Islamic Jihad

ISLAMIC JIHAD

Palestinian Islamic fundamentalist resistance movement.

Islamic Jihad emerged from the Islamic revivalist tradition of the association of Muslim Brotherhood in Israeli-occupied Gaza and was formed by Palestinians studying in Egypt. Rather than pursue the Brotherhood's policy of the gradual Islamization of Palestinian society as the basis for future liberation from Israeli occupation, certain militants in the late 1970s began arguing for a more active, armed, Islamic response to the occupation much as secular groups associated with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) had undertaken. Sources of inspiration included such militant historical figures as Shaykh Izz al-Din al-Qassam in Palestine and Sayyid Qutb in Egypt, as well as the revolutionary movements spawned by Muhammad Abd al-Salam Faraj in Egypt (the Jihad Organization) and the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in Iran. What tied these traditions together was their belief in active struggle (jihad) in the service of Islam as opposed to mere preaching.

It is believed that Islamic Jihad emerged as an actual organization in 1980. Two early leaders were Abd al-Aziz Awda, deported by Israeli authorities in November 1987, and his successor, Fathi Abd alAziz Shiqaqi, himself deported in August 1988. Shiqaqi operated in Lebanon thereafter until his assassination in Malta in October 1995. Jihad's new head became Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, who moved to Damascus in the mid-1990s. The group has always maintained close relations with Iran. One of Islamic Jihad's first dramatic acts against the Israeli occupation was an attack on a group of soldiers in Jerusalem in October 1986, followed by a series of well-planned attacks on Israeli targets in late 1987. These helped to precipitate the Palestinian uprising, known as the Infidada, against Israeli rule in the occupied territories, which erupted in December 1987. Islamic Jihad has operated as a small, clandestine group of militants who seek the total liberation of all of Palestine through armed struggle rather than a mass-based organization like the Muslim Brotherhood or HAMAS. Its activities were severely hampered by Israeli repression during the Intifada. Jihad operated alongside but separate from the PLO's Unified National Command of the Uprising during the Intifada. Jihad activists were among the 418 Palestinians from the territories deported by Israel in December 1992.

Jihad opposed the Israeli–Palestinian peace talks, which began in 1991, as well as the subsequent 1993 Oslo Accord. In 1992 it joined the "Damascus Ten," a grouping of Palestinian organizations opposed to the peace talks, which changed its name to the National Democratic and Islamic Front in 1993. Jihad continued to attack Israeli targets even after establishment of a Palestinian Authority (PA) in Gaza and the West Bank in 1994, promoting considerable friction between it and the PA leadership. Jihad figures were arrested; Abdullah al-Shami, the group's spokesman and spiritual leader in Gaza, was arrested by the PA on six different occasions for Friday sermons that criticized the PA and its president, Yasir Arafat. Eschewing any compromise with Israel, Jihad activists have resorted to suicide bombings against Israelis during the 1990s.

Jihad and HAMAS were rivals until the al-Aqsa Intifada tended to bring them together in their activities. Jihad also has undergone some internal problems. Abd al-Aziz Awda eventually left Jihad and returned to the PA from his Israel-imposed exile with Arafat's approval. In 2003 al-Shami was pushed out of his positions and quit the movement as well.

see also aqsa intifada, al-; hamas; intifada (1987–1991); muslim brotherhood; oslo accord (1993); palestine liberation organization (plo).

Bibliography

Abu-Amr, Ziad. Islamic Fundamentalism in the West Bank and Gaza: Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic Jihad. Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1994.

Hatina, Meir. Islam and Salvation in Palestine: The Islamic Jihad Movement. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University, 2001.

michael r. fischbach