Was al-Qaeda’s Saharan Amir Mokhtar Belmokhtar Killed in the Battle for Gao?

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

July 12, 2012

Though al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) continues to deny the death of one of its leading amirs in the late June battle for the northern Malian city of Gao, the movement has yet to provide any evidence of the survival of Mokhtar Belmokhtar (a.k.a. Khalid Abu al-Abbas), the amir of AQIM’s Sahara/Sahel-based al-Mulathamin Brigade.

Mokhtar Belmokhtar Outside of Gao

Belmokhtar and his AQIM fighters are reported to have played a central role in leading the takeover of Gao by the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa (MUJWA), a sub-Saharan AQIM spin-off (Le Républicain [Bamako], June 28; for MUJWA, see Terrorism Monitor, April 6). The clashes were sparked on the night of June 25, when Idrissa Oumarou, a popular local politician and leader of a group dedicated to resisting the rebel occupation of Gao, was killed while riding his motorcycle through a checkpoint run by the largely Tuareg Mouvement National de Libération de l’Azawad (MNLA) (L’Esssor [Bamako], June 27; Info Matin [Bamako], June 27; L’Indicateur du Renouveau [Bamako], June 27). Youth protests began the next morning with the burning of tires in the streets. As the protest turned violent, it appears that MNLA fighters opened fire on the protesters from rooftops, wounding 12 and possibly killing one or two demonstrators (L’Esssor [Bamako], June 30; Le Combat [Bamako], June 27). At this point MUJWA launched an attack on the MNLA, which succeeded in driving the movement out of the city in which it had shared administration with the Islamists.

Accounts of Belmokhtar’s death during the battle vary only in the details. The AQIM leader was variously reported to have been killed on June 28 by a burst of gunfire to his chest, by a rocket that destroyed his vehicle, or by a rocket to his chest fired by Tuareg leader Colonel Bouna ag Atayub before the latter was himself killed in the fighting. Belmokhtar’s death has since been reported by the MNLA and confirmed by Algerian sources (Toumast Press, June 30; July 2; Ennahar TV [Algiers], June 28; Liberté [Algiers], June 30). An unnamed Mauritanian AQIM commander was also reported killed (Toumast Press, June 30; SIWEL – Agence Kabyle d’information, June 28). The other senior MNLA officer reported killed in the clashes was identified as Colonel Wari, possibly Wari ag Ibrahim, a former National Guard officer and a member of the Idnane Tuareg.

At least 35 people died in the fighting, including those drowned in the Niger River and those who died in hospital afterwards. The MNLA admitted to four dead and 10 wounded, but made the improbable claim of having killed “dozens” of MUJWA fighters (AFP, July 1). Most of the dead appear to have been MNLA fighters, along with a few civilians caught in the deadly crossfire (Le Combat [Bamako], June 29).

However, two days after Belmokhtar’s supposed death, a communiqué regarding the events in Gao issued under his alternate name of Khalid Abu al-Abbas was published by a Mauritanian news agency and later carried by jihadi websites (Agence Nouakchott d’Information. June 30).  In the statement, Belmokhtar describes the deadly force used against protesters by the MNLA and goes on to describe the latter’s subsequent expulsion from Gao, though he is careful to note that the use of force “was limited in time and place,” was not intended as a declaration of war “on any party,” and cannot be interpreted as a conflict between Arabs and Tuareg. None of the events described in the communiqué appear to post-date June 28 and as Belmokhtar’s message appeared in the form of a statement rather than an interview that would verify his continued existence, it does not establish the AQIM amir’s survival past June 28.  

Since expelling the MNLA, the Islamists have been conducting house-to-house searches for MNLA members or sympathizers (RFI, July 3). MUJWA has also issued warnings on local radio that they have laid anti-personnel mines in the bush areas surrounding Gao to force all traffic to use the few roads controlled by the movement and thus prevent re-infiltration of the city by MNLA forces (Le Combat [Bamako], July 3). MUJWA forces in Gao are under the command of the movement’s leader, Hamadou Ould Khairou, a Mauritanian who left AQIM last year to form a new and largely sub-Saharan militant Islamist group. Ould Khairou has been living at the Algerian consulate since his fighters seized the building and abducted seven Algerian diplomats in April and is frequently seen driving the Algerian Consul’s four-wheel drive vehicle in the streets of Gao (Jeune Afrique, July 7).

MUJWA leader Hamada Ould Khairou

Following the MUJWA takeover of Gao on June 27, Islamist reinforcements (mostly Algerian according to the MNLA) began arriving in trucks that night, joining MUJWA forces and some 100 members of Ansar al-Din already in Gao (VOA, June 28; Toumast Press, June 30).  The MNLA reported the destruction on June 29 of a convoy of Islamist reinforcements in the Tarkint region of Gao by a brigade under the command of Colonel Leche ag Didi of the Idnane Tuareg (Toumast Press, June 30). Many of the MNLA’s leaders belong to the Idnane tribe, which has in recent years been engaged in a growing power struggle with the aristocratic Ifogha tribe, to which Islamists like Algabass ag Intalla and Ansar al-Din leader Iyad ag Ghali belong (al-Jazeera, June 11; Info Matin [Bamako], July 4). In some quarters of Mali, the conflict between the rebel groups is seen as a proxy struggle between Algeria, the “secret sponsor” of the MNLA, and Qatar, the “secret sponsor” of the Islamists (L’Aube [Bamako], July 2).

MNLA Secretary General Bilal ag Cherif, who was wounded in the fighting (either by shrapnel or friendly fire), was airlifted to a hospital in the Burkina Faso capital of Ouagadougou by a Burkinabe helicopter, apparently under the orders of Burkinabe president Blaise Compaoré, who is hosting negotiations between the northern Mali rebel leaders and the transitional Malian government. According to some reports, Ag Cherif was accompanied by MNLA military commander Colonel Muhammad ag Najim (Le Combat [Bamako], June 29; AFP, June 28). The rest of the Gao-based MNLA appears to have withdrawn to the Gao Region town of Ménaka to regroup (L’Indépendant, June 29).

After taking Gao, the Islamists claimed to have found a “black list” of assassination targets on the computer of Muhammad Jerry Maiga, the vice-chairman of the MNLA’s Azawad transition committee. Among the names allegedly found there was that of Idrissa Oumarou, the politician whose death led to the brief struggle for Gao. MUJWA has since issued a reward of FCFA 3 million and a Land Cruiser for the death or capture of Maiga (Le Combat [Bamako], July 2). After the MUJWA victory, Maiga told French radio that MUJWA has little real strength and would soon be driven out of Gao by the MNLA (RFI, June 28).

A MUJWA spokesman, Abu al-Walid al-Sahrawi, claimed his group had taken 40 prisoners as well as two tanks and heavy weapons such as a Grad missile launcher abandoned by the MNLA in the fighting (al-Jazeera, June 29). One Ansar al-Din commander, Umar Ould Hamama, mocked MNLA claims that they would return to Gao after a “tactical withdrawal”: “How can they talk about a counteroffensive when they have left behind them their war arsenal and trucks full of ammunition?” (L’Essor [Bamako], June 29).

Aside from their victory in the spontaneous battle for Gao on June 30, MUJWA also claimed responsibility for an early morning attack the previous day on the regional headquarters of a paramilitary police force in the Algerian town of Ouargla that killed one and wounded three. MUJWA accuses Algeria of encouraging the MNLA to confront the Islamists in northern Mali (AFP, June 29).

This article first appeared in the July 12, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Mallam Muhammadu Marwa and the Roots of Religious Extremism in Northern Nigeria

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

June 29, 2012

A statement from the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) issued on June 21 warned that last week’s Boko Haram attacks on Christians in Kaduna and Zaria and the subsequent reprisals against innocent Muslims represented a descent into a complete social breakdown in Nigeria “reminiscent of the horrific inter-ethnic and religious war that marked the violent break-up of the former Yugoslavia” (Nigerian Tribune, June 21). As the crisis mounts in Nigeria, the recent and surprising release from prison of a former leader of sectarian violence in northern Nigeria has almost been overlooked, but in itself threatens a resumption of the murderous outrages of the Maitatsine movement of the early 1980s that claimed nearly 10,000 lives and nearly shattered Nigeria’s social and political order.  Though not identical in ideology, the ongoing violence of the Boko Haram movement in many ways takes its inspiration from one of the most dreaded and controversial figures  in post-independence Nigeria – the late Mallam Muhammadu Marwa, better known by his Hausa nickname, “Maitatsine,” or “The One Who Damns.”  As his successor Makaniki returns to the streets of northern Nigeria, it is worthwhile to re-examine the life of Muhammadu Marwa, a man who sought not merely to reform Islam, but to change it completely, regardless of the cost in blood this would require.

Early Life of Muhammadu Marwa

Though Marwa was born a member of the powerful and widespread Fulani tribe in the town of Marwa in northern Cameroon (close to the Nigerian border), we know little of his early life before he emerged as a young itinerant mallam (Islamic teacher). [1] From the beginning, there were aspects to his teaching that orthodox Muslims found provocative, and it was not long before authorities in British Cameroon quietly pushed him across the border to British-occupied Nigeria in 1945 in the hopes he would become someone else’s problem. [2] Physically, Marwa was described as unimposing; a small, slender man, soft-spoken in his early days, bearded and with two gold incisor teeth. [3]

Central Mosque, Kano

Marwa arrived in the garb of a religious scholar in Kano in the 1950s, where his idiosyncratic interpretation of Islam and claims that Muhammad was not an actual prophet drew his presence to the attention of Ado Bayero, the Emir of Kano, who had the controversial  preacher shipped back to Cameroon in 1962. His residency there was short-lived; however, as local Cameroonian authorities facilitated the return of this disturbing individual to Nigeria in 1966, where he established himself as a Quranic teacher to young boys, a situation that permitted him to begin building a loyal following indoctrinated in his particular interpretation of Islam, though not before he served another stretch in prison beginning in 1973 when authorities objected to his methods and teachings. [4] This incarceration appeared to have little effect on Marwa’s progress in Kano, and it was not long before his followers began to comb the city for homeless youth who could be easily enticed by promises of food and shelter. With a development boom infused with petrodollars, Kano went from a city of 400,000 people largely confined within the old city walls in 1970 to a sprawling metropolis of 1.7 million people only ten years later. Wealth remained concentrated in the hands of a privileged few, however, and the streets of Kano were filled with young people seeking any means of survival. [5] In building his following, Marwa made full use of the almajiri system in which boys, usually between ten to 14 years-old, were attached to a religious teacher who provided sufficient instruction in Arabic to permit the reading and memorization of Islamic scriptures.

The students were largely self-supporting through daily begging for alms (a traditional means of support for religious students), a portion of which went directly to Marwa. The movement’s funding was supplemented by Marwa’s growing reputation as a composer of allegedly powerful amulets and charms, an activity shunned by better-educated religious scholars, but one that appealed to a wide spectrum of Muslims still influenced by traditional interpretations of Islam that incorporated pre-Islamic belief systems. Marwa’s efforts in this area hearkened back to the 1906 Mahdist Satiru Rebellion in northern Nigeria, in which a briefly successful uprising eventually came to grief when insurgents eschewed the use of fire-arms in favor of traditional weapons and charms produced by a holy man named Dan Makafo that promised to turn bullets into water. [6]

Building a Base for Islamic Renewal in Kano

During the 1970s, Marwa began to take on the established Sunni scholars, condemning anyone who used any other scriptural source than the Quran, including the Sunna and the Hadiths. [7] More broadly, he damned those who read any book other than the Quran or used watches cars, bicycles, televisions, cigarettes and many other products that reflected Western life, earning himself the nickname “Maitatsine,” or “The One Who Damns.”  By the late 1970’s, Marwa had become a well-known public figure by challenging all manner of authority. Such activities earned him a year in prison at hard labor in 1978, but this did little to deter him. Indeed, Marwa grew more powerful from this point as his followers began appropriating properties beside his Quaranic school, eventually developing a self-ruling enclave of several thousand men to which opponents and alleged “traitors” to the movement were brought and summarily executed after a brief and predictable appearance before the movement’s own “court.” [8]

The 1979 Iranian Revolution encouraged the growing millenarian trend in the Muslim community and Marwa’s own followers became increasingly violent in their rejection of state authority, partly by exploiting the greater degree of political and individual freedom promulgated by Nigeria’s 1979 constitution. The growing tensions in northern Nigeria’s Islamic community led to dozens of clashes between authorities and various Islamic groups in the lead-up to the Kano insurrection of 1980. Marwa began work on a new center for his followers, located in the unfinished ‘Yan Awaki district of Kano. The fortified compound was based on high ground and partly protected by a stream that wound round part of the property. A separate one-storey building at the rear of the compound was known as “the slaughter-house,” where numerous victims of the sect were murdered and their bodies dumped through a trap-door into the stream. Efforts to rein in Marwa through legislation against unorthodox preaching failed through fears it could be applied against the more mainstream ulema (religious scholars and clergy) and the Maitatsine enclave and its surroundings became a “no-go” area for local police. Even undercover work was abandoned, leaving security forces with little intelligence regarding the movement’s intentions. In the absence of any opposition by authorities, Marwa continued to illegally expropriate neighboring properties and encouraged his supporters to settle on any unoccupied real estate, asserting that all land belonged to Allah and his people. By 1980, Marwa had roughly 10,000 followers (mostly in Kano but with smaller groups in Bauchi, Gombe, Maiduguri and Yola) and confrontations with police and the ulema became common, often degenerating into pitched street-battles with multiple fatalities.

Marwa was accompanied by bodyguards everywhere and his followers began to appear armed at public events, having received training under the supervision of the movement’s military commander Saidu Rabiu from former soldiers and policemen who had joined the movement. It was common for sect members to carry concealed weapons in the streets while confident of the protection against firearms and other weapons bestowed by the charms and amulets produced by Marwa. [9] In this atmosphere it became clear that matters would soon come to a head, especially when rumors began to circulate that Marwa intended to take over Kano’s market and main mosques. [10] Nonetheless, authorities in Lagos denied repeated requests from Kano for police reinforcements to deal with Marwa and his followers, who by this time vastly outnumbered the available police in Kano.

Beyond Orthodoxy

Marwa’s message appealed to the largely unemployed or underemployed masses that the rapid expansion of Kano attracted from the Nigerian countryside and even from across regional borders, many of whom could not afford the consumer goods denounced by the increasingly bellicose religious leader. Marwa’s prohibition against carrying only small amounts of cash on the grounds that carrying more displayed a lack of faith in Allah did not require much adaptation by the migrants, working poor and impoverished students who flocked to his leadership, who were often inspired as much by resentment against the flourishing corruption and mismanagement that concentrated money in the hands of a few as by religious concerns. The anti-materialist theme in Marwa’s teachings gave focus to the lives of the impoverished, replacing envy with righteousness. Though Marwa sought to reform Islam through a highly individual interpretation of what constituted orthodoxy, he did not hesitate to employ older, pre-Islamic spiritual beliefs regarding the concentration of magical powers in certain individuals, traditions that were familiar to his largely rural-origin following. Marwa also changed the wording and the ritual involved in daily prayer, a shocking display of arrogance to most Muslims. Most controversial, however, was Marwa’s 1979 claim to be a nabi, or prophet, at times equating himself with the Prophet Muhammad, and at other times declaring his superiority to this “mere Arab.” [11] For orthodox Muslims, who believe Muhammad is the last Prophet, Marwa had now gone beyond all reasonable interpretations of Islam and placed himself at odds with the larger Muslim community in northern Nigeria.

An Inevitable Confrontation

In response to public complaints, Kano State governor Muhammad Rimi (who was alleged to have previously had ties to the cult) sent Marwa a message on November 24, 1980 demanding that he and his followers vacate their illegally expropriated holdings or face government action. Marwa, in turn, began summoning his followers to his defense.

When police attempted to prevent a public demonstration by arresting some leaders of the ‘Yan Tatsine (as Marwa’s followers were known) at Kano’s Shahuci Playing Grounds on December 18, 1980, they were attacked by ‘Yan Tatsine wielding machetes, knives, spears, axes and bows and arrows. Police arms quickly fell into the eager hands of the ‘Yan Tatsine and it did not take long for the security forces to lose control of the situation entirely. Kano was turned over to mobs of ‘Yan Tatsine who murdered, raped and pillaged in the city for days, often while singing movement favorites like Yau Zamu Sha Jini (“Today We Will Suck Blood”). [12] At times the marauders were opposed by vigilante groups (the ‘Yan Tauri), but these were generally ineffective as supporters of Marwa continued to pour into the city. [13] By December 22, with many of the outnumbered and demoralized police no longer showing up for duty, it was felt necessary to deploy the Nigerian military to retake Kano, which they began by “softening up” the militants (and their unfortunate neighbors) with a ten-hour mortar barrage by the 146th Infantry Battalion, together with aerial support. Militants and innocents alike perished in the bombardment, which was followed by military forces mopping up the remaining resistance with rockets and machine guns in bitter street fighting. Battalion Major Haliru Akilu noted later that the militants showed little fear of the Army’s superior weapons: “They were ready to kill first, or be killed, but never to run” (The Age [Lagos], February 21, 1981).

A contributing factor to the ferocity of the onslaught of the ‘Yan Tatsine on the ordinary citizens of Kano appears to have been the death shortly before the clashes of Marwa’s eldest son Tijani (a.k.a. Kana’ana). Though Tijani appears to have opted for association with members of Kano’s criminal underworld rather than the pursuit of religion, Marwa blamed Tijani’s death at the hands of his criminal associates on the people of Kano as a whole and vowed to make every father “taste the bitterness of losing a child” (Sunday Trust [Abuja], December 26, 2010).

Separated by only a decade from a bitter civil war, Nigeria’s largely northern ruling class was in no mood to tolerate such challenges to its authority or national unity. Official figures claimed over 4,000 dead, though other sources suggest the figure was far larger. At least 100,000 people were displaced by the fighting. [14] Hundreds of children abducted by the sect for indoctrination were also freed when soldiers entered the Maitatsine compound.

Rumors that the insurgents had been aided by Libyan troops or provided with Libyan arms soon proved false (Libyan troops were fighting across the border in Chad at the time). Other claims that “Zionist forces” or various Western intelligence agencies were behind the rebellion were raised at the subsequent Aniagolu Commission of Inquiry but remained unsubstantiated. [15] The Zionist allegation appears to have had its origin in the sect’s practice of praying while facing Jerusalem rather than Mecca. [16]

The Legacy of Maitatsine

Once the Army had retaken control of Kano, Marwa’s body was exhumed from a shallow grave on the outskirts of the city (News Agency of Nigeria, December 31, 1980). The would-be prophet was variously reported to have died from smoke inhalation or wounds to his leg during the attack on his compound (The Age, February 21, 1981). [17] On the orders of Justice Aniagolu the remains were cremated and remain today in an officially sealed jar on the shelf of the police laboratory in Kano (Sunday Trust [Abuja], December 26, 2010). The area where Marwa built his enclave is now home to a police barracks, all traces of the former complex having been destroyed in the fighting or demolished soon afterwards.

In the commission of inquiry that followed the devastation of Kano, there was inevitable criticism of police efforts. Most of the police rank-and-file came from the same culture as the members of the ‘Yan Tatsine, and were just as prone to believing in the efficacy of the charms and amulets worn by Marwa’s followers. Their leaders also came under criticism, with the commission declaring the acting commissioner of police at the time “had totally succumbed to the permanent existence of the threat, which like the state governor and other government functionaries, was believed to be beyond suppression. It was a case of total surrender to an overwhelming situation” (Sunday Trust [Abuja], December 26, 2010).

Attempts by some Nigerian authorities to create an “Outsider Narrative” to explain the events in Kano were not supported by evidence.  Police records confirm that Nigeriens, Chadians and Cameroonians were among Marwa’s followers arrested after the 1980 uprising, but their numbers were relatively small and did not justify government attempts to characterize the ‘Yan Tatsine as a “foreign” movement that had infiltrated Nigeria.

Marwa’s rise took place at a time and in a region where Islam was perhaps more of a divisive than a unifying force.  There was intense competition between the major Sufi orders (the Qadiriya and the Tijaniya), Saudi-inspired Salafists, anti-Sufists of the Saudi-supported ‘Yan Izala movement and politically conscious Muslims inspired by the 1979 Iranian revolution.  Wrapped in a resolutely anti-authoritarian, anti-state and anti-materialist garb, Marwa was able to present himself as the final prophet of Islam based on the millenarian fervor existing in the Islamic year AH 1400 (1979-1980). In doing so, Marwa exploited strong currents of Mahdism in the region, which was in expectation of a mujaddid, or “Renewer,” an individual believed to appear at the end of every century (on the Islamic calendar) to restore Islam to its original purity. The strength of these beliefs not only gave Marwa a certain degree of immunity in the Muslim community, but also allowed for the close connections he was alleged to have with certain politicians and prominent businessmen in the area.

Despite the deaths in Kano and the arrest of several thousand of Marwa’s supporters, the ‘Yan Tatsine continued to exist, though much of the movement relocated to the city of Maiduguri in Borno State. Drawing strength from the belief that Marwa was not actually dead, the movement was soon operating in defiance of the state once more.

  • ·         October, 1982 – A ‘Yan Tatsine clash with police at Bulunkutu, outside Maiduguri, left over 450 dead before the fighting spread to Kaduna State, where scores more were killed.
  • ·         February, 1984 – More than 1,000 people were killed during rampages in Jimeta (Gongola State) that followed the mass escape of ‘Yan Tatsine from a local jail.
  • ·         April, 1985 – Efforts to arrest Marwa’s successor al-Makaniki (“the Mechanic,” a.k.a. Yusufu Amadu) in Gombe (Bauchi State) left at least another 150 dead after the ‘Yan Tatsine engaged in a gunfight with security forces. Makaniki fled to Cameroon, where he remained until 2004, when he returned to Nigeria and was arrested. In a surprise development, Makaniki was acquitted and discharged as a free man in early May, 2012 (Daily Trust [Abuja], May 9).

In 2006, one of Maitatsine’s wives, Zainab, told a reporter that Marwa had nothing to do with the Kano violence in 1980 and that her late husband was “an embodiment of scholarship, a father and a religious reformer that was misunderstood. He preached tolerance, peace, harmony and religious revival… To the best of our understanding of him, he was a man of humility and we are sure he was framed, misunderstood and castigated for preaching” (Sunday Trust [Abuja], December 26, 2010). While most Nigerians reject such an interpretation of the Maitatsine legacy, the calculated viciousness of contemporary attacks by Boko Haram extremists against Muslims and Christians alike suggest that religious extremism, police corruption, lack of opportunity, inept intelligence work, economic inequity and uninhibited urban growth continue to provide fertile ground for periodic and uncontrollable explosions of religiously-inspired violence in northern Nigeria.

Notes

1. For contemporary Fulani militancy in Africa, see Andrew McGregor, “Central Africa’s Tribal Marauder: A Profile of Fulani Insurgent Leader General Abdel Kader Baba Laddé,” Militant Leadership Monitor 3(4), April 30, 2012.

2. Francis Ohanyido, “Poverty and Politics at The Bottom of Terror (Part 1 – The Maitatsine Phenomenon),” Ayaka 3(2), June 2012, http://www.ayakaonline.com/politics/poverty-and-politics-at-the-bottom-of-terror-part-1-%E2%80%93-the-maitatsine-phenomenon/

3. Toyin Falola, Violence in Nigeria: The Crisis of Religious Politics and Secular Ideologies, Rochester, 1998, p.141.

4. The dates of Marwa’s various convictions and the duration of his sentences are a matter of some dispute in the literature concerning him and is likely due to inconsistent record-keeping.

5. Michael Watts, “Black Gold, White Heat: State violence, local resistance and the national question in Nigeria,” in: Michael Keith and Steven Pile (eds.), Geographies of Resistance, London, 1997, p.47.

6. J.S. Hogendorn and Paul E. Lovejoy, “Revolutionary Mahdism and Resistance to Early Colonial Rule in Northern Nigeria and Niger,” African Studies Seminar Paper, African Studies Institute of the University of the Witwatersrand, May 1979, pp.26-27.

7. Niels Kastfelt, “Rumours of Maitatsine: A Note on Political Culture in Northern Nigeria,” African Affairs 83(350), 1989, p. 83.

8. Paul Collier and Nicholas Sambanis, Understanding Civil War: Africa: Evidence and Analysis, World Bank Publications, 2005, p.103.

9. Falola, op cit, p.146.

10. Rosalind I.J. Hackett, “Exploring Theories of Religious Violence: Nigeria’s ‘Maitatsine’ Phenomenon,” in: Timothy Light and Brian C. Wilson (eds.), Religion as a Human Capacity: A Festschrift in Honor of E. Thomas Lawson, Leiden, 2004, p.197.

11. Falola, op cit, p.143.

12. Ibid, p.154.

13. Allan Pred and Michael John Watts, Reworking Modernity: Capitalisms and Symbolic Discontent, Rutgers, 1992, p.24.

14. Watts, op cit, p.55.

15. Elizabeth Isichei,“The Maitatsine Risings in Nigeria 1980-85: A Revolt of the Disinherited,” Journal of Religion in Africa 17(3), October 1987, pp.76-78.

16. Hackett, op cit, pp.199-200.

17. Abdur Rahman I. Doi, Islam in Nigeria, Zaria, 1984, p.299.

This article was first published in the June 29, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Militant Leadership Monitor

Intervening in Mali: West African Nations Plan Offensive against Islamists and Tuareg Rebels

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

June 28, 2012

As Tuareg rebels battle radical Islamists with heavy weapons for control of the northern Mali city of Gao, Mali and the other 15 nations of the Economic Community of West African States(ECOWAS) are planning a military offensive designed to drive both groups out of northern Mali in an effort to re-impose order in the region and prevent the six-month old conflict from destabilizing the entire region. So far, however, operational planning has not been detailed enough to gain the approval of the UN Security Council for authorization of a Chapter Seven military intervention, leaving ECOWAS and the African Union with the option of delaying the campaign or proceeding without UN approval.

An ECOWAS Intervention Force

ECOWAS maintains that a military intervention would be a last resort if talks hosted by the ECOWAS-appointed mediator (Burkino Faso President Blaise Compaore) should fail, but with negotiations in Ouagadougou going nowhere and divisions between the formerly allied rebel groups erupting into open conflict in northern Mali, there will be inevitable pressure to step up preparations for a military intervention. One obstacle to deployment so far has been the absence of a formal invitation from Malian authorities, though there has been discussion within ECOWAS of launching a military intervention without Mali’s consent (PANA Online [Dakar], June 9; Le Combat [Bamako], June 20).

MNLA Fighters in Northern Mali

ECOWAS has explicitly rejected the rebels’ “so-called declaration of independence” and has stated that it will “never compromise on the territorial integrity of Mali” (PANA Online [Dakar], May 30). Though the Islamists have agreed to talks, the mediators in Ouagadougou have insisted the largely Tuareg Islamist Ansar al-Din movement of Iyad ag Ghali sever all ties with al-Qaeda before talks can proceed, a move that seems most unlikely at this point (AFP, June 18; for a profile of Ag Ghali, see Militant Leadership Monitor, February 2012). Ansar al-Din spokesman Sena Ould Boumama has warned that his movement “will fight ECOWAS if it engages us in northern Mali” (al-Akhbar [Timbuktu], n.d., via Le Politicien [Bamako], June 7).

Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, Niger and Nigeria are all expected to contribute troops to the mission if it receives authorization. Mauritania, which has conducted cross-border counter-terrorist operations in Mali in the past but is not a member of ECOWAS, has only expressed its “availability to join common efforts” to resolve the crisis (AFP, June 4). The ECOWAS intervention, which is projected to consist of 3,270 men, will have to stabilize southern Mali before it can effectively restore control of the north to the Bamako government.

Algeria, with a capability for desert operations and a powerful military with decades of combat experience, has been urged by some Western and regional nations to take a leading role in any intervention, but appears reluctant to provide ground forces. Algeria’s participation is widely viewed as key to the success of any military intervention. Earlier this month, Algerian intelligence chief General Muhammad “Toufik” Mediène described a potential Algerian role consisting of intelligence provision and airlifts of necessary materiel from Tamanrasset and Reggane (Jeune Afrique, June 14). Algeria’s main condition for participation will likely be the complete absence of Western troops from the campaign, particularly French forces.

Niger’s president Mahamadou Issoufou is a strong supporter of the intervention and claims to have information regarding the presence of Afghan and Pakistani instructors working with the Islamists in northern Mali, but has not shared the details publically (France 24, June 7. With a large and often restless Tuareg minority in northern Niger, Issoufou has much to lose by allowing the creation of an independent state in northern Mali. The Niger Foreign Minister has stated that “the military option is the only one” for Mali (Le Politicien [Bamako], June 7).

The Government in Bamako

In post-coup Bamako, the lack of political leadership remains a major stumbling block to resolving the crisis. Dissatisfaction is growing in many quarters with the prevarications of Transitional Government Prime Minister Cheick Modibo Diarra and his continued opposition to a foreign military intervention (22 Septembre [Bamako], June 19). Mali’s 70-year-old transitional president, Dioncounda Traoré, was attacked by pro-coup demonstrators in Bamako on May 22, enduring injuries that forced his evacuation to a Paris hospital (AFP, June 5). Complicating matters is the continued presence of coup-leader Captain Amadou Haya Sanogo, despite the ECOWAS-ordered dissolution of Sanogo’s Comité National pour le Redressement de la Démocratie et la Restauration de l’Etat (CNRDRE) on June 7.

In return for ending his destructive putsch and agreeing to step aside for a transitional government, Sanogo has been rewarded with official former head-of-state status, a generous monthly allowance, a prominent residence and two vehicles. This decision came despite the opposition of ECOWAS, which wanted to return Sanago to a subordinate position in the military (L’Indépendant [Bamako], May 23; Le Combat [Bamako], June 12). The 39-year-old American-trained Sanogo is reported to rarely leave his well-guarded residence inside the Kati military base outside of Bamako. In a recent interview, Sanogo insisted that if the Army were given the means, it “would recover the north in a few days” (Jeune Afrique, June 9). Members of the CNRDRE, including Sanogo, continue to wield influence by having formed the Comité militaire de suivi de la réforme des forces de défense et de sécurité (CMSRFDS) on June 12 to absorb the CNRDRE, though the new committee will allegedly act in only an advisory role (Le Pays [Ouagadougou],  June 14; L’indicateur du Renouveau [Bamako], June 18).

Supporters and opponents of the March military coup have organized themselves into two fronts: the pro-putsch Coordination of the Patriotic Organizations of Mali (COPAM) and the anti-putsch Front for Safeguarding Democracy and Republic (FDR), though in a positive sign, the two groups have been meeting for discussions of Mali’s political future (Le Republicain [Bamako], June 18). COPAM took advantage of the attack on Dioncounda Traoré to hold a convention to advance the name of Captain Sanogo as the new transitional president, which only created further suspicion as to the motives and identity of those behind the attack on the transitional president (L’Indépendant [Bamako], May 23, May 25; Le Combat [Bamako], June 2; Info Matin [Bamako], June 7). Since then, several leaders of COPAM have been jailed while others appear to have left the country. Nonetheless, a pro-Sanogo radio station, Raio Kayira, urges opposition to ECOWAS “meddling” in Malian affairs and hosts regular calls for the death of Dioncounda Traoré and former members of the government (Jeune Afrique, May 30).

Clashes between the MNLA and Ansar al-Din

On May 26, Ansar al-Din and the secular Mouvement National de Libération de l’Azawad (MNLA) announced their merger as the Transitional Council of the Islamic State of Azawad (L’Essor [Bamako], May 30). However, by June 1, the MNLA had issued a new document declaring all provisions of the May 26 merger agreement “null and void” (AFP, June 1). Mossa ag Attaher, a MNLA spokesman, admitted that the group had made a mistake in drafting the agreement: “[We] accepted the idea of an Islamic State but it should have been written that we will practice a moderate and tolerant Islam, with no mention of Shari’a” (AFP, June 1).

A June 8 statement from Ansar al-Din expressed the movement’s disappointment with the MNLA’s withdrawal from the Gao Agreement, but stated the movement would continue alone if necessary: “Unfortunately we were surprised with the Nouakchott statement issued by the Political Bureau of the movement which stated its clear refusal of the project of the Islamic state… therefore the Jama’at Ansar Al-Din declares and ensures to the sons of its Islamic ummah [community] its adherence to the Islamic project.”[1] Clashes between the two movements were reported the same day in Kidal, resulting in the city being roughly divided between the two armed groups (AFP, June 8).

Though the short-lived agreement spoke of an “independent Azawad” nation, Ansar al-Din leader Iyad ag Ghali has since returned to his opposition to the establishment of a new state: “We are not asking for much: just the application of Shari’a law in the northern and southern regions. We are Malians and we are against the division of Mali… Anyone who does not lead the fight under our flag is our enemy and will be fought. Secularism is disbelief. Whoever is for a secular state is our enemy and will fought by all means” (Reuters, June 16).

While the MNLA were willing to agree to an Islamic State, their conception of a moderate and tolerant Islamic base quickly proved at odds with the Islamists of Ansar al-Din and the al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) splinter group, Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa (MUJWA), whose eagerness to begin lashing people for trivial offenses threatens to dissipate even the small popular support they may have enjoyed several months ago.  Their numerous prohibitions and severe punishments have defied even the advice of the AQIM Amir, Abu MusabAbdul Wadud (a.k.a. Abdelmalek Droukdel), who used a May 23 audiotape release to warn the Islamists: “It is a mistake to impose all the rules of Islam at once on people overnight… So, for example, shutting down places of drugs, liquors and immoralities is something that they can seek to do now without delay, but the implementation of the just punishment is the responsibility of the Shari’a legislators and should come gradually” (Sahara Media [Nouakchott], May 23).

Face-to-face negotiations between Iyad ag Ghali and MNLA leader Muhammad ag Najim in Gao have had little success, as the gulf between the freedom and independence sought by the Tuareg of the MNLA and the strictly regulated future offered by the Salafists of Ansar al-Din is too great (Le Republicain [Bamako], May 30). Ag Ghali, who is reported to now speak only Arabic and wishes to be known by the Arabic name of Abu Fadil, is insistent on giving space to AQIM in the new state of Azawad, a breaking point in negotiations with the MNLA (Jeune Afrique, June 9).

Prior to the current fighting in Gao, a major clash between the MNLA and Ansar al-Din occurred in Timbuktu on June 13. Other confrontations have been reported in northern towns where residents have demonstrated in favor of the MNLA and against the Islamists (L’Essor [Bamako], June 19; AFP, June 13). The Malian government is also preparing a file for submission to the International Criminal Court (ICC) concerning the slaughter of disarmed prisoners at Aguelhok in late January,an action claimed by Ansar al-Din during a joint operation with the MNLA(Le Combat [Bamako], June 12). In its public statements and attitudes, it is clear the MNLA is now trying to distance itself from the Islamist factions, particularly with possible ICC prosecutions looming if ECOWAS is successful in retaking northern Mali (Info Matin [Bamako], June 12).

Dissension in the North

There are many indications that those northern Malians who have not fled the country outright have already tired of Islamist rule. By some reports, the situation in Gao (co-administered by the MNLA) is becoming critical, with a lack of food, water, electricity and currency (L’Essor [Bamako], May 23). In Kidal, youth and women tired of Ansar al-Din’s social restrictions gathered to display their opposition to the movement with slogans, public smoking in defiance of the ban on tobacco use, and stone-throwing by the women, who removed their Islamist-decreed veils after Ansar al-Din elements retreated in damaged vehicles (Le Republicain [Bamako], June 7; Le Combat [Bamako], June 7).

In the town of Bourem, MUJWA outraged local residents by opening three prisons for those “caught doing sin,” one for men, one for women and one for children. In Douentza (Mopti Region), the power supply has been shut down for lack of fuel and MNLA fighters are reported to be looting local homes (L’Essor, June 12, June 19).  In the town of Goundam, two-thirds of the population of 12,000 has left, while the remaining young men often have verbal confrontations with the rebels that result in their arrest (L’Essor [Bamako], June 7).

The Malian Army

Since 1991, the Malian military has suffered from underfunding, nepotism, corruption, under training, poor pay and a failure to maintain its aircraft and armor. Chronic demoralization is the result of purges of the officer corps, attempts to integrate former Tuareg rebels with loyalist troops and being required to operate in unfamiliar desert terrain with a lack of intelligence, equipment or ammunition (Jeune Afrique, June 17). Malian troops suffered greatly in the northern campaign earlier this year from an almost total lack of air support from the much-decayed Malian air assets.

On a recent visit to the Amadoui Cheickou Tall military base, Malian Prime Minister Cheick Modibo Diarra told government troops: “If God gives me the time and strength to liberate the country, I promise that my government will not spare any effort to create a strong, modern, efficient and effective army, an army that frightens, an army that brings peace” (L’Essor [Bamako], June 5). Where the money will come from to support a revival of the military is uncertain; the economic disaster that followed the coup d’état has resulted in the state budget being reduced from FCFA 1400 billion to FCFA 870 billion (Le Combat [Bamako], June 4). Even the removal of ECOWAS sanctions has failed to renew capital flows into Mali until the army returns to its barracks and a new, elected government is formed.

Colonel Ould Meydou

Malian fortunes in the north will rest in the hands of three senior officers known for their fighting skills and distaste for barracks life: Colonel al-Hajj Gamou, a Tuareg, Colonel Ould Meydou, anArab, and Colonel Didier Dakuo, a southerner. Gamou and Meydou met with Algerian authorities last month regarding future operations in northern Mali (AFP, May 24). Colonel Meydou narrowly escaped the military revolt at the Kati military base that started the coup and took refuge in Mauritania, where he says he is prepared to return to the field with 1,000 men of the Arab militia he commands (Jeune Afrique, June 17). 

Using deceit, Colonel Ag Gamou was able to escape from northern Mali into Niger with his command intact when the rest of the Malian Army collapsed. Though presently disarmed, some 600 pro-state Tuareg fighters under his command are awaiting redeployment into northern Mali at a military base near Niamey (Independent [London], May 10; L’Indépendant [Bamako], June 18).

In addition to the desert-fighting skills of these militias, roughly 2,000 regulars with ten armored vehicles under Colonel Dakuo are available in the Mopti Region town of Sévaré, close to the southernmost area occupied by the rebels. For now, this total group of roughly 3,000 to 4,000 men represents all the forces the Malian Army can count on. They will face rebels equipped with superior Libyan arms supplemented by vast stocks of military materiel seized from the Malian Army earlier this year. Nearly all the Army’s Russian-made assault tanks have been destroyed or disabled.

Mali’s military will be handicapped in their re-conquest of the north by the absence of its elite unit, the “Red Beret” parachute commando regiment of some 600 men under the command of Colonel Abidine Guindo. The regiment, which doubled as the presidential guard, was officially disbanded by the putschists after it remained loyal to ex-President Amadou Toumani Touré and succeeded in spiriting Touré out of the country before he could be arrested. A failed counter-coup led by the “Red Berets” on April 30 complicated matters further, with members of the regiment now being put on trial for opposing the new government.

The Role of Militias

The Arabs of northern Mali have largely remained loyal to the concept of a secular and unified Malian state and have no wish to come under Tuareg rule, whether secular or Islamist. An armed branch of the Arab opposition, the Front national de libération de l’Azawad (FNLA, also known as al-Jabhah al-Arabiya, “the Arab Front”), has vowed to wage war “for the liberation of Timbuktu and the independence of our territory,” while maintaining a secular, non-secessionist and non-Islamist identity (AFP, June 5; L’Essor [Bamako], June 7).

Another group is the Front de libération du Nord-Mali (FLNM – National Front for the Liberation of Northern Mali), formed on May 28 as an umbrella group for the largely Black African Songhai and Peul/Fulani Ganda Koy and Ganda Iso militias, which have a strong anti-Arab and anti-Tuareg character (Le Republicain [Bamako], May 30; for the Ganda Koy, Ganda Iso and other Malian militias, see Terrorism Monitor, April 20). The militias, which have a notorious reputation for violence against civilians, say that the peace talks in Burkina Faso do not concern them as negotiations should follow military action (VOA, June 26).

A Timbuktu militia allegedly formed from the Songhai and Tuareg ethnic groups has vowed to expel the Islamists from that city. According to Hamidou Maiga, a former officer in the Malian Army, the Mouvement patriotique de résistance pour la libération de Tombouctou (MPRLT) “will engage in military action against the invaders until they leave” (AFP, June 7).

Retaking Northern Mali

Malian military sources have indicated a plan to retake the north would begin with the liberation of Douentza in Mopti region. Military operations are projected to employ irregular but unreliable units such as the Ganda Iso and Ganda Koy militias (Le Politicien [Bamako], June 7). A drive from the south could be accompanied by the reinsertion of Colonel Ag Gamou’s Tuareg militia from the southeastern border with Niger. The number of rebels is uncertain, but the MNLA claims to have 10,000 men under its command, while the Ansar al-Din is estimated to have 500 and MUJWA to have some 300. Driving these groups out of the cities of Gao, Kidal and Timbuktu might require challenging urban warfare, but dealing with a guerrilla campaign in the desert wilderness could prove even more difficult.

Washington and Paris would undoubtedly be called on to provide intelligence (particularly aerial surveillance), logistical support and financial support. If Algeria prevents the use of American or French special forces for gathering operational intelligence on the ground, it might deploy its own Groupe d’Intervention Spécial (GIS) for this purpose.

The deployment of air assets, whatever their source, will be complicated by the possible rebel possession of anti-aircraft weapons from Libya’s armories. Such weapons appear to have been used by Ansar al-Din on June 15 against two unmarked planes (likely American surveillance aircraft) flying over Timbuktu (AFP, June 17).

Conclusion

While both Ansar al-Din and the MNLA are engaged in talks in Burkina Faso, it is safe to say that time is running out for a negotiated solution. The crisis in Mali and the outflow of refugees is destabilizing the entire region. There is also no desire either regionally or internationally to allow the further entrenchment of terrorist groups in the area such as AQIM or MUJWA, neither of which are involved in negotiations or any other effort to restore order to northern Mali. However, the opposition of Algeria to the involvement of Western militaries (on the ground at least) and a general Western reluctance to become heavily involved in such efforts after the Libyan debacle will ultimately leave such efforts in the hands of ECOWAS. However, this organization can deploy only a limited number of troops from a handful of countries with a limited history of cooperation in the field.  The use of different languages, arms and communications systems will not enhance the efficiency of a West African intervention force, and the absence of accurate intelligence could prove fatal in a confrontation with experienced, determined and well-armed rebels on their home turf. Without substantial cooperation and support from Algeria or Western militaries, the small composite force of roughly 3,300 men envisaged by ECOWAS may experience many of the same setbacks experienced by the shattered Malian military earlier this year. While growing divisions amongst the Malian rebels may seem to present an opportune time for intervention, any military defeat suffered as the result of an over-hasty deployment could rock the political foundations of West African nations such as Nigeria that are enduring bloody insurgencies of their own.

Note

1. Sanda Ould Bouamama, Spokesman of Jama’at Ansar al-Din, “Statement from Jamaat Ansar Al-Din about the MNLA repealing of the Gao agreement,” Timbuktu, June 8, 2012.

This article first appeared in the June 28, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

The Mysterious Death in Custody of Boko Haram Leader Habib Bama

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

June 28, 2012

Habib Bama, who is alleged to have directed numerous bombings in north and central Nigeria,was arrested in the Yobe State town of Damaturu in the early hours of June 21 by members of the Joint Task Force (JTF), an elite Nigerian counterterrorist unit. According to the JTF’s Yobe State commander, Colonel Dahiru Abdulsalam, Bama was picked up while trying to escape after JTF agents were tipped off by local residents (Guardian Nigeria, June 22). According to the Nigerian State Security Service (SSS), Habib Bama (a.k.a. Shuabu Bama, Habib Mamman) is a Kanuri from Borno State and a former private in the Nigerian Army before his dismissal. (Vanguard [Lagos], February 15). The arrest concluded a manhunt for Bama that began on February 15. Before his death in custody, Bama was reported to be providing useful information to JTF interrogators, who said they were “still extracting words from him,” but might move him to Abuja if his condition improved (The Nation [Lagos], June 22; Leadership [Abuja], June 22).

Habib Bama

Nigerian security sources have cited Habib Bama as playing a leading role in a number of especially bloody attacks:

  • Mogadishu Barracks Mammy Market, Abuja – December 31, 2010 (see Terrorism Monitor Brief, January 6, 2011).
  • Suicide bombing of Police Headquarters in Abuja – June 16, 2011 (see Terrorism Monitor Brief, June 23, 2011).
  • Suicide bombing of the UN headquarters in Abuja – August 26, 2011.
  • Car bomb attack on St. Theresa’s Catholic Church, Madalla, Niger State – December 25, 2011.

Various accounts have circulated regarding the manner of Bama’s arrest. One version maintains that the JTF stormed his base in Damaturu on June 21 and engaged Bama and his aides in a gun battle in which Bama was fatally wounded (Daily Trust [Lagos], June 22). Another account suggests that Bama was shopping for food in the market when he was identified by a former army colleague on patrol with his unit. Bama reportedly tried to grab one of the soldier’s weapons but was shot in the leg before four soldiers overpowered him. Two young men who were with Bama reportedly escaped in the confusion (The Nation, June 22). A day later it was reported that the two young men (by now “armed to the teeth”) had been arrested along with Bama and were undergoing interrogation, where they had made “some useful statements” according to the JTF (The Nation, June 23). .

According to another JTF source, Bama was shot in the market “to incapacitate him,” as JTF men were unsure if he and his companions were armed. The latter ran away, while Bama was “given the best of medical treatment to save his life” but died despite the efforts of doctors, though not before “providing some leads for the JTF” (The Nation, June 23).

A further JTF source added that “security agencies were able to interrogate him even while in pain and he was able to respond to some questions… It was unfortunate that Bama died of gunshots. We had planned to fly him to Abuja for the best treatment, but he could not just make it” (The Nation, June 23).

Gunshot wounds to the leg are rarely fatal if medical treatment is received in a timely fashion, making Bama’s subsequent death in JTF custody somewhat unusual. However, a source from the SSS was quoted as saying that “a deliberate decision” was made to deny Bama medical care, a decision made in light of recent difficulties encountered in obtaining convictions for alleged Boko Haram militants in Nigerian courts due to the reluctance of witnesses to testify against the movement (SaharaReporters.com [Lagos], June 22).

This article first appeared in the June 28, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Is Russia Sending a Detachment of the Black Sea Fleet to Syria?

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

June 28, 2012

Despite a recent flurry of contradictory reports, it appears that a detachment composed of ships from the Russian Black Sea Fleet and possibly the Baltic Fleet is preparing for deployment to the Russian naval port at Tartus, Syria. The date for their departure has not been finalized and appears to be dependent on developments in the Syrian insurgency, but the ships are reported to be ready to leave on four hours’ notice (Nezavisimaya Gazeta Online, June 20). Preparations appeared to intensify following an unannounced visit to Moscow on June 14 by the Syrian Defense Minister, Brigadier Dawud Rajihah (al-Quds al-Arabi, June 19).

The Russian Defense Ministry had earlier described American reports that the large amphibious warfare ship (LAWS) Kaliningrad of the Baltic Fleet was being sent to Syria as “disinformation… aimed at further escalating the situation in Syria…” adding that “the only true piece of information in these reports is that the LAWS Kaliningrad is indeed part of the Baltic Fleet” (RIA Novosti, June 19). Nevertheless, a source in the Russian Navy headquarters told Interfax-AVN the same day that the Kaliningrad would depart for Tartus “in a few days” (Interfax-AVN, June 19). The Russian Defense Ministry had also denied reports carried by American media sources to the effect that Russian ships had already departed for Syria by June 15 (Rossiyskaya Gazeta Online, June 18). Pentagon reports that U.S. satellite imagery revealed the BDK (Bolshoy Desantny Korabl – large amphibious landing ship) Nikolay Filchenkov was heading for Tartus earlier this month appear to have been incorrect, at least so far as timing is concerned. Loaded with military hardware, the ship left the Ukrainian port of Sevastopol (on lease to Russia) on June 21 bound for the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk rather than Tartus, but was due back in Sevastopol on June 25 (CNN, June 16; RIA-Novosti, June 21).

BDK Nikolay Filchenkov

Despite the denials, a Russian media source specializing in defense issues claimed its sources had confirmed that the large landing ships Nikolai Filchenkov and Tzar Kunikov and the SB-15 rescue tugboat of the Black Sea Fleet together with units of a Russian Marine brigade were prepared to leave for Tartus once the Nikolai Filchenkov returned to Sevastopol (Interfax-AVN, June 20; June 19). Aerial protection of the ships has been guaranteed by Major General Vladimir Gradusov, deputy commander of the Russian Air Force (Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye Online, June 19).

The Tartus facility was established in 1971 at a time when the Soviet Union had similar facilities in the Syrian port of Latakia and the Egyptian ports of Alexandria and Mersa Matruh. Today, only the facility at Tartus remains. Officially, Russia does not call the Tartus a naval base, but rather a “Navy Sustainment Center” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, June 19). Under the official name of the Russian Federation Navy 720th Logistic-Support Station, the strategically important Tartus facility provides repair, refueling and re-provisioning services for Russian naval vessels operating in the Mediterranean, the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean. Following a dredging program that began in 2009, the floating maintenance station (the PM-138), floating docks and workshops at Tartus can handle even the Russian Fleet’s largest ships, such as the Soviet-era aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov, which visited Tartus in January. [1] The station is leased from Syria at a cost of $2 million per year, with payments made in both cash and arms (Komsomolskaya Pravda Online, June 15). Tartus is also said to act as the receiving port for Russian arms shipments, like that allegedly delivered by the MV Professor Katsman in sealed containers on May 26 (Interfax, June 4).

If Moscow remains committed to its opposition to foreign military intervention in the Syrian crisis, any Russian military mission would likely be limited to a primary task of evacuating Russian citizens and personnel, with the option of a secondary task of defending Russian installations at Tartus. The floating PM-138 can actually be moved offshore if threatened.

The Kaliningrad

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has estimated there are approximately 100,000 Russian citizens in Syria, many with Syrian wives and families (Vedomosti Online, June 22). With such numbers, it is certain that a naval evacuation would prioritize diplomatic and military personnel in its calculations. The number of Russian stationed at the Tartus naval facility is estimated at no more than 100 (Vedomosti Online, June 22).

Though a website sympathetic to the Syrian insurrection had announced the Free Syrian Army (FSA – the main armed opposition group) intended to attack Tartus and had already infiltrated troops for this purpose, the FSA’s Colonel Malik al-Kurdi described such speculation as “irresponsible talk” (al-Sharq al-Awsat, June 18).

Units of Russia’s Naval Infantry (Morskoy Pekhoty – colloquially known as “Marines”) under the command of Hero of Russia Colonel Vladimir Belyavskiy are reported to be ready to board all three Baltic Fleet ships on the receipt of orders (Interfax-AVN, June 19).  Colonel Belyavskiy received his award for commanding Russian Marines of the Black Sea Fleet in a desperate engagement with Chechen mujahidin at the Tezen-Kale Gorge in February, 1995. [2]

The Russian Black Sea Fleet flagship, the missile cruiser Moskva, was scheduled to visit Tartus earlier this month, but its voyage was cancelled for reasons apparently related to the Syrian crisis (Interfax-AVN, May 23). The Soviet-era destroyer Smetlivy, which was to be relieved by the Moskva, was instead ordered to extend its cruise in the Mediterranean (Interfax, May 18). A Black Sea Fleet spokesman reported that security for the Smetlivy was provided in Tartus by a counterterrorism unit of Russian marines (Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye Online, June 19).

While a unilateral intervention by Russia in Syria appears to be out of the question for now, the possibility of Russian participation in a UN-authorized multinational force remains open. There is also speculation that a peacekeeping force under the auspices of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO – a military alliance of seven former Soviet states, including Russia) might have a role in Syria. Various elite Russian military formations are reported to be receiving training for such an eventuality, including the 15th Combined Arms Brigade in Samara and the Pskov 75th Air Assault Division, which has previous experience with peacekeeping in Kosovo and in combat operations in Chechnya and Georgia. Also mentioned as likely participants in such a force are the Chechen Vostok and Zapad battalions of the Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), which participated in peacekeeping operations in Lebanon and more active operations in Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye Online, June 15). [3]

The view of Tartus as strategically vital to Russia’s defense is not unanimous, however. A new report from the Russian Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies (described as having close ties to the Russian defense community) downplayed the strategic importance of the Syrian naval facility, suggesting that Tartus was “more of a symbolic rather than practical value to the Russian navy,” whose loss “would have no significant effect on Russia’s naval capabilities” (Financial Times, June 26).

Notes

1. The Russian designation for ships of this type is Tyazholyy avianesushchiy raketnyy kreyser, “heavy aircraft-carrying missile cruiser.” 

2. See http://rusnavy.com/history/branches/bv/belyavskiy.htm.

3. For Vostok and Zapad activities outside Chechnya, see Andrew McGregor, “Chechen Troops Accompany Russian Soldiers in Lebanon,” Chechnya Weekly, October 26, 2006, http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php?volume_id=416&issue_id=3902&article_id=2371588, and “Peacekeepers or Provocateurs? Kremlin-Backed Chechen Troops Raise Tensions in Abkhazia and South Ossetia,” North Caucasus Weekly, December 6, 2007, http://www.jamestown.org/chechnya_weekly/article.php?articleid=2373839.

This article first appeared in the June 28, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Fatwa Wars Continue as Saudi Cleric Bans Jihad in Syria

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

Terrorism Monitor, June 15, 2012

As both clashes with rebels and punitive violence increase in intensity within Syria, there have been numerous accounts of foreign jihadis entering Syria to exploit the struggle in furtherance of global Salafist-Jihadi objectives. However, such efforts encountered resistance last week from the official Saudi religious establishment. Shaykh Ali Abbas al-Hikmi, a member of the Saudi Council of Senior Scholars, issued a fatwa (religious ruling) on June 7 forbidding Muslims from initiating or participating in a Syrian jihad. While acknowledging that Syrians were “facing injustice, persecution and the force of an arrogant and haughty regime,” al-Hikmi made it clear that the decision to launch a jihad could only be made “under the authority of the guardian” (i.e. responsible authorities) in harmony with a nation’s foreign policy: “Everything is linked to a system and to the country’s policies and no person should be allowed to disobey the guardian and call for jihad” (al-Sharq al-Awsat, June 7; al-Akhbar, June 7). The senior cleric’s decision appears to have been spurred by growing calls on Saudi social media for individuals to travel to Syria to partake in a jihad against the Assad regime (al-Shorfa, June 7).

SyriaSimilar anti-jihad fatwas have had little impact in the past, as Salafist-Jihadis tend to regard members of the Saudi religious establishment as compromised scholars and respect only those rulings issued by scholars sympathetic to their movement and its aims. Most relevant to those Salafi-Jihadis entering Syria are the three fatwas regarding the status of the Alawite community (to which the Assad clan and many of Syria’s ruling class belong) issued by Shaykh Taqi al-Din Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328), the intellectual hero of the Salafi-Jihadist movement. Issued while Muslim Mamluk rule of Syria was threatened by Mongol invasion, these fatwas collectively describe the Alawis as “deceptive unbelievers” whose rejection of Islam is greater than that of the Jews and Christians: “Their religion externally is [Shi’ism] but internally it is pure unbelief.” [1]

The Alawi community has been the subject of more favorable fatwas in the past, though these are unlikely to influence the Salafi-Jihadists. A fatwa issued by Grand Mufti of Jerusalem al-Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husayni (best remembered now for his pro-Nazi sympathies) recognized the Alawis as Muslims and played a large role in their acceptance into the Islamic community of the region. [2] Musa Sadr, the influential Iranian-born founder of the Afwaj al-Muqawama al-Lubnaniya (AMAL – Lebanese Resistance Detachments), issued an important fatwa in 1974 affirming that Alawis were members of the Twelver Shi’a community (the dominant Shi’a faction in both Iran and southern Lebanon) before he and two companions disappeared during a 1978 visit to Mu’ammar Qaddafi’s Tripoli. [3]

The Saudi government has been generally supportive of the opposition Free Syrian Army (FSA) and would like to see foreign support directed to that group rather than encourage another round of radicalization of young Saudis in militant jihadi organizations, as happened in Afghanistan and Iraq. This position was supported by another member of the Council of Senior Scholars, Shaykh Abdullah al-Mutlaq, who emphasized that it is the FSA that is “in charge of fighting and jihad in Syria and should be supported” (al-Akhbar/AFP, June 7). However, the Saudi position has been characterized elsewhere in the Arab world as too close to the stance of the United States – typical of these characterizations was the recent suggestion by an Israeli-based Arab daily that the Saudis and the Arab League were trying “to victimize Syria and sacrifice it on the shrine of colonialism. We don’t know which Arab country is going to be next” (Ma’a al-Hadath [Tamra], June 8). On February 26, popular Saudi scholar Dr. A’id al-Qarni used a television broadcast to issue a fatwa calling for the death of Bashar al-Assad, whom he described as a heretic who had lost his legitimacy as a ruler and “a murderer who killed hundreds of children and destroyed mosques instead of protecting the Golan Heights.” [4]

Syrian authorities have in the past gone out of their way to mock the fatwas of the Saudi religious scholars as both backwards and dangerous. On April 5, Syria’s permanent representative to the United Nations Dr. Bashar Ja’afari told a press gathering:

I have good news for you. The Saudi Mufti… has issued a fatwa saying young people now have the right to enter the malls and supermarkets… Could you believe it? We are on April the 5th, 2012, and the Saudi Imam is still thinking about whether the young people should have access to the malls or not. The second good news, another fatwa from the same Imam, saying that women could attend football matches but in separate places, and they should not raise their voices when they get excited by the game, and they should abstain from attracting the attention of the males… The third good news… the same Imam said that all churches in the Gulf area should be destroyed and that a Christian or a Jew should not have the right to be buried in the area of the Gulf States. We are April the 5th, 2012, and we still hear such ridiculous and provocative statements coming from Saudi Arabia on behalf of people who call themselves the Custodians of the Holy Shrines. [5]

Official Syrian media has also suggested that the recent Saudi fatwa calling for a ban on new Christian churches in the Arabian Peninsula and the demolition of existing churches “could also give a boost to the armed Islamists within Syria, who already persecute, kidnap, torture and kill Syrian Christians” (Syria News, March 24).

Last February, 107 prominent Islamic scholars signed a statement denouncing the Syrian regime with the following rulings and calls for action:

• Members of the Syrian security forces are forbidden to kill citizens or discharge weapons in their direction. It is their duty to desert and disobey orders, “even if that means being killed.”
• Members of the regular army and security forces should join the Free Syrian Army to protect civilians, cities and public institutions.
• It is a duty for all Muslims to support the revolutionaries in Syria “so that they can successfully complete their revolution and attain their rights and their freedom.”
• Arab states must take a firm stand against those members of the international community, such as Russia and China, which continue to support the Syrian regime.
• In a gesture of magnanimity towards the Alawi community and a warning to Islamist radicals, the scholars said it was essential to “protect the ethnic and religious minorities which have lived for more than a thousand years as part of the Syrian people,” noting that only the regime bears responsibility for its crimes, “and not the minorities they may belong to.”

Among the signatories were Shaykh Yusuf al-Qaradawi of Qatar, Shaykh Ali Guma’a (Chief Mufti of Egypt), Shaykh Rashid Ghanouchi of Tunisia, and Shaykh Abd al-Majid al-Zindani of Yemen. [6] Al-Qaradawi, a highly-influential Doha-based member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, recently condemned the pattern of hereditary succession intended or achieved in Arab republics such as Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen and Syria before predicting the “downfall and annihilation” of Bashar al-Assad (Gulf Times Online [Doha], June 9).

Notes:

1. See Yvette Talhamy, “The Fatwas and the Nusayri/Alawis of Syria,” Middle Eastern Studies 46(2), 2010, pp. 175-194; Nibras Kazimi, Syria through Jihadist Eyes: A Perfect Enemy, Washington, 2010.
2. For the full broadcast, see Al-Arabiya, February 25, 2012, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAx4H0RCnCE. For al-Qarni, see Terrorism Monitor Brief, December 1, 2011.
3. For new light on this case, see Terrorism Monitor Briefs, September 22, 2011.
4. See Paulo Boneschi, “Une fatwà du Grande Mufti de Jérusalem Muhammad Amin al-Husayni sur les Alawites,” Revue de l’histoire des religions 122(1), July-August 1940, pp. 42-54.
5. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33_SqXvmoFs
6. For the full text, see http://www.islam21c.com/editorials/2407-fatwa-on-syria-by-107-scholars.

Security of Libyan Interior Challenged by Struggle for Smuggling Routes

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

June 14, 2012

A new round of inter-tribal clashes in southern Libya has drawn in northern militia units loyal to Libya’s Transitional National Council (TNC) in the latest episode of the struggle to control Libya’s borders in the absence of a centralized, national army.  

Isa Abd al-Majid Mansur

At least 29 people are dead and scores more wounded after two days of intense fighting in the strategically important Kufra Oasis in southeastern Libya, near the borders with Chad, Egypt and Sudan. Fighting began on June 9 when members of the indigenous African Tubu ethnic group clashed with members of the Kata’ib Dera’a al-Libi (Libyan Shield Brigade) commanded by Wissam Ben Hamid. As fighting spread power was cut to the desert city and water was reported to be in short supply (Tripoli Post, June 11; Libya Herald, June 10). The Libyan Shield Brigade had been sent to Kufra earlier this year to stabilize the Oasis after a vicious round of fighting that left over 100 dead took place between the Tubu and the Arab Zuwaya tribe, who have contested control of the Oasis for over 170 years.

There were also battles in April between the Tubu and Arabs of the Qaddadfa and Awlad Sulayman tribes in Libya’s southwestern Oasis city of Sabha in April. Though the violence in Kufra was brought under control in March, tensions remained high between the Tubu and the Zuwaya, who claimed the Tubu were cooperating with their cross-border cousins in Chad to take control of important smuggling routes that pass illegal immigrants, cigarettes, drugs and various other types of contraband through Kufra from the African interior. In response to the tribal violence, Tubu military leader Isa Abd al-Majid Mansur revived the dormant Tubu Front for the Liberation of Libya, complaining that TNC militias and the Zuwaya sought to “exterminate” the Tubu (AFP, June 10).  Abd al-Majid said the Tubu neighborhood in Kufra was shelled by the Libyan Shield Brigade on June 10 (El Moudjahid [Algiers], June 10; L’Expression [Algiers], June 10).

In mid-May, fighting broke out in the ancient Saharan city of Ghadames along the border with Algeria, some 600 km south of Tripoli. The conflict began over control of a desert checkpoint along a traditional smuggling route used by Tuareg tribesmen (al-Jazeera, May 16; Reuters, May 16). Nine people were killed in the fighting, including Libyan Tuareg leader Isa Talaly (Libya Herald, May 18). Local Tuareg have been at odds with local Arab tribes since the Tuareg were expelled from the city in September 2011 following allegations the Tuareg were supporting the late Libyan president Mu’ammar Qaddafi against rebel forces. TNC mediation efforts have been unsuccessful and local Arabs have burned the homes of Tuareg residents to prevent their return. Some Tuareg are planning to build a new settlement at the nearby Oasis of Dirj, while others remain across the border in Algeria, vowing to return to Ghadames (Libya Herald, April 7).

The inability of both Libyan and Tunisian security forces to rein in rampant smuggling across their mutual border has forced the closure of the most important border crossing between the two nations in recent days. Libya’s TNC again turned to the Libya Shield Brigade to bring the situation under control at the Ras Jedir crossing point, where members of the Brigade forced out Libyan border police who are accused of assisting the smugglers (Libya Herald, June 10). Tunisian border guards complain they are forced to give way to Libyan smugglers who are highly armed with RPGs and automatic weapons (Reuters, May 2).

Smugglers on both sides of the border have become incensed with recent efforts to crack down on the illegal trade, leading to attempts to physically smash their way through the border with groups of as many as 150 vehicles at a time. Food from Tunisia is a major form of contraband, as is subsidized petrol from Libya and subsidized phosphates from Tunisia. Tunisian smugglers are known to resort to violence when their trade is interfered with by authorities. So deeply ingrained is smuggling in the border regions (which suffer otherwise from high unemployment), that the military was recently forced to fire into the air to subdue an angry mob in the southeastern town of Ben Guerdane unhappy with a new anti-smuggling campaign (TunisiaLive.net, May 14). Tunisia is now planning to build a fence along the border with Libya to halt the smuggling trade and the influx of illegal refugees (Libya Herald, June 3). South of Tunisia, Algerian authorities have recently arrested seven Libyans transporting two vehicles loaded with arms including assault rifles and Katyusha rockets. The arms were believed to be on their way to al-Qaeda elements (El Khabar [Algiers], June 12).

Arab Militia Checkpoint in Kufra Oasis

Egypt has become especially alarmed with the scale of smuggling along its border with Libya, where large quantities of arms have been intercepted, most of which are believed to be on their way to fuel a simmering insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula. Aggressive bands of smugglers are reported to have set fire to farms in Egypt’s western Siwa Oasis in retribution for local cooperation with security forces (Middle East News Agency [Cairo], May 10). Egyptian security forces have suggested the smuggling of arms may be funded by Iran in the hope of sparking a confrontation with Israel in the Sinai that could bring Egyptian and Israeli military forces into conflict (al-Sharq al-Awsat, May 9).

The collapse of internal security in Libya has also led to the smuggling of a new commodity – Roman-era antiquities which are found in abundance throughout Libya but are no longer protected by government security forces (The National [Abu Dhabi], May 28).

This article was first published in the June 14, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Egypt’s Former Intelligence Chief Warns of Possible Civil War

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

May 31, 2012

As the presidential choice for Egyptian voters is narrowed down to an uncertain Islamist future under Muslim Brotherhood candidate Dr. Muhammad al-Mursi or a return to quasi-military rule under Air Marshal Ahmed Shafiq, former Egyptian intelligence chief Major General Umar Sulayman has warned of a potential confrontation between the two political trends that could  lead to civil war. General Sulayman, whose own candidacy for the presidential post was nullified by an act of parliament earlier this year, made the remarks in a recent two-part interview with a pan-Arab daily (al-Hayat, May 22).

Egyptians “Rally” in Support of Umar Sulayman’s Presidential Candidacy

As Egypt’s intelligence chief, Sulayman earned an unwelcome reputation for his broad and consistent application of torture as an instrument of state, supervision of a domestic intelligence network that permeated Egyptian society and as Mubarak’s point-man on Egyptian-Israeli relations. None of these roles endeared him to Egyptian voters and his claims that he was running for president only in response to wide popular appeals appeared as contrived as the small demonstration of sign-waving supporters that appeared on cue to back the announcement of his candidacy (see al-Akhbar [Cairo], April 9). Nonetheless, by means both fair and foul, Sulayman has over several decades compiled a detailed knowledge of Egypt’s politics and political leaders that is frequently described as encyclopedic.

General Sulayman hands-on leadership of an often brutal campaign to quell the growing influence of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has naturally placed him at odds with the movement, which successfully manipulated a largely secular revolution to become the dominant party in Egypt’s new parliament. Sulayman claims his own abortive run at the presidency was accompanied by repeated death threats from Islamist militants and the law that quickly disqualified ten candidates fromrunning for president was so clearly directed at the ex-intelligence chief that it was nicknamed “the Umar Sulayman law”  (al-Akhbar, April 9; al-Hayat, May 22; Ahram Online [Cairo], April 14).

In this context, it is unsurprising that Sulayman warns that the Islamists do not possess the trained personnel capable of administering state institutions and that an Islamist victory would roll back women’s rights, make decisions based on religious considerations rather than the needs of society, disrupt relations with the West and open up Egypt to a return of Islamist militant groups such as al-Qaeda, Islamic Jihad and Takfir wa’l-Hijrah. The general further suggests that good relations with the United States are essential for the stability of Egypt, and if these relations are allowed to deteriorate to score political points for the Muslim Brotherhood, “We will become worse than Pakistan and Afghanistan, and we will be considered as a country that exports terrorism… Thus Egypt will lose its role, its army – whose U.S. weapons constitute 70% of its arms – will lose, and its economy will be hit.” Sulayman suggests that the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) has been deceived by the Brotherhood’s conciliatory tone, made possible by the strict discipline enforced within the movement. According to the former intelligence chief, SCAF’s biggest mistake has been to allow the Muslim Brothers to assume important roles in the all-important constitution committee that will determine the political and social future of the Arab world’s largest nation.

When asked directly by al-Hayat if a military coup was possible to prevent the establishment of an Islamist government in Egypt, Sulayman replied: “It is possible, quite possible. However, the Muslim Brotherhood Group is not foolish, and hence it is preparing itself militarily, and within two or three years it will have a revolutionary guard to fight the army, and Egypt will face a civil war, like Iraq.”

Despite his description of the dangers of a president drawn from the Muslim Brotherhood, Sulayman has elsewhere expressed his rejection of any attempts to diminish the near-dictatorial powers of the Egyptian presidency: “The head of the state must enjoy real powers. And I think that the country needs a powerful president who restores stability and protects the country’s security. It does not need the sort of fighting and power sharing that leads to further anarchy” (al-Akhbar, April 9).

This article first appeared in the May 31, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Al-Qaeda Cell on Trial as Ethiopia becomes a Religious Battleground?

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

May 31, 2012

Ten Somalis and one Kenyan are currently under trial in Addis Ababa for their alleged involvement in an al-Qaeda bombing plot after weapons and training manuals were seized in the Bale region of southeastern Ethiopia last December. The Kenyan, Hassan Jarsoo, has admitted his role in the alleged plot, but the others, who allegedly include several members of the army of Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government, have denied their involvement. Six of the defendants are being tried in absentia (Walta Info Online [Addis Ababa], May 20; Africa Review [Nairobi], May 22; AFP, May 18).

Ethiopia is one of the earliest homes of both Christianity and Islam, with its 85 million people being roughly 60% Christian and 30% Muslim. These communities have traditionally lived in harmony, but in recent years Ethiopia’s Orthodox Christians and Sufi-based Muslims have come under destabilizing pressure from external sources, primarily from American backed Christian evangelists and Saudi/Kuwaiti backed Salafists. Both of these trends have caused dissension in the religious communities by describing traditional Ethiopian forms of worship as deviations if not outright heresy and insisting that their adherents must convert to these new, more fundamentalist forms of worship. Ill-considered intervention by the central government has only inflamed the situation, and the result has been a growing wave of religious violence in a nation that has prided itself on religious tolerance. 

Islam arrived in Ethiopia even before it had firmly established itself in Arabia, as the Prophet Muhammad urged his persecuted followers to flee Mecca in 615 and take refuge in northern Ethiopia, where he promised they would find protection from its just king and his Christian followers. While many returned when Mecca became safe for Muslims, there is some evidence that others stayed in Ethiopia, founding the first Muslim community in Africa. The first muezzin (prayer-caller) in Islam was the ethnic Ethiopian Bilal ibn Rabah (a.k.a. Bilal al-Habashi), one of the Prophet’s closest companions. The Ethiopian city of Harar is regarded in some traditions as the “fourth-holiest city in Islam,” with mosques dating back to the 10th century and over 100 shrines.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told parliament in April that the government was “observing tell-tale signs of [Islamic] extremism. We should nip this scourge in the bud” (Reuters, May 10). In response to fears of an incipient Salafist movement to establish an Islamic state in Ethiopia, the government is attempting to make a little-known and non-threatening Islamic sect known as al-Ahbash the dominant form of Islam in the country, a solution that has inflamed Sufis and Salafists alike.  The Ahbash movement was founded by Abdullah al-Harari (a.k.a. Abdullah al-Habashi, 1910-2008), a Harari scholar of Islam whose views were regarded locally as divisive, resulting in his being forced to leave for Lebanon in 1950. Al-Harari founded al-Ahbash, also known as the Association of Islamic Charitable Projects, in the 1980s. Ethiopian Salafists have complained the government is importing Ahbash imams from Lebanon to teach local Muslims that Salafism is a non-Muslim movement (OnIslam.com, April 29).

Abdullah al-Harari

The leading Islamic religious authority in Ethiopia is the Islamic Affairs Supreme Council (IASC). Salafists no longer participate in the Council, which is in the process of having its representatives replaced by government appointed members of the Ahbash sect. Even authorities such as Dr. Ali Jum`ah, Grand Mufti of Egypt and Professor of the Principles of Islamic Jurisprudence at Cairo’s al-Azhar University, charge the movement with having “strange deviant views that have never been expressed by any Muslim sect, group or movement,” including the free intermingling of the sexes, unrestricted cooperation with non-Muslims and the issuing of fatwa-s that contradict the Koran and Sunnah. Salafists and orthodox Sunni scholars also charge al-Ahbash with allowing intercession with the dead (saint-worship), overlooking the need to observe the five pillars of Islam, declaring Salafist-favored scholars such as Ibn Taymiyah, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab and Sayyid Qutb to be kuffar (infidels) and obscuring their true beliefs by failing to commit them to print (OnIslam.net, April 22). Seven Muslims were killed and scores wounded by Ethiopian police in late April when security forces surrounded a mosque in the Oromia Region in an attempt to arrest Salafist Shaykh Su’ud Aman following protests against the government’s efforts to impose Ahbashism (OnIslam.com, April 29; VOA, May 21).

As in many other parts of the Islamic world, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states have built numerous schools in underserved regions while Ethiopian workers have found employment in the Arabian Peninsula, where they have been exposed to highly conservative forms of Islam that differ greatly from those traditionally practiced at home. The religiously-inclined can find employment in Saudi-sponsored mosques in Ethiopia after taking advantage of generous scholarships to study Salafist Islam in Saudi Arabia. Local imams suffer from an educational and financial disadvantage in countering the Salafist scholars.

To offset the growing Salafist influence in Ethiopia, the United States Embassy in Addis Ababa attempted to have two works by Khalid Abou el-Fadl, a Kuwaiti Islamic scholar who teaches in the United States, translated into Amharic, Oromo and Somali, but were unable to find translators willing to undertake the work. The failed effort was part of an attempt to use “cultural programming” to turn “public opinion against activists who seek to overturn the existing order and import a brand of Islam that breeds conflict through its corrosive teachings that run counter to more orthodox interpretations of the Koran.” [1]

The Shrine of Shaykh Nur Hussein

In the Bale Region of Oromiya, dozens of Sufi shrines were reported to have been destroyed by Salafists in the 1990s before the Salafists turned their attention to the Shaykh Nur Hussein shrine, a religious center built around the tomb of a 12th century holy man. The shrine is the site of several important annual celebrations and, most importantly, has become a site of pilgrimage, an unforgivable violation of the Salafist code of Islamic worship, which only permits pilgrimage to the holy cities of the Hijaz in western Saudi Arabia. As part of its campaign to counter the Salafist trend, U.S. officials financed a major restoration of the shrine in 2007 at the same time Salafists were trying to force its closure (Ayyaantuu News Online, November 10, 2011). [2]

Local Muslims in Amhara Region then sought U.S. funding for restoration of the 18th century Jama Negus Mosque in Amhara Region, a project which had been denied funding from Gulf State NGOs on the grounds it had not only become a place of pilgrimage, but was also the center of annual celebrations of the Prophet Muhammad’s birthday (Moulid al-Nabi), which are also banned in the Salafist creed. [3]  Salafists despise the Jama Negus mosque as an alternative center of pilgrimage and Moulid celebrations, leading the Gulf States to refuse financial assistance to its physical rehabilitation and creating an opening for the United States to sap support from their Gulf State allies in the battle for “hearts and minds” in Ethiopia by providing reconstruction assistance. [4]

The introduction of non-Orthodox Christianity by Protestant missionaries has also created often violent dissension in both the Christian and Muslim communities. Evangelical Protestant churches and the homes of some evangelical Christians were burned down by in the town of Asendabo in southwest Ethiopia in March, 2011.  Residents of the dominantly Muslim region were incensed by rumors that members of the Pentecostal churches were using pages of the Koran as toilet paper (Radio Netherlands Worldwide Africa, March 20, 2011). Thousands were displaced in violence Prime Minister Zenawi blamed on a sect known as Kawarja. In Bale Region, a group of 17 Ethiopian Christian students were assaulted last year after they attempted to distribute Bibles to local Muslims (Ethiopian Review, March 2, 2011). There have also been Muslim attacks against evangelical Christians in the southern Ethiopian city of Besheno in November, 2010 and May 2011 (AsiaNews, May 2, 2011).

Notes

1. Wikileaks, U.S. Embassy Cable, 09ADDISABABA1675, July 15, 2009; U.S. Embassy Cable, 08ADDISABABA3230, November 26, 2008. The books in question were The Great Theft: Wrestling Islam from the Extremists (2005), and The Place of Tolerance in Islam (2002).

2. Wikileaks, U.S. Embassy Cable, 08ADDISABABA3230, November 26, 2008.

3. Wikleaks, U.S. Embassy Cable 09ADDISABABA1672, July 15, 2009.

4. Wikileaks, U.S. Embassy Cable, 09ADDISABABA1675, July 15, 2009.

This article first appeared in the May 31, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Thirtieth Anniversary of Sinai’s Liberation Marked by Libyan Arms, Bedouin Militancy and a Growing Rift with Israel

Posted on by

Andrew McGregor

May 18, 2012

Though Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has just marked its 30th anniversary of liberation from Israeli occupation, the region is perhaps less integrated with the rest of the Egyptian state now than at any time since the Camp David Accords returned sovereignty of the Sinai to Cairo. An influx of arms from Libya and elsewhere is fuelling a growing insurgency amongst an alienated and disenfranchised population and deteriorating relations between Egypt and Israel are threatening to once more make the Sinai borderlands a battleground between these regional rivals.

The Sinai: Northern Deserts and Southern Mountains

Egyptian security authorities blame most of the scores of attacks on police since the January 25, 2011 Egyptian uprising on Gaza-based Palestinian militant groups such as Jaljalat, Jaysh al-Islam, Izz al-Din al–Qassam and the local al-Qaeda in the Sinai Peninsula (Egypt Independent, May 1).  [1] However, while radical Islamism and close ties to Palestinian militants in Gaza play an important role in the unrest, there is little question that the core of the Sinai insurgency consists of armed Bedouin who exist largely on the fringes of Egypt’s Nile and Delta-based society.

Law enforcement has declined in the Sinai to the point that the police exist mainly to protect police installations that increasingly resemble improvised fortresses protected by large sand berms and steel walls to repel RPG attacks. The security situation is not helped by continuing protests against the military government by disgruntled police across Egypt, including in the towns of the northern Sinai. The Bedouin tribesmen have little fear of government authorities – security checkpoints are routinely attacked and security men and soldiers assassinated.

The Bedouin Factor

Tribal chiefs have issued demands for the establishment of a free trade zone and open passage for trade between Gaza and the Sinai, a move that would provide much needed employment and opportunity for local tribesmen, but which is unlikely to ever receive the necessary approval of Israel (MENA, April 21). It is estimated that 90% of the Bedouin population is unemployed and prevented by law from seeking employment in either the security services or the resorts of southern Sinai. The Bedouin are demanding the right to participate in the local security apparatus, but the idea has met resistance in Cairo where lingering questions about Bedouin loyalty to the state have deterred providing the Bedouin with modern arms and training. The release of Bedouin prisoners seized before last year’s Egyptian Revolution and the right to own land are also high on the Bedouin agenda.

The military government used the Liberation Day holiday to announce the commitment of $66 million to development projects in the northern Sinai, the largest project involving an upgrade to the port at al-Arish (Ahram Online, April 25). Further agreements to initiate a labor-intensive extension of water supply lines in north and south Sinai were signed the next day (Bikya Masr [Cairo], April 26). However, there is little chance of significant progress being made until after Egypt’s presidential elections, a multi-staged process which will begin on May 23.

The Sinai as Election Issue

As the elections approach, it has become clear that local issues in the Sinai have become irretrievably interwoven with Egypt’s changing relationship with Israel, as revealed by an examination of the platforms of several leading candidates:

  • Moderate Islamist candidate Muhammad Salim al-Awa has called for negotiations with Israel to amend the Camp David treaty in areas “that go against Egypt’s interests, like dividing the Sinai into three demilitarized zones, allowing Israelis into the Sinai without visas and other privileges given to Israel that should stop immediately” (Al-Ahram Weekly, May 10-16).
  • Amr Moussa, a secular candidate and former chairman of the Arab League, has called for a new agreement with Israel for the export of Egyptian natural gas across the Sinai based on current global market prices, adding that Israel must abandon its “policy of intransigence, threatening, [development of] settlements, occupation and [allow] the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state” (Business Today Egypt, May 8).  Moussa has promised to restore stability in the peninsula, end the marginalization of the Bedouin tribes and overturn the prohibition against Bedouin owning land in the Sinai (Ahram Online, April 21).
  • Neo-Nasserist candidate Hamdeen Sabahi (Karame Party) has promised to create a new local police force that is in tune with the rights and traditions of the Bedouin as part of an effort to turn the Sinai into “a paradise.” Nonetheless, his recent visit to the peninsula was cut short after receiving threats on his life from a Salafist group in the northern Sinai town of Shaykh Zuwayid despite promising to release all Bedouin political prisoners and suspected militants without conditions if elected (Ahram Online, April 21; April 29)
  • Muhammad Mursi, the head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, has called for urban development in the Sinai and the resettlement of millions of Egyptians in the sparsely inhabited region as Egypt’s population surges towards the 90 million mark, far more than can be comfortably supported in the Delta region and the slim fertile strip along the Nile (Ahram Online, April 29). A message from Muslim Brotherhood leader Muhammad Badi on April 26 said that the Mubarak regime had persecuted the Bedouin as criminals when they were, in fact “patriotic citizens.” Badi added that a mass transfer of Egyptians to the Sinai from other parts of Egypt would “frustrate Zionist ambitions to seize Sinai once again” (EgyptWindow.net, April 27).

However, these pledges have had only limited resonance with the Sinai Bedouin.  As North Sinai Bedouin writer Ashraf Ayoub put it, “Sinai doesn’t need promises – what it really needs is reconciliation between the locals of Sinai and the rest of Egypt which looks at them like foreigners who plot against the country. We are more than a group of people who live in a strategic location” (Ahram Online, April 29).

In the meantime there is growing evidence that Libya’s looted armories are now being used to equip militants in the Sinai much as they have provided modern weaponry to militants in parts of North and West Africa. Egyptian security forces reported the seizure on May 10 of a large quantity of weapons being transferred to the Sinai for use against Egyptian security forces by a convoy heading east from the Mediterranean port city of Mersa Matruh. Among the weapons were 50 surface-to-surface rockets, 17 grenade-launchers, seven assault rifles, a mortar and a large quantity of ammunition. The three smugglers arrested were reported to be Sinai Bedouin (Daily Star [Beirut], May 10; AP, May 10).

Israeli authorities announced on April 5 that one or two rockets possibly of Libyan origin had been fired at the Israeli Red Sea port of Eilat from the Egyptian Sinai, though Egyptian spokesmen claimed Israel was only “spreading rumors” (Al-Quds al-Arabi, April 7; NOW Lebanon, April 10; AP, May 10). Israel is preparing to link Eilat to an early-warning system in anticipation of further rocket attacks from Egypt.

Israel sees the hand of Shiite Iran behind the turmoil in the Sunni Sinai. According to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “The Sinai is turning into a kind of “Wild West” which … terror groups from Hamas, Islamic Jihad and al-Qaeda, with the aid of Iran, are using to smuggle arms, to bring in arms, to mount attacks against Israel” (Voice of Israel Network B, April 24). Egyptian security sources are reported to have expressed their own suspicions of Iranian funding for weapons transfers from Libya to Sinai, though Iran has denied any such activities (al-Sharq al-Awsat, May 8). Egypt and Iran have not had diplomatic relations since Egypt’s recognition of Israel in 1980, though efforts have been underway to re-establish relations since the overthrow of Mubarak.

Severing Israel’s Natural Gas Supply

A persistent irritant in Egyptian-Israeli relations are the long-term contracts for the supply of Egyptian natural gas to Israel at below market rates negotiated by corrupt businessmen within the inner circle of former president Hosni Mubarak. With the pipeline to Israel having been blown by Sinai-based militants 14 times since Mubarak was deposed in January 2011, Egypt finally announced on April 23 that the natural gas agreement had been scrapped. The pipeline, which has not been operational since March 5, was last bombed on April 9 when militants mistakenly believed it had been returned to use after noting the Interior Ministry had sent some 2,000 Special Forces officers to guard it (Ma’an News Agency, April 9; April 15). A dispute over missing payments appears to have been the main cause for the termination of the contract.

An official in Egypt’s oil ministry commented: “It was a popular demand to call off this treaty, as we export gas to [Israel] cheaper than market prices… Their error was not to pay on time, and we have taken the opportunity to stop this shameful deal” (Bikya Masr [Cairo], April 23).

According to an official of the East Mediterranean Gas Company (EMG), Egypt has the right “to cancel its contract with the company as… [Israel] has not paid its commitments for several months…” (al-Hayat, April 29). EMG was founded by fugitive financier Hussein Salim, a former crony of Mubarak. However, international shareholders in the EMG are trying to paint the cancellation as a political move as the basis for an $8 billion lawsuit (Ahram Online, May 3). A statement from the shareholders claims that the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (ENGH) failed to protect the pipeline, though the latter describes the repeated bombings of the pipeline as a force majeure situation and insists that it was non-payment for gas received that led to the cancellation of further shipments in line with the terms of the contract (al-Hayat, April 27).

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has tried to downplay suggestions that Egypt’s cancellation was a form of aggression against Israel by confirming the decision was part of a “legal-commercial dispute” that would not have long-lasting effects due to the development of natural gas resources in the Mediterranean that would make Israel “a major exporter of natural gas in the world” (Voice of Israel Network B, April 24).

A Greater Threat to Israel than Iran?

Israeli foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman recently described Egypt as “more troubling than the Iranian issue” and advised Prime Minister Netanyahu to move three to four divisions up to the Sinai border, complaining that the seven Egyptian battalions currently operating in the Sinai “aren’t carrying out real antiterrorism activities” (Ma’ariv [Tel Aviv], April 22). Though offered several opportunities to do so, Lieberman has not backed away from his assessment that Egypt will commit a major violation of the 1979 peace treaty after the upcoming presidential election in order to unite the nation around a common enemy.

The publication of Lieberman’s remarks was followed by an immediate request by Egypt’s foreign minister Muhammad Kamel Amr for “clarification” on their accuracy (Ahram Online, April 24). Lieberman’sassertion was also challenged by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak: “The Iranian threat is a threat with existential potential. At the moment this is not the case [with Egypt]…” (Globes Online [Rishon Le-Zion], April 25).

Israel’s Counterterrorism Bureau  issued a warning on April 21 for all Israelis in the Sinai to leave the region and return to Israel after it claimed to have determined that terrorists were planning an attack against resorts in the southern Sinai that are highly popular with Israeli tourists (Ahram Online, April 21). However, the warnings appear to have had little resonance with Israeli holiday-makers in search of a cheap vacation, with border authorities reporting more Israelis entering Egypt than leaving and resort owners in South Sinai reporting that most hotels were fully booked (Jerusalem Post, April 23). South Sinai Governor Major General Khalid Fouda suggested that Israel spread rumors of imminent terrorist attacks whenever Egypt’s tourism industry showed signs of recovery from the low point reached during the 2011 revolution (Ahram Online, April 21).

Members of the largely Bedouin “Sinai Revolutionaries Movement” attempted to strike a symbolic blow against Israel on Liberation Day by planning to paint an Israeli memorial in the Sinai to ten Israeli soldiers killed in a helicopter crash during the Israeli occupation with the Egyptian colors (al-Youm al-Saba’a [Cairo], April 25).  The effort was prevented by Egyptian security forces who are obliged to protect the memorial under the terms of the Camp David agreement. Israel in turn maintains a memorial to fallen Egyptian troops in the Negev Desert. A spokesman for the northern Sinai tribes, Abd al-Mun’im al-Rifa’i, said the people of the Sinai reject this provision of the treaty and cited a “need to demolish the rock [i.e. the memorial in the form of a large rock] because it stands as a provocation” to the Sinai tribes who “do not want any memorial for the Zionist entity on their land” (al-Hayat, April 27). The movement cites Israel’s reluctance to agree to a greater Egyptian security presence in the Sinai as a principal cause of the region’s instability (Ma’an News Agency [Bethlehem], April 12). Annex 1 of the Camp David Accords divides the Sinai Peninsula into four zones running roughly north-south (“Zones A to D”), with the Egyptian security presence in each zone decreasing as they grow closer to the Israeli border. Any change to these deployments must be made with the agreement of the Israeli government, severely limiting Cairo’s ability to meet security challenges in the Sinai.

A state-controlled Egyptian media source suggested it was time to “change the rules of the game” imposed on Egypt by the Camp David agreement:

It is no longer acceptable to tolerate tipping the balances of power in favor of the Israeli enemy. It is no longer possible to submit to conditions of capitulation that undermine Egypt’s sovereignty or allow its resources to be stolen. It is no longer possible to be tolerant with Israel’s conspiracies against Egypt’s interests in the waters of the Nile (al-Akhbar, April 29).

In an effort to permanently cut off Hamas-governed Gaza from Egypt, Israel is constructing a new security barrier along its border with Sinai that is expected to be finished later this year. The new fence will be five meters high, covered in barbed wire and augmented by dozens of radar installations. 120 km have been finished so far, with work continuing on a further 100 km (Jerusalem Post, April 25). After five failed attempts, the new fence was successfully breached by Bedouin smugglers using hydraulic tools in early May, though the infiltrators were quickly caught by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) (Arutz Sheva [Tel Aviv], May 2; Times of Israel, May 2).

Israel is also increasing its military presence along the border. The IDF’s 80th “Edom” Division has experienced significant upgrades since it was redeployed along the Sinai border following cross-border attacks last August (Ma’ariv [Tel Aviv], April 6). In addition, the IDF announced call up orders for an additional six battalions to man the Sinai and Syrian borders on May 3 (Arutz Sheva [Tel Aviv], May 3).

Last month, Egypt’s Second Army commenced Nasr-7, one of the largest live-fire exercises carried out in years in the Sinai. The commander of the Second Army, Major General Muhammad Farid Hijazi, announced that the Egyptian military was fully capable of defending the Sinai against attacks from any quarter (MENA, April 23). Field Marshal Muhammad Hussein Tantawi, the head of Egypt’s military government, adopted a belligerent tone during the exercise, telling troops of the Second Army: “We will break the legs of anyone who dares to come near to the borders” (Ahram Online, April 23).

International Peacekeepers under Pressure

Attempting to ensure that the security provisions of the Camp David agreement are maintained is the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO), consisting of some 1400 soldiers and civilians from 12 nations, including 800 Americans operating as a sub-unit known as “Task Force Sinai.”

With the parties of the 1978 peace treaty having failed to obtain backing for a UN peacekeeping force, the MFO was created in 1981 as an alternative, equipped with a mandate to supervise the security provisions of the treaty and to use its influence to prevent treaty violations. Financing for the force is divided three ways between the United States, Israel and Egypt.The MFO deployment began on April 25, 1982, as Israel withdrew from the Sinai and returned sovereignty to Egypt. Increasingly, however, the MFO is finding its ability to carry out its mission restricted by growing levels of militancy in the Sinai.

In mid-March, some 300 Bedouin armed with automatic rifles surrounded a MFO base holding hundreds of U.S., Colombian and Uruguayan troops to pressure Cairo to release five tribesmen facing possible sentences of death or life in prison for their alleged role in the 2005 bombings of the Sharm al-Shaykh resort in southern Sinai (Ahram Online, March 15). On May 7, ten Fijian soldiers belonging to the MFO were kidnapped along the Auja-Arish highway in northern Sinai by Bedouin demanding the release of several tribesmen from prison. The Fijians were released later that day following negotiations with Egyptian authorities in which the kidnappers were assure their demands would be met (Ahram Online [Cairo], May 7; AFP, May 7).

Conclusion

While Egyptian relations with Israel continue to cool, the interim military government in Cairo has no wish to become involved at this point in a military confrontation with Israel sparked by the activities of militant groups in the Sinai. While Field Marshal Tantawi talks tough about defending Egypt’s borders, he and the rest of the military command are aware that even defensive clashes with the IDF could jeopardize ongoing U.S. funding of the Egyptian military, particularly in a sensitive election year in the United States. At the same time, Israeli demands for greater security in the peninsula cannot be met without revisions to those parts of the Camp David treaty governing the number of troops and types of military equipment that can be deployed there. Most important, however, is the need to address the long-standing grievances of the indigenous Bedouin population who find themselves unhappily trapped on a traditional Egyptian-Israeli battleground while held in suspicion by both parties. In the absence of meaningful efforts to resolve their economic and social issues, the Bedouin will continue to find themselves attracted to militancy, a situation that has the potential of igniting a new Middle Eastern conflict.

Note

1. For al-Qaeda in the Sinai Peninsula, see Andrew McGregor, Jamestown Foundation Hot Issue, “Has al-Qaeda Opened a New Chapter in the Sinai Peninsula?,” August 17, 2011, http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews[tt_news]=38332

This article first appeared in the May 18, 2012 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor