americanism indicator used to predict favorability toward al-Qaeda. According to the results in Table 2, respondents who prefer a role for Islamic principles based on a strict interpretation of the text (literalist outlook) as well as those who desire a role for religion are more likely to hold favorable views of al-Qaeda in most models. The evidence confirms the negative relationship between religiosity and favorable views of al-Qaeda. Controlling for these factors, we find that unfavorable views of the United States, the Americans, and the American technology are less likely to generate a positive opinion of al-Qaeda. While coefficients for “support for the American war on terror,” “American business practices,” and “American idea of democracy” do not reach statistical significance, some dimensions of cultural anti-Americanism matter. Respondents who dislike the American customs and the American movies/music lean favorably toward al-Qaeda, but dislike of “American technology” decreases favorability. This result stands in contrast to the findings of previous studies putting the policy anti-Americanism in the spotlight (Esposito and Mogahed 2007). We find that if individuals have a deep discontent about American values in the form of cultural anti-Americanism, this may breed support for al-Qaeda in the MENA region (see Berger 2014 for a similar view).

We also present the marginal effects from the models presented in Table 2 to show the magnitude of these effects. As Figure 4 shows, different kinds of anti-Americanism have larger substantive effects than those associated with religiosity and a literalist religious outlook. Individuals who dislike the spreading of American customs are 25 percent and those who have distaste for American movies and music are 21 percent less likely to hold very unfavorable views toward al-Qaeda. On the flip side, those with similar cultural anti-American orientations are 7 percent and 6 percent more likely to hold very favorable views of this organization. If anti-American orientation is about the Americans, the United States, or the American technology, this leads to less sympathy for al-Qaeda, as can be seen in the magnitude of marginal effects. Thus, while some forms of cultural anti-Americanism may generate favorability toward this lethal group, holding unfavorable views about American people or the United States as a country does not bring about the same effect. Figure 4 also confirms the robust impact of religious outlook (positive) and religiosity (negative) on favorability of al-Qaeda, but these effects are relatively small compared with the effects of anti-American orientations.

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Figure 4.

Predictive margins for favorable views of al-Qaeda by type of anti-Americanism.

In CMP estimations presented in Table 2, we also find evidence supporting the implications of cultural modernization theory as individuals with egalitarian gender beliefs lean less favorably toward al-Qaeda. The results do not show a statistically significant relationship between objective indicators of well-being (education and income) and favorable views of al-Qaeda but there is some evidence that women are more likely to favor this organization only in Egypt and Jordan.

Conclusion

The analysis in this paper focused on four countries in the MENA region (Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, and Tunisia) to explain the determinants of sympathy toward al-Qaeda. However, we believe that the findings of this study provide important insights for understanding support for similar terrorist groups in other Muslim majority countries. The results show that one cannot always assume a positive relationship between anti-American sentiment and support for terrorist organizations. More important, this study demonstrates that various types of anti-American sentiment are related to favorability of al-Qaeda in highly nuanced ways and that significant cross-national variation exists in this association (Jamal 2012). For example, unfavorable views of “Americans,” “the United States,” and “American technology” reduce favorability of al-Qaeda while attitudes about “American business practices” and “American democracy” do not exert any effect in our models. Interestingly, the proposed positive relationship between anti-Americanism and favorability of al-Qaeda does not necessarily originate from policy anti-Americanism (i.e., support for American war on terror), but rather through cultural anti-Americanism related to the dislike of “American customs” and “American movies/music.” Thus, beyond policy anti-Americanism (Tessler and Robbins 2007), resentment toward some aspects of American culture may breed positive leanings toward militant groups. Subsequently, this study joins the emerging scholarship about the unconventional effects of anti-Americanism on political attitudes (Berger 2014; Bush and Jamal 2015; Ciftci and Tezcür 2016; Jamal 2012).

Our research corroborates the importance of specific religious outlooks in explaining sympathy toward radical groups. Individuals who desire implementation of Islamic law based on a narrow literal interpretation of religious texts lean more favorably toward al-Qaeda compared with those who favor a flexible interpretation of Islamic sources. We suspect that this robust relationship, as demonstrated by others (Fair, Goldstein, and Hamza 2016; Wiktorowicz 2005b), is due to the appeal of al-Qaeda’s ideology for individuals who lack a deep knowledge of Islam. Some ordinary Muslims may be more conducive to accepting al-Qaeda’s rulings to compensate for this knowledge gap. We also find that personal religiosity decreases favorability of al-Qaeda (Tessler and Robbins 2007). Overall, the findings imply that we need to draw careful distinctions between politicized preferences of Muslims and personal religiosity as well as the different types of anti-American sentiment in understanding Muslim political attitudes about terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and ISIS.

Certainly, this study has numerous limitations that can be addressed in future research. Some limitations include social desirability bias, issues surrounding survey methodology in nondemocratic societies (Kuriakose and Robbins 2016), and lack of appropriate questions to test the implications of our theory. Our measure of support for violent organizations and attitudinal indicators of religious outlooks are far from perfect. In the future, scholars may use a detailed set of questions to gauge support for violent organizations and politicized religious outlooks for a stronger empirical test. While we test the effects of some possible causes (anti-Americanism, religiosity, and scriptural literalism) on favorable views of terrorist organizations, our analysis does not allow us to make a causal claim. Students of global public opinion and transnational violence could conduct experimental studies to provide causal assessments linking these factors to the perceptions of terrorist groups.

Overall, and from a policy perspective, we can argue that the wholesale depiction of ordinary Muslim men and women as supporters of violent extremism is well misplaced. It would be wise to scrutinize the arguments linking Islamic beliefs to support for terrorist acts before developing informed public policy. A similar note is in order for assessing the relationship of anti-Americanism and favorability of terrorist groups. The assumption that anti-Americanism and discontent about the U.S. policy in the Middle East is the only reason generating sympathy toward groups such as al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, or ISIS is simply wrong. Policy makers should recognize that there are significant nuances in relation to various types of anti-American feelings that may or may not generate positive attitudes toward groups such as al-Qaeda and ISIS and that there may be significant cross-national variation in this relationship in Muslim majority societies.