37 Revolutionary Salafi Islamists in Egypt

REVOLUTIONARY SALAFI ISLAMISTS IN EGYPT: AN ANALYSIS AND GUIDE By Barry Rubin* While the ruling Muslim Brotherhood has received a great deal of attention in Egypt, the varied Salafi groups have been far less studied. At times allies and at times rivals of the Brotherhood, the Salafists are widely varied. Whether the two groups can cooperate will determine the future of Islamist rule in Egypt. The Salafists pull the Brotherhood to take stronger action more immediately and may have faith in the larger organization or consider it to have betrayed the revolution. Moreover, the Salafists operate with a wide deal of autonomy, being able to take extra- parliamentary action ranging from terrorist armed struggle to violent attacks on Christians and other opponents of the regime. The fact that there are now four competing Salafi parties shows the different streams of ideology and strategy. This article was written prior to the army action, but still shows how the Salafists are organized and their different camps. The overthrow of the Mubarak regime in moving more quickly and toughly to impose Egypt in February 2011 unleashed Islamist Islamism on Egyptian society. forces there to the point that the Muslim What seems to be not at all likely, however, Brotherhood took over the presidency, despite the fact that this idea is at the center of parliament, and writing of the new constitution U.S. and Western policy, is that the within the next 18 months. While the Brotherhood would repress the Salafists or Brotherhood was the strongest single force in pose a serious alternative in principle and not Egypt, the number-two slot was held not by merely on the timing and tactical levels. It liberals, moderates, or secularists but by the should be stressed at the outset that the even more radical Islamist groups called Brotherhood is also actually a Salafi Salafists. Who are the Salafists and what is organization. Yet since the term has been used their strategy and ideology? to define the disparate, even more radical The principal question in Egypt regarding Islamist groups in Egypt, it will be employed the Salafists was whether they could work for that purpose in this article. Basically, too, together effectively enough to remain a strong the Brotherhood has the same ideology as the political voice in the country with actual Salafists. The differences are in strategy and influence on the national level. A second issue tactics. was how their extra-parliamentary activity-- Of course, since the goal is not merely to possibly including violence--would help institute Shari’a rule but to take power in consolidate a Shari’a state and intimidate the one’s own hands, the Brotherhood and political enemies of both the Salafists and the Salafists are competitors for control of Egypt. Muslim Brotherhood. A third question is the At times, the Salafists support the degree to which Islamists and the Brotherhood Brotherhood--which now also means can work together, even if the Islamists try to supporting the government; at other times, outflank the Brotherhood in terms of greater they compete with the Brotherhood--as in militancy. If the Salafists are in effect a lobby elections--or criticize it for not going farther on the Brotherhood, they can simultaneously faster. The most important difference is that play the role as the shock troops for the the Salafists are impatient. They want the Brotherhood regime, giving it the rationale for Islamist program to be fulfilled much more quickly than the Brotherhood and are willing Middle East Review of International Affairs, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Summer 2013) 37 Barry Rubin to take far greater risks, both domestically and true--but because it feared the kind of total internationally. If the Brotherhood is repression faced in the 1950s and 1960s at the “pragmatic” or “cautious,” that only signifies hands of the Arab nationalist regime. Salafi its willingness to go more slowly in order to leaders either quit the Brotherhood in better achieve the same goals. frustration or developed their own version of A central idea in Obama administration Islamism in parallel, sometimes with cultish policy has been to support the Brotherhood features and always with a greater willingness being in power in order to restrain the to confront the Mubarak government, at times Salafists. This is a foolish concept based on a with violence. This history has been discussed misunderstanding of the situation. First, the in great detail in the current author’s book, two groups have the same goal. Second, the Islamic Fundamentalists in Egyptian Politics.1 Brotherhood does not want to repress the The Salafi groups were more fearless in Salafists but rather to use them for its own saying and doing things that led to government purposes. crackdowns against them. This battle This is true for such matters as the use of culminated in the assassination of President violence against Christians, foreign embassies, Anwar al-Sadat in 1981 and built to the near- moderate oppositionists, modernist social civil war in the 1990s when the government practices, women, and Israel. If Salafists act, was forced to repress a Salafi insurgency. the Brotherhood--and hence the government-- During all of these events, the Brotherhood can then claim to be innocent of responsibility exercised discipline on its members and for, say, an attack on the U.S. embassy by a avoided involvement. Only when President mob. This would be the case even though it Husni Mubarak seemed to be on his last legs, did not attempt--as a movement--to discourage the regime weakened, the elite disaffected, and the anti-American frenzy (On the contrary, it the United States weak, in October 2011, was encouraged that sentiment.) or--as a the word given by the Brotherhood leadership government--to protect the embassy properly to move into a revolutionary stage. (On the contrary, its security forces were Nevertheless, within the Brotherhood, there ordered to stand by and do nothing until the had always been more militant factions, which last moment when a repeat of the Iranian sympathized with the revolutionaries and hostage crisis of 1979 became possible.). perhaps even imitated them. Periodically, What is taking place, then, is not “moderate individuals and groups had left the Islamism” by the Brotherhood but deniability. organization to join or establish radical In fact, the Salafists are incapable of taking groups. Moreover, by spreading Islamist ideas power in Egypt, largely because their ranks and taking over major institutions--including are so badly divided and their strategies are so mosques and professional groupings--the unrealistic. What is really happening, Brotherhood was extending its influence however, is that the Salafists are helping the throughout the society and providing a Brotherhood make sure that Egyptian potential base of ideology and supporters for nationalists and liberals can never gain power the militants’ violence.2 and that the social revolution of thoroughly Again, it should be stressed that the Islamizing the society takes place. Brotherhood and the Salafists openly made clear that they agreed on goals. Their dispute THE SALAFI REVOLT was only over the best methods that would most likely achieve those goals. The The Salafi movement was born in the Brotherhood believed, based on its experience, 1970s out of rejection of the Brotherhood’s that the regime would defeat any insurgency. strategy of caution, especially by young Nevertheless, in the 1990s, Egyptian Islamists- militants. The Brotherhood did not act so -especially the al-Jihad and the Islamic Group, carefully because it had moderated--its which emerged from the Jam’iyat Movement ideology and literature show this not to be (al-Jama’a al-Islamiyya)--waged a 38 Middle East Review of International Affairs, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Summer 2013) Revolutionary Salafi Islamists in Egypt: An Analysis and Guide revolutionary war against the regime that leadership fell and the movement became peaked during the decade’s first half and more tied to Upper Egypt, where organization declined thereafter. They were defeated for a was easier but seizing state power harder.5 variety of reasons, including the government’s There were also particular problems with clever, multi-layered strategy; the strength of the revolutionaries’ selection of violent tactics. the regime’s institutions and the security These focused on the assassination of officials, agencies’ loyalty; the lack of popular support attacks on security forces, attacks on Coptic for the radicals; and the divisions among the Christians, and assaults on tourists. All these insurgent groups. types of actions raised problems for the Among the Salafists’ weaknesses then--like radicals. Murdering people who were Arabs today--were their many splits. A cleric and Muslims challenged both nationalist and involved in al-Jihad remarked that the real traditional Islamic thinking and was reason there were “thousands” of groups and unpopular. Copts were at least fellow factions was that "everybody wishes to be a Egyptians and striking them seemed to leader.”3 The broadest divide would be undermine national unity. Murdering tourists-- between those who came out of the Jam’iyat though they were foreigners and non- groups, who were Islamists involved in Muslims--damaged the livelihood of many grassroots community organizing, and the al- Egyptians. Thus, the armed struggle failed Jihad forces, which originated as a group bent largely due to two fundamental problems: the on armed struggle. An estimated 300 to 700 government defeated the rebels militarily and al-Jihad members had fought with the the masses did not rally to their side. mujahidin in Afghanistan against the Soviets. By July 1990, 1,225 al-Jihad members This gave them military experience as well as were in jail, and the number of prisoners a basis for misestimating the problems of increased sharply in the next few years.6 staging an uprising at home.4 During March 1993, 21 people were killed and Jam’iyat insurgents were the first to hundreds more arrested in nine raids in Cairo abandon the armed struggle, when they and Aswan.7 In December of the same year, an concluded it was not working.

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