"Caliphate" against the Crown: Martyrdom, Heresy, and the Rhetoric of Enemyship in the Kingdom of Jordan

The execution of captured Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kasasbeh in February 2015 by Daesh (or ISIS) forces generated large public outcry in Jordan and thereby presented the regime of King Abdullah II with a moment of danger. In response to this rhetorical situation, the Abdullah regime engaged in rhetorics of enemyship based on appeals to religious orthodoxy, authoritarian ideology, and apocalyptic language. By examining these texts, this essay seeks to draw from contemporary rhetorical scholarship on terrorism, enemyship, and mass violence to expand the heuristic scope of the rhetoric of enemyship to include political rhetoric situated outside democratic contexts.