Nouran Khalil, Carme Ferré-Pavia and Luisa Martínez Garcia have published It’s us vs. them: social identification framing and polarization in ISIS’ Dabiq Magazine, in the Taylor Francis journal Behavioural Sciences of Terrorism and Political Agression.The study analyses Dabiq, the English-language magazine of the Islamic State (ISIS), as a blueprint for how identity itself is engineered through narrative. Across 206 articles published between 2014 and 2017, ISIS constructs a sacred in-group – devout, heroic, and morally superior – while portraying all outsiders as enemies of God, deserving of violence and erasure. Using Framing Theory and Social Identity Theory, and through inductive content analysis supported by chi-square testing, this paper shows how ISIS systematically builds a polarized ‘us vs. them’ universe in which violence is sanctified, opponents are dehumanized, and belonging becomes both a moral and existential obligation.

Polarization processes are needed to construct the enemy’s image

The results are not merely persuasion, but transformation: readers are offered not just a cause, but a new identity through which to see the world. In an age where polarization and identity conflict are reshaping politics, media, and public life, tracing how identity is framed and weaponized is key to understanding the mechanics of influence, ideological control, and the forces that divide and mobilize us.