Western Resistance

ANSAR ISLAM

ANSAR AL ISLAM is an Iraqi-based group, which opposes US influence. It is a radical Kurdish grouping, which supported Saddam's regime. According to Iraqi News.com it was founded in December 2001 after a merger between Jund al-Islam, the Soldiers of Islam (led by Abu Abdallah al-Shafi'i - real name Raid al-Khlaf al-Khuraisat) and a splinter group from the Islamic Movement, led by Mullah Krekar. Mullah Krekar is their presumed leader. It is based in Biyarah and surrounding regions, near the border with Iran.

Ansar al-Islam recent activities include: razing of beauty salons, burning a school for girls, and murdered women in the streets for refusing to wear the burqa. It has seized a Taliban-style enclave of 4,000 civilians and several villages near the Iranian border. It is also responsible for ambushing and killing of 42 Kurdish soldiers.

FrontPage Mag has noted its association with Al Qaeda, and calls its headquarters "Little Tora Bora" after the enclave in Afghanistan. According to Wikipedia it is held responsible for suicide bombings in Iraq, such as one at a checkpoint on February 26, 2003, a month before the war started, and others such as the suicide car bomb which killed an Australian journalist and others on March 22 that year. It attcked a US Department of Defense office in Abril in September 2003, killing 3, and on February 1, 2004 it attacked two Kurdish party offices, killing 109 and wounding 200.

More information can be found in the report here, compiled by Human Rights News.

ANSAR AL-SUNNAH

We reported here recently on the activities of Ansar al-Sunnah, where two Iraqi oil workers were stoned to death, their fates recorded on videotape. That incident was on October 09. Four days before, they beheaded two Iraqis, accusing them of spying for the US military. The video, accordiing to Reuters, was dated 12 September 2005, and was the first video to show a beheading since May. As is typical in all their decapitation snuff videos, their victims had their heads sawn off (from the throat to the vertebrae), and then the severed heads were lain upon the victims' backs.

Their first video was made in February 2004, and was more of a propaganda documentary. They now seem to prefer documenting their atrocities. In a report by Global Security.org, Ansar al-Sunna, or Jaish Ansar al-Sunna is an offfshoot of Ansar al Islam, and is closely tied with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Many of their victims are Iraqis, but they have claimed the beheadings of foreigners too, imcluding the decapitations of 12 Nepalese hostages in August 2004.

They are probably behind the beheadings of US contractors, such as Eugene "Jack" Armstrong and others. Their base of operation is around Kirkuk, where they filmed their latest video spectacle, the stoning to death of the two oil workers this weekend.

GROUPE ISLAMIQUE COMBATTANT MAROCAIN

The following information is taken from the US Government's PATTERNS OF GLOBAL TERRORISM report, 2003, Appendix C. The Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) wishes to establish an Islamic state in Morocco, and support Al Qaeda's battle against the west. The group emerged at the end of the 1990s and has Moroccan recruits who trained in camps in Afghanistan. Their members have links with other North African extremists, particularly in Europe. Their assets were frozen by the US on November 22, 2002. They traffic in false documents, and probably gunrunning, and have issued communiques condemning the Moroccan government. Their locus operandi is Western Europe, Afghanistan and Morocco.

They have been linked with the bombings in Casablanca in May 2003 and also with the Madrid train bombings, which happened in March 2004.

HARAKUT-UL-JIHAD-AL-ISLAMI

Harakat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami is an extremist Sunni group that follows the Deobandi version of Islam. It was founded in Afghanistan in 1980, to fight jihad against the Soviets. It is affiliated with the Jamiat Ulema-I-Islam Fazlur Rehman faction (JUI-F), and also the Deobandi school of thought. Led primarily by its chief Amin Rabbani, it is comprised mostly of Pakistanis and foreign Islamists who are fighting to wrest Kashmir from Indian control, and for it to be part of Pakistan. It is linked to the Kashmiri militant group al-Faran which kidnapped 5 Western tourists in July 1995, one of whom was killed a month later, with the others were later killed in December that year. It operates from Pakistan and Kashmir, and used to train its members in Afghanistan until late in 2001, when American forces removed the Taliban (whose senior members were also from Deobandi schools).

HARAKUT-UL-JIHAD-AL-ISLAMI BANGLADESH

Harakat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami Bangladesh is led by Shauqat Osman, and its mission is to establish Islamic rule in Bangladesh. It has connections with Harakat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (above) who share similar aims. An assassination attempt upon the then Prime Minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina Wazed, made in July 2000 has been linked to this group, as has the stabbing of a journalist in November 2000, after he had made a documentary on the plight of Hindus in Bangladesh. This group has an estimated strength of several thousand members, according to US Department of State Patterns of Global Terrorism Report 2003. It operates and trains its members in Bangladesh, where it had 6 camps at the time of the US government report, and its funding comes mostly from madrassas in Bangladesh, and has ties with other militants in Pakistan who may also supply funds.

HEZB-E-ISLAMI GULBADDIN

This group is under the control of its founder, Gulbaddin Hekmatyar, (pictured), who founded the party in 1975 to fight the then leader of Afghanistan, Doud, and is based in Afghanistan. Hekmattyar's was one of the groups that helped to end the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, but in the early 1990s Hezb-e-Islami (the Islamic party) clashed with other Mujahideen factions while trying to gain control of Kabul. During the anti-Soviet fighting years, he was an associate of Osama bin Laden, and was also linked to the blind Egyptian cleric, Sheikh Omar Abdul Rahman, who was jailed in 1995 for his attempt to blow up the Twin Towes of the Worls Trade Center. Gulbaddin Hekmatyar and his group were blamed for much of the killing of Afghan people in the post-Soviet era, and when the Taliban arrived, many welcomed them.

A Pashtun Sunni, Gulbaddin Hekmatyar had support from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, but the infighting with other groups led to Islamabad supporting the Taliban. When they came to power in 1995, Hekmatyar and his Hezb-e-Islami followers wee routed from Kabul. He himself took refuge in Tehran, in Iran. When Hamid Karzai became President of Afghanistan, Gulbaddin Hekmatyar's vocal opposition saw him becoming alienated from his Iranian hosts, and expelled from the country in February 2002. Threatened by Afghanistan with trial for war crimes, he made an offer of peace to the Karzai administration in March 2002 and now is believed to reside somewhere in either Afghanistan or Pakistan.

Hezb-e-Islami were accused of attempting to overthrow the Afghan government. 160 people were arrested. Most of these were accused of belonging to Hezb-e-Islami. In May 2002, an attempt to kill hi with a missile from an unmanned aircraft was made by the US to kill him in Kabul, but failed. In December 2002 he announced in leaflets along the Afghan/Pakistani border that his groups would fight international troops in Afghanistan. According to Global Security.orgin 2003 Gulbaddin Hekmatyar was designated by the United States as a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist under the authority of Executive Order 13224".

On 2 July 2003 Gulbuddin Hekmatyar urged Afghans to "cut off the hands of the foreign meddlers" and drive all foreign forces out of Afghanistan. Hekmatyar forwarded his video message to AP from his mountain hideout, believed to be situated somewhere in Konar Province near the Afghan-Pakistan border.

More information on Hezb-e-Islami can be found in Wikipedia. The group did have an English-language website, but sadly that stopped being used on December 17, 2001. However, you can see an archived version of the site here.

ISLAMIC JIHAD UNION

The Islamic Jihad Union, formerly known as the Islamic Jihad Group is based in Uzbekistan. It helped to end the Uzbek regime and mounted operations against the US and Israeli embassies in Tashkent in 2004. In June 2004 a man carrying fake explosives was shot dead outside the Israeli embassy, and shortly afterwards, the majority of staff were shipped out, leaving only the Israeli ambassador, Ami Mehl and a handful of security guards, according to a contemporary report.

Advice to travellers in the region, supplied by the US government states:

SAFETY AND SECURITY: Supporters of terrorist groups such as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Al-Qaida, the Islamic Jihad Union, and the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement are active in the region. Members of these groups have expressed anti-U.S. sentiments and have attacked U.S. Government interests in the past, including the U.S. Embassy in Tashkent, and may attempt to target U.S. Government or private interests in Uzbekistan. The Department of State urges Americans in Uzbekistan to exercise extreme caution, including avoiding large crowds, celebrations, and places where Westerners generally congregate. In the past, these groups have been known to conduct kidnappings, assassinations and suicide bombings.

JAMAAT UL-FURQAN

This group is closely aligned with the group Khuddam-ul-Islam, so here I will be brief. The group is based in Pakistan, and has been blamed for atrocities there, including suicide attacks, as reported in an article from the Pakistan Daily Times.

Sources said Mr Jabbar, former commander of the defunct Jaish Mohammad was seen in Azad Kashmir some time ago. He was arrested in Midhranjha, a town near Sargodha, in July 2003 in connection with the Taxila church blast and an attack on a missionary school in Murree in 2002. Mr Azhar had expelled Mr Jabbar and 12 other members of his outfit for their alleged involvement in sectarian killings. Mr Jabbar formed Jamaat-ul-Furqan after his expulsion but his organisation was banned in November 2003. Sources said the suicide attackers had links with Jamaat ul Furqan. "Jabbar was in custody at the time of the suicide attacks but he gave important information to the intelligence agencies about the militants who could have planned the attacks on President Musharraf," sources said. Intelligence agencies had also suspected the TKI's involvement in suicide attacks and therefore detained Mr Azhar's brother for questioning.

JUNDALLAH

Jundallah is a group that appears to have been set up from nowhere to be a force attracting Palestinians into a web that involves Al Qaeda. A very good article can be read here by Daniel Pipes. According to a May 22, 2005 piece from the Scotsman the group known as Jundallah is "a new militant group based in Gaza formed by extremists who have become disillusioned with Hamas and Islamic Jihad." Operating mainly within the Gaza region the Palestinian Authority security officials have said that Jundallah or "Allah's brigade" had links to Al Qaeda.

The PA officials were quoted as saying that Jundallah gunmen launched their first attack on Israeli soldiers near Rafah in Gaza last week. Four soldiers were wounded in the incident. Abu Abdullah al-Khattab, who identified himself as the spokesman for Jundallah in Gaza, denied his group was linked to al-Qaeda but hinted that as well as Israeli targets, the group was planning to target US interests in the region.

There had been earlier associations of Al Qaeda with Palestinian links. In February 2003, an Israeli military court sentenced a man to 27 years' imprisonment for training in Afghanistan with Al Qaeda's network.The man, a Hamas member, Nabil Oukal, stated in 2000 that he had been recruited by Al Qaeda to set up a terrorist group in Palestinian regions.

"While this information about Jundallah has yet to be confirmed, there's no doubt that al-Qaeda has tried and continues to try and recruit members of other organisations such as Hamas or Islamic Jihad," said Dr Ely Karmon, a senior researcher in international terrorism at Israel's International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism.

Another article about Jundalah can be found here on windsofchange.net, and another here.

It appears that the Jundallah have their ancestry in the Indian sub-continent. The Daily Times of Pakistan has this report from June 18 2004:

Three Jundallah activists arrested

KARACHI: The police raided a madrassa in Orangi Town on Thursday night and arrested three activists of the Jundallah.

The names of those arrested are Rahimullah, Faizullah and Iqbal. Twelve hand grenades, four sub-machine guns, two G-3 rifles, five TT pistols and three .222 rifles were recovered from their possession. They were formerly in the Sipah-e-Sahaba and recently joined the Jundallah. CCPO Karachi Tariq Jamil confirmed the arrests, but declined to give details. Recently, nine activists had been arrested in Karachi, bringing the total number of Jundallah activists arrested so far to 12.

KHUDDAM UL-ISLAM

This group is related to Jamaat ul-Furqan, mentioned above, and according to the US' Overseas Security Council it is sometimes associated with Jaish-e-Mohammed, or JEM. The JEM had training camps in Afghanistan untl the fall of 2001 when the US brought down the Taliban. Its aims are to unite Kashmir with Pakistan. In 2003 JEM splintered and become Jamaat ul-Furqan and Khuddan ul-Islam. Both groups were officially baned by Pakistan in November 2003.

LASHKAR I JHANGVI

Lashkar I Jhangvi, or "Army of Jhangvi", according to Patterns of Global Terrorism, Appendix B.

It emerged in 1995 among Libyans who had fought the Soviets in Afghanistan. Some concentrate on annihilation of Gaddafi, while others are more aligned with Al Qaeda. The group was designated for asset freeze under E. O. 13224 and UNSCR 1333 in September 2001. It claimed responsibility for an assassination attempt against Gaddafi in 1996 which failed, and fought Libyan security forces in the late 1990s.

MILLAT-E-ISLAMI

This group, like Lashkar-i-Jhangvi and Jamaat-ul-Furqan, is an offshoot of Sipah-e-Sahaba, and was banned by the Pakistan government in 2003 on account of its sectarian violence. It is a Sunni group, and a report of some of its activities can be found in the article by the BBC from October 7 last year. See the following entry.

SIPAH-E-SAHABA PAKISTAN

Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan or Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan is a Deobandi Sunni sectarian group which violently opposes the Shia. It renamed itself Millat-i-Islami in August 2002. They call for Shia to be declared non-Muslims and organise political rallies, and attempt to assassinate prominent Shia leaders, according to the 2003 Patterns of Global Terrorism report.