I'm currently in the middle of writing up a threat dossier on the Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ) for my day-time job and I got to say, you learn the most obscure things about terrorist groups and their origins doing these things. My previous research on Algeria's GIA took me all the way back to the 1980s to the formation of the Mouvement Islamique Algerien (MIA) or Algerian Islamic Movement under Mustafa Bouyali in 1982. Bouyali was previously a member of the Front des Forces Socialistes (FFS) or Socialist Front Forces before he joined the much larger FLN and seems to have wanted to implement the FFS program by selling it under the banner of Islam.
My research into the Egyptian Islamic Jihad seems to be progressing along pretty much the same track. The standard line is that they evolved out of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, but the actual realities seem a little more complicated. So far I've identified at least two proto-EIJs, the Islamic Liberation Organization that tried to stage a coup against Sadat in 1974 and what I'm thinking is the original Takfir wal Hijra in 1977. What I find particularly interesting given the level of Takfiri influence today is just how small it started out as under Shukry Mustafa during the 1977 Cairo food riots.
Finally, the more I look into the actual assassination of Anwar Sadat at the hands of an Islamist conspiracy headed up by Lieutenant Khalid Islambouli, Mohammed Abd al-Salaam Farag, and Karam Zuhdi, the more appreciative I am of just how much time and planning went into the assassination - they'd been planning to take down Sadat for more than 3 years and while most everyone knows the story of how Sadat was killed, this was the first time that I had ever heard of the bonafide Islamist insurrection in Asyut that took place right after his death.
In any case, looking back at the various actions of the Egyptian Islamists over the last couple of decades certainly gives one some idea of why they have traditionally made up most of the al-Qaeda leadership. It also leads one to the somewhat disconcerting thought that someone like Ayman al-Zawahiri may well not be one of a kind as has generally been assumed.
One more thing - it seems that Iran helped to bankroll part of FIS's electoral campaign in Algeria. If this is true and the mullahs were happy to finance Sunni Islamist revolution in Algeria, it would seem to pretty much drive a stake through the idea that a Sunni Islamist victory, at least in some parts of the world, are viewed by the mullahs as being completely inimical to their interests.
> the first time that I had ever heard of the bonafide Islamist insurrection in Asyut that took place right after [Sadat's] death
Interesting--any suggested reference or hyperlink for that?
If this is true and the mullahs were happy to finance Sunni Islamist revolution in Algeria, it would seem to pretty much drive a stake through the idea that a Sunni Islamist victory, at least in some parts of the world, are viewed by the mullahs as being completely inimical to their interests.
Are there degrees of "inimicalness"?
Given that Algeria's Shiite population is practically non-existent, and the socialist (and decidedly non-fundamentalist) FLN (and its offshoots) has controlled and continues to control the Algerian government since the withdrawal of the French, support for Sunni fundamentalists in Algeria didn't exactly represent a threat to Shiite fundamentalism...
AMac:
Schanzer documents it in his book, which is one of the reasons why I highly recommend it as a resource.
Can I suggest a thematic tie-in?
The Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan al-Muslimin) struggled against government oppression in the 70s and into the 80s. It was organizing civilly (taking over professional organizations, organizing in the poorer quarters, staying our of trouble).
Sadat's separate peace with Israel, prompted some to give up the political activity I describe above. Takfir W'al Hijrah was the result.
However, meanwhile, the Brotherhood was making progress when it was allowed to run candidates in elections (as Independents, and (!) Wafdists.
However, as the door to democracy was shut in the early to mid 1990s by repressive or stupid governments in Egypt, Algeria, Jordan, and elsewhere, frustrated Ikhwan and similar activists, who had put up with the civil orientation for almost two decades, rebounded into vicious murder.
The coincident disintegration of civil order in Afghanistan set up a place for such people to congregate and train, but not after ugly terrorism and brutal repression in their home countries first.
Good luck in your day-job.
The Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan al-Muslimin) struggled against government oppression in the 70s and into the 80s.
you need to go back another couple of decades. The Islamic Brotherhood formed in the 50's with the encouragement of the US Government. America didn't like the fact that Eqypt was seriously allied with the Soviet Union, and sponsored Islamic fundamentalism in Eqypt to prevent the spread of "godless communism" throughout the middle east.
(meanwhile, the Soviets were doing the same thing with Islamic fundamentalists in Iran, because the Shah was closely allied with the US....)
THe whole "war on terror" is really just a hangover from the cold war.
bq. The Islamic Brotherhood formed in the 50's with the encouragement of the US Government.
Eh? The Muslim Brotherhood has been around since the 1920s ...
Dan, get with the program. North Korean nukes: America's fault. Al-Qaeda: America's fault. Frankly, anything that isn't America's fault isn't worth talking about (or so it would seem).
I understand all that, it just seems to me that if you want to claim that we sponsored the formation of the Muslim Brotherhood, which as I recall was drawn up at least partially in reaction to all the social upheaval following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire (must the West be responsible for any and all evils?) and the end of the caliphate.
Or am I making a category mistake and the individual who has aired the opinions you enumerated above is writing in the genre of alternate history?
I think the word you're struggling for is 'bullshit'.
Was the Egyptian Air flight 990 crash ever laid to rest? What does it say about a society and government that can't stomach brutal truths?
I understand all that, it just seems to me that if you want to claim that we sponsored the formation of the Muslim Brotherhood, which as I recall was drawn up at least partially in reaction to all the social upheaval following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire (must the West be responsible for any and all evils?) and the end of the caliphate.
You are correct on a technical level, but although the Brotherhood had its origins in the late 20's as a "youth group" (not much different than the CYO), it was not until the very late 1940's that it became identified with militant fundamentalist Islam (i.e. terrorism). The Brotherhood was banned for a couple of years, then re-legitimized, then banned again (in 1954) subsequent to the overthrow of King Farouk (in 1952) when the "Arab socialists" lead by Nasser took over, and chose "socialism" over Sharia law for Eqypt. It was during the subsequent decade as a banned organization (thousands of members of the Brotherhood were arrested, and thousands more fled to other nations) that the Brotherhood took on its "modern" character as a subversive revolutionary/terrorist organization dedicated to imposing Islamic fundamentalism on Eqypt. The US supported this development in order to prevent the spread of communism/socialism in the Mid-East.
P. Lukasiak's comments are incorrect on many levels.
The Ikhwan was founded in the Salafi spirit from the start, irrespective of whatever vehicle Hasan al-Banna used at its inception. That they were terrorists in the 1940s is silly, as Egypt was an occupied nation, ruled by a corrupt family (the Khedives) under the tutelage of an indifferent colonial master, the British.
In the 1960s, when, as Mr. (Ms.?) Lukasiak delicately puts it, "socialism" was chosen, leading to the torture and murder of many Ikhwan, not mere arrest and flight.
The role that they then took on afterward might have been subversive, but it was not terrorist. They organized within the current system in the manner I described above.
It is fine for those who want to equate any and all fervour within Islam as "terrorism", but it will not make for any useful analysis. This analysis, not Mr. Bush's foreign policy, creates more terrorists (among other causes).
Identify terrorists and and hunt them down. However, a great disservice is done vilifying poorly understood movements and organizations as a substitute.
By the way, comments that say that the US was behind al-Qa'idah's inception, or that Israel was behind that of Hamas, or that the US was behind the Ikhwan are equivalent to Mr. Richard Nixon being responsible for the Cultural Revolution because better relations with China were helpful in the Cold War in the 1970s onward.
People need to look at history with perspective. Periodically reformers arise in Muslim countries with the purpose of purifying Islam of new interpretaions that, in the opinion of these reformers, weaken it.
These are of a Salafi bent, and one can point to many examples. What arose in Egypt in the last century, also arose in Saudi Arabia, India, and Indonesia, mostly independently of each other.
Connections had been made by the "jet age", and these tendencies have gone overboard, as some devolve into local thuggery and large scale violence against innocent life.
The Muslim Brotherhood in WW2 was allied with Hitler. See the career of Sadat, Anwar for further details.
It is my considered opinion that p.l. is paid to deposit his little bits here and there.