How did Boko Haram, ISWAP, and bandits' tactics change against Muslim communities between 2020 and 2024?

1. How ISWAP’s “discipline” frayed and then reconfigured violence against Muslims

Early in the period, ISWAP applied a quasi‑administrative model: taxation, limited policing, and formal prohibitions against looting Muslims, which reduced overt attacks on Muslim civilians in areas under its control. That model began to fray after 2021 as territorial losses, defections, and military pressure reduced ISWAP’s capacity to police its fighters, prompting occasional reprisals, higher levies, and limited forced recruitment of Muslim youths—measures that increased pressure on Muslim villages previously tolerated or governed by ISWAP ^[4]. By 2022–2024 ISWAP also adopted more sophisticated operational techniques—coordinated near‑simultaneous raids, night assaults implying night‑vision gear, extensive motorbike use for mobility and the emergent deployment of weaponized or armed drones—raising the lethality and reach of attacks and increasing collateral harm in mixed‑faith communities ^{[1] [6]}. Observers therefore see a two‑phase ISWAP evolution: governance‑style restraint followed by militarized intensity as operational conditions deteriorated.

2. Boko Haram/JAS: from fringe to direct predation on Muslim communities

Boko Haram’s splinter, JAS, deepened attacks on Muslim communities as rivalries and battlefield losses reshaped incentives. Where ISWAP earlier sought to limit plunder of Muslims, JAS treated all civilians—including Muslims—as legitimate prey for looting, abduction, forced marriage and killing, reclaiming swaths of territory such as Lake Chad islands and the Mandara mountains and intensifying raids on settlements that had relied on ISWAP’s protective norms ^[4]. By 2024 reporting documents show JAS involved in mosque attacks and night‑time abductions of worshippers in several states, signaling a shift from selective targeting to more indiscriminate violence that directly impacted Muslim worship and community leaders ^[5]. Analysts note JAS’s retreat from large‑scale offensives to smaller, predatory attacks as its capacity changed, but the human toll on Muslim civilians increased where JAS operated, undermining earlier distinctions between jihadist groups and criminal banditry ^{[1] [4]}.

3. Bandits and the blurring of criminality with ideological violence

“Bandit” networks, historically opportunistic and locally oriented, increasingly converged with jihadist actors between 2020 and 2024, adopting tactics—mass kidnappings, attacks on mosques, extortion of pastoralists—that made Muslim communities explicit targets in some regions. By 2024 official updates catalogued incidents where bandits attacked Friday prayers, kidnapped worshippers during night prayers, and killed Muslim religious figures, signaling a departure from the earlier pattern of primarily targeting Christian or mixed communities ^[5]. This convergence also involved pragmatic alliances and recruitment, extending jihadist reach into northwest enclaves and complicating distinctions between ideological insurgency and criminal economies. The result is an erosion of safe havens for Muslim civilians in both northern and central states as banditry adopted guerrilla‑style mobility and economic disruption tactics—livestock theft, taxation, and road interdictions—previously associated with insurgent groups ^{[7] [2]}.

4. Technology, tactics and geography: drones, night raids and expanded fronts

Between 2020 and 2024 insurgent tactics grew more technologically enabled and geographically expansive. ISWAP’s reported use of armed commercial drones for reconnaissance and strikes and the growing incidence of night‑vision‑implied attacks enabled rapid, coordinated assaults across Borno, Adamawa and Yobe, and even into Cameroon’s Far North, increasing Muslim civilian exposure to sudden, high‑intensity violence ^{[1] [6]}. The tactical shift toward simultaneous raids and night operations reflects training, external supply lines or battlefield learning and has been accompanied by greater disruption of transport corridors and markets—economic levers that disproportionately affect livelihoods in Muslim‑majority rural areas. Analysts caution these changes signify not just tactical adaptation but strategic pressure to disrupt governance and humanitarian access, thereby amplifying the humanitarian emergency that left millions requiring assistance by mid‑2024 ^{[3] [7]}.

5. What analysts agree on and where disputes remain: scale, intent and implications

Across sources there is consensus that violence increased and that Muslim communities moved from relative protection to direct victimhood in many theatres, driven by factional splits, tactical innovation and alliances between militants and bandits ^{[3] [2]}. Disputes persist about timing and emphasis: some accounts stress ISWAP’s continued relative restraint up to 2024 with most harm driven by JAS and bandits, while others highlight ISWAP’s tactical escalation and technological adoption as central to rising civilian harms ^{[4] [1]}. All analyses warn that the blurring of criminal and jihadist modes and the adoption of drones, night raids and coordinated assaults made mitigation harder and widened displacement, creating a worsening humanitarian and governance crisis for Muslim communities across northeastern Nigeria and adjacent regions ^{[3] [7]}.