Mali has become the latest country to have a Salafi-jihadi insurgency surrounding its capital. Al-Qaeda’s Sahelian affiliate, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimeen (JNIM), has blockaded Bamako and several other key towns in central and southern Mali since September 2025 and demanded the implementation of sharia law across the country.1 The Malian junta’s struggle to end the blockade led several countries to urge their citizens to leave Mali, as did reports from academic and media outlets that Bamako was on the verge of falling to JNIM in the second half of 2025. However, the situation has marginally improved since the end of 2025.2
These fears bear some similarities to warnings, albeit slightly alarmist, of an al-Qaeda takeover in Somalia throughout 2025 and to the more real collapses of the Afghan government and Syrian regime in 2021 and 2024 respectively.3 The parallels serve as an impetus for this report, which seeks to compare JNIM’s capabilities and intent in Mali to those of its Salafi-jihadi analogues in other parts of the world. This exercise will help contextualize the risk of any JNIM takeover in Mali and inform the group’s likely trajectory in Mali and beyond.
Figure 1. JNIM besieges southern Mali (Source: author, Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, Armed Conflict Location & Event Data)
This piece lays out that while JNIM shares many similarities with its al-Qaeda–linked brethren, Mali is more likely to mirror the de facto fragmented-state symptoms of current-day Somalia—pockets of government or pro-government control in a sea of insurgent-controlled or heavily contested territory—than to experience a full-blown JNIM takeover as Afghanistan and Syria did. The piece begins by shortly summarizing previous research comparing JNIM’s political model to its al-Qaeda–linked analogues. It then takes a deeper look at how JNIM’s broader strategic vision is playing out in Mali compared to the visions of these other groups. This comparative exercise first looks at the group’s strengths, many of which it shares with the Taliban, before turning to key differences that prevent it from replicating the Taliban altogether. The final section examines several possible future developments that could alter this trajectory, such as a government collapse, negotiations, international intervention, or an internal schism within JNIM.
Political Model: The al-Qaeda Playbook
On the political level, JNIM has used a playbook similar to that of al-Qaeda’s Somali affiliate (al-Shabaab), the ex-al-Qaeda Syrian affiliate Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), and the Afghan Taliban. Jason Warner recently laid out the six components of the HTS model in this journal when evaluating whether Salafi-jihadi groups in Africa would seek to emulate HTS’s path to power:4
- Disavowing violence against civilians
- Framing itself as a legitimate alternative authority
- Pursuing a strategy of localization
- Considering negotiations with governments
- Collaborating with a strong regional state
- Breaking away from transnational jihadist groups
While HTS employed these tactics throughout its evolution in Syria over the last decade, Warner noted that most of them are not unique to the group but are common to many other jihadist insurgencies, including al-Qaeda, al-Shabaab, the Taliban, and JNIM.5 JNIM regularly disavows violence against Muslim civilians as part of its effort to present itself as a protector of local populations. This approach supports the group’s effort to frame itself as a legitimate alternative authority through other governance, justice, and service provision efforts. JNIM has also frequently framed its actions as local, even when threatening to retaliate against neighboring states or international partners for counterterrorism efforts. Rounding out the similarities, JNIM has regularly engaged in negotiations with local communities, negotiated with various states as part of hostage deals, and signaled an openness to direct negotiations with the government.6
JNIM differs most politically from HTS in that it lacks serious external backing by any state actor and has not disavowed its transnational ties. JNIM remains a regional pariah due to its growing expansion into neighboring states as well as its continued ties to al-Qaeda. While there have been rumors that JNIM could consider dropping its official affiliation with al-Qaeda, doing so would undermine a key uniting identity among what is a very decentralized, multiethnic, and multinational group.7
Comparing JNIM with Its Jihadist Peers
Understanding JNIM’s political model is key, but it is worth further examining how its broader strategic vision bears out in practice. Although JNIM may be following a playbook similar to those of other groups, these groups have different capabilities and operate in different local contexts. What worked for HTS or the Taliban may not work as well or even be feasible for JNIM for a variety of reasons. Comparing these similarities and differences can help inform the trajectory that Mali and the wider Sahel may take.
JNIM’s relative strengths are most similar to those of the Taliban or al-Shabaab, except that JNIM suffers from several key weaknesses the Taliban did not face. A Taliban-like seizure of power is highly unlikely in the short-to-medium term because of these shortcomings, but it cannot be ruled out in the long term. Still, JNIM’s ascendancy will likely lead to the slow hollowing out of state presence outside major population centers in the short-to-medium term—a Somalia scenario.
JNIM’s Operational Advantages: Taliban-Lite
1. Disruption of Roadways
JNIM is infamous for using siege tactics across the Sahel, which began as early as 2019 in Burkina Faso and Mali. JNIM enforces sieges to punish communities that it views as hostile, e.g., for cooperating with security forces or recruiting self-defense militias.8 The end objective is to isolate security forces in the area and coerce civilians into fleeing or complying with JNIM shadow governance. Amnesty International reported in July 2023 that at least 46 locations were under siege in Burkina Faso alone, while the Critical Threats Project, using Armed Conflict & Location Event Data, identified at least 63 towns and cities across Burkina Faso and Mali where JNIM partially or entirely controls the surrounding ground lines of communication.9
A key requirement for enforcing blockades is disrupting ground lines of communication, which JNIM does through a combination of coercion and direct violence. Amnesty defined JNIM’s tactics as “checkpoints at the main exit, the laying of IEDs in the main road axis to limit traffic, and occasional attacks against people, soldiers, and supply convoys trying to reach those besieged towns.”10 The group frequently stops civilians or drivers not complying with the siege and sometimes kills them. JNIM’s physical control over specific roadways varies from case to case, but the group contests the roadways enough to generate a psychological effect convincing civilians that the road is too dangerous to use.
The group’s efforts have forced Malian forces to abandon some key commune outposts and enabled the group to now besiege cercle and regional capitals. (Mali’s administrative levels descend from regions, to cercles, then communes, and finally villages or quarters.) Malian forces abandoned key district outposts on opposite sides of central Mali near the borders with Burkina Faso and Mauritania, respectively, in mid-2025 after two major attacks that together killed at least 121 soldiers.11 The attacks are two of the 14 large-scale attacks—defined as JNIM-initiated events that inflicted 20 or more fatalities in the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data dataset—that JNIM conducted in Mali in 2025, more than in all of 2024.12 As JNIM increasingly overruns these smaller outposts, the group is laying siege to bigger targets across the country. In the last year, it has enforced blockades to varying degrees on nearly all of Mali’s regional capitals; the most notable is the ongoing fuel blockade against Bamako and other major towns in the southern half of the country.
Figure 2. Salafi-jihadi sieges across the Sahel (Source: author, Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, Armed Conflict Location & Event Data, Amnesty International)
The Sahelian states have developed two responses to JNIM sieges: armed convoys and airdrops. While armed convoys occasionally provide much-needed relief, they are highly risky, as some of JNIM’s deadliest attacks have been ambushes of these relief convoys. JNIM also targets key infrastructure, such as bridges, to make road travel impossible.13 Airdrops provide limited and temporary relief, and Mali has only seven transport aircraft.14
JNIM uses its control of roadways to control the livelihoods of civilians, which undermines state authority and causes backlash against the state.15 Along the roads, the group has begun enforcing aspects of sharia, such as veiling and gender segregation, at checkpoints, leading women traveling between government-held cities to veil out of fear that JNIM could stop them and punish them if they do not comply.
JNIM frequently denies civilians in towns access to surrounding farmland subject to local agreements (see subsequent section), cutting them off from their livelihood and the basic resources they need to survive. The group also attacks critical infrastructure underpinning the local economy, such as water systems.16 The inability of civilians to acquire basic goods results in inflation, as essential resources like water and food become scarcer.17 Health and education services also often collapse under siege, as JNIM explicitly targets related personnel and infrastructure, or staff preemptively flee.18
Control of the roads allows the group to further position itself as a de facto governing authority through taxation, which also generates significant funds. JNIM imposes taxes on communities as part of its blockades and resulting peace deals and collects toll taxes at road checkpoints.19 The group has looted state coffers in attacks on customs posts near Mali’s borders with neighboring Guinea, Mauritania, and Senegal, as well as on other border points in the Sahel.20
Comparison with other jihadist actors
In 2020 and 2021, the Taliban heavily degraded and consolidated control over key roads to isolate Afghan forces. This campaign left Afghan forces demoralized and without supplies except for sporadic air resupply missions, leading them to eventually abandon key district-level outposts.21 The collapse of district-level checkpoints enabled the Taliban to consolidate control over these roadways and begin to isolate regional capitals and control economic activity throughout the country. The Taliban also used its control of roadways to position itself as the de facto governing authority and generate significant funds through taxation and customs tolls.22
HTS used control of roadways in northwestern Syria to establish itself as the de facto governing authority in the area and legitimize its control over civilians, using similar tactics to the JNIM and the Taliban. Checkpoints were a defining feature of its shift from a pure insurgent group to asserting itself as a centralized, systematic governing authority in northwestern Syria. HTS levied taxes at these checkpoints, especially near the Turkish border, generating millions of U.S. dollars per month.23 Its taxation system grew even more sophisticated in subsequent years, including the creation of new taxes for vehicle registrations and trade and construction licenses.24 Although it invested some of these funds back into road infrastructure efforts, Syrian civilians regularly criticized the group for not doing enough given how much it collected in taxes.25 The group also enforced certain sharia precepts across its territory, presumably including at checkpoints, in its first years before it began to take a softer approach in the 2020s.26
While al-Shabaab has not seized power in Somalia, the group heavily contests or controls most roadways in the southern half of the country. Al-Shabaab has also used this control to generate millions of U.S. dollars in revenue from checkpoints.27 The group’s campaign has effectively isolated most government-held population centers in southern Somalia, creating the “Swiss cheese” effect of a de facto fragmented state with government-held cities in seas of contested or al-Shabaab–controlled territory.28
2. Local Agreements
JNIM’s blockade tactics are heavily intertwined with another tool in the group’s tool kit—local agreements. JNIM often ends blockades once it comes to an agreement with the local leaders of targeted communities, which the leaders have called “survival pacts.”29 These agreements provide a modicum of security for beleaguered local populations and enable economic activity to resume, as JNIM allows local markets to reopen and civilians to return to their farming and grazing land.30 The pacts ultimately result in JNIM de facto supplanting state authority.
One of the two key stipulations in local agreements is that there should be no military resistance to JNIM, which sidelines the military and government-aligned militias in affected areas and gives JNIM a monopoly on the use of force and security provision. Local communities often agree to cease all cooperation with state security forces, which cuts critical intelligence and resource streams that state forces need to safely maintain their position. The group cut similar deals with bus transportation companies that had helped move security forces around the country. In some cases, the deals have even placed specific constraints on the military forces stationed in the town.31 Many of the deals have also led government-aligned militias, which have become the only obstacle to JNIM’s control in rural areas that security forces have abandoned over the last decade, to surrender their weapons and cease their activities.32
The other key aspect of these local agreements is the requirement of populations to adhere to sharia law, effectively meaning they concede to JNIM shadow governance. Basic aspects of this sharia implementation include dress codes, alcohol bans, and zakat collection (i.e., taxation).33 In many cases, JNIM taxes come in the form of livestock or other goods, which the group then sells or barters elsewhere.34 Enforcement and other initiatives to mediate disputes and provide basic services can vary greatly in their nature and scope as the group seeks to win over the local community.35 For example, local JNIM fighters also sometimes make pragmatic concessions of their own at the request of communities, including on limiting JNIM involvement in religious affairs, arms and IED control, schooling, and efforts to reduce collateral damage from fighting in towns.36
JNIM increased the scale and geographic scope of its negotiations in Mali in 2025, partially at the acquiescence of the Malian junta. Armed Conflict Location & Event Data recorded that JNIM concluded 15 local agreements and lifted at least three sieges, which implies the existence of an agreement, in 2025. New agreements in Sikasso in 2025—the group’s first in southern Mali—are contributing to this yearly record. The Malian junta quietly showed more openness to local negotiations in 2025, especially in central Mali, as a result of the deteriorating security position in southern Mali. Numerous media reports indicate that junta-linked officials are trying to enforce agreements and increasingly oversee or get directly involved in negotiations.37
Figures 3 and 4. JNIM local agreements in central and southern Mali (Source: author, Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, Armed Conflict Location & Event Data)
Comparison with other jihadist actors
The Taliban cultivated local agreements at a rapid pace as it extended its control across Afghanistan in 2020–21. It achieved this mostly through coercion and persuasion of isolated communities, much like in JNIM’s current blockade campaign.38 Afghan capitulations to the Taliban involved state security forces more frequently than JNIM’s local agreements, partially due to the larger size and presence of Afghan security forces compared to Sahelian forces, but JNIM’s agreements are still having a similar effect of eliminating any armed resistance—state or militia—to its control. Taliban negotiations also used local tribal elders to increase the legitimacy and reach of its appeals, which resembles the JNIM tactic of negotiating with local leaders in blockaded areas.39 The surrender of Afghan communities helped the Taliban gain more weapons, control of population, and revenues, creating a snowball effect that enabled it to rapidly encircle the Afghan government until it collapsed.40
Local agreements were a major component of HTS’s efforts to consolidate control of and legitimacy among the Christian minority population in northwestern Syria since 2018 and were key to the group’s lightning advance across Syria in late 2024. HTS had negotiated with Christian leaders in Idlib Province since at least 2018, and these talks led to agreements that returned seized property to their Christian owners, allowed public holiday celebrations and prayers, and ceased security force attacks on Christian communities.41 This experience served as a template for HTS as it spread across Syria in late 2024, when it preemptively engaged community and diaspora leaders of minority communities to secure agreements that enabled it to spread into new areas with minimal force and establish popular legitimacy.42
Al-Shabaab has also used local agreements and local leaders to strengthen its position in various parts of Somalia. It has frequently navigated Somalia’s fractious clan politics by striking local agreements with various clans.43 The group faced a clan-based uprising in central Somalia in 2021–23 after it overplayed its hand with forcible conscription and heavy taxation practices that alienated locals in the area. In response to this uprising and the ensuing government-backed offensive, al-Shabaab rallied support among certain clans in the region that were rivals of those engaged in the uprising, which helped it eventually halt the offensive.44 Since then, al-Shabaab has gradually overturned its losses by either striking deals with or sidelining the same clan militias that initially rebelled against it. The group typically contacts clan elders in nominally government-held areas before it sends forces to retake them, offering clan militia fighters amnesty if they stand down. This has allowed the group to reclaim many territories previously liberated by clan/government forces since 2022, sometimes without firing a shot.45
3. Psychological and Propaganda Efforts
The strategic surprise JNIM achieved in southwestern Mali in the second half of 2025 has another more practical effect—wearing down the psyche of the junta and Malian civilians, which could critically undermine the confidence, will, and popular legitimacy of the Malian government and military. JNIM publicly announced its arrival in southwestern Mali on July 1, when it simultaneously attacked five army positions in the Kayes region and two positions in the Segou region. By all accounts, it seemed the attacks were a series of tactical defeats for JNIM. The Malian army claimed to have killed at least 80 militants as it repelled the incursions.46 But the attacks still validated fears that the group’s growing strength in the southwest since at least 2020 would eventually threaten Mali’s economic and political center of gravity, disrupt regional economic activity, and spread to neighboring states.47
Despite the tactical defeat, JNIM’s operations in southwestern Mali have had a strategic and psychological impact by shattering the pro-junta information bubble in Bamako and other parts of southern Mali, undermining the junta’s raison d’etre. An oversimplistic analogue for this situation is the impact of the Tet Offensive during the Vietnam War. The junta has spent the last several years systematically cracking down on independent press and co-opting civic space to project the narrative that it is leading a montée en puissance (growing strength), which is integral to its popular support and legitimacy.48 However, JNIM’s attack on Bamako in 2024 and its campaign across southern Mali in the second half of 2025 aimed to torpedo the narrative among the junta’s support base in these previously insulated areas. It directly confronted Malians with the reality that the security situation is not improving despite what the government propaganda and talking points are telling citizens in the cities.
JNIM has sought to further exaggerate its strength through its propaganda. It regularly publishes attack claims with supporting media to highlight its victories and drive the narrative that it is strengthening and winning.49 The group began publishing pictures and videos of its training camps in 2024; the SITE Intelligence Group recorded at least 27 such publications.50 JNIM published training camp media more frequently and with a greater focus on Mali in 2025, especially since the siege in the southwestern part of the country began. The group has published 11 training camp media releases since August 31, six of these since the beginning of December 2025. Almost all publications since the start of 2025 have been from Mali-based camps, including its first video from a camp in southern Mali, while the group’s 11 publications in 2024 were split between Burkina- and Mali-based camps.51 The media aims to send a clear message—the group is overpowering the junta and is only growing stronger.
Comparison with other jihadist actors
The Taliban used propaganda and social media to undermine the morale and cohesion of Afghan forces and support for the government prior to its takeover of Kabul in 2021. Pro-Taliban social media accounts flooded the internet with graphic images and warnings to Afghan soldiers or anyone who refused to surrender to the group.52 The group circulated images of its conquests on social media and more traditional propaganda channels to “win the narrative,” undercutting the will of the Afghan people to resist the group and contributing to the snowballing of surrenders.53
HTS used a much more sophisticated propaganda network to bolster its own public image as a legitimate state authority in northwestern Syria. After the HTS merger and rebrand in 2017, the group expanded preexisting strategies to highlight its governance efforts in northwestern Syria. It did this through a variety of sources, including online and offline outlets and content that included op-eds and political analysis in addition to the typical Jihadist battlefield content.54 The group consolidated increasing control over the information space to promote its governance vision in HTS-held areas and sought to manage Western media coverage of these areas through its information apparatus.55 During the offensive that toppled the Assad regime in 2024, officials posted updates across social media and recorded videos detailing operations, but this messaging was directed at Syrian civilians and the international community more than at regime forces.56
Al-Shabaab frequently uses its traditional and social media networks to spread propaganda that undermines the Somali government. It has an extensive media apparatus that involves its own official media channel, domestic radio stations, online news outlets, and social media presence.57 The group spreads standardized messages across this apparatus to control and present a unified narrative.58 Al-Shabaab’s media network spreads many of the same narratives as JNIM, particularly highlighting its victories and abuses by state and partner forces. The group also regularly highlights its governance and religious activity in a similar way to HTS.
4. Distracted Adversaries
Much like the Taliban and HTS in Syria, JNIM is threatening Bamako at a time when Mali has few—if any—solid or effective external partnerships. Mali’s partnership with Russia has been a disaster. From the outset, the math did not add up, as the junta traded nearly 2,500 French soldiers and 12,000 UN peacekeepers for 2,000 Russian mercenaries. The junta had legitimate grievances with the continued worsening of violence and the stalled reintroduction of government control to Tuareg rebel-held parts of northern Mali. However, the shift has left Malian and Russian forces overstretched and unable to backfill French and UN forces that had been responsible for security in the north for nearly a decade. The junta and its Russian counterparts have pursued a woefully ineffective counterinsurgency strategy premised on brutal, Russian-style, military-centric counterinsurgency doctrine. Burkinabe and Malian state forces are now on pace to kill more civilians than Salafi-jihadi insurgents across the Sahel for the second straight year, which has reportedly led to an increase in JNIM recruitment and has likely contributed to JNIM’s expansion and strengthening across the Sahel.59
To make matters worse, Russia’s continued invasion of Ukraine means it is unlikely that Russia can provide impactful reinforcements for the Malian military. Africa Corps (formerly known as Wagner Group) faced significant recruiting shortages throughout 2024, which affected its ability to expand operations in partner countries like Burkina Faso and Niger.60 While the Kremlin surged Africa Corps recruiting in 2025, the Institute for the Study of War assessed that this was likely to replace legacy Wagner Group members and in part to recruit personnel to fight in Ukraine, where the Kremlin uses Africa Corps as a reserve pool.61
Looking elsewhere, Mali has few partners able to fundamentally alter the strategic picture in the short term. Turkey offers the most promise; Turkish trainers are reportedly planning to deploy to neighboring Niger and mercenaries are reportedly protecting Turkish economic sites in Mali and Burkina Faso.62 Turkish drones are being used throughout the Sahel and are helpful in disrupting JNIM control of key towns or highways but cannot deny the group influence over these areas entirely, much less alter the strategic picture. Mali first acquired Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2s in December 2022 (since which time the insurgency has undoubtedly worsened) and now has between eight and 17 TB2s according to various sources.63 Other partners, such as China, the European Union, and the United States, offer various degrees of material and intelligence support, but none are positioned—much less willing—to play the role France did when it sent 4,000 soldiers after JNIM’s predecessor captured major population centers in 2013.64
Comparison with other jihadist actors
In taking power in Syria in 2024, HTS greatly benefited from the weakening and distraction of the Assad regime’s main enablers—Iran and its proxy network as well as Russia. Israel severely degraded Iran’s proxy network after Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attacks. Among Israel’s various actions to target the network, it launched several airstrikes on Iranian facilities and Iran-aligned militias in Syria, which forced those personnel to withdraw.65 Lebanese Hezbollah had also played a key role in Iran’s support for the Assad regime but had been severely weakened by its war with Israel, which ended only days before the HTS offensive in November 2024.66 Similar to its position in Mali, Russia’s preoccupation with Ukraine had also weakened the Assad regime’s position, specifically through the loss of air assets that Russia moved to Ukraine.67
The Taliban escalated its efforts to seize Afghanistan alongside the U.S. withdrawal from that country. The United States initially agreed in February 2020 to withdraw all troops by May 2021 but eventually extended this deadline to September 11, 2021. U.S. forces began accelerating their withdrawal in May 2021, and it was 95% complete by July.68 Taliban forces launched their summer offensive as the American withdrawal accelerated in May 2021, and the offensive escalated and snowballed alongside the U.S. drawdown over the rest of the summer.69
Al-Shabaab faces greater multilateral resistance than JNIM or other actors, but it too has exploited recent divisions among Somalia’s international partners. Part of al-Shabaab’s resurgence in central Somalia in 2025 owed to the messy transition of the African Union (AU) peacekeeping mission in Somalia. Burundi, which had maintained troops in central Somalia for 18 years, abruptly threatened to withdraw from the new mission days before it was slated to begin.70 A major political dispute involving Ethiopia and Somalia in 2024 also meant that Ethiopia and Egypt finalized their involvement in the new AU mission after it began.71 The AU faces challenges in finding continued funding for the mission.72 Those challenges aside, AU forces and international drone support (namely from the U.S., U.A.E., and Turkey) continued to play a critical role in helping Somali forces regain some territory from al-Shabaab in parts of the country in 2025.73
JNIM’s Weaknesses
While JNIM undoubtedly enjoys many advantages, many of which are worryingly reminiscent of those of the Taliban or HTS, the group faces several internal and external constraints that neither of the successful groups faced. While these shortcomings will not stop JNIM from pushing Mali toward becoming a de facto fragmented state of government-controlled urban centers surrounded by jihadist-controlled or contested countryside and roadways, the limitations do make the group highly unlikely to seize and directly govern Bamako or other major population centers by force in the near or even medium term. In short, the group lacks the capacity, the capability, and likely even the intent to do so.
1. Lack of Intent
JNIM’s rhetoric and behavior indicate that it wants to heavily influence the state—not to directly capture it. JNIM and its al-Qaeda–linked predecessors have historically been open to negotiations under the condition that foreign forces leave the country. Amid the blockade, the group demanded a direct dialogue with the junta and continued to show an openness to negotiations. The group’s demands have focused on fuel trading provisions, sharia law, and even the ousting of the current regime, which are all short of implying it seeks direct control. In July 2025, JNIM put out a call for “all influential figures, intellectual and cultural elites, businessmen, media personalities, and all the elements and components of our society” to fight back against the juntas.74 Nowhere did the statement explicitly call for these elites to join JNIM; rather, it urged them to hold the governments accountable for their actions.
JNIM’s negative historical experience with direct administration, and the resulting international intervention, will also likely inform the group’s approach. JNIM is undoubtedly stronger than its predecessor groups were when they first faced international intervention in 2013, after they had seized and begun administering major population centers in northern Mali. However, JNIM still has not yet shown it can win conventional battles and hold major population centers against Malian forces, much less in the face of a renewed international effort. While HTS and the Taliban each sidelined the threat of international intervention against them in their own ways, JNIM has done little to tangibly dissuade a potential international intervention aside from maintaining a low profile. It has done this by explicitly avoiding seizing cities or conducting major attacks that could cause foreign fatalities.75 The rare JNIM attacks on foreigners are often kidnappings in which the group sells the hostages back to the host country for ransom, which establishes mediation channels and builds trust rather than adopting a purely confrontational stance.76 The group has repeatedly criticized and warned against foreign meddling in the Sahel for years, signaling that avoiding an international intervention remains a genuine interest.
Comparison with other jihadist actors
HTS mitigated the risk of unwanted international intervention by disavowing its links to al-Qaeda and cultivating ties with Turkey. First, HTS formally renounced its ties with al-Qaeda in 2016. This step was key in “gaining broader acceptance and reducing external pressure” among both internal Syrian factions and the broader international community.77 HTS also allied with Turkey, which shielded the group physically and politically. Analysts note that HTS operated with “de facto Turkish protection” in northeastern Syria as it built its capabilities.78 The Taliban, in contrast, ended unwanted international intervention by striking a deal with the United States, which constrained the United States in its response to the escalating Taliban insurgency and ultimately ended decades of U.S. involvement.79
2. Lack of Capacity
JNIM is working with fewer fighters across a wider expanse of geography than its jihadist peers. The latest public estimates claim the group has 6,000 fighters, which is a fifth of HTS size estimates in 2024 and a tenth of the lower-end estimates of the Taliban’s fighting force in 2021.80 These fighters are primarily spread across Burkina Faso and Mali—an area more than twice as large as Afghanistan and nearly nine times larger than Syria—and western Niger.81
Comparison with other jihadist actors
HTS and the Taliban had many more fighters, including vis-à-vis the adversaries they were fighting, when they took power in their respective countries than JNIM currently has. In terms of raw numbers, lower-end estimates of HTS strength in 2024 and the Taliban’s strength in 2021 are 30,000 and 60,000 militants, respectively, compared to JNIM’s 6,000.82 JNIM continues to trail its peers in size relative to that of the opposing security forces.83 The group has one militant for every 10 soldiers it faces across Burkina Faso and Mali combined, excluding thousands of militia fighters the group also faces.84 HTS and the Taliban enjoyed more favorable ratios of roughly one fighter for every five or six Syrian or Afghan soldiers.85 These numbers do not even paint the full picture of the difference, however, as HTS and the Taliban also benefited from alliances with other armed groups, while their adversaries were even weaker than their stated numbers due to poor morale and cohesion.
Figure 5. JNIM’s capacity challenges compared to those of other jihadist groups (Source: author, Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute)
JNIM’s capacity issues, specifically its ability to govern, are more clearly exposed when comparing its size to the population and territory it is aiming to control. There is one JNIM militant for every 8,000 people across Burkina Faso and Mali, while HTS and the Taliban had one militant for every 820 and 710 people in their respective countries.86 JNIM is also operating across a much larger geographic expanse, as noted previously, with one militant for nearly every 100 square miles of Burkinabe and Malian national territory. HTS and the Taliban had one militant for roughly every two and four square miles respectively. Removing Burkina Faso, a relatively more densely populated country of nearly 23.5 million people, helps balance the civilian figures to a still-lopsided 4,000-to-one ratio in Mali alone but hardly impacts the geographic imbalance given Mali’s vast territory.
3. Lack of Capability
Militarily, JNIM is working with less experienced fighters and weaker hardware than the other jihadist groups examined in this study. Its most veteran fighters are concentrated in northern Mali, where the initial al-Qaeda–linked insurgency latched onto the Tuareg rebellion in 2012. However, many of JNIM’s fighters, especially in the areas where JNIM and its constituent groups have spread south in recent years, are newer recruits and part-time fighters who rally from nearby villages for a given attack.87The group’s training camps show an intention to improve its overall combat effectiveness, but training still does not make up for years of experience. JNIM is increasingly using drones in kinetic operations but is tactically limited to using rudimentary commercial quadcopters to drop mortars or other explosives onto stationary targets.88
JNIM also remains vulnerable to Malian drones, which limit its ability to mass forces for conventional assaults. As a result, its militants in southern Mali resort to smaller ambushes along roadways and commando-style attacks in major cities. The Malian military has begun to degrade JNIM’s ability to maintain its blockade along some axes in southern Mali through drone strikes since October 2025.89 Furthermore, drones proved decisive in Mali’s ability to recapture Kidal city in northern Mali in 2022, underscoring their utility should JNIM attempt a more conventional urban assault.90 JNIM has acquired ad hoc anti-air capabilities thanks to looted weaponry, such as a 14.5mm anti-aircraft gun in Burkina Faso, which it used to repel state air support and remain in large numbers in a provincial capital for multiple days in one instance in June 2025.91 These systems are still unable to reliably shoot down combat drones, however, and have not been deployed in southern Mali.
Comparison with other jihadist actors
The Taliban and HTS were much more experienced and capable fighting forces than JNIM. Veteran Taliban fighters had been active in the country since the initial U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. The Taliban had used looted night-vision goggles, armored vehicles, and other higher-end equipment for years prior to its capture of Kabul in 2021.92 HTS had been fighting the Assad regime, rival rebel groups, and ISIS since its inception as Jabhat al-Nusra in 2012. Many veteran jihadists in Syria, such as the group’s leader Ahmed al-Sharaa and foreign fighters, had been fighting even longer across the Middle East. HTS further professionalized its fighting forces by establishing a military academy in 2019 that was run by Syrian army defectors.93 The academy included a standardized training course for rebels who had merged with the group as well as specialty courses for drone, artillery, and special force units.94 HTS had been developing a drone unit since 2019 that produced reconnaissance, attack, and suicide drones to carry out a range of tactical functions in the 2024 offensive.95
In addition to these major differences from the successful HTS and the Taliban, JNIM has drone defense shortcomings similar to those of al-Shabaab, which has contributed to its struggles to seize power in Somalia. Somalia and its partners have limited drones in the country, meaning coverage is spotty, but the drones that do operate are still able to create a persistent physical and psychological threat.96 This threat degrades al-Shabaab’s ability to mass the forces necessary to conventionally seize major towns. Partially for this reason, al-Shabaab also resorts to commando-style raids or suicide bombings via infiltration of government-held cities, such as Mogadishu. The Taliban, by contrast, had neutralized the Afghan Air Force prior to taking power through targeted assassinations of Afghan pilots (who were few in number given their specialized training), while the Afghan Air Force simultaneously struggled to maintain its aircraft after the withdrawal of U.S. forces and attendant logistics support.97 In Syria, Russia had been the main source of pro-Assad air support, and its commitments in Ukraine meant that Russian air support could not keep pace with the HTS offensive.98
4. Lack of Legitimacy
JNIM’s roots as a predominantly ethnic minority-based Salafi-jihadi movement have contributed to a legitimacy gap vis-à-vis the Malian state in urban centers, especially in the south. JNIM has exploited farmer-herder tensions and other ethnic grievances among Mali’s mostly rural ethnic minorities—initially as part of the separatist insurgency among the Tuareg in northern Mali and gradually among other minorities, such as the Fulani pastoralists in central Mali and Burkina Faso. JNIM’s other class- and ethnicity-based populist appeals hold little weight in urban centers or the southwest, however, which is predominantly Bambara (Mali’s largest ethnic group). Some Malians find JNIM’s sharia structures useful for addressing some of their grievances in the absence of any state solutions. However, even in JNIM strongholds, Salafi-jihadist ideology itself is often not a primary recruiting factor as Malians have traditionally practiced a more moderate strand of Islam.99
Compounding JNIM’s uphill battle, most Malians have expressed positive or mostly positive sentiment toward the army for decades. At least 75% said they were “very” or “partially” confident in the army in several successive Afrobarometer polls dating back to 2000, before the latest military coups.100 Notably, prior to the 2020 coup, the military had constantly remained on par with, if not outpaced, the legitimacy of traditional and religious authorities and was vastly more popular than government institutions and other security forces.
It is unclear whether popular sentiments are shifting amid the deteriorating security situation. More recent Afrobarometer polling showing disproportionate support for the junta and for President Assimi Goita in Mali’s increasingly oppressive information space should be treated with skepticism given the authorities’ censorship and the challenges researchers face in reaching most of the country.101 However, the latest Afrobarometer study included some important nuance, finding that “the junta enjoys a certain credibility at low‐to‐moderate levels of violence but suffers a precipitous collapse of trust once violence crosses a new threshold, whereas high levels of subjective fear [propaganda, news, or other indirect experiences] alone rekindles public solidarity in a conditional rally‐around‐the‐flag effect.”102 In simpler terms, while the junta’s control of the information space makes populations in insulated urban areas more immune to secondhand accounts or media, the growing degree of personal encounters with implicit or direct violence (e.g., unprecedented fuel shortages or JNIM checkpoints) experienced in Bamako and across southern Mali risks rapidly undermining the junta’s credibility.
JNIM has tried to broaden its appeal and undermine the junta’s support base through narratives other than just its focus on security forces’ violence against ethnic minorities that the group treats as its traditional constituencies.103 For example, in a July 25 statement, JNIM’s official media outlet accused the junta of “elevating their dominance and tyranny,” backtracking on their promises, and targeting secular political figures that contradict their “authoritarian whims.”104 In other statements, the group has pointed to the lack of electricity, food, and water as the result of the junta “plundering the wealth of their countries to give it for free to the Russians.”105 JNIM has seen growing success in its recruiting efforts among Bambara communities, but its legitimacy gap is still a challenge to operations, much less governance, in southern Mali.106
Comparison with other jihadist actors
HTS and the Taliban both enjoyed comparative advantages to JNIM in their legitimacy battles. They both hail from the majority ethnic groups in their respective states and were facing paper tigers that had dubious legitimacy among the population. The Taliban had also already governed the country for several years in the 1990s before it was overthrown, and it continued to evolve its governance efforts even while out of power. HTS built up local legitimacy by distancing itself from Salafism entirely. It favored a highly pragmatic and localized “social inertia” approach that retained popular Islamic practices within mainstream Syrian views, including aspects of Sufism and traditional Islamic jurisprudence.107 Despite these advantages, it is worth acknowledging that HTS still had to form a broader coalition and currently does not assert unilateral control over the entirety of its national territory due to tensions with minority ethnic groups, such as the Druze and Kurds.108 In short, developing the necessary popular support in Syria and Afghanistan, while no easy feat for either HTS or the Taliban, was nonetheless a lesser challenge compared to what JNIM faces in Mali.
Future Inflections: What Comes Next?
While it appears Mali is becoming a de facto fragmented state, future developments could punctuate this trajectory and dramatically alter the course of the conflict. Things rarely remain on the same stable course forever—they happen slowly and then all at once. Aside from a Taliban-style takeover, developments such as a collapse of the Malian government, centralized negotiations between JNIM and the junta, international intervention, and schisms within JNIM could all drastically change the future of Mali, JNIM, and the wider Sahel.
1. Government Collapse
While JNIM may not capture cities, it can impose conditions that could collapse the junta. Continued popular support for the junta is far from guaranteed. President Goita’s popularity and legitimacy rest on his portrayal as Mali’s “defender and liberator.”109 JNIM’s latest offensive undermines that narrative entirely, and Malians in the southern half of the country may be much less likely to unconditionally back the junta with the violence reaching their front door. It is worth remembering that the Malian army and state also nearly collapsed during the initial 2012 insurgency before French intervention staved this off.110
JNIM has said it plans to sustain its fuel blockade until the junta collapses or agrees to implement sharia law nationwide. While the junta has eased the blockade since its peak in late 2025, fuel shortages are still widespread, causing rolling blackouts, long lines at gas stations, and inflation across the country.111 JNIM’s expansion into western Mali also threatens to undermine the junta’s vital mining revenues. In addition to these economic impacts, JNIM’s growing visibility in these areas threatens support for the junta among what should be its power base. While the junta may be able to rally the public in the short term, and while many Malians detest JNIM’s interpretation of sharia and the violence the group has wrought, it is unclear whether the military or the public will be able to stomach this pressure indefinitely. A change of government could impact Mali’s approach to negotiations and to regional and international engagement, both of which are explored in greater detail below.
2. Centralized Negotiations
JNIM’s economic warfare could lead the junta to pursue negotiations with JNIM or cause a government collapse that would enable JNIM to negotiate with new authorities. Mali’s government began to come around to the idea of limited negotiations in 2020, but the subsequent coups in 2020 and 2021 ended these efforts.112 However, the Malian junta has shown receptiveness to discrete outreach, especially on the local level, in recent years and amid the ongoing blockade. More comprehensive negotiations between JNIM and the junta would be a challenge, as they would likely involve a major public reversal and further shred the junta’s legitimacy, which could ultimately lead to the aforementioned government collapse.113 While it is unclear who would succeed the current junta, civil society and religious organizations, some of whom have advocated for dialogue with JNIM or are junta critics, could become key actors. Mali’s High Islamic Council (HCI) remains a powerful and respected political actor across the country.114 Former HCI president and exiled imam Mahmoud Dicko previously led dialogue with the current JNIM leader in 2012 and joined an opposition coalition in December 2025 that aims to “open a national dialogue with Malian armed groups” as part of a transition to return to constitutional order.115
It is hard to imagine what negotiations would entail, given the wide range of topics that would need to be addressed. Experts such as Alex Thurston and the International Crisis Group have previously explored this and noted that an obvious topic is the role of religion and the state. JNIM has repeatedly insisted on the implementation of sharia law in Mali, while successive Malian governments have defended the secular nature of the country’s constitution. Symbolically, a compromise would almost certainly at the very least include an Egyptian-style acknowledgment of sharia as the “source” of Malian law in the constitution and involve discussions of JNIM’s allegiance to al-Qaeda and support for any global operations.116 However, outcomes could also involve much more practical matters, such as the application of sharia law, where JNIM is one of many powerful religious voices in Mali. There would also need to be discussions of whether JNIM-linked actors assume institutional roles or continue to influence the state autonomously as other religious organizations have done in Malian history.117
JNIM’s rhetoric surrounding the junta indicates it is most likely interested in some power-sharing arrangement by which it secures greater control over rural areas while leaving Bamako and other areas under state control, albeit with JNIM influence. The group has repeatedly called for a popular uprising in government-held cities.118 Other elements of its negotiating strategy have repeatedly sought to limit the role of the state while securing its control over rural areas. This pattern includes the previously covered local agreements as well as its demands to end a ban on rural fuel trading as part of the current blockade.119
While the outcomes of potential negotiations are hard to forecast, one thing is clear—JNIM would be negotiating from its historical zenith. In previous moments when dialogue was discussed, international backers helping to contain JNIM mostly opposed the idea.120 They also presumably did not feel the need to make any major concessions, as JNIM did not threaten economically or politically sensitive areas. Neither situation is currently true; international assistance has diminished and JNIM is destabilizing economically and politically sensitive parts of the country.
3. International Intervention
JNIM’s growing strength is a regional and arguably international threat that could generate a regional or international response. JNIM is already active in Benin and Togo, where it carries out dozens of attacks every year. The group also has rear support zones in Nigeria, where it claimed its first attack in 2025, and likely has additional rear bases in Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, and Senegal.121 Leadership figures from JNIM’s parent organization, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, and prominent JNIM officials have frequently threatened neighboring countries for “hostile” actions against Fulani communities and warned of potential reprisals.122 This approach mimics the playbook the group used to exploit local grievances and expand into central Mali and Burkina Faso a decade ago.123 JNIM has also regularly retaliated against littoral countries for cross-border counterterrorism cooperation and proactive counterinsurgency measures, which the group frames as “provocations.”124
Regional efforts, whether through the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) or other multilateral fora, such as the Accra Initiative, have repeatedly disappointed. Generating a regional response has not been a priority for non-Sahelian states until recently, as they hoped to rely on the French and UN presence to keep jihadist expansion from the Sahel in check. Coastal countries face various domestic political constraints in their security responses, and they have all given priority to using international security assistance and their small and/or already-overstretched security forces (in the case of Nigeria) to address more pressing domestic security challenges. Key among these challenges are ensuring regime security (given the coup plots in Benin and Nigeria in late 2025) and shoring up border security to contain the Salafi-jihadi insurgency in the Sahel.125 This prioritization has meant that West African governments are unable or unwilling to dedicate financial resources to operationalize a hypothetical regional counterterrorism force.126 Deep-seated animosity and mistrust have also given rise to major political differences between the Sahel states and many of their coastal neighbors, fueling mutual suspicions (some more valid than others) that they are seeking to overthrow each other and preventing the implementation of any regional security force in the near future.127
The fractured region is unlikely to overcome these deeply rooted personal and institutional challenges to the degree necessary to solve the crisis, but JNIM’s growing strength could conceivably provide the impetus to progress toward a stronger regional response. ECOWAS initially announced plans to create a 5,000-strong regional standby force in March 2025 through AU funding channels before announcing in August that it aimed to activate an implausibly large 260,000-strong rapid response force—twice the size of the Nigerian military.128 ECOWAS is currently struggling to secure the 2.5 billion U.S. dollars needed to fund its latest plans and is looking for alternative bilateral and multilateral funding channels from international donors.129 Regime change among either of the two blocs could also create an opening for renewed cooperation with new, likeminded authorities.
An ECOWAS force would mirror some elements of the AU-supported peacekeeping operations in Somalia, the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) in the Lake Chad Basin, or the Rwandan intervention in Mozambique.130 African peacekeepers and air assets would be able to immediately bolster Mali’s capacity to secure key supply lines by conducting more frequent patrols, participating in convoy protection, and securing population centers.131 Forces with a more offensive mandate would be able to support Malian forces in clearing known insurgent havens and working with peacekeepers to protect vulnerable civilians in these areas.132 Increased collaboration with neighboring countries’ forces through a setup like the MNJTF could also enable partner forces to more effectively target insurgent zones along shared borders.133
The various obstacles to a regional intervention could lead to a hybrid model in which ECOWAS plays a smaller role with a narrower aim alongside other external security partners and private military companies. This arrangement would resemble the fragmented counter–Islamic State operations during the Syrian civil war.134 Russia’s Africa Corps remains present across Mali, especially in the north, where it supports Russia’s economic interests and seeks to bolster the junta’s narrative of an improving security situation.135 Turkey is also assuming an increasingly large role, using drones across all three Sahelian countries, providing trainers in Niger, and allegedly training and funding Syrian mercenaries in Burkina Faso and Mali to protect Turkish economic sites.136 The United States is looking to reengage the Sahelian states on critical minerals and security; the U.S. military has resumed intelligence sharing of high-value targets with its Malian counterparts since mid-2025 and American private military contractors are allegedly in contact with the Malian junta for protection services.137 China remains a major arms provider and economic partner of Mali, and while it is unclear whether Chinese private security contractors are present in the country, these contractors have proliferated across parts of Africa where China has large investments and citizens at risk of violence—conditions present in the Sahel.138
4. Internal Factionalism
Another unique challenge that JNIM faces as it gains power is that posed by the group’s internal factions. JNIM is a coalition of several subgroups, many of which are characterized by their links with specific ethnic groups and commanders.139 This decentralized franchise structure appeals to the local grievances of various groups as JNIM expands across the Sahel.140 The subgroups retain a large degree of operational autonomy although JNIM’s senior leadership retains control over the group’s broader strategic objectives.141 For example, it appears the current blockade is locally driven, at least in part, given that the group articulated local demands focused on fuel smuggling in southern Mali before opportunistically raising the stakes.142
Greater power, through either the gun or the negotiating table, could throw JNIM’s delicate equilibrium into limbo. For one, JNIM is a multinational group, operating across numerous countries. Taking power in one country would “elevate” one of several centers of power within the group.143 JNIM is also a multiethnic group, which means it could alternatively fracture along ethnic lines if certain ethnic constituencies feel they are being marginalized. Either shift could lead to infighting or splintering, especially since the group has maintained cohesion through a mutual support system that breeds “mandatory interdependence.”144 The group’s allegiance to al-Qaeda is a major unifying factor, but that too could come into question in the course of negotiations or as part of a strategy JNIM uses to avoid international intervention. All said, JNIM would be opening a can of worms that would require an incredibly delicate balancing act if it were to take power.
Conclusion
Mali is slowly becoming a de facto fragmented state at JNIM’s hands. The trends are dismal and share many similarities with the HTS rise in Syria and, even more so, with the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan. These alarm bells are concerning, but JNIM is unlikely to seize Bamako tomorrow or even over the next several years. The group is still unprepared militarily and politically to start capturing and governing cities. We should not assume that JNIM even wants to do so, as the last time its predecessor tried this in 2012, it led to a strategic setback at the hands of an international intervention. These factors together mean the current most likely trajectory is toward a Somalia-like fragmented state scenario, although negotiations, internal rivalries, and international intervention create a wide range of possible outcomes. If the last several decades are anything to go by, Mali’s transformation into Somalia instead of Afghanistan is of little consolation, which is why the international community must remain engaged and look for opportunities to alter this trajectory so that Mali does not become another epicenter of seemingly perpetual regional instability.