Radicalization and Political Violence

Rolling Stone has published a new article entitled “Everything You’ve Been Told About Radicalization is Wrong.” It is primarily an attack on the NYPD’s study Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat, written by Mitchell D. Silber and Arvin Bhatt, but it more broadly makes the bold claim that there is no causal connection between radicalization and violence. (I will define some of these terms subsequently — something that Rolling Stone failed to do, and that certainly contributed to the piece’s lack of clarity.)

In studying what drives people to undertake terrorist violence, it is extremely important to be open to new ideas, and new ways of thinking about the issue. Further, I have my own criticisms of the NYPD’s model, which I have already outlined at Al-Wasat. But the major problem with Rolling Stone‘s argument is that it is a broadside against entire lines of inquiry without actually presenting evidence that these ways of thinking about the problem set are flawed.

Framework

It is worth beginning any discussion of radicalization by exploring what the concept refers to. I’ll offer two definitions. Since Rolling Stone is attacking the NYPD’s study, we might start with how that study conceptualizes the process of radicalization.

The NYPD’s study views salafi jihadist ideology as “the driver that motivates young men and women, born or living in the West, to carry out ‘autonomous jihad’ via acts of terrorism against their host countries.” Radicalization, according to that study, is a four-step process (sequential though not necessarily linear) that terminates in a final step that it refers to as jihadization. NYPD defines this phase:

Jihadization is the phase in which members of the cluster accept their individual duty to participate in jihad and self-designate themselves as holy warriors or mujahedeen. Ultimately, the group will begin operational planning for the jihad or a terrorist attack. These “acts in furtherance” will include planning, preparation and execution.

NYPD’s study notes that “individuals who do pass through this entire process,” to the jihadization phase, ”are quite likely to be involved in the planning or implementation of a terrorist act.”

Now, if I were critiquing the NYPD’s study, I would argue that the definition of jihadization makes the study’s conclusion almost tautological. Is it any surprise that people who “accept their individual duty to participate in jihad and self-designate themselves as holy warriors,” and then take the extra step to “begin operational planning” for a terrorist attack are “quite likely to be involved in the planning or implementation of a terrorist act”? But, oddly, Rolling Stone takes the opposite tack. It actually argues that there is no connection between completing the steps in NYPD’s study and the propensity to undertake violence.

Moving away from the NYPD’s definition of radicalization — which, as I said, seems to contain a tautology — let’s also employ a more generalized definition of radicalization. I find the definition offered by Peter Neumann and Brooke Rogers useful: “radicalisation describes the changes in attitude that lead towards sanctioning and, ultimately, the involvement in the use of violence for a political aim.” In other words, under this definition radicalization refers to various changes in attitude that culminate in the idea that using violence for political aims is acceptable. So if we’re querying whether there is a causal connection between radicalization and political violence, the question is if embracing an ideology that holds political violence to be acceptable or even required makes one more likely to engage in political violence, or if it makes no difference.

Finally, I should mention that there is no single pathway to terrorism: this discussion is not about whether ideological radicalization is the only cause of terrorist violence. As I wrote on Al-Wasat earlier, sometimes “political anger, group dynamics, even sense of adventure” may be the dominant factor driving people to violence. Rather, this discussion is about whether ideological radicalization is one such pathway to terrorism, or whether that causal connection is a myth.

John Horgan: “The Greatest Myth Alive”

“The idea that radicalization causes terrorism is perhaps the greatest myth alive today in terrorism research.”–John Horgan

I recognize Horgan as a talented academic, albeit one whose past work has sometimes had a blind spot with respect to the role of religious ideas. So I was interested to see the evidence for such a bold claim. But none of the points he made to Rolling Stone establish that the connection between radicalization and terrorism is a myth. I engaged Horgan on Twitter, and he provided two different sources that he said grounded his argument in far deeper research than is reflected in the Rolling Stone piece. But neither of those sources support his strong conclusion either.

Before addressing Horgan’s arguments, let me point out that the idea there is some causal connection between radicalization and terrorism is one of the more intuitive connections in all of terrorism research. One would expect that someone who believes in an ideology that justifies the use of violence for political ends would be more likely to engage in politically-motivated violence than someone who does not. Of course, sometimes the intuitive answer is not the right one — so let’s look at Horgan’s evidence.

Arguments to Rolling Stone. Horgan provides two arguments to Rolling Stone about why the idea that radicalization causes terrorism is a myth. First, he says that “the overwhelming majority of people who hold radical beliefs do not engage in violence.” I agree with this, and in fact made a similar point in a recent CNN interview. (When I said this, I was defining “radical beliefs” in a different way than the NYPD does in its jihadization phase, and Horgan is almost certainly employing a different definition as well.) But the point that most people who hold radical beliefs don’t engage in violence doesn’t disprove a causal connection. I find that, because people tend to be uncomfortable discussing religion, they have a far lower threshold for accepting evidence discounting the connection between religious ideas and terrorist violence than they might in other contexts; I noted this tendency in a recent review of a book by Clark McCauley and Sophia Moskalenko. So let’s take this out of the context of religion and examine parallel claims and refutations:

• Poverty is a causal factor in crime. “That’s not true. The overwhelming majority of poor people do not commit crimes.”
  
• The widespread availability of firearms is a causal factor in gun violence. “That’s not true. The overwhelming majority of gun owners do not commit gun violence.”
• Government repression is a causal factor in revolutions. ”That’s not true. The overwhelming majority of repressive governments do not experience revolutions.”

In these cases, the refutations do not disprove the initial claims. Similarly, Horgan’s statement makes the point that there is hardly a one-to-one relationship between radical ideas and terrorism. But that doesn’t mean there is no causal connection.

Horgan’s second argument is that “there is increasing evidence that people who engage in terrorism don’t necessarily hold radical beliefs.” I asked him about this on Twitter, and he explained that “it’s not that they don’t hold extreme beliefs. It’s that the beliefs don’t always precede involvement.” This is obviously a different claim than his quotation in Rolling Stone. Since I don’t have access to the data he’s referring to, I can’t really speak to it, except to make one point: the fact that in some cases involvement in a violent extremist movement doesn’t precede beliefs does not disprove a causal connection between radicalization and terrorism.

Horgan also makes a third point later in the Rolling Stone article: ”There are the bigger social, political and religious reasons people give for becoming involved… Hidden behind these bigger reasons, there are also hosts of littler reasons – personal fantasy, seeking adventure, camaraderie, purpose, identity. These lures can be very powerful, especially when you don’t necessarily have a lot else going on in your life, but terrorists rarely talk about them.” But as Adam Elkus pointed out on Twitter, multicausality is part of social science. While Horgan’s point is, again, true, it doesn’t substantiate his claim that the causal connection between radicalization and violence is a myth.

Terrorism and Political Violence. Horgan pointed me to his article in Terrorism and Political Violence (Jan. 2007) entitled “A Conceptual Framework for Addressing Psychological Process in the Development of the Terrorist.” It was an interesting and worthwhile read, but did not demonstrate that the causal connection between radicalization and terrorism is a myth. Here is what that article had to say about ideology and terrorist violence:

The influence of ideology in a psychological sense has been little explored with respect to terrorism. As noted earlier, Hall describes ideology as ‘‘the framework for thinking and calculations about the world—the ‘ideas’ that people use to figure out how the social world works, what their place is in it and what they ought to do.’’ In a psychological sense, this implies influences on an individual’s cognitive state, a point noted by Aaron T. Beck in his paper on terrorism: ‘‘Ideology concentrates their thinking and controls their actions.’’ For Beck, ideology implies not only cognitive influences, but that it operates as a process, changing or ‘‘controlling’’ behaviour; ideology therefore might be expressed in forms of cognitive structure, but it also has a sense of content that may exercise significance influence over behaviour. From a different context, as noted earlier, Louis Althusser also emphasises the significance of meaning and representation expressed through language and social action and practice. Taylor and Taylor and Horgan explored the role of rule governance as one way of understanding the behavioural process that might be involved in ideological control over behaviour, and it may be that further empirical exploration of this would yield valuable results.

Far from implying a lack of causal connection, this passage thus implies that further research into the connection between ideological radicalization and terrorism could “yield valuable results.” So did something change in the six years since his article came out to change his mind about that point?

START article. A second article Horgan pointed me to, published by the University of Maryland’s START center last year, speaks to that question. In it, Horgan argues that we should “end our preoccupation with radicalization so that we can effectively regain a focus on terrorist behavior.” This article is primarily concerned with problems with practically applying the concept of radicalization. Nowhere does it provide evidence that there is no causal connection between radical beliefs and violence. In fact, it addresses his above-discussed point that involvement may precede beliefs. He writes:

A lingering question in terrorism studies is whether violent beliefs precede violent action, and it seems to be the case that while they often do, it is not always the case. In fact, the emerging picture from empirical studies of terrorists (including over a hundred terrorists I have interviewed from multiple groups) is repeatedly one of people who became gradually involved with a terrorist network, largely through friends, family connections, and other informal social pathways but who only began to acquire and express radical beliefs as a consequence of deepening involvement with a network.

There are two things worth noting about this. First, it is useful that he quantifies that radical beliefs “often” precede violent action. Second, Horgan’s statement is entirely consistent with the conclusions in the NYPD study, which speaks of the role of social networks:

• “The key influences during this phase of conflict and ‘religious seeking’ includes trusted social networks made up of friends and family, religious leaders, literature and the Internet.” (p. 30)
• “Clusters of like-minded individuals begin to form, usually around social circles that germinate within the extremist incubators.” (p. 31)
• “These groups, or clusters of extremists … are not ‘name brand’ terrorists or part of any known terrorist group. For the most part, they have little or no links to known militant groups or actors. Rather they are like-minded individuals who spend time together in clusters organized, originally, by previously established social network links.” (p. 85)

Overall, Horgan’s paper makes some valuable points about practical applications of the concept of radicalization, and about some of the lack of clarity some scholars have when discussing radicalization. While I disagree with some points that Horgan makes in his paper, it is a) a valuable read, and b) one that does not support the very strong claim he made about the causal relationship between radicalization and terrorism being a myth.

Rolling Stone‘s Other Arguments

I examined Horgan’s ideas in depth because, as I said, I respect him as a scholar. Though none of the rationales he gave support his strong claim that “the idea that radicalization causes terrorism is perhaps the greatest myth alive today in terrorism research,” I wanted to examine them in detail and point out where they contribute valuable critiques to our discussion of radicalization as a concept. The rest of the article provides less meat, although it does contain one critique with which I agree.

The critique I agree with comes from Jamie Bartlett, who states: “I have found that many young home-grown al-Qaeda terrorists are not attracted by religion or ideology alone – often their knowledge of Islamist theology is wafer-thin and superficial – but also the glamour and excitement that al-Qaeda type groups purports to offer.” As I said in my last Al-Wasat post on radicalization, “an on-point criticism of the NYPD study … is that it assumes the primacy of ideology (religious or otherwise) in moving an individual toward the embrace of violence.” Ideology, as Bartlett notes, is not always the primary moving force. However, this doesn’t mean that the study and the concept of radicalization lack value: I find that the NYPD’s study provides a useful conceptual framework in cases where ideology is the predominant pathway toward undertaking terrorist violence. This seemingly includes the case of Tamerlan Tsarnaev, thus making this a strange time for Rolling Stone to launch a broadside against the concept of radicalization.

Other critiques that Rolling Stone offers:

If media accounts are to be believed, the accused Boston marathon bombers were “radicalized” by watching American-born Yemeni cleric Anwar al-Awlaki’s YouTube sermons and reading Inspire, the al Qaeda magazine.

False. My last Al-Wasat entry goes through media accounts carefully. This is not the impression one would come away with after reading my entry. If Rolling Stone‘s contention is that you’d get this impression by reading narrowly and selectively within the media accounts… well, okay, but not the best critique.

Jamie Bartlett, head of the Violence and Extremism program at the think tank Demos, echoes these doubts. “The word ‘radicalization’ suggests a fairly simple linear path toward an ultimate violent conclusion,” he says. Studies suggest that although there may be stages in the evolution of a terrorist, placing them sequentially on a line, as the NYPD’s report literally does, is far too pat. The stages are fluid, not a simple trajectory, and it is virtually impossible to predict who will or won’t engage in violence based solely on their beliefs.

Ignores what the NYPD study actually says. That study clearly states (p. 19): “Each of these phases is unique and has specific signatures associated with it. All individuals who begin this process do not necessarily pass through all the stages and many, in fact, stop or abandon this process at different points. Moreover, although this model is sequential, individuals do not always follow a perfectly linear progression.”

As I flagged before, the idea that “it is virtually impossible to predict who will or won’t engage in violence based solely on their beliefs” is rather absurd if those beliefs are represented by the “jihadization” phase of the NYPD’s study. Once individuals “accept their individual duty to participate in jihad and self-designate themselves as holy warriors or mujahedeen,” it is probably a bit less difficult to predict who will or will not engage in violence. Further, while the ability to predict violence is relevant the utility of radicalization models, it does not really speak to the truth of the models. In other words, a radicalization model can simultaneously accurately describe the process leading one to commit violence while also doing little to help us distinguish between those who will drop out and those who will not.

“To be a radical means to reject the status quo, which in some cases propels society forward,” says Bartlett. “Equating radicalism with terrorism can produce a dampening effect on free expression – either by government or by self-censorship.”

Employs a different definition of radicalism than either the NYPD study or Neumann and Rogers. Salafi jihadism, the focus of the NYPD study, has never propelled any society forward.

Conclusion

The Rolling Stone piece also mixes in a great deal of criticism of the NYPD’s policing efforts. This is a fair area for discussion, but even if one concludes that the NYPD’s efforts were wrong in every way, the policies undertaken by NYPD do not invalidate the concept. Again, taking this outside the context of religion and political violence, let’s examine a few similar claims to Rolling Stone‘s contention that the connection between radicalization and terrorist violence is invalid because it led to what the magazine considers to be bad, discriminatory policies:

• A carbon tax would be an economically disastrous, awful policy. Therefore, the idea that carbon dioxide causes global warming is invalid.
• Gun control would put us on the road to dictatorship. Therefore, the idea that the availability of firearms is linked to violence is invalid.
• Abortion is a positive evil, akin to murder. Therefore the idea that an abortion can ever be in the health interests of a mother is wrong.

Rolling Stone‘s readers would, I suspect, disagree with all three of these propositions, and see the logical flaws in them. The fact that you might oppose a carbon tax does not prove that global warming is a myth. Likewise, one’s views of the NYPD’s policing practices do not invalidate the connection between radicalization and terrorist violence. Overall, there may be a strong argument that, as Horgan suggests, there are serious problems with applying models of radicalization in the law enforcement context. But that is a far different argument than the contention that everything we’ve been told about radicalization is wrong.

Let me close by explaining, briefly, why the connection between extreme ideas and violence matter. Last month I did field research in Tunisia, where there has been an alarming amount of vigilante violence undertaken by hardline salafis against artists, activists, women, and religious minorities. If there were no connection between extremism and violence, we would expect vigilante violence to be evenly distributed within Tunisian society–undertaken sometimes by secularists, sometimes by Communists, sometimes by sufis. It is not. And if radical ideas and terrorism are not connected, then the growth of Ansar al-Sharia Tunisia, which openly shares al-Qaeda’s ideology, should not be seen as particularly problematic. After all, since it is not currently engaged in a terrorist campaign, its ideology should not be seen as predictive of future violence — right?

If we pretend that a connection between certain radical ideas and political violence does not exist, we will be taken by surprise, time and again, by future acts of non-state violence.

Notes on the Tsarnaevs’ Radicalization

The investigation into the radicalization of the Boston Marathon bombing’s Tsarnaev brothers has only just begun. While the picture of the radicalization of the Tsarnaev brothers remains incomplete, many have already pointed to what appear to be obvious warning signs of violence. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the younger of the two brothers, seemingly became a recruit of his older sibling Tamerlan. However, the older brother Tamerlan showed many classic signs of radicalization and a turn to violence. When placed in context, the question shifts from “How was Tamerlan radicalized?” to “Why was Tamerlan’s radicalization not detected?”–Clint Watts, “Detecting the Radicalization and Recruitment of the Boston Bombers”

In this entry, I will outline some of my thoughts and notes on the Tsarnaevs’ radicalization. In the above-quoted piece, Watts utilizes Chris Heffelfinger’s radicalization model, which consists of four different stages: 1) introduction to an extremist ideology, 2) immersion in the ideology’s “thinking and mindset,” 3) frustration that other adherents to the ideology are not taking action, and 4) resolve to undertake violence to advance the ideology’s cause.

Heffelfinger’s model is similar, though not identical, to the model offered in the NYPD’s 2007 study, written by Mitchell D. Silber and Arvin Bhatt, Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat. While Heffelfinger’s model is generalized, and a researcher could try to apply it to a range of extremist ideologies, the NYPD model is focused exclusively on salafi jihadism. That study similarly identifies four phases in the radicalization process. The first is pre-radicalization, an individual’s life before his journey to extremism. The second is self-identification, in which the individual begins exploring salafi Islam “while slowly migrating away from their former identity — an identity that now is re-defined by Salafi philosophy, ideology, and values.” The third phase is indoctrination, where the individual’s beliefs intensify, culminating in “the acceptance of a religious-political worldview that justifies, legitimizes, encourages, or supports violence against anything … un-Islamic, including the West, its citizens, its allies, or other Muslim states whose opinions are contrary to the extremist agenda.” The fourth and final phase is jihadization, where the individual comes to accept an individual duty to undertake violence, and may even “begin operational planning for the jihad or a terrorist attack.”

In both models, it should be noted, many more people will begin the process than will complete it: most people who come to hold extremist ideology drop out at some point before using violence in service of those beliefs. (Many people may in fact continue to hold extreme beliefs, but not be driven to violence by them.) A great deal of criticism has been directed at the NYPD model in particular. Some of this criticism is off-base: in Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) Literature Review, Minerva Nasser-Eddine and colleagues criticize the NYPD study for “leav[ing] out militant Christians, … as well as other groups within the West that employ terrorist and guerrilla tactics in their campaigns.” The rather obvious problem with this criticism is that it unreasonably assumes that all militant ideologies should share a common radicalization trajectory. However, an on-point criticism of the NYPD study, which is also applicable to Heffelfinger’s model, is that it assumes the primacy of ideology (religious or otherwise) in moving an individual toward the embrace of violence. In my own research on “homegrown” jihadist terrorism in the West, I’ve found that ideology is sometimes the central factor in an individual’s radicalization, while sometimes another factor — political anger, group dynamics, even sense of adventure — predominates.

I find both the Heffelfinger and also the NYPD model useful so long as we understand that they don’t explain the entirety of terrorist cases, and not even the entirety of cases where the terrorist attack is designed to further the salafi jihadist cause. Rather, they can help us to understand radicalization trajectories in cases where ideology is the predominant factor.

I wanted to introduce these radicalization models because they will help us to think about the points that follow. But my goal in this entry is not to discuss the merits or shortcomings of existing radicalization models. Rather, I want to outline some aspects of this case that strike me as significant.

The end of Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s boxing career

The New York Times carried a long article on the impact that the change in entry rules in the Golden Gloves national tournament had on Tamerlan Tsarnaev. The tournament rules changed in 2010 to disqualify legal permanent residents, after which Tamerlan “dropped out of boxing competition entirely, and his life veered in a completely different direction.” The Times explains:

Mr. Tsarnaev portrayed his quitting [boxing] as a reflection of the sport’s incompatibility with his growing devotion to Islam. But as dozens of interviews with friends, acquaintances and relatives from Cambridge, Mass., to Dagestan showed, that devotion, and the suspected radicalization that accompanied it, was a path he followed most avidly only after his more secular dreams were dashed in 2010 and he was left adrift.

Fox News has published an article where Tamerlan’s former coach, Bob Russo, commented on the Times piece: “That’s ridiculous. You can’t tie the sport of amateur boxing — that has helped so many immigrants and unfortunate people — to his transition to radical Islam.” This critique represents a gross misreading of the Times article, which in no way implies that boxing made him do it. The NYPD’s study, wherein the radicalization trajectory is largely based on salafi-jihadist ideology, notes that the catalyst for the religious seeking that exemplifies the self-identification phase “is often a cognitive event or crisis, which challenges one’s certitude in previously held beliefs, opening the individual’s mind to a new perception or view of the world.”

Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s disqualification from boxing in future Golden Gloves national tournaments seems to have been a personal crisis of this kind, which made him open to new ideologies and ways of understanding the world. Acknowledging this in no way blames boxing, excuses Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s actions, nor obscures the role of radical Islamic ideology.

Religious ideology and radicalization

The reporting on Tamerlan Tsarnaev makes religious ideology appear to be a powerful force — and, I would say, likely the dominant force — in his radicalization and turn toward violence. It should be noted that when we talk about the role of religious ideology in this context, we aren’t speaking about the role of Islam writ large, but rather a particular understanding of the faith that many other Muslims oppose. This is illustrated in Tamerlan’s case, when some of his theories about the faith were rejected at a Cambridge, Massachusetts mosque.

I had an interesting conversation on Bloggingheads with Adam Serwer that I recommend for those interested in this topic, in part because I thought it did a good job of broaching controversial aspects of this discussion that are often shunted to the side, while not veering into the sensationalistic or offensive. Further, much of my academic work on the topic has focused on the role of religious ideology in the radicalization process. While studies like the NYPD’s may over-emphasize the role of ideology, other studies unfairly marginalize it. Examples that I have reviewed include the work of Clark McCauley and Sophia Moskalenko, and of Jessica Stern. To help navigate this controversy, my work has outlined indicators of religious ideology being a guiding force in a subject’s radicalization: their presence or absence can help researchers determine the importance of religious ideology to a particular terrorist’s radicalization.

Here are some data points that I have found relevant with respect to Tamerlan Tsarnaev:

Where did his radicalization occur? The N.Y. Times (Apr. 27) reports that Tamerlan’s landlady, Joanna Herligy, said, “He certainly wasn’t radicalized in Dagestan.” That is, she believes signs of his extremism were evident before he left for six months in the Caucasus. Herlihy “told law enforcement officials that his trip clearly merited scrutiny,” and said “that Mr. Tsarnaev’s embrace of Islam had grown more intense before that.”

Adoption of a legalistic Islamic practice. One of the steps that my 2009 study on religious ideology and radicalization identifies is adoption of a highly legalistic practice of Islam. A legalistic practice in itself is not alarming: most often it is indicative only of someone becoming more conservative in his practice of the faith. But in a great deal of homegrown terrorist cases, adoption of a highly legalistic practice was an early step in the process indicative of an individual coming to adopt a new identity, and new ideas at odds with his previous life.

As part of this step, several homegrown extremists stopped listening to music. Those who gave up music included Adam Gadahn (who once made his own death metal albums) and John Walker Lindh (who used to post obsessively in online hip hop chat rooms, at one point claiming that he was “a famous MC who shall remain anonymous due to dickriders”). Tamerlan also gave up music as his practice of Islam became more severe. He not only listened to all kinds of music, but also was a talented musician. The N.Y. Times (Apr. 27) recalls that “during registration for a [boxing] tournament in Lowell, he sat down at a piano and lost himself for 20 minutes in a piece of classical music. The impromptu performance, so out of place in that world, finished to a burst of applause from surprised onlookers.” Tamerlan listened to all kinds of music, including classical and rap, and used the email address The_Professor@real-hiphop.com. In fact, a few years ago he had planned to enter music school. AP (Apr. 23) shows that Tamerlan’s interpretation of Islam guided his eventual avoidance of music. Six weeks after Tamerlan had told Elmirza Khozhugov, the ex-husband of his sister, about his plans to enter music school, they spoke on the phone. Elmirza asked how music school was going. Tamerlan said that he had quit, and explained that “music is not really supported in Islam.”

Growing a beard is another act that can indicate an increasingly legalistic practice (though, again, is not at all alarming in itself). Members of the Fort Dix Six, for example, had a rather long conversation, captured on tape by an informant, about the details of how beards should be kept according to religious law. The N.Y. Times (Apr. 27) reports that Tamerlan “grew first a close-cropped beard and then a flowing one.” Tamerlan shaved off his beard prior to the bombing.

Spiritual mentor. In his turn toward a stricter practice of Islam, Tamerlan may have had a spiritual mentor. Referred to in early reports as “Misha,” this alleged influencer’s real name is Mikhail Allakhverdov. Tamerlan met him in 2008 or 2009. The AP (Apr. 23) reports that Tamerlan’s family thought Misha/Allakhverdov was instrumental in his decision to stop studying music. Elmirza Khozhugov told the AP about his method of religious instruction: “Misha was telling him what is Islam, what is good in Islam, what is bad in Islam. This is the best religion and that’s it. Mohammed said this and Mohammed said that.” Khozhugov witnessed the conversation, which occurred until Tamerlan’s father, Anzor, came home from work around midnight. When he asked why Misha was still there, Tamerlan’s mother, Zubeidat, replied, “Don’t interrupt them. They’re talking about religion and good things. Misha is teaching him to be good and nice.” Tamerlan’s relationship with Misha would cause tension with his father, who felt that his son was listening to Misha and not to him. But it apparently did not cause tension with his mother, who was also coming to practice a stricter form of Islam (as I will discuss momentarily). Though much of the steps Tamerlan took suggest a move toward strict salafism, Christian Caryl, the writer who first tracked Misha/Allakhverdov down, has said that he did not think Misha was a salafi.

Misha was apparently also influential in turning Tamerlan toward political extremism and conspiracy theories. Tamerlan “turned to websites and literature claiming that the CIA was behind the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and Jews controlled the world,” AP reports. He read The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and also developed an interest in Alex Jones’s conspiracy website Infowars. Tsarnaev began to frequent jihadist websites, and read extremist literature like Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s English-language online publication Inspire.

Attempts to impose his religious beliefs on others. Another step in my 2009 study was attempts to impose one’s religious beliefs on others. Tamerlan seems to have done this with his mother, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, with respect to the wearing of hijab. The Times (Apr. 27) reports that his mother used to not cover her head, and in fact “she began wearing a hijab only a few years ago, in the United States, prodded by her son.” This actually caused tension at home. The Wall Street Journal (Apr. 22) reports that Tamerlan’s father, Anzar, said, “You are being crazy, covering yourselves.” Zubeidat replied, “This is what Islamic men should want. This is what I am supposed to do.” Tamerlan’s mother and father later divorced.

Intolerance toward perceived religious deviance; belief in a schism between Islam and the West. Two of the steps in my 2009 study were extreme intolerance of perceived religious deviance, and perception of an irreconcilable schism between Islam and the West. Both of these appear to have been present in Tamerlan, based on the same incidents.

Belief in a schism between Islam and the West can be manifested in self-isolation, or distancing oneself from previous friends and acquaintances who are non-Muslim. In one U.K. case, that of attempted suicide bomber Nicky Reilly, his stepfather noted that Reilley “started to hate us. He went on about how he’d die and find Allah and lasting paradise.” Likewise, acquaintances of 7/7 bomber Germaine Lindsay noted that he “shut himself away,” and that “when he converted, he stopped hanging out with his normal friends.” We can see evidence of this in Tamerlan. After his one-time best friend Brendan Mess was killed in a gruesome triple murder (which Tamerlan himself may have committed, as I will discuss), Tamerlan did not attend the funeral, explaining, “I don’t have any American friends.”

Both of Tamerlan’s outbursts disrupting services at the Islamic Society of Boston’s Cambridge mosque were in service of his vision of a schism between Islam and the West, and showed his intolerance of what he saw as religious deviance. As the L.A. Times reports:

The older brother twice disrupted services. In November, Tamerlan Tsarnaev disputed a preacher’s statement that it was appropriate to celebrate national holidays, according to the society’s statement. Then in January, he challenged a preacher who praised the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.: Tsarnaev “stood up, shouted and called him a ‘non-believer’; said that he was ‘contaminating people’s minds’ and began calling him a hypocrite,” according to the statement. Congregants urged Tsarnaev to leave, and once the service was over, he was told he was not welcome to attend the mosque if he continued interrupting services.

Earlier signs? There has been a great deal of speculation that Tamerlan may have carried out a gruesome triple murder before leaving for the Caucasus: one of the victims was his former best friend, Brendan Mess. The victims were bound, had their throats slashed, and were sprinkled with marijuana. The linked piece provides possible reasons for this murder, including the possibility that Tamerlan was outraged that Mess had given marijuana to his younger brother Dzokhar, and also the possibility that the victims may have been targeted because they were Jewish.

Russia’s FSB warned the FBI and CIA about Tamerlan in 2011, saying that he had “changed drastically” and become “a follower of radical Islam.” The FSB also stated that he planned to travel to the region, where he would connect with “underground” militant groups. Much of the inevitable debate about whether an intelligence failure occurred prior to the Boston bombing will focus on the FSB’s warning, Tamerlan’s trip to the region, and how evident the danger Tamerlan posed in 2011 was. However, it is worth noting that there is a difference between someone holding extremist views and someone being likely to undertake violence. In a free society, the fact that someone holds extreme views does not automatically confer the right for the government to put him under surveillance, nor should it.

Dzokhar Tsarnaev. Dzokhar, on the other hand, did not display his brother’s signs of religiosity. He was a pot smoker, a drinker, a partier — all of which contributed to people who knew Dzokhar feeling such disbelief that he could be involved in the Boston plot. (Those who knew Tamerlan, in contrast, were able to recall various data points illustrating his transformation.) This is why, in my Bloggingheads conversation, Adam Serwer and I agreed that “religious identity politics” were likely more important to Dzokhar than religious belief itself. And other factors may have loomed even larger, such as peer pressure from his respected older brother.

Why is Ansar al-Sharia Tunisia’s Leader Threatening the Government?

Yesterday, Ansar al-Sharia Tunisia’s fugitive leader Abu Iyad al-Tunisi (Saif-Allah Benahssine) issued a bellicose statement threatening the overthrow of Tunisia’s government if it interfered with AST. Abu Iyad specifically threatened to cast the Tunisian government into the “dustbin of history.” (For a more complete translation of Abu Iyad’s statement than appears in press reporting, see this post at Long War Journal.) Abu Iyad’s statement is noteworthy, and perhaps surprising, because it represents the first time he has made a threat against Tunisia’s government: he had previously affirmed, on multiple occasions, that “Tunisia is a land not of jihad, but of preaching (dawa).” In this sense, the statement represents a deviation from the strategy AST has established toward the use of violence, albeit perhaps a smaller deviation than it appears at first glance.

AST’s strategy toward use of violence has had a few distinct characteristics. AST has publicly condemned the use of violence, as when Abu Iyad told Al Jazeera in July 2011 that “we have the gentlest attitude” toward the Tunisian people, “and will never be dragged into harming them in any way.” But on the other hand, AST has been purposefully ambiguous about its connection to actual acts of violence — it seems to have been involved in several such acts, but with plausible deniability built in. Essentially, AST’s strategy was designed to intimidate its domestic opponents through the use of force, and consistently expand the boundaries of what might be considered “acceptable violence” (in other words, acts of violence that won’t trigger a state crackdown). At the same time, AST maintained its ability to operate openly, and in that way build its base and power:

• AST’s official position has been that Tunisia is a land of dawa, and not of jihad.
• AST has undertaken violence against civilians, while maintaining ambiguity about whether the group was actually carrying out such attacks. I recently wrote an article for Foreign Policy outlining the rise in hardline salafi vigilante violence in Tunisia: though AST hasn’t claimed any of those acts, the degree of organization involved in several of them suggests AST involvement.
• AST occasionally pushes the boundaries of acceptable violence against foreign targets of jihad. Most prominently, AST was fairly clearly behind the September 2012 assault on the U.S. embassy in Tunis, something that one can discern even from its social media activity.
• AST consistently undertakes dawa to grow its organization, including through the provision of social services.
• Though the evidence on this point is somewhat ambiguous, AST seems to be stockpiling weapons for use at some point in the future. This is consistent with the advice of jihadist ideologues and strategists such as Hamzah bin Muhammad al-Bassam and Abu Sa’ad al-Amili (with whom AST enjoys a particularly close relationship).

Abu Iyad’s statement is a departure from this established strategy because it threatens the Tunisian state for the first time. So what could explain this move? Here are several possibilities, moving from what I consider the most likely to the least likely:

• AST may be concerned that the anti-terror crisis cells Tunisia is setting up, in addition to other arrests of salafis following the assassination of Chokri Belaid, suggests that Tunisia intends to get tougher on AST in a way that may threaten its growth. There are so many candidates to have assassinated Belaid that it is entirely conceivable (perhaps likely) that AST didn’t carry out that killing. If so, Abu Iyad’s statement may also send a message to Ennahda warning them about pinning the killing on salafis. If, on the other hand, AST did kill Belaid, this may be a warning to Tunisian politicians that they too may be individually targeted. Either way, the goal of the warning is to coerce the Tunisian government to maintain its policies of containing AST, rather than moving toward a crackdown.
• AST may think the government will be unwilling or unable to escalate following the threat. If so, this further pushes out the bounds of acceptable violence within Tunisian society through a direct threat against the state that essentially goes unanswered.
• AST may believe it has gained enough strength that it can withstand any government response. In that way, this threat could represent another step toward AST fully establishing itself as a parallel state structure.
• It could be an emotional error on Abu Iyad’s part, especially given that he has been living as a fugitive for months.
• Finally, AST may believe that now is the time to transition from dawa to jihad. This option seems quite unlikely.

It is well worth watching how both the Tunisian state and also AST react following this threat.

Did Tunisia’s Salafi Jihadists Just Announce Their Allegiance to al-Qaeda?

On Friday, Magharebia came out with a report that has already garnered attention among those who follow jihadist militancy. The publication claims that Tunisia’s salafi jihadists have just announced their allegiance (bayat) to al-Qaeda:

Tunisian salafist jihadists announced their allegiance to al-Qaeda this week, accepting the group’s invitation to wage a holy war.

Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb’s call Sunday (March 17th) to fight Westerners, secularists, reformers and other so-called “enemies” was welcomed by Tunisian salafist jihadists, the movement’s leader Mohamed Anis Chaieb told Assabah.

This was the first time Tunisia’s salafist jihadist groups officially declared their allegiance to al-Qaeda. And the terror group’s call to arms could not have come at a more critical juncture for the still-fragile state.

This is an extraordinarily sloppily reported and misleading article that shouldn’t be taken at face value, although there is a relevant data point beneath the sensationalized presentation. The first, and most obvious, error is that Mohamed Anis Chaieb simply cannot be regarded as “the movement’s leader” in any way, shape, or form. The biggest salafi jihadist organization in Tunisia is Ansar al-Sharia Tunisia (AST), and Abu Iyad al-Tunisi is widely recognized as AST’s emir. Chaieb is an obscure enough figure that most analysts who follow Tunisia and the Maghreb closely have probably never heard of him. He is, in fact, affiliated with AST, as we will detail below. But it is not clear that the statement he made can be construed as speaking for AST as a whole.

The second problem is that Magharebia‘s sourcing to Assabah may be inaccurate (although it is possible that it is referencing a print edition that doesn’t turn up in online searches). There are two Assabah news agencies, one based in Tunisia and the other based in Morocco. A comprehensive search of both websites did not turn up any interview with Chaieb; and an Arabic-language Google News search turned up only three sources. Two of them were Magharebia‘s own Arabic-language report on Chaieb’s statement, but the third source, an Al-Mogaz report, does contain some relevant information. And if Al-Mogaz provides an accurate account of Chaieb’s statement (given that Magharebia doesn’t quote him directly), then Magharebia seriously misquoted Chaieb. (It is also worth noting that Al-Mogaz‘s report doesn’t refer to Chaieb as the representative or leader of Tunisia’s salafi jihadist movement, but rather as a representative or leader, which appears more accurate than Magharebia‘s description.)

Al-Mogaz quotes Chaieb not as saying that Tunisian salafi jihadists will meet AQIM’s call “to wage a holy war,” but rather to do what AQIM asked in its March 17 statement. In that statement, AQIM advised Muslim youth in the Maghreb, particularly in Tunisia, not to leave their home countries to fight en masse, which would ”leave the arena empty for the secularists and other expatriates to spread mischief on earth.” Rather, AQIM encouraged Tunisian salafi jihadists to undertake dawa at home. In fact, what AQIM urged Tunisia’s salafi jihadists to do is precisely the course that AST had already announced it was following.

In speaking of AQIM’s March 17 statement, Chaieb explained that AQIM “calls to preserve the gains of the Tunisian revolution.” He explains that AQIM’s rationale in calling young salafi jihadists not to leave their land is because the country is now “vulnerable to the onslaught of secularism.” As an example of this, he pointed to Amina, the 19-year-old Femen activist who posted a topless photo of herself on Facebook as a form of protest. Chaieb’s statement, even if it spoke for all of AST, falls short of being the oath of allegiance that press reporting painted it as.

Overall, though the Maghrebia report is highly misleading, Chaieb’s statement is not irrelevant: it is, in fact, another data point outlining the dimensions of the relationship between AST and AQIM, a relationship that is certainly important to understand. And since Chaieb is largely unknown to observers, we present a short profile of him based on Arabic-language material.

Mohamed Anis Chaieb. Chaieb was born in 1984. He was arrested in 2007, when he was in university as a fourth-year engineering student, and sentenced to three years of imprisonment under Tunisia’s 2003 counterterrorism laws. Since his release from prison, he has been active in AST. Here is video of him at one recent AST event in Mahdia; and he also appeared at an AST event in Kram on December 22.

Al-Qaeda in Iraq Enters the Syrian Conflict

Earlier this morning, the Islamic State of Iraq, the front name for al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), claimed responsibility for a March 4th attack that killed 48 Syrian soldiers and nine Iraqi guards. This was the first confirmed case of AQI announcing its involvement in what is now the greater Syrian conflict. As Syrian jihadist groups like Jabhat al-Nusra (JN), which according to the US government was originally established by AQI, continue to consolidate their hold on border posts and regions along the Syrian-Iraqi border, it is likely that more cross-border incidents could occur. This attack also highlights the potential for a more permissive jihadist corridor of open coordination between western Iraq and eastern Syria, the zones where jihadists are strongest in each country.

It is unsurprising that the Syrian-Iraqi border would start to heat up. There is a history going back to the US-led Iraq war last decade that connected eastern Syria to the jihadist front in western Iraq. At the time, the Assad regime turned a blind eye to the staging ground that AQI used in eastern Syria for facilitating training, weapons and fighter trafficking, and document forgery. In other words, eastern Syria was a key hub for the lifeline of AQI’s efforts. Not until 2007 did the Assad regime start cracking down on these networks.

This is also one of the reasons for the rapid rise of JN last year. Unlike other groups, they were not completely starting from scratch. Many of the Syrians that lead JN previously fought with AQI during the height of the jihadist insurgency last decade. Further, according to the US Treasury Department’s designation of JN, in the fall of 2011, AQI sent two senior leaders Maysar Ali Musa Abdallah al-Juburi and Anas Hasan Khattab to help establish and prepare the groundwork for the creation of JN in January 2012. Therefore, while JN is majority Syrian, there are past and present links between it and AQI.

The recent JN seizure of the border post at Yarubiyah on March 2 as well as JN’s leading role in governance and social welfare in the Eastern Region of Syria highlights the soft nature of the Syrian-Iraqi border since jihadists do even not recognize such lines. Put together, it is possible that JN and AQI might start openly coordinating attacks, whereby JN attacks border crossings, Syrian soldiers try to take safe haven in western Iraq, and AQI is waiting on the other side to finish the job.

AQI now also has other motivations for overtly taking part in the fight against the Assad regime. The sectarianization of the Syrian conflict coupled with the nature of the Iraqi Sunni lot has provided an opportunity for AQI to regain its credibility among the Iraqi Sunni community, which turned on it as a result of its excessive violence and perceived foreign implementation of sharia last decade. As the Sunni protests in western Iraq have picked up steam over the past year, AQI has attempted to co-opt it by cultivating a narrative that it is the only true defenders of the Sunni community. They even went so far as calling a video “The Anbar Spring.”

Through the Syrian conflict, by defending the Sunnis there, AQI will try to convince Iraqi Sunnis that they are on their side too against the marginalization of the Shia-led Iraqi government. All of this also feeds into AQI’s master narrative regarding the Iraqi government as truly doing the bidding of the Iranian regime. In light of Iran and Hizbullah going all in on Syria and assisting the Assad regime, what began as local fights in Syria and Iraq, could meld together through the work of AQI and JN.

The announcement of involvement by AQI in killing the Syrian soldiers illustrates how the Syrian conflict is no longer confined to its borders. The longer the fight against the Assad regime continues the more likely more incidents like this are to occur. Jihadist actors have a key motivation for this: they do not see the Syrian conflict through a nationalist lens, but as part of their greater global conflict to reestablish the Caliphate. Through sectarian rhetoric, AQI will use the Syrian fight to try and gain more recruits in Iraq and redeem itself for its lost opportunity last decade. Time will tell if they are successful.

Context and Conflict Documents

Documents recovered from battlefields are tantalizing to an analyst. They contain raw data that can be mundane or groundbreaking, holding out the prospect of knowledge often hidden under dull pleasantries, flowery language, and stains left by the very destruction that made them available. They can also provide insight into little-understood insurgent groups, as seen most recently in the sands and bombed-out buildings of northern Mali’s main cities. As reporters have flooded in just behind French, Malian, and other African forces, some have been digging through the reams of paper left behind as al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the Movement for Tawhid and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO) and Ansar al-Din fled Gao, Timbuktu, and Kidal, seeking refuge in riverine villages and mountain hideouts.

Just last week, The Telegraph, Foreign Policy, and the Associated Press published some of these documents, providing a glimpse into the day-to-day operations of these groups in northern Mali, the minute detail put into the implementation of shari’ah, possible divergences over strategies and leadership, and the long-term plans AQIM’s leadership had (and may still have) for the Sahel. These are not the first instances of documents emerging from the failed jihadist offensive in Mali; the AP’s Rukmini Callimachi and Baba Ahmed previously found AQIM commander Abou Zeid’s trash and notebooks in Diabaly, while Lindsey Hilsum explored documents that littered the floor of the Islamic Police station in Gao following that city’s liberation. But they do show that we may soon learn much more about how AQIM and its affiliates thought and operated before and during the 10-month occupation of northern Mali.

However, it is important when analyzing these documents to provide the necessary context to understand what these documents do (and do not) show. For instance, the AP report, which details a 9-page letter from AQIM leader Abdelmalek Droukdel, shows divisions between Droukdel and his subordinates over the speed with which the latter implemented shari’ah in Timbuktu, as well as the failure to collaborate effectively with local groups, including the National Movement for the Liberation of the Azawad (MNLA). The primary evidence provides key evidence not just of disagreements between the leader and his lieutenants, but also shows that Mali was part of a long-term strategy for AQIM to implement shari’ah in the north, or at least plant the “seeds” of the idea.

What the article does not note is that when Droukdel expressed these ideas to his local commanders some time after June (the letter is undated), it was not the first time. In May, Droukdel released an audio statement saying much the same thing, urging AQIM to use local Islamist groups like Ansar al-Din as cover for their activities in northern Mali, pushing for the gradual implementation of shari’ah in the north, and urging cooperation with the MNLA. Droukdel’s missive to AQIM in Timbuktu was not, then, the first instance in which he’d urged this path, a fact that could explain his pique at the actions undertaken subsequent to his “directions” from May. Furthermore, it is also possible that unease at the failure to implement his orders prompted Droukdel in part to travel to northern Mali at some point over the past year.

The documents unearthed by the various media organizations also show the difficulties in communication between northern Algeria (where Droukdel was previously based and to where he may have returned after his time in northern Mali) and the desert thousands of kilometers to the south. Droukdel has reportedly struggled for years to keep the southern katibat in line, sending three different men to the south to assume overall control of these fighters and appointing a fourth, Yahya Abou al-Hammam, after Saharan emir Nabil Makhloufi was killed in a car accident in August. It is also possible that Droukdel traveled to Mali to more directly coordinate with his commanders and with other militant and local leaders, including Ansar al-Din’s Iyad Ag Ghali. Unfortunately, it is a vanishingly small group of people that genuinely knows the truth about the subject. Still, the documents reinforce Droukdel’s isolation and the difficulty in maintaining control of far-flung and semi-autonomous commanders; Osama bin Laden struggled with this in Abottabad, and Droukdel has had to cope with increasingly effective military pressure from Algerian forces in and around Kabylia — another possible reason for him to have undertaken the dangerous and risky trip to Mali.

Still, while these documents raise some fascinating subjects and questions, they provide only snapshots in a complicated tableau. For instance, the AP suggests that one of the reasons the past 10 months saw fewer amputations than Gao was because of direct AQIM leadership in Timbuktu, as opposed to that of MUJAO in Gao. This is definitely a possibility, though it could also simply be because different leaders with different personalities and different personalities behave differently. Additionally, Ansar al-Din/AQIM in Timbuktu still engaged in their share of horrible and abusive behavior, just of another sort. I would suggest, though, that aside from the possibility that different leadership drove different group behavior, we would be well-served to look at the actual composition of these groups’ recruits. To take Gao as an example, we have known for months that the group recruited heavily from the Gao region, specifically from villages that have long been known for “Wahhabi” religious practice, the term used by many in Mali to refer to reformist or Salafi practices. I strongly suspect that this had a significant impact on the group’s actions in Gao, especially given that the fighters present in the city were largely these local recruits, though in recent months foreign fighters and in particular foreign leaders became more prominent in the management of affairs in the city.

Additionally, the documents present more anecdotal evidence that previous conceptions of AQIM may be incorrect, or at least severely deficient. In the document, Droukdel talks at some length about not just being a flexible and adaptable organization to adjust to changing conditions, but also about changing outside appearances and organizational structures in line with different stated aims. To this end, he suggests:

As for internal activity, in this we would be under the emirate of Ansar Dine.

Our emir would follow their emir and our opinion would follow their opinion. By internal activity, we mean all activity connected to participating in bearing the responsibilities of the liberated areas.

In external activity, connected to our global jihad, we would be independent of them (Ansar Dine). We would ensure that none of that activity or its repercussions is attributed to them, as care must be taken over negative impacts on the project of the state.

If this sounds familiar, it’s because it appears to closely follow the apparent divergence between AQIM and MUJAO, with the latter group originally engaging largely in external activities yet still appearing to maintain a close or at least a working relationship with AQIM, the organization from which it ostensibly split in anger in late 2011. This is far from conclusive evidence for my contention that MUJAO’s formation represented a “managed separation” from AQIM but it does demonstrate the ability to accommodate multiple structures as well as the organization’s attempts to use group designs to shape outside opinions of northern Mali’s militant groups.

Finally, the documents shed an interesting light on continued racial and ethnic biases that may be present and at work among jihadis in northern Mali, especially the largely Algerian leadership of AQIM. In her excellent book Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara, the British social anthropologist Judith Scheele discusses the conception that many Algerian traders and their families held — and still hold — about northern Mali as a kind of wilderness that corrupted men and ruined families (forgive the lack of page citation, but I’m currently traveling and do not have the book with me). At the same time, Scheele notes that various families claim credit for their ancestors’ having first brought tea to the bilad as-Sudan, with tea here symbolizing civilization. That same paternalistic attitude toward the region creeps in to Droukdel’s writing, and his discussion of the “Azawad Islamic project”:

It is very important that we view our Islamic project in Azawad as a small newborn, with many phases ahead of it that it must pass through to grow and mature. The current baby is in its first days, crawling on its knees, and has not yet stood on its two legs. So is it wise that we start now to lay burdens on it that will inevitably prevent it from standing on its own two feet and perhaps even smother it?!! If we really want it to stand on its own two feet in this world full of enemies waiting to pounce, we must ease its burden, take it by the hand, help it and support it until it stands.

The Night’s Watch: Ansar al-Shari’ah in Tunisia’s ‘Neighborhood Committees’

Following the untimely assassination of Chokri Belaïd (Shukri Bilayd), a Tunisian lawyer, opposition leader with the left-secular Democratic Patriots’ Movement and one of the leader’s of the Popular Front to which his party had adhered when the coalition was formed, there was a sense that security within Tunisia could break down. Although it appears, for now, that the situation has calmed down and many are returning to their normal everyday activities, on February 7th, Ansar al-Shari’ah in Tunisia (AST) for the first time activated its ‘Neighborhood Committees.’ The mobilization of these committees within a mere few hours illustrated the strength of AST’s organizing structures as well as its memberships obedience to orders coming from the top.

The ‘Neighborhood Committees,’ which were originally called ‘Security Committees,’ were announced and set up on October 6, 2012 as a preemptive precautionary measure in case there was a security vacuum within the country. In other words, aspirationally, the establishment of a de facto non-state controlled martial law force if need be (more on if they were successful in their first mobilization below). The original intent of these committees was to safeguard and protect individuals in case the country spiraled out of control on October 23, 2012, which was the one year anniversary of the Constituent Assembly Election. No security issue or vacuum developed and the date passed without the activation of AST’s committees.

This changed last week, though, in light of the assassination, as well as the tense environment on the streets of Tunisia. Some individuals attempted to take advantage of this and began to loot, but many have since been arrested for these crimes. As a consequence of the perceived lack of security, AST called on its followers to mobilize their ‘Neighborhood Committees,’ stating the goal was to protect individuals, their money and property, and ward off thieves and looters. AST also urged followers to remain vigilant and cautious in light of potential gangs and criminality. Within a few hours, AST was able to mobilize members in Sfax and Hammamet for the night of the 7th. The mobilization was even swifter on the 8th whereby committees in addition to the former two came to the streets in al-Zahra’, al-Wardiyyah, al-Qayrawan, Sousse, al-Qalibiyyah, Mahdia, Ariana, Sidi Bouzid, al-Tadhamin Neighborhood, Beni Khayr, Southern Suburbs (Tunis), al-Kef, Diwar Hishur, al-Dandan, al-Nur Neighborhood, Jendouba, the Western Suburbs (Tunis), Matar, the Braka Coast, al-Khadra’ Neighborhood, and Qarbah (excuse the literal transliterations from Arabic in some cases, I’m fully aware they are spelled differently in the French rendering). AST conducted some of their patrols with the League for the Protection of the Revolution (LPR), believed to be a hardline faction associated with Ennahda.

In the pictures and videos AST has posted to its official Facebook page, it shows men either hanging around certain parts of streets or riding on scooters and motorcycles through the center or outskirts of cities. In all cases they are waving the flag made famous by al-Qaeda in Iraq that has the first half of the Muslim testament of faith on the top and under it Muhammad’s official seal. For added effect in the videos, AST adds anashid that provide an even more visceral emotion that is meant to bring out pride for their efforts in “protecting” the average citizen in the particular neighborhood, village, or city. The amount of AST members that helped on patrols varied by place, but has ranged anywhere from 10-50 (if not more). Their largest turnout was in al-Qayrawan, where they also rode through the center of the city during the day this past Saturday in a convoy of scooters and cars holding up Rayyat al-Tawhid (what jihadis call the black flag). AST framed all of this in terms of securing the residents and being the true bearers of stability in the country in comparison with the state and using the slogan ‘Your Sons Are at Your Service.’ As I have argued previously, AST has been in the process of building a state within a state going back to their founding in March 2011. The addition of security patrols to their social welfare provides them a strong selling point for many dissatisfied with the government or Islamists disillusioned with Ennahda.

While this is the perception that AST wants to foster, especially for those not necessarily in these locations, the truth is slightly different. Based on conversations with a few individuals in Tunisia (whom I will keep anonymous), indeed AST members were out in the streets, but their actions were on the whole no more than photo-ops. It is true that in some places they were standing “guard” all night, but truly securing a neighborhood, village, or city seems a bit exaggerated at this juncture, especially since, although many worried that more violence would erupt, on the whole, while things are tense, there has not been any type of descent into chaos. Sure there were a few scuffles and AST claimed they caught a thief with a knife going after a women in Sousse, but overall, one should not extrapolate too much from this episode. As AST’s strength grows, though, and it continues to try and co-opt more hardline elements within Ennahda that are perplexed by the concessions to the secularists in the writing of the constitution and the perceived to-be moderate stances of Prime Minister Jebali. AST is preparing the groundwork for the potential split within Ennahda. It is therefore possible that AST could one day truly impose some type of non-state martial law in some locations. Based on the evidence thus far, though, it would be too soon to ascribe these capabilities to AST.

That being said, the mobilization does illustrate that AST is a strong organization. It highlights its ability to call on its followers in a rapid manner in a variety of locations within Tunisia to respond to a request made by the leadership of the group. As AST continues to provide social welfare services, it is likely that they will be able to further project power in even more locations as well as being able to call on more individuals to back whatever plan AST might have going forward. It seems for now that the ‘Neighborhood Committees’ have been decommissioned until the next crisis (since they have not posted anything related to it in more than a day now and if they were still doing them you can bet they would promote it, though it is certainly possible the committees are still activated), but one thing is for certain, AST continues to gain prestige and credibility among a certain segment of the Tunisian population. Therefore, expect more cases where AST attempts to show it is out hustling the state and other Islamist rivals.

Salafis Consolidate Power in Syria

While many focus on the fighting between rebel forces and the Assad regime as well as rightfully the continuing humanitarian tragedy that is wrecking havoc on the daily lives of many Syrians, there have been key organizational changes behind the scenes within the Syrian Islamic Front (SIF). The SIF is a Salafi-jihadi conglomeration of brigades that banded together to create an umbrella organization in late December 2012. After its formation, the combined force of the SIF has become one of the key rebel factions in the battle against the Assad regime. The consolidation of the SIF’s power through mergers and acquisitions will help solidify its growing role in the opposition as a force that has reach throughout the country and is united unlike many other rebel factions that have fractured over time.

The SIF is an organization that calls for an Islamic state and the implementation of sharia based on its Salafi creed after the fall of the Assad regime. In addition, to playing an increasingly important role on the battlefield, the SIF has also been involved in some social welfare through its relief committee where they distribute aid from the Humanitarian Relief Fund (IHH), a government-linked Turkish NGO with ties to Hamas, and Qatar Charity, another government-linked NGO. Their charter has also gotten the stamp of approval from the Syrian jihadi ideologue Shaykh Abu Basir al-Tartusi, who is allegedly affiliated with the SIF. Tartusi also recently spoke with al-Hiwar Channel explaining he was helping advise the creation of sharia courts in “liberated” areas of Syria.

When the SIF was first announced it was made up of eleven brigades, including Kata’ib Ahrar al-Sham (which operates throughout Syria), Harakat al-Fajr al-Islamiyyah (which operates in and around Aleppo), Kata’ib Ansar al-Sham (in and around Latakia), Liwa’ al-Haqq (in Homs), Jaysh al-Tawhid (in Deir al-Zour), Jama’at al-Tali’ah al-Islamiyyah (in rural parts of Idlib), Katibat Mus’ab bin ‘Umayr (in rural parts of Aleppo), and the Damascus-area groups Liwa’ Suqur al-Islam, Kata’ib al-Iman al-Muqatilah, Saraya al-Maham al-Khasa, and Katibat al-Hamzah bin ‘Abd al-Mutalib. It has since shrunk through two larger-scale mergers among some of the eleven brigades and one acquisition from outside its fold. This has helped strengthen the organization through the consolidation of ties and centralization of authority.

First, on January 31, three of the groups (Harakat al-Fajr al-Islamiyyah, Jama’at al-Tali’ah al-Islamiyyah, and Kata’ib al-Iman al-Muqatilah) merged into Kata’ib Ahrar al-Sham (KAS). The four now go under the name Harakat Ahrar al-Sham al-Islamiyyah (HASI). This move can be seen as a victory for KAS’ hardliners, over elements in the group that wanted to join the Supreme Military Council (SMC), an armed affiliate of the U.S.-supported National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces (SOC) because groups that merged like Harakat al-Fajr al-Islamiyyah are seen as more radical. Further indication that rumors of KAS joining the SMC has likely been quashed, the SIF released a statement on February 6 rejecting the SOC president Mu’az al-Khatib’s recent call for talks with the Assad regime.

Second, on February 2, Damascus-based groups Liwa’ Suqur al-Islam, Saraya al-Maham al-Khasa, and Katibat al-Hamzah bin ‘Abd al-Mutalib joined together to become Kata’ib al-Hamzah bin ‘Abd al-Mutalib. Prior to this formation, they had little to no battle record posted online, suggesting were not key players on the ground. It is possible that they joined forces better position themselves on the ground. Since then, the SIF has posted some attacks from this new formation, potentially signifying that the merger was a precursor to a more active plan going forward. The SIF might have also encouraged this due to a new offensive planned by rebel forces in Damascus and its countryside dubbed “Support for Daraya.”

Lastly, on February 5, the Hama-based fighting group Liwa’ al-Iman, which has an online footprint going back to late September 2012, left the Syrian Liberation Front (SLF), an Ikhwani and Salafi umbrella group, and joined HASI within the SIF. This solidifies the SIF’s foothold in Hama since none of the original eleven were based there. It also highlights the strength the SIF is projecting to other rebel forces in contrast to the non-unified SLF, which is viewed as unorganized with a lack of coordination because of the number of large players like Suqur al-Sham and Kata’ib al-Faruq.

As a result of the consolidation, the SIF now stands at six fighting forces. These maneuvers over the past week have helped solidify its organization. It would not be surprising if other mergers and acquisitions occur in the near term because of their prowess on the battlefield as well as their ability to be organizationally disciplined and unified. More than anything, the actions of the SIF illustrate that they are planning for the long-term and will continue to play a key role in the fight against the Assad regime and attempting to shape the post-Assad state of play.

Analyzing Foreign Influence and Jihadi Networks in Nigeria

After France intervened militarily in Mali on January 11, a move that hastened the deployment of Malian soldiers and African partners to northern Mali, many expected a kind of ripple effect expanding outward from Mali. This was driven out of concern both that such a move would push militants into neighboring countries, and draw negative responses from Muslims around the world. Yet hordes of angry protestors have thus far not materialized, and the response so far among jihadist groups in the sub-region’s other prominent hotspot for violent extremism, Nigeria, has been decidedly mixed. The Boko Haram splinter group Ansaru, whose full name is Jama’atu Ansaril Muslimina fi Biladis Sudan, or “Vanguard for the Protection of Muslims in Black Africa,” attacked a group of Nigerian soldiers heading to Mali on January 20, killing two officers. Meanwhile, a Boko Haram spokesman announced a ceasefire after a brief increase in violence, to the general surprise of observers. However, these different responses may give us a window to examine differences between Ansaru and Boko Haram, the role that groups like al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) have and have not played in shaping these groups, and the frameworks analysts apply when examining jihadist militancy.

While Boko Haram’s violence and links to regional militant groups like AQIM has garnered significant attention in Nigeria, Africa, and the West, Ansaru, which announced its dissidence from Boko Haram in January 2012, has kept a somewhat lower profile. Though the group distanced itself from Boko Haram due to the latter’s attacks against Muslims, violence Ansaru’s first statement termed “inhuman,” it has since become known for its similarities and suspected links to AQIM and allied groups like the Movement for Tawhid and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO). In addition to the attack on Nigerian soldiers, Ansaru claimed responsibility for the kidnapping of a French engineer in the state of Katsina, an operation involving 30 men assaulting a compound. In a statement, the group said the operation was prompted by “ the stance of the French government and the French people on Islam and Muslims,” including France’s ban on the niqab and partial ban on the hijab, as well as  ”France’s major role in the (planned) attack on the Islamic state in northern Mali.”

This was the second kidnapping believed to have been carried by Ansaru, with the first coming in May 2011 when gunmen seized two men, a Briton named Christopher McManus and an Italian named Franco Lamolinara, from Birnin-Kebbi. Though the kidnapping was claimed by “Al-Qaeda in the Lands Beyond the Sahel” the British government suggested in October 2012 when it declared Ansaru a terrorist organization that the group was actually behind the seizure, which ended tragically in the deaths of both hostages in a failed rescue attempt in March 2012. As Jacob Zenn points out, this kidnapping was similar to to previous AQIM operations, and certainly looked very similar to the kidnapping of a German engineer in Kano, an operation claimed directly by AQIM (though I have lingering doubts about AQIM directly carrying out a kidnapping in Nigeria, as opposed to being allowed to claim credit for an action carried out by a group like Ansaru or another jihadist or criminal faction).

Regardless, the pattern of attacks, the available evidence, and denials of involvement from Boko Haram’s leadership suggest a certain kinship between Ansaru and AQIM, though Boko Haram has its own share of assumed, reported, and occasionally confirmed links to the array of groups operating in northern Mali. It is this international aspect to Ansaru’s activities and rhetoric that seems to define it for some analysts. Yet there is a distinct aspect to Ansaru that has gone largely unexplored: Its specific ideological links to AQIM and its particular brand of international jihadism — though I prefer Jean-Luc Marret’s characterization of the group as “glocal.”

Current writing about AQIM tends to obscure or leave out altogether important components of its history, namely that its predecessor, the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) was itself a splinter group of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), which formed in the late 1990′s largely in response to the uncontrolled violence perpetrated by the GIA against Algerian civilians. It is striking that, given the aspirational and possibly operational closeness between Ansaru and AQIM, Ansaru’s stated justification for its split from Boko Haram was largely the same as that of the GSPC in leaving the GIA.

With that in mind, let’s re-examine Ansaru’s admittedly brief history. Broadly speaking, there are two ways of interpreting the May 2011 kidnapping in particular, as well as the December 2012 kidnapping and the January attack on Nigerian troops. On the one hand, the choice of name used to claim the May 2011 kidnapping, as well as the choice of tactics and target for that and subsequent actions, can be seen as overtures to AQIM, a means of showing agreement and a desire to cooperate by mirroring the more prominent organization. The other way to evaluate Ansaru’s actions is as a sign of pre-existing links with AQIM and associates of the group that in turn shaped the group that would eventually become Ansaru.

As evidence to support the latter conclusion, observers have pointed to the role that a man known as Khalid al-Barnawi (alternately spelled Barnawy or Barnaoui) reportedly played in the kidnapping. Barnawi was designated as a “global terrorist” by the U.S. State Department in June 2012. The Mauritanian news service Agence Nouakchott d’Information (ANI) reported after the two men were killed that they were held by a group led by Barnawi, adding that Barnawi was one of the first  Nigeriens* to join the GSPC and participated in the assault on the Mauritanian army post at Lemgheity in June 2005. His reported participation has in part led Zenn (see footnote 45) and Morgan Lorraine Roach to conclude that al-Barnawi is a leader in Ansaru. Another interesting indication of possible links to AQIM is that, again according to ANI, the negotiator handling talks for a ransom payment to free Lamolinara and McManus was none other than Mustapha Ould Limam Chaffi, a Mauritanian opposition figure, special counselor to Blaise Compaoré, and negotiator who handled multiple AQIM hostage takings. However Chaffi came to be part of the negotiations (assuming the ANI story was correct), his presence bolsters the anecdotal evidence of certain ties between Ansaru, or at least factions of Boko Haram, and AQIM.

The possibility of ties between AQIM in northern Mali and Ansaru, or a Boko Haram faction that would later become Ansaru, raises a significant question about Nigerian jihadis in Mali. Nigerians have been reportedly training with the GSPC and AQIM for years, though the last two years and specifically the last nine months have seen a proliferation of reports placing Boko Haram fighters specifically in northern Mali, working alongside AQIM and allied groups. I’ve questioned these reports in the past, and while it seems certain at this point that Nigerian jihadis have been flowing in some numbers into northern Mali, whether to train, join AQIM/MUJAO, or cooperate with them, I have often wondered how exactly  the journalists reporting these stories came to identify these fighters specifically as Boko Haram members. Did the fighters identify themselves as Boko Haram members? Did local witnesses hear fighters speaking Hausa, and assume that they were from Boko Haram? Did intelligence agencies tracking known Boko Haram members or Nigerian jihadis find evidence of movement into and out of Northern Mali? With relatively few exceptions, we just don’t know. But I would posit that given the anecdotal evidence and the ideological affinity between Ansaru and AQIM/MUJAO, at least some of the fighters in Mali identified as belonging to Boko Haram may actually have been with — or subsequently joined — Ansaru.

While this may seem like a very nitpicky point (because it is) it could influence the relative strength of the groups in question, as well as their future operations. After all, different groups, even splinters that maintain ties, still have different motivations and make different cost/benefit calculations about operations based on different factors. Which ultimately goes to show that, counter to what some might think, not all Muslims think and react the same way to complex and rapidly evolving events. Not even Nigerian jihadis.

*There seems to be some disagreement over Barnawi’s origin. The State Department refers to Barnawi as being from Nigeria, and indeed his name *could* signify that he is from the Nigerian state of Borno. However, as Alex Thurston pointed out last year, “Khaled al-Barnawi” is roughly the equivalent of “Bob from Maine” in terms of helping actually identify someone. Additionally, this name could simply mean that al-Barnawi spent time in Borno, something that would in no way be unusual for a Nigerien. While the U.S. Government may have specific information on Barnawi’s origins to which I am not privy, ANI is generally well-informed on security and terrorism issues, and cited a source close to AQIM for the story I linked to above. 

Primer on Jihadi Players in Algeria & Mali

Below is a primer I put together on the four main jihadist groups currently operating in Algeria and Mali for Jihadica, who have been kind enough to solicit and post my work from the past week. Fellow al-Wasat editor Aaron Zelin was kind enough to compile the 4-part series, and links to the original posts appear at the bottom of the post. 

The brazen assault and hostage taking in southern Algeria has brought about a sudden surge of interest in the region’s jihadist groups, especially given the complex history of the man reportedly behind the assault, Mokhtar Belmokhtar. This, in turn, has led to a good deal of questioning about Belmokhtar’s past, his “new” jihadist group, and the other militant groups currently occupying northern Mali. Here’s a quick explainer:

al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb

The best-known of the groups operating in northern Mali is almost certainly al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, led by Abdelmalek Droukel (Abu Musab Abdelwadud). Renamed in 2007 after officially merging with al-Qaeda, AQIM was previously known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC in French), itself created in 1998 as a rejection of the brutal behavior and takfirist stance of the Algerian Armed Islamic Group (GIA in French). The GIA was the first Algerian jihadist group to send fighters (including Mokhtar Belmokhtar) to the Sahel, though it was the GSPC that first truly implanted itself in the region and in northern Mali in particular. There it recruited fighters, set up training camps, sowed deep ties with some local communities, got deeply involved in local and regional smuggling networks, and kidnapped foreigners for ransoms (the first such operation took place in southern Algeria in 2003). The GSPC also engaged in military activities, notably the 2005 attack on a Mauritanian military base in Leimgheity. Among the many young Mauritanians who joined the organization after police crackdowns in 2004 and 2005 was Younis al-Mauritani, who helped facilitate the GSPC’s merger with al-Qaeda in 2006 and was a key operational leader in al-Qaeda Core in Pakistan until his arrest in Quetta in 2011.

After a rush of deadly AQIM activity in northern Algeria in 2007 and 2008, Algerian authorities gained the upper hand and were progressively able to restrict AQIM to isolated and mountainous areas east of Algiers. AQIM’s kata’ib(battalions) in the Sahel, however, expanded, as Belmokhtar and Abdelhamid Abou Zeid (a senior AQIM commander) began a run of audacious kidnappings that led to an estimated tens of millions of dollars in ransom payments (more, according to some sources)–money reportedly bolstered by income from cigarette smuggling and taxes from the region’s growing drug trade. AQIM’s southern groups, believed before 2012 to number several hundred fighters, also continued operations across the region, killing tourists, conducting attacks (including suicide bombings) against regional and foreign militaries and government facilities. AQIM fighters are believed to have been heavily involved in fighting in northern Mali after the outbreak of the Tuareg rebellion in January 2012, and have largely controlled the city of Timbuktu since April.

AQIM has for years enjoyed good relationships with some local populations, having strengthened its roots in northern Mali through marriage and business ties. Recently the group announced the creation of a new battalion to be led by a Tuareg, as part of a larger rearrangement of personnel and leadership. The battalion is said to be leading the fighting under the command of Abou Zeid around the town of Diabaly against Malian and French troops. AQIM holds 7 foreign hostages.

Belmokhtar and Those Who Sign with Blood

The man allegedly behind the gas facility attack, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, had, until recently, run AQIM’s Katibat al-Moulathimin (“The Veiled Brigade”), a reference to the practice of male veiling common in parts of the Sahel.  In October 2012 AQIM stated that Belmokhtar had been “suspended” from the command of the group, owing to Belmokhtar’s supposed deviations from the goals of the group’s leadership. Belmokhtar was purportedly at loggerheads with three AQIM leaders: AQIM’s amir Droukdel, the recently-appointed Saharan emir Yahya Abou el-Hammam, and Katibat Tariq Ibn Ziad commander Abou Zeid.

Belmokhtar’s spokesman denied the removal but in December Belmokhtar appeared on video for the first time to announce his departure* from AQIM and his creation of a new group, al-Mouwakoune Bi-Dima (“Those Who Sign with Blood”), a reference to the name of the GIA detachment responsible for the 1994 hijacking of an Air France flight. In his video, Belmokhtar said his group aimed to consolidate shari’ah in northern Mali. He also threatened to attack Algeria and France and called on Mauritanian imams to come to the aid of the “Azawad,” a term used largely (but not exclusively) by Tuareg nationalists to refer to northern Mali.

In an interview with the Associated Press, Belmokhtar’s close associate Oumar Ould Hamaha relayed that Belmokhtar remained under the orders of al-Qaeda central. Moreover, the “split” with AQIM does not appear to have inhibited Belmokhtar’s actions; by all available indications he took his fighters with him to his “new” group, and they have reportedly been working alongside jihadist MUJAO group in Gao and in In Khalil (more on them tomorrow). In telephone calls with journalists during the current hostage crisis, jihadis involved in the attack said they were from “al-Qaeda” before specifying their membership in al-Moulathimin and al-Mouakoune Bi-Dima. They further conveyed that the operation had been in the works for two months, suggesting that the supposed internal turmoil in AQIM did not adversely affect the complicated preparations for a major assault staged hundreds of miles away from northern Mali.

Algerian security officials said they took at least one member of the attack team alive, meaning that we may find out more about the group’s structure in the coming days and weeks. We do know that the attack team involved at least two longtime Belmokhtar aides, Abu al-Bara and Aberrahman al-Nigeri, and reports indicate that the hostage takers included Egyptians, Tunisians, Libyans, as well as possibly a Frenchman and a Canadian.

*CORRECTION: In the video, Belmokhtar does not actually announce a departure from AQIM, only the creation of al-Mouakoune Bi-Dima. Instead, the talk of a “split” came from press accounts, including an Associated Press interview with close Belmokhtar associate Omar Ould Hamaha (h/t @GCTAT on Twitter).

Movement for Tawhid and Jihad in West Africa

The Movement for Tawhid and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO, in French) is an AQIM splinter group that publicly appeared in December 2011, when they claimed the kidnapping of three European aid workers in Tindouf, Algeria. Led by the Mauritanian Hamada Ould Kheiru*, an explosives expert, preacher, and longtime GSPC/AQIM member close to Belmokhtar, the group’s stated reason for leaving AQIM was the latter’s purported lack of devotion to jihad and failure to promote non-Algerians to leadership positions.

Ostensibly dedicated to propagating jihad in West Africa, the group’s leadership was originally believed to be largely composed of Mauritanians and Arabs from the Gao region, though recent announcements indicate that the leadership has diversified to include a Saudi, an Egyptian, and a Tunisian, as well as other “foreign fighters”. The group has also reportedly recruited from local populations and some sub-Saharan Africans.

MUJAO, which controls the Malian city of Gao, benefits from a close relationship with Mokhtar Belmokhtar, whose forces fought with and may have led MUJAO’s successful military attacks against the Tuareg nationalist group the MNLA in Gao in June, and in Ménaka in November. MUJAO and Belmokhtar’s Katibat al-Mulathimeen (Battalion of the Veiled Men) seized the infamous smuggling town of In Khalil (sometimes written as al-Khalil) in late December, and are reportedly involved in the current Islamist offensive in central Mali.

One of the MUJAO’s key military leaders, spokesmen, and favorite quote machine for Western journalists, Omar Ould Hamaha, was a commander under Belmokhtar and was identified for a time as the military commander of Ansar al-Din. Hamaha is also, according to some reports, Belmokhtar’s father-in-law.

While rumors abound that MUJAO receives support from local businessmen and known traffickers, in addition to foreign governments, MUJAO has also made an extensive effort to portray itself as a “true” jihadist organization by instituting hudud punishments in and around Gao, conducting attacks against foreign targets, and adopting a media strategy that includes a web forum, a Facebook page, a Twitter account, and battalion names recalling past Muslim leaders, famous jihadist figures, and also a local Muslim organization.

Despite its stated focus on West Africa, MUJAO has conducted 4 operations (including two suicide bombings) in Algeria or against Algerian targets, in addition to the kidnapping of 7 Algerian diplomats from the Algerian consulate in the northern Malian city of Gao. MUJAO currently holds 3 of the 7–after releasing three and killing one–and one French-Portuguese hostage kidnapped in November.

* While some sources indicate that Kheiru founded MUJAO in cooperation with other “dissident” AQIM members, this explanation is not universal. For instance, Mauritanian journalist Mohamed Mahmoud Abu al-Ma’ali, who published a lengthy analysis in May of the various jihadist groups occupying northern Mali, says that the group was founded by the businessman, smuggler, and AQIM member Sultan Ould Bady, with Kheiru subsequently joining the group. Regardless, both were represented as key leaders of the group until recently, when Ould Bady purportedly left MUJAO to join Ansar al-Din. In December the United States Department of State referred to Kheiru (written as Khairy) as a “founding leader” of MUJAO alongside Ahmed el-Tilemsi, when the State Department designated MUJAO a terrorist organization and applied sanctions to Kheiru and Tilemsi (but no other MUJAO leaders).

Ansar al-Din

Ansar al-Din was created in November 2011 by Iyad Ag Ghali, a legendary Tuareg powerbroker in northern Mali who led two rebellions against the Malian government in the 1990′s and in 2006. According to journalistic accounts as well as scholarly writing, Ag Ghali grew increasingly religious and joined the Tablighi Jamaat, the Pakistani Islamic missionary organization known for its piety as well as quietist political views. However, Ag Ghali at some point moved away from the group, and in 2010 Saudi authorities expelled him from his diplomatic post in Jeddah due to suspected contacts with unknown radicals.

Various sources claim that Ag Ghali only founded Ansar al-Din after failing in his efforts to become the leader of the MNLA and of the Ifoghas Tuareg tribe, though as far as I can tell these claims all come from sources close to or within the MNLA.  Initially composed of veteran rebels from the same tribe (and in many cases the same clan), Ag Ghali’s ranks were swollen in early 2012 by the addition of at least 40 AQIM fighters brought by his cousin, an AQIM commander named Hamada Ag Hama (commonly known as Abdelkrim el-Targui).

Ansar al-Din played a key role in fighting the Malian army in Aguelhoc (where nearly 100 Malian soldiers were reportedly executed), Tessalit, and Kidal. After the March 2012 coup and the departure of the Malian army from the north, Ansar al-Din took responsibility for the cities of Kidal and Timbuktu. At least one “Ansar al-Din” leader in Timbuktu, Sanda Ould Boumama (Sanda Abou Mohamed), was a suspected GSPC and AQIM member, and AQIM is largely believed to have exerted real control over the city.

Various Tuareg Ansar al-Din leaders and spokesmen engaged in negotiations in Burkina Faso and Algeria, and Ag Ghali himself endorsed mediation efforts to achieve a political solution to the Malian crisis. Nevertheless, the group’s leadership appears to be divided and has made contradictory remarks about the group’s goals, in particular where they sought to apply shari’ah (in Kidal? In northern Mali? In all of Mali? Across West Africa?). Ag Ghali himself put an end to the ambiguity when he announced the end of a ceasefire in January 2013, and then led an advance of Islamist forces into central Mali on January 10. This in turn prompted the French intervention in Mali the following day.

Original Posts:

Part 1- http://www.jihadica.com/primer-on-jihadi-players-in-algeria-and-mali-pt-1-aqim/

Part 2- http://www.jihadica.com/primer-on-jihadi-players-in-algeria-and-mali-pt-2-belmokhtar-those-who-sign-with-blood/

Part 3- http://www.jihadica.com/primer-on-jihadi-players-in-algeria-and-mali-pt-3-movement-for-tawhid-and-jihad-in-west-africa/ 

Part 4- http://www.jihadica.com/primer-on-jihadi-players-in-algeria-and-mali-pt-4-final-ansar-al-din/