Women in the Religious Wave of Terrorism and Beyond: The West Versus the Rest An analysis of women’s motives and agency in Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State

As terrorism expands and changes in this globalized world, women’s involvement in terrorist groups remains to be an object of fascination, particularly Western women who choose to join terrorist groups in the Middle East. This paper aims to reveal and analyze the motivations that women have for joining terrorist groups, without merely labeling them as delusional or misguided by men. While it is true that women have roles in many different terrorist groups, this paper chooses to focus solely Al-Qaeda and largely the Islamic State as they (and increasingly the Islamic State) are extremely important for today’s global security. Furthermore, the paper juxtaposes the differences in the motivations and recruitment between women from the West, and Middle Eastern women who are closer to the conflict areas. Ultimately, this paper finds that there is a vast amount of differing reasons why women choose to join Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. However, geography and historical context play a large role in these factors, thus showing a difference between motivations of women in the West versus women who are closer to the conflict in the Middle East. Overall, this paper finds that women have diverse and legitimate motivations and reasons for joining terrorist organizations, and female terrorists will continue to need to be researched and analyzed as terrorism evolves

Lingnan University in Hong Kong

Poster created by students in the 2016 IWU Freeman Asia Internship Program

Synthesis, crystal structure, and DFT study of two new dinuclear copper(I) complexes bearing Ar-BIAN ligands functionalized with NO2 groups

Two new bis(aryl-imino)-acenaphthene, Ar-BIAN (Ar = 2,4,6-trimethylphenyl = mes) ligands, bearing the NO2 group in the naphthalene moiety of the iminoacenaphthene at para- (5-NO2) and meta- (4-NO2) position, of formulations 1,2-bis(mes-imino)-5-nitroacenaphthene, 1, and 1,2-bis(mes-imino)-4-nitroacenaphthene, 2, were synthesized. Their respective dinuclear iodide bridged copper(I) complexes [Cu2(μ-I)2(mes-BIAN-5-NO2)2], 3 and [Cu2(μ-I)2(mes-BIAN-4-NO2)2], 4, were obtained in good yields by treatment with an equimolar amount of CuI. All compounds were characterized by elemental analysis, single-crystal X-ray diffraction, 1H-NMR, 13C-NMR, FTIR, UV/Vis spectroscopy. DFT calculations helped to understand the different molecular structure observed in the crystals of 3 and 4 and the determining role of packing forces. TDDFT revealed that the absorption bands in the visible were essentially MLCT (Metal to Ligand Charge Transfer), with some n→π* character (intra ligand). The shift to the red compared to the spectrum of the Cu(I) complex analogue without the NO2 group, [Cu2(μ-I)2](mes-BIAN)2], 6, could be explained by the stabilization of the ligand unoccupied π* orbitals in the presence of NO2.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Gina Blaskie

Blog created by Regina Blaskie for the 2016 Freeman Asian Internship Progra