Jihad (song)
song composed by Jeff Hanneman with lyrics by Jeff Hanneman performed by Slayer
"Jihad" is a song by the American thrash metal band Slayer which appears on the band's 2006 studio album Christ Illusion. "Jihad" was primarily written by guitarist Jeff Hanneman; the lyrics were co-authored with vocalist Tom Araya. The song portrays the viewpoint of a terrorist who has participated in the September 11, 2001 attacks, concluding with spoken lyrics taken from words left behind by Mohamed Atta; Atta was named by the FBI as the "head suicide terrorist" of the first plane to crash into the World Trade Center.
Joseph Dias of the Mumbai Christian group "Catholic Secular Forum" expressed concern over "Jihad"'s lyrics, and contributed to Christ Illusion's recall by EMI India, who to date have no plans for a reissue in that country. ABC-TV's Broadcast Standards and Practices Department censored the song during Slayer's first US network television appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! on January 19, 2007. Only the opening minute was broadcast over the show's credits, thus omitting 40% of the lyrics. "Jihad" received a mixed reception in the music press, and reviews generally focused on the lyrics' controversial subject matter. The song drew comparisons to Slayer's 1986 track "Angel of Death"—also penned by Hanneman—which similarly caused outrage at the time of its release.
Origins
Primarily written by guitarist Jeff Hanneman, "Jihad" features lyrical contributions by vocalist Tom Araya.
“Jihad (song)” enters the record as song composed by Jeff Hanneman with lyrics by Jeff Hanneman performed by Slayer. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Jihad, song and composed can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3119415. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2006, 2001, 2007 and 1986.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jihad (song)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.