A French Jihādī in Crisis: “Role Exit” and Repression

On Wednesday, February 14, 2007, at dawn, Abu Yâsin, a man about 30 years old, father of a family, was arrested at his home in France. He was suspected of belonging to an organization that was arranging to send irregular fighters into Iraq. The arrest had been in preparation for over two months, through Franco-Belgian cooperation. The whole security operation had actually begun 24 hours earlier with the arrest in Syria of two French citizens who were accused of trying to enter Iraq illegally. Abu Yâsin was released after three days of questioning and nine interviews in front of an officer of the court. He immediately wrote out a text detailing as precisely as possible the events that took place during his detention. This text was subsequently posted on a website, and later circulated by e-mail. His narrative allows us to gain access from the inside to the heart of representations of Salafi-Jihadist political identity, as these are diffused through the culture by means of the literature produced by this tendency, here in the early part of the 21st century. We present this text here, along with an introduction and commentary.