Strategic Thinking of the Salafi-Jihadi Movement
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The Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy Institute for Policy and Strategy Strategic Thinking of the Salafi-Jihadi Movement Mr. Yair Minzili Submitted to: DOD/ONA Islamist Strategies Project Institute for Policy and Strategy, Herzliya Hudson Institute, Washington DC Project Leader: Dr. Shmuel Bar May 1, 2007 Contents Executive Summary ..................................................................................................1 Introduction...............................................................................................................7 General Background..............................................................................................7 Sources of Authority: Islamic Jurisprudence and Political Concepts .....................12 The Rule of Shari’a as a condition for Islamic rule ............................................12 The Principle of al-wala’ wa-al-bara’a ...............................................................12 The Principle of Takfir ........................................................................................13 The Principle of the Influence of Human History and Balances of Power.........15 Analysis of the Balance of Power between Islam and its Enemies ...........15 The Enemy – “Crusaders”, Israel and “Apostate” Regimes ...................................16 General ................................................................................................................16 The Clash of Civilizations...................................................................................16 The Crusader Attack ...........................................................................................17 Bin Laden’s Perception of “The American Enemy” as the Main Enemy...........18 Bin Laden’s Perception of Israel and the Jews ...................................................19 The Rules of War against “Natural Infidels” ......................................................19 The Attitude towards Apostate Regimes in the Region......................................22 The Attitude towards Apostate Muslims ( murtaddun ) .......................................22 The Attitude towards the Saudi Arabian Regime ...............................................24 Muslim-Infidel Relations ....................................................................................24 Agreements Signed between the US and Apostate Regimes in Muslim States..26 Providing Aid to Infidels in Their War against the Muslims..............................27 The Means: Jihad, its Nature and Importance.........................................................28 General ................................................................................................................28 ‘Abdallah ‘Azzam – Revitalizing the Idea of Jihad ............................................28 Jihad and its Advantages.....................................................................................30 The Aims of Jihad ...............................................................................................31 Stages of Jihad ....................................................................................................31 Types of Jihad According to Circumstances.......................................................32 Types of Jihad According to Means....................................................................35 Preparations for Jihad..........................................................................................35 Jihad as Guerilla Warfare....................................................................................36 Use of Non-Conventional Weapons....................................................................36 Jihad by Means of Harming Economic Interests ................................................37 The Principle of Self-Sacrifice for the Sake of Allah ( istishhad ).......................38 Bin Laden’s Military-Operational Conception ...................................................39 Setting Priorities for Attacking Targets of the Enemies of Islam .......................40 TheLeadership of the Mujahidin Qualities and Obligations...............................41 The Ultimate Objective – Establishment of the Caliphate/Islamic State................44 General ................................................................................................................44 The Objectives and the Plans to Achieve Them .................................................46 Perception of Iraq as the First Stage ...................................................................47 Foundations of Government in the Islamic State................................................49 Establishment of the “Islamic State of Iraq”.......................................................56 Institutions and Foundations of the Caliphate and the Qualities of its Leaders..56 Apocalyptic and Eschatological Aspects ................................................................58 Summary .................................................................................................................61 Executive Summary The strategies of the World Jihad movement headed by al-Qaeda are not uniform, though they all are inspired by the same religious sources: medieval authorities such as Ibn Taymiyya and later intellectuals and leaders that have written since the early 1980s. The broad common denominator of this literature in all its forms is the unambiguous statement that all matters – religious, political or military – must be directly derived from two sacred religious sources, the Koran and the Sunna. In other words, its fountainhead is the Law of God itself. The room for independent interpretation and adaptation to modern reality is narrow and marginal and where it does exist must derive from the way of life and customs of the Islamic patriarchs (al- salaf al-salih ). Any idea, concept or religious ruling in this literature in the individual, social or political spheres is binding and sanctified and becomes the Word of the living God by basing it on citations of rulings from the Koran or the Hadith. Its application is a sacred duty, whether it be individual, societal or through Islamic rule. Deviation from its application may bring about a declaration that the deviate, whether an individual or rule – is an apostate that has abandoned the Muslim community and whose fate is death. This inflexible and uncompromising religious approach has turned the followers of the Jihadist stream into totally loyal people who obey any order or religious ruling, especially the one calling for jihad and self-sacrifice for its sake. Based on this methodology, the World Jihad movement led by al-Qaeda has developed a corpus of strategic thinking. While this corpus has not been processed into one consensual document, and remains hidden in different treatises and ideas, certain common elements can be discerned. This literature focuses mainly on addressing the definition of the enemy and its nature, the global view of relations between Islam and the outside world, the ultimate aims and the ways and means of attaining them. This thinking also deals with apocalyptic ideas from which it may be inferred – and sometimes it is even explicitly stated - that the present era is approaching End of Days in which redemption and victory over its enemies are predicted. In any event, the Muslims are called upon not to remain indifferent but to take the destiny of the Ummah and their divine mission into their own hands and fulfill their mission of local and global jihad in which victory is promised by Allah. World Jihad strategy was not created ex nihilo . It developed under the impact of the collapse of nationalist-secularist ideology in the Arab and Islamic world, the protracted socio-economic crises that beset it, and the political and strategic developments that turned it into an arena of violent cultural conflicts between external forces and factors and the local peoples and states. The movement’s harbingers identified the ideological schism on the one hand, and the political opportunity on the other, and acted toward breathing life into anachronistic Salafiyya concepts and ideas and dressing them up in ideological attire in line with the spirit of the times and circumstances, thereby providing an answer to the spiritual yearnings and needs of a wide public. They derived from the original slogan of the Muslim Brotherhood – Al- Islam huwa al-Hall (Islam is the Solution) – that was mainly intended to enlist the masses for revolution in the Arab states, but did not stop there. They adopted an agenda with a global framework and composition. The struggle conducted by the “Afghan Arabs” for the liberation of Afghanistan from Soviet occupation in the 1980s was the crucible in which the al-Qaeda organization, the World Jihad movement, and 1 the platform for enriching the doctrine of jihad and its establishment in its new form, were forged. The battle taking place today over the fate of Iraq is in fact the continuation of the earlier one, and fuels the preservation and development of jihad doctrine through al-Qaeda and the advancement of its global agenda. The Jihadi texts enumerate four key principles that guide the strategy of the movement, as follows: • Hakemiyat Allah - The Rule of Shari’a as a condition for Islamic rule. • Al-wala’ wa- al-bara’a - total loyalty to Allah and acceptance of his absolute authority, on one hand and disavowal of any connection with infidelity or infidels.