My ISIS instructor recommends a video to me. Its lessons are straightforward.

Courtesy of BILD

How does ISIS recruit its attackers in Germany? What are the last instructions before the terrorists strike and kill as many innocent people as possible? For months, BILD reporter Björn Stritzel pretended to be an Islamist willing to carry out an attack (always in consultation with the security authorities). 

My ISIS instructor recommends a video to me. It is a straightforward instruction on how to kill.

At the beginning of the video, past ISIS attacks in the West are celebrated – the axe-attacker from Würzburg is also briefly shown. This is followed by the headline: “Explanation of how to slay the disbelievers”. A ruined house can be seen, in which a prisoner is chained to a concrete pillar with handcuffs. A masked jihadist explains in French why terror attacks against the “crusaders” must be carried out.

Then the terrorist – who is introduced as Abu Sulayman al-Faransi – shows several knives (from a kitchen knife to a combat knife) and explains which ones are suitable for an attack. “Jack-knives are bad because of the unstable blade”.

Another masked jihadist approaches the prisoner, who wears a white jumper with the logo of a German pharmaceutical company. The gagged prisoner stares listlessly at the ISIS terrorist who cuts open his wrists, stabs him in the throat and the belly, and finally cuts his throat.

At the end of the video, a masked jihadist also explains how to make explosives. In order to demonstrate the effect of the explosive, a backpack bomb produced this way is used to murder another prisoner.

My German-language ISIS instructor wants me to use the knife techniques shown in the video – in Germany. He immediately suggests several suitable targets: “Go to an old people’s home, that’s very easy.” I ask whether that is permitted, even by ISIS’s radical interpretation of Islam. “Is an old people’s home allowed from an Islamic perspective?”

His answer is clear: “Yes, inshallah. Or to go a monastery or a church.”

He is obviously suggesting targets where potential victims will show little resistance, or that have a special symbolic value. An attack of this kind already happened: on July 26, 2016, two ISIS terrorists cut the priest Jacques Hamel’s throat in a church in Normandy. Amaq later published a letter claiming responsibility first, and then a martyr’s video of the terrorists, who were shot by the police.

Stefano Rellandini/ReutersMy instructor knows about the shock that this murder caused worldwide. This is exactly what he wants to repeat. “Believe me, Akhi, it will fill their hearts with so much terror, because everybody can do this.”

Nobody is supposed to feel safe, because everybody could be a potential terrorist – this is the insidious strategy of the German jihadist.

In order to remove any last doubts I might have, he promises me heavenly rewards for the murder: “It will also encourage many Muslims to do the same, and then you will receive your reward.”

What he means is the reward in the afterlife. In this Salafist-jihadist ideology, when a jihadist’s deeds inspire others, this counts extra towards heavenly rewards. Not only is one’s own terror attack added to one’s “martyr account”, but also the attacks of those who were inspired by it.

My ISIS instructor actually tries to make me commit an attack by the same methods that are used elsewhere to lure buyers into dubious pyramid schemes. In both cases, the “seller” appeals to the lure of allegedly easy to reach riches. In the case of ISIS, however, the payment for a terror attack will follow when one is with Allah.

I explain to my ISIS instructor that, despite the knife techniques in the video, I am too clumsy to kill a person. He also has a solution for this problem: “Akhi, trust in Allah, wallahi it is very easy. Simply walk into a hospital … Take flowers with you and go to the inpatient ward, where the severely ill are. Then calmly slay them. Very calmly.”

Hiding a knife in a bouquet of flowers in order to murder severely ill people – so this is what jihad is for my ISIS instructor.

“Sheikh al-Adnani rahimahuallah has said this many times. We want very simple operations, because the enemy cannot stop these. Do you understand, akhi?”

Al-Adnani – whom my ISIS instructor refers to here – was one of the highest-ranking ISIS leaders. He was head of the ISIS secret service’s department of external operations responsible for attacks abroad. In pamphlets and audio messages, Al-Adnani kept calling for attacks in the West – be it by car or knife. On August 30, 2016, al-Adnani was killed by a US airstrike in northern Syria.

However, his department of external operations still exists. His German employees still try to guide willing jihadists towards carrying out attacks – just as they did with me.