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| Terror Networks |
| Egyptian Extremist Rewriting Rationale For Armed Struggle |
| 2007-07-15 |
| Jailhouse Dissent Seen as Challenge to Al-Qaeda The guerrilla leader who crafted what became al-Qaeda's guide to jihad is preparing to renounce its extremes, including the killing of innocent civilians, according to his onetime colleagues and his own writings. Abdul-Aziz el-Sherif, an emir, or top leader, of the armed Egyptian movement Islamic Jihad and a longtime associate of al-Qaeda deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, is writing his dissent behind prison walls on Egypt's Nile River. Retired Gen. Fouad Allam says state security officials tried to discredit extremists' religious reasoning for armed attacks. Such jailhouse "revisions," as they are known here, have helped to widen rifts between al-Qaeda and some of its former admirers and have led to the release of thousands of erstwhile Islamic extremists from Egypt's prisons. "It will be a challenge to al-Qaeda, from someone from inside, who speaks the same language," said Kamal Habib, a former Islamic Jihad leader imprisoned for 10 years after Islamic extremists assassinated President Anwar Sadat in 1981. Habib, who bears scars from cigarettes that he said Egyptian security officials stubbed out in his palms during interrogations, said that based on his own experience, Sherif probably was tortured after he was imprisoned in Egypt in 2004 but not as he has been writing his revision. "Torture is not the thing to break Sayed Imam," Habib said, using an honorific for Sherif. "He is very strong." Fawaz A. Gerges, a Middle East scholar at Sarah Lawrence College in New York, said the revisions "pour fuel on a raging struggle within the jihadist community and . . . challenge the narrative offered by Ayman al-Zawahiri and Osama bin Laden." Without such dissents, armed attacks "would be much greater, much broader and much more devastating," Gerges said. The main body of Sherif's revision is a tract of no more than 100 pages that Egypt's state security forces and state-allied religious scholars are vetting. Publication is expected to lead to Egypt's release of up to 5,000 former Islamic Jihad members and other activists. Among other well known Islamic Jihad figures behind bars in Egypt, Abbud al-Zumar, another former leader, is believed to support Sherif's revision; Mohammed al-Zawahiri, the younger brother of the al-Qaeda deputy leader, publicly "neither supports nor condemns it," according to an associate of the radicals familiar with the revision. He spoke on condition of anonymity. The associate said he was not convinced of the sincerity of Sherif's revision, in part because Sherif had argued at length against revisions issued by Egypt's other leading militant movement, the Islamic Group. |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #4 ltop - that paragraph hints at a reason to release the jihadist in jail so they can attack the US. Bet on it. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2007-07-15 09:29 |
| #3 This statement comes right out of the DNC playbook. Hmmm...Has anyone seen Dr. Demento Dean lately? |
| Posted by: Unens Pelosi3836 2007-07-15 07:37 |
| #2 Islamic Jihad's revision comes as the group itself grows into something of an anachronism. Western governments today are fighting a new era of decentralized, often freelance Islamic fighters -- members of what Gerges called "the Iraq generation" -- who are angered by the U.S. occupation of Iraq and support of Israel. "Jihad today is no longer a religious idea. It's a political idea, a protest against U.S. activities," said Allam, the retired state security director, sitting on his flower-lined patio next to the Mediterranean, his words accompanied by the crash of waves notorious for their undertow. "The whole world has to do revisions." Hmmm. I sometimes wonder if the jihadis themselves aren't really confused and of several minds on this. Not the young, sex-deprived guys who are of an age and suitable ignorance to think that murdering mothers with babies will somehow atone for the extreme emptiness and futility of t heir lives. No, those guys and the bin Ladens and Hooks and such do definitely cling to the religious motivation. But I suspect that some of the older guys just used Islam as a way to stir up hatred and foment political revolution against corrupt authoritarian governments. In their twisted minds the US is responsible because we give aid to Mubarak. And because we support the Joos. And because of Britney Spears and Madonna. We really are guilty on that last point. Not to mention Al Gore. Although he could have arisen in the EU so maybe that's not our fault exactly. shrugJust an hypothesis. But there does seem to be a difference between many of the older leaders and the new young fanatics who grew up really KNOWING how inadequate their culture is and who have very little chance at a good career, family etc. |
| Posted by: lotp 2007-07-15 07:26 |
| #1 This is a scam to avoid death sentences and jail. I find the prosecutor's statement at the end VERY VERY troubling. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2007-07-15 04:03 |