As Lebanon looks back on a summer of vicious fighting between the army and Fatah al-Islam that left 168 soldiers dead, armed Salafi-jihadist networks continue to operate beyond the ruins of the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp with relative impunity. Contrary to the conventional wisdom among many terrorism analysts, they have never plotted (let alone attempted) to establish an Islamic state in Lebanon. Rather, these Sunni Islamist militants have used "islands of insecurity" in the country as conduits for training and dispatching terrorists to conflict zones around the world (particularly Iraq). Under an informal quid pro quo dating back to the Syrian occupation, most have abstained from destabilizing operations within Lebanon itself in exchange for being left alone. When Fatah al-Islam violated this understanding, it was "excommunicated" by international and local Al-Qaeda affiliates eager to preserve their privileges in Lebanon.

The ruling March 14 coalition's tolerance of Salafi-jihadist networks isn't quite the nefarious conspiracy decried by the Lebanese opposition. The more prosaic reality is that the ultraconservative strand of Islamic fundamentalism they espouse has become deeply ingrained in peripheral Sunni areas of Lebanon that were egregiously neglected and harshly governed during the Syrian occupation. Any governing coalition that relies primarily on Sunni political support will find it virtually impossible (absent a major provocation) to confront Salafi jihadist networks, particularly in an atmosphere of confessional polarization and economic stagnation.

The Fall and Rise of Tripoli

The trajectory of Salafi-jihadism in Lebanon has been strongly conditioned by the environmental opportunity structure of Lebanon, - understood here to mean the sum totality of distinct social, economic, and cultural resources available to local actors. The demography and historical experience of the Lebanese Sunni Muslim community are central to its success. Estimated to range from 25%-30% of the population, Lebanese Sunnis are unique among the country's leading sects in being overwhelmingly urban (with little geographically contiguous hinterland) and in lacking a minoritarian outlook. Whereas Shiites, Maronites and Druze see themselves as islands in a vast regional Sunni Arab sea, most Lebanese Sunnis see themselves as a part of that sea (either through a religious or nationalist prism).

While the Sunni elites who agreed to the 1943 National Pact (which divided executive and legislative power along sectarian lines) had concrete interests in the establishment of an independent Lebanon and virtually monopolized their community's "allotment" of political power in the First Republic,[1] the formation of Lebanon hurt the economic interests of many Sunnis. The predominantly Sunni northern port of Tripoli, once the economic equal of Beirut, declined in relative prosperity as its traditional trade routes to the Syrian interior lapsed, which is one reason why all major currents of Lebanese Sunni Islamism have been centered in the city. Rural pockets of the Sunni community, such as Akkar in north Lebanon, slipped through the cracks of an extreme laissez faire, services-oriented economy.

Decline of the Political Islamists

Although a number of Islamic revivalist movements surfaced after Lebanon's independence, they represented little more than fading nostalgia for the Ottoman Empire. Pan-Arabism soon became the ideology of choice for disaffected Sunnis who longed for integration with the rest of the Middle East. The 1964 establishment of the Lebanese branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, known as Al-Jama'a al-Islamiyya (the Islamic Association), marked a watershed. Al-Jama'a saw the pursuit of an Islamic state as a viable (if long-term and incremental) political project and an antidote to the burgeoning appeal of secular Arab nationalism. Al-Jama'a was fiercely opposed to both Sunni political elites and the Sunni religious establishment they largely controlled, known as Dar al-Fatwa. [2]

After the outbreak of the 1975-1990 civil war and the intervention of Syrian military forces, Al-Jama'a began to splinter. Although most Sunni Islamists in Lebanon saw the intervention as a nefarious power play by the Alawite-dominated (and therefore heretical) Syrian regime to subvert Sunni influence, in most areas of the country they acquiesced to Syria's grip. In and around Tripoli, however, a host of radical Al-Jama'a offshoots inspired by the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran sprouted up. [3] In 1982, these factions formed Harakat al-Tawhid al-Islami (the Islamic Unification Movement).

Under the leadership of charismatic preacher Said Shaaban, Tawhid seized control of Tripoli from Syrian-backed militia forces. Strengthened by arms from the PLO and the influx of highly trained Syrian Brotherhood operatives after the Hama massacre, Tawhid forces imposed Islamic law at gunpoint in neighborhoods they controlled for two years (e.g. banning alcohol, forcing women to veil) and executed dozens of secular political opponents (mostly Communists), sparking an exodus of Christians from the city. [4]

In the autumn of 1985, Syrian forces swept into the city and brought Tawhid's mini-state to an end. Although Shabaan wisely acquiesced ("Tripoli is not dearer to us than Hama," Syrian Vice-president Abdul Halim Khaddam reportedly told him at the time),[5] other Tawhid "emirs" and hundreds of their followers fought on until they were physically eliminated or captured. Armed Sunni Islamist resistance to Syrian forces in Lebanon disappeared after 1986, while Sunni public figures who expressed even the faintest hint of anti-Syrian dissent were simply eliminated.[6]

Along with mainstream Sunni clerics, Al-Jama'a and Al-Tawhid came to accept and endorse the Syrian occupation. Instead, they crusaded against un-Islamic cultural influences in Lebanon (in sharp contrast to Shiite Islamists)[7] and repeated bellicose slogans condemning Israel and the West. They were not allowed to actually go fight Israelis (let alone Westerners), however, as the Syrians feared that battle-hardened Sunni Islamist fighters might one day turn their guns on Damascus and "resistance" to Israel was the exclusive preserve of Hezbollah and the Lebanese Shiite community.

Adding insult to injury, Syria supported the growth of a hitherto obscure Shiite-influenced Sunni revivalist movement known as Al-Ahbash, granting it control over prominent mosques and access to the airwaves to broadcast its conspicuously Alawite-friendly brand of "tolerant" Islamism. Under Syrian patronage, the once pacific movement morphed into a bizarre monstrosity, demonstrating with sticks and knives to intimidate anti-Syrian protestors in the waning years of the occupation (and later being linked to the killing of the late Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri).

As the Syrians were brutally suppressing Islamist groups and promoting idiosyncratic Sunni religious doctrines, economic conditions in Tripoli improved little as streams of poor Sunnis from Akkar and the northern Beqaa settled in its crowded eastern suburbs. In this cauldron of poverty and resentment, a different ideological pole of Sunni fundamentalism was gaining steam.

The Salafis

Salafism is a puritanical Sunni current that seeks to emulate the "righteous ancestors" (al-salaf al-salih) of early Islamic history and purge the faith of fallacious innovations (bida'a). While mainstream Salafis pursue this goal non-violently through missionary and educational activity, others (commonly dubbed Salafi jihadists) have embraced violence to achieve its aims. "Both have the same objective . . . to convert society into an Islamic society," explains Lebanese journalist Hazim al-Amin, but "vary in the method of achieving it."[8]

In sharp contrast to Al-Jama'a and its offshoots, Salafis and Salafi-jihadists are largely apolitical. The former usually eschew involvement in local politics so as to maintain the freedom to disseminate their message to the people with minimal interference from the state, while the latter do so to maintain freedom of action in fighting the enemies of Islam abroad. Both are intolerant of heterodox Muslims and abjure any national identity, claiming allegiance to the universal community of Muslim believers (umma).

Salafi missionaries first gained prominence in Tripoli after the start of the civil war, under the leadership of Sheikh Salem al-Shahal. Although Shahal's followers maintained a modest armed force known as the Nucleus of the Islamic Army, they remained aloof from the fighting that waged on around them. "In 1985, when Tripoli was destroyed, we never carried out a single military operation," his son, Dai al-Islam, recently recalled.[9] Tawhid's aspiration to impose Islamic law in Tripoli may have appealed to Salafis, but Shahal viewed Shaaban's close relations with Iran (and, later on, with Syria) as an abomination.

The Salafis were allowed to proselytize freely as Syria tightened its grip on Lebanon because they stayed out of politics and - more importantly - because their close ties to Saudi Arabia gave them a measure of immunity during a period of warming Syrian-Saudi relations. Most leading Lebanese Salafi preachers studied theology in the kingdom, under the guidance of ultra-orthodox Wahhabi clerics, and received subsidies from private Saudi donors. Shahal had very close ties with the late head of Saudi Arabia's Council of Senior Islamic Scholars (and future grand mufti), Sheikh Abd al-Aziz ibn Abdallah ibn Baz, who arranged for hundreds of Lebanese and Palestinian students to enroll in Islamic studies programs at Saudi universities during the civil war (including Dai al-Islam al-Shahal).

By the early 1990s, the Salafi current had quietly established a strong social foundation in Tripoli and surrounding areas (including the nearby Baddawi and Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camps), and to a lesser (or less conspicuous) extent in Sidon and smaller Sunni communities in south Lebanon and the Beqaa.[10] Although this raised some eyebrows within Syrian military intelligence, the movement's militantly apolitical dogma was hardly unwelcome to Damascus. Salafi denunciations of Al-Jama'a for participating in national elections helped deprive the latter of substantial electoral power. Salafi denunciations of Western cultural influences in Lebanon also served Syrian interests by increasing pressure on Dar al-Fatwa to spend its time chasing windmills at a time of great popular disaffection. Grand Mufti Rashid Qabbani was responsible for the controversial 1994 banning of a book by the late Libyan writer (and fierce critic of Islamic orthodoxy) Sadiq al-Nayhum[11] and the 1999 indictment on blasphemy charges of Lebanese Christian singer Marcel Khalife (who was publicly defended by most senior Shiite clerics).[12] For many Salafis, these were battles far more important than the political game in Lebanon - or, for that matter, the economic game (as Tripoli grew more and more outwardly militant, it was largely bypassed by tourists).

The biggest source of tension between Lebanese Salafis and Damascus was the latter's promotion of the Ahbash. True or not, widely rumored Syrian plans to make Al-Ahbash leader Nizar al-Halabi the next grand mufti were seen by Salafis as an existential threat. By 1994, Shahal and other Salafi preachers in Tripoli were unleashing a constant stream of invectives about the "heretical" Ahbash (and vice versa). These denunciations caught the ear of a hitherto obscure Palestinian Islamist militia looking for religious guidance.

The Salafi-Jihadists

Sunni Islamism was already on the upswing in Ain al-Hilweh, a Palestinian refugee camp on the outskirts of the predominantly Sunni port of Sidon in south Lebanon, but it was only beginning to feel the impact of Salafi proselytizing in the early 1990s. Radical Sunni Islamist currents in the camp were predominantly Iranian-backed, prime among them an armed network known as Ansarallah (Partisans of God), established by Hisham Shreidi. After Shreidi was assassinated in 1991, his successor, Abdel-Karim al-Saadi (aka Abu Muhjen), initiated a sweeping reorientation in the group's religious identification and renamed it Asbat al-Ansar (League of Partisans).

This transformation was fueled by increasing resentment of "Shiite-only resistance" against Israeli forces in south Lebanon and the growing realization that the "anti-Zionist struggle" sponsored by Iran and Syria would never be allowed to proceed beyond the pursuit of these two governments' own limited national interests. Rather than play a backseat supporting role in this charade, Shreidi's successors looked for an alternative cause and mode of identification that deemphasized the struggle to regain Palestine.

Salafi-jihadism fit the bill. As Bernard Rougier explains, "they put an end to Iranian tutelage for reasons of sectarian incompatibility and reoriented the group's operations far from the Lebanese-Israeli border," while "stamping it with a salafist character it did not originally have." [13] Toward this end, in 1994 Asbat al-Ansar invited Dai al-Islam al-Shahal's charitable group, Jam'iyyat al-Hidaya wal-Ihsan (Association for Guidance and Charity), to teach theology in the camp.

The following year, in an apparent bid to attract broader Sunni support in Lebanon, Asbat al-Ansar assassinated Ahbash leader Nizar al-Halabi. Although there is no evidence that Salafi leaders in Tripoli were involved , this hardly mattered in view of their constant denunciations of the Ahbash and visible association with Asbat. In the weeks that followed, the Lebanese authorities arrested scores of Sunni fundamentalists in north Lebanon on charges of plotting terrorist attacks (most of them subsequently released after robust interrogation), banned Shahal's charity, and charged eight Salafis (including two members of the Shahal family) with publishing seditious material.[14]

This heavy-handed response culminated in the gruesome public execution of Halabi's assassins in 1997. It did not, however, result in any attempt by the authorities to apprehend Abu Muhjen or other indicted Asbat members residing in Ain al-Hilweh. Although the terms of the 1969 Cairo Agreement grant Palestinians in Lebanon the right to maintain security in their camps, the main reason why no incursion took place after this and subsequent Asbat terror attacks was that Damascus would not allow it. These "islands of insecurity" served as part of the justification for Syria's occupation of Lebanon (for much the same reason, the Lebanese authorities were not allowed to arrest former Hezbollah Secretary-General Subhi Tufaili when his militia killed Lebanese soldiers in a 1998 gun battle).

Although officials in Beirut accused Asbat of seeking to establish an Islamic state, it clearly never entertained such ambitions. Asbat focused its resources on consolidating its enclaves in Ain al-Hilweh against encroachments by Fatah and training militants to fight abroad (mostly in Chechnya). Apart from its murder of four Lebanese judges in 1999 (presumably in retaliation for the execution of Halabi's assassins), the closest it came to attacking the Lebanese state was shooting a policeman who tried to obstruct its January 2000 rocket attack on the Russian embassy. Asbat militants also carried out small-scale bombings of churches and bars, but most of these attacks caused only material damage and did not pose a threat to the state (if anything, they legitimized official claims about the dangers of sectarian violence if Syrian troops depart). Had it been otherwise, the Syrians would never have tolerated their existence.

Asbat's "success" inspired Lebanese Salafis to follow its example. In 1998, a Lebanese veteran of the Afghan war Bassam Ahmad al-Kanj (aka Abu Aisha), arrived in Tripoli and began recruiting disaffected Lebanese (and some non-Lebanese Arab) Sunnis into a guerrilla force in the mountainous Dinniyeh region east of the city. This the Syrians could not allow. On New Year's Eve 1999, the militants ambushed a Lebanese army patrol that had been sent to make arrests, touching off six days of fighting that left 11 soldiers and 20 rebels dead. Around 15 of the besieged militants managed to escape by boat and take refuge in Ain al-Hilweh.

Although Lebanese officials accused the Dinniyeh militants of trying to establish an Islamic state, the militants were clearly training to go abroad and fight for Islam. The crackdown simply reflected Syria's refusal to allow an armed Sunni Islamist presence to develop outside of the refugee camps (where the comings and goings of Salafi-jihadists can be closely monitored), irrespective of its intent. Those who crossed this line disappeared into a murky extra-judicial underworld of Syria's making, one in which Islamists were held without trial for years on end or brought before military tribunals that routinely dismiss allegations of routine torture by Lebanese security forces.[15] Dai al-Islam al-Shahal went into hiding after coming under indictment.[16]

Inside Ain al-Hilweh, the Salafi-jihadist current continued to grow in strength, fueled by an influx of new external funding after the 9/11 attacks. Initially, Asbat relied on donations funneled through Salafi charities in the camp affiliated with the imam of Al-Nour mosque in Ain al-Hilweh, Jamal Khattab, or transported directly by Al-Qaeda couriers.[17] Later, it began receiving money wired by supporters abroad (a simple process due to Lebanon bank secrecy laws and poor record of investigating terrorist financing).[18] In its eagerness to draw support from the global jihadist movement, Asbat began targeting Americans in Lebanon. In addition to several bombing attacks on American commercial franchises, it is alleged to have been behind the killing of an American missionary in 2002 and a failed plot to assassinate US ambassador Vincent Battle the following year.

For all of its audacious terror attacks, Asbat recognized the need for a minimal accommodation with the Lebanese authorities. In July 2002, amid mounting Lebanese public pressure for a military incursion into the camp, Asbat apprehended and turned over a Dinniyeh militant who fled into the camp after killing three plainclothes Lebanese military intelligence officers who tried to arrest him. This controversial decision led a faction of Asbat, headed by Abdullah Shreidi (the son of Hisham Shreidi), to break away and operate independently as Asbat al-Nour (which eventually dissolved after he was killed the following year). Another Salafi-jihadist faction, calling itself Jama'at al-Nour, emerged under the leadership of Ahmad al-Miqati and other Dinniyeh militants in the camp.

The Salafi-jihadists set aside their differences following the US-led ouster of Saddam Hussein in 2003 and focused on sending operatives to fight in Iraq. Since the Syrians were anxious to undermine the American presence in Iraq, the Lebanese authorities turned a blind eye to Islamist recruitment outside of Ain al-Hilweh. Many scores of Lebanese Sunnis went to Iraq,[19] a few playing important leadership roles in the Arab jihadist wing of the insurgency.[20] If the tally displayed on banners plastered throughout Tripoli is reasonably accurate, the Lebanese Sunni community's per capita contribution of "martyrs" rivals that of the Saudis.[21] Lebanon also became a critical conduit for non-Lebanese Arab (particularly Saudi) jihadists traveling to Iraq and everywhere else under the sun. Two members of the Algerian terrorist group Salafist Group for Call and Combat (GSPC) arrested by French police in 2005 were found to have received explosives training at a camp near Tripoli.[22]

The participation of many Lebanese Sunni Islamists in Iraq paved the way for the emergence in Lebanon of Salafi-jihadist networks that adhere to the zealous takfirism (branding other Muslims as unbelievers) espoused by the late Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq. In 2004, dissident Asbat members and Dinniyeh militants[23] formed a new movement calling itself Jund al-Sham (Soldiers of the Levant),[24] a name previously used by Zarqawi's followers before he arrived in Iraq. In a series of public statements, Jund al-Sham declared Shiites and Christians to be "infidels."[25] So long as takfiris could infiltrate Iraq and kill both by the thousands, however, Lebanese "infidels" faced little threat.

In September 2004, the Lebanese authorities carried out a wave of arrests in the predominantly Sunni town of Majdal Anjar in the Beqaa (a logistical hub of jihadists going to Iraq through Syria), claiming to have uncovered imminent terror attacks against the embassy of Italy and other Western targets in Lebanon. However, most Lebanese Sunnis suspected that the alleged plots were fabricated by Damascus to deflect American pressure (the UN Security Council had just passed Resolution 1559 calling for a Syrian withdrawal). When the 35-year-old alleged mastermind of the plot died of "heart failure" in custody, thousands of Sunnis protested in the streets of Majdal Anjar.[26]

As Lebanese Salafis fumed over the detentions, the assassination of Hariri in February 2005 set in motion a chain of events that granted them their heart's desire. The departure of Syrian forces from Lebanon in April gave Islamists unmitigated freedom to participate in public life for the first time in decades and to renegotiate their relationships with the governing elite from a position of strength - at a time when popular disillusionment with secular politicians was at a peak.

After the Syrian Withdrawal

As Lebanon adjusted to its newfound freedom, the late Hariri's son and political successor, Saad, faced a problem in the four-round May/June 2005 parliamentary elections. The March 14 coalition, led by Hariri and Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, could only hope to win a majority of the seats against Michel Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) if it swept mixed Sunni-Christian districts of north Lebanon in the final round, where victory hinged on mobilizing high Sunni turnout (which had been very low in the first round of the elections in Beirut). With Al-Jama'a and many traditional Sunni politicians boycotting the elections, Hariri reached out to Salafi preachers for help.

Having endured relentless harassment by Syrian-backed governments years, Salafi leaders in north Lebanon suspended their traditional aversion to electoral politics and mobilized their followers to go to the polls. Sunni turnout was very high by Lebanese standards, underscoring how much credibility Al-Jama'a had lost on the street to the Salafi current. After the March 14 coalition claimed its majority, the newly-elected parliament released 26 Dinniyeh militants and seven of the Majdal Anjar detainees still awaiting trial.[27]

The amnesty was more than a reward for Salafi mobilization during the elections - it was a signal of the ruling coalition's commitment to averting conflict with militant Salafi currents. Prime Minister Fouad Siniora reaffirmed and expanded the fragile quid pro quo that had taken shape since the US invasion of Iraq - Salafi-jihadists could operate with minimal interference by the state so long as they did not carry out attacks in Lebanon or otherwise destabilize the country.

The understanding was tacit and ad hoc, but pro-March 14 media outlets alluded to it with surprising frequency (as if to remind terrorists of the terms). For example, Hariri's newspaper, Al-Mustaqbal, noted that al-Qaeda "has benefited from Lebanon as a transit point for individuals and logistics headed to Iraq or other Arab countries" and therefore "has not used Lebanon as an arena for confrontation."[28] A prominent Islamism expert sympathetic to Hariri, Al-Hayat journalist Hazim al-Amin, elaborated,

Al-Qaeda benefits from Lebanon as a human and financial transit point that does not tighten its surveillance and search measures at its airports and facilities. If Lebanon is turned into a target because of a decision by al-Qaeda, it will become an area of difficulty . . . There are some aspects of al-Qaeda's presence in Lebanon to which a blind eye is turned in a sense . . . While most of the region's countries have doubled the financial and commercial supervision of activities linked to suspected Islamic organizations, Lebanon has not adopted any such measures. Unlike many other countries, it has not imposed special procedures for the transfer of funds through it.[29]

The arrangement has proven to be quite durable, despite some violations. When a jihadist cell linked to Zarqawi launched a volley of Katyusha rockets into Israel in December 2005, the perpetrators were promptly hunted down and arrested. A few months later, another cell was arrested (on the initiative of military intelligence, which is not controlled by the coalition) for plotting to kill Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah. So long as armed Salafi-jihadists avoided such major security provocations, however, the Siniora government shied away from confrontation. It did nothing to reverse Jund al-Sham's seizure of the neighborhood of Taamir adjacent to Ain al-Hilweh in 2005. The militants finally allowed the army to deploy in Taamir only after Bahiya Hariri (Saad's aunt) paid them off in early 2007.[30]

Although the quid pro quo has a security rationale (neither the police nor the military were up to the task of confronting Salafi-jihadists), it also reflects a political logic. The stability of the ruling coalition hinges on Sunni solidarity, which in turn hinges on Salafi support for (or at least tolerance of) the Hariri family. Both have a strong interest in staving off a decline in Sunni communal power, particularly if it is to the benefit of Shiites. Moreover, in a Sunni community generally sympathetic to anti-Zionist "resistance,"[31] Salafis have the merit of being by far the least sympathetic to Hezbollah.

Of course, Hariri has done what he can to shore up Sunni solidarity through other means. He has used his formidable financial resources to build direct grassroots support in areas where Salafism is strong - largesse that may be of some concern to Salafis. The charitable arm of his Future Movement has provided subsidies and social services to poor Sunnis in many areas of the country. In addition, he has reportedly lavished money on Al-Jama'a (and, it is rumored, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood), leading many of its top leaders to publicly back the coalition. With Washington pushing the government to rein in Hezbollah, however, Salafis were the only credible Sunni Islamists who could be fully trusted not to switch sides. Not surprisingly, Hariri initially went to considerable lengths to solidify their support. The high water mark came during the uproar over a Danish newspaper's publication of cartoons lampooning the Prophet Muhammad in February 2006, when Hariri provided transportation for Sunnis in north Lebanon to attend a government-licensed demonstration (led by Shahal and others with megaphones) in Beirut.[32] The initiative backfired when the protesters went on a rampage, setting fire to a building housing the Danish embassy and vandalizing two nearby churches in full view of Internal Security Forces (ISF) riot police.

Although Hariri subsequently avoided such close public association with the Salafis, the fundamental convergence of interests underlying the partnership grew even stronger after the outbreak of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war. Hezbollah's initiation of hostilities with Israel was designed to bolster its appeal not so much among Shiites (who assume most of the risks incurred by the attacks) as among Sunnis (who assume far less risk, identify much more strongly with the Palestinian struggle, and would otherwise have strong reservations about an armed Shiite presence in Lebanon). So long as a majority or very large minority of the Sunni community opposes Hezbollah's disarmament, near unanimity among Shiites is sufficient to blunt international pressure for it.

It is no accident that Hezbollah's initial failure to respond to the massive upswing of Israeli-Palestinian violence in June 2006 led Zarqawi to issue a rambling tirade against group for "raising false banners regarding the liberation of Palestine" and "stand[ing] guard against Sunnis who want to cross the border."[33] Nasrallah may have been chomping at the bit to join the fray, but the intensification of Salafi hostility toward Hezbollah in preceding months[34] made it virtually imperative that he find a way to upstage Palestinian Islamists and re-legitimate the movement in Sunni eyes.[35]

The Rise of Fatah al-Islam

The March 14 coalition struggled to bolster Sunni unity after the Israel-Hezbollah war. The political Islamists effectively splintered, with a majority of Al-Jama'a leaders (led by Mawlawi) backing the coalition and a minority Al-Jama'a faction (led by Fathi Yakan) and Tawhid backing the Hezbollah/FPM opposition axis. Salafi support for the government became more critical than ever, widening the latitude enjoyed by Salafi-jihadist groups.

The Syrians exploited this weakness by allowing Arab jihadis to cross into Lebanon, most notably Shaker al-Absi, a Jordanian-Palestinian associate of Zarqawi best known for organizing the 2002 assassination of US diplomat Lawrence Foley in Amman. During the summer and fall of 2006, Absi quietly recruited a small force of several dozen militant Sunni Islamists and trained them at facilities made available by pro-Syrian Palestinian organizations. After operating underground for several months, however, his men apparently "went native" in late November, seizing control of three Fatah al-Intifada compounds in the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp near Tripoli and issuing a statement denouncing the "corruption and deviation" of the sclerotic Syrian proxy and the "intelligence agencies" it serves. Calling themselves a "Palestinian national liberation movement" and adopting the moniker Fatah al-Islam, they declared a holy war to liberate Palestine.[36]

While Absi presented Fatah al-Islam as an all-Palestinian movement,[37] most of the hundreds of volunteers who answered his call over the next six months were Lebanese[38] and a substantial minority were Saudis[39] and citizens of various other Arab and Islamic countries. Astonishingly, this massive expansion took place with little interference from the government.[40] Despite having been convicted in absentia for the Foley murder, Absi operated in the open, even playing host to journalists from The New York Times (which noted obliquely that "because of Lebanese politics" he was "largely shielded from the government").[41]

Although investigative journalist Seymour Hersh and others have argued that March 14 leaders encouraged the growth of Fatah al-Islam as a counterweight to Hezbollah,[42] the reality is probably more nuanced. The coalition was clearly reluctant to pay the hefty political premium of confronting a well financed and provisioned Sunni jihadist group operating within the protection of a Palestinian refugee camp. It was not until Fatah al-Islam robbed its third bank in the Tripoli area and US Assistant Secretary of State David Welch visited Beirut to press the issue in May 2007 that Siniora finally sent the ISF into action with a pre-dawn raid on a Fatah al-Islam safe house.

Siniora's failure to inform the army beforehand left Lebanese soldiers stationed outside Nahr al-Bared vulnerable to a withering reprisal hours later while most were asleep in their barracks (nine were found with their throats slit). Ironically, by horrifying the vast majority of Lebanese, the massacre not only greatly bolstered public support for the army's besiegement of camp, but also helped persuade other Salafi-jihadist networks inside and outside Lebanon to withhold their support. As Fatah al-Islam fought a grueling battle to the death, no endorsement from Al-Qaeda ever came. Even Asbat al-Ansar distanced itself (and extinguished an abortive attempt by Jund al-Sham to join the revolt).

As the army pounded Nahr al-Bared for three months, a number of terror attacks outside the camp were carried out by sleeper cells established by Fatah al-Islam or isolated jihadist networks sympathetic to its cause (most notably the June 24 bomb attack in South Lebanon that killed six UNIFIL peacekeepers). These attacks demonstrated that Fatah al-Islam had been very well connected in the militant Salafi community (even Shahal later acknowledged having met twice with Absi).[43] As the authorities began periodic raids of addresses gleaned from captured Fatah al-Islam militants, it became clearer how few were the degrees of separation.

In June, the army raided a building in the Tripoli suburb of Abu Samra, killed six militants in an intense gun battle and captured eleven. Local residents had been well aware of the armed force, which they had curiously dubbed "Al-Shahal." Shahal denied involvement, but acknowledged knowing the leader of the budding militia, Sheikh Nabil Rahim, very well. "Rahim has naturally disappeared from sight, but he never wanted this to happen," Shahal assured reporters afterwards, adding that the youths had been radicalized by arbitrary detention and torture at the hands of the security forces. "Every practicing Muslim in the North is portrayed as a violent, suicidal extremist."[44]

Shahal's remarks reveal a code of understanding among mainstream Salafis in Lebanon that embraces the formation of underground armed networks so long as they do not antagonize the authorities. The fact that several Salafi mosques in an around Tripoli offer free or heavily subsidized martial arts classes is a fairly strong hint of where the preachers stand. When interpersonal relationships so frequently blur the divide between violent terrorist networks and mainstream Salafi preachers, "missionary work" is not as innocuous as it sounds. Many of the military commanders in the Salafi-jihadist movement are former Tawhid fighters who "converted" to Salafism under their influence.[45]

Shahal's intimate association with Rahim assumed darker connotations several weeks after the raid in Abu Samra. Absi's principal lieutenant, a Lebanese by the name of Shihab al-Qudur (Abu Hurayra), snuck out of Nahr al-Bared and was killed entering Abu Samra when his motorcycle failed to stop at a roadblock. When asked by interrogators why Qudur had undertaken such a highly risky trip, his assistant (who survived) said he was going to meet with Rahim. The latter's ties to the international Al-Qaeda network also came to light.[46]

Conclusion

Even as they tacitly condone and rationalize the formation of underground Sunni militias, Shahal and other Salafi preachers continue to beam with expressions of solidarity with Hariri.[47] The alternative, according to Salafi Sheikh Omar Bakri, is "to be silent and let the Shiites overtake the Sunnis."[48] While this unswerving loyalty is an asset in building solidarity within the Sunni community, it is a liability in bridging differences with other confessions. The proliferation of armed Sunni networks and the government's tolerance of them makes Shiites less willing to contemplate disarmament.

Hariri's peculiar relationship with the Salafi current has also alienated many Lebanese Christians, who have traditionally seen Sunni Islamism as a more menacing threat than Shiite Islamism (this is why the FPM remains the country's most popular Christian political party in spite of its political alliance with Hezbollah). The widespread perception that Hariri is beholden to Salafi preachers is therefore a major liability for the government. In July 2007, after the Siniora government signed the "Children's Rights in Islam" accord (a largely symbolic "treaty" that most Muslim countries have accepted with little debate) and removed Good Friday from the list of officially recognized holidays, even Archbishop Bishara Raii flew off the handle, warning that the government is "taking Lebanon toward Islamization" and "working on dividing rather than uniting the country."[49] The fact that Absi managed to escape the siege of Nahr al-Bared is viewed with suspicion by many Christians.

Christian unease with the Hariri-Salafi partnership is further heightened by the fact that Lebanese Salafi preachers (who are ideologically averse to national distinctions among Muslims) support the naturalization of Lebanon's 350,000-400,000 Palestinian refugees. Although March 14 politicians dismiss such talk, granting citizenship to this mostly Sunni population would dramatically shift the demographic and political balance in favor of Hariri, while providing the Salafi current with easier access to a pool of prospective converts. It also so happens that American officials see naturalization of some or all of the Palestinians as critical to a final settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Notes

  [1] Members of four prominent Sunni families (Solh, Karameh, Yafi, and Salam) held the premiership in forty of the fifty-three Lebanese cabinets that served from 1943 to 1982. Samir Khalaf, Lebanon's Predicament (New York: Columbia University Press, 1987), p. 106.
  [2] Although Dar al-Fatwa administered a vast network of social institutions, politicians exerted enormous influence over it by manipulating the predominantly non-clerical electoral college that selects the Sunni grand mufti.
  [3] Most notably Ismat Murad's Harakat Lubnan al-Arabi (Arab Lebanon Movement), Kanaan Naji's Jundullah (Soldiers of God), and Khalil Akkawi's Al-Muqawama al-Shaabiyya (Popular Resistance).
  [4] The shrinking of Tripoli's Christian minority from 20% of the population before the war to 5% today was largely the result of this brief interlude. "Fighting at Nahr al-Bared splits Tripoli into two camps," The Daily Star (Beirut), 3 July 2007.
  [5] Kurt Mendenhall, "Syria's Ongoing Lebanese Adventure," Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August 1988, p. 9.
  [6] Key Sunni figures believed to have been assassinated on orders from Syria include Sheikh Subhi Saleh, deputy chairman of the Supreme Islamic Council (1986); Muhammad Shokair, political adviser to then President Amine Gemayel (1987); Grand Mufti Mufti Hassan Khalid (1989); and MP Nazim Qadri (1989).
  [7] In sharp contrast to Hezbollah, the political platform of Al-Jama'a in the 1998 municipal elections (where the absence of fixed sectarian quotas obviates the need to attract non-Muslim voters) called for banning alcohol, horse racing, and other immoralities (an effective pitch that netted one third of the seats in Sidon and Tripoli). A. Nizar Hamzeh, "Lebanon's Islamists and local politics: a new reality," Third World Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 5 (2000), pp. 739-759. Hezbollah's platform contained not a hint of Islamic influence.
  [8] Al-Arabiya TV, 13 April 2007. Translation by BBC Worldwide Monitoring.
  [9] "Fighting at Nahr al-Bared splits Tripoli into two camps," The Daily Star (Beirut), 3 July 2007.
  [10] For more on Salafis outside of north Lebanon, see Bilal Y Saab and Magnus Ranstorp, "Securing Lebanon from the Threat of Salafist Jihadism," Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, Vol. 30, No. 10, pp. 825-855, 2007.
  [11] See Dale F. Eickelman and James Piscatori, Muslim Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), p. 156.
  [12] "Lyrical liberties?," Al-Ahram Weekly, 14 - 20 October 1999; "Khalife song not an insult to Islam: Fadlallah," Agence France Presse, 4 October 1999.
  [13] Bernard Rougier, Everyday Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam among Palestinians in Lebanon, translated by Pascale Ghazaleh (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), pp. 49, 85.
  [14] "Two Moslem fundamentalist charity groups banned," Agence France Presse, 4 January 1996.
  [15] Human Rights Watch, Lebanon:_Torture and unfair trial of the Dhinniyyah detainees, 7 May 2003.
  [16] Al-Safir (Beirut), 8 February 2003.
  [17] A key figure in this regard (until his assassination in 2003, apparently by Israel) was Abdel-Sattar al-Jad (widely known as Abu Muhammad al-Masri), an Egyptian Al-Qaeda operative who arrived in the camp in the mid-1990s.
  [18] For example, a foiled plot to assassinate US ambassador Vincent Battle was allegedly financed by the Lebanese-born head of Australia's Islamic Youth Movement, Bilal Khazzal. See "The baggage of Bilal Khazal," Sydney Morning Herald (Australia), 4 June 2004. For their alleged links to Asbat al-Ansar, see "Clashes leave Fatah in poor position," The Daily Star (Beirut), 22 May 2003.
  [19] By November 2004, according to the London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat, "dozens" of Lebanese Sunnis and "tens" of Palestinians from Lebanese refugee camps were already fighting in Iraq. Lebanese killed in Iraq included two residents of Al-Qara'un (Fadi Ghaith and Omar Darwish), two from Majdal Anjar (Ali al-Khatib and Hassan Sawwan), and "several" from the predominantly Sunni cities of Sidon and Tripoli. The report also mentioned the deaths of Palestinians Muhammad Farran and the son of Ansarallah leader Jamal Suleiman. Al-Hayat (London), 8 November 2004.
  [20] One of earliest Lebanese arrivals, Mustapha Darwish Ramadan (aka Abu Muhammad al-Lubnani), was said to have been the "right-hand man of Zarqawi" until his death in a September 2004 American air strike. Al-Rai al-Aam (Kuwait), 20 September 2004. "Smoke of Iraq War 'Drifting Over Lebanon,'" The Washington Post, 12 June 2006.
  [21] The number reached 50 during the summer of 2006. "Lebanese salute their 'martyrs' in Iraq war," The Independent (London), 7 July 2006.
  [22] See Emily Hunt, "Can al-Qaeda's Lebanese Expansion Be Stopped?" PolicyWatch #1076, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 6 February 2006.
  [23] Although nominally founded by prominent preacher Muhammad Sharqiyah (aka Abu Yousef), the main decision-makers were Abu Ramiz al-Sahmarani (aka Abu-Ramiz al-Tarabulsi), a prominent Dinniyeh militant, and Imad Yassin, a former Asbat commander who had gained notoriety for instigating a shootout with Hamas in 2002.
  [24] The Arabic word al-Sham literally means "the north." In early Islamic history, it was used to refer to lands north of the Arabian peninsula, including present-day Syria, Lebanon, and Israel. Jund al-Sham is sometimes translated as "soldiers of Greater Syria."
  [25] Al-Nahar (Beirut), 26 June 2004; Al-Safir (Beirut), 14 July 2004.
  [26] Uproar over Lebanon custody death, BBC, 28 September 2004.
  [27] Beirut clashes follow Geagea amnesty, Aljazeera.net, 20 July 2005.
  [28] Al-Mustaqbal (Beirut), 8 January 2006. Translation by BBC Worldwide Monitoring.
  [29] Al-Hayat (London), 27 August 2006. Translation by BBC Worldwide Monitoring.
  [30] Michael Young, "Destruction and deceit in North Lebanon," The Daily Star (Beirut), 24 May 2007.
  [31] Graham E. Fuller, "The Hizballah-Iran Connection: Model for Sunni Resistance," The Washington Quarterly, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Winter 2006-2007), p. 147.
  [32] "The Hariri group bussed many groups in from Akkar," according to American University of Beirut professor Hilal Khashan. Quoted in "Lebanon's New War," Al-Ahram Weekly, 24-30 May 2007.
  [33] "Hezbollah, al-Qaida Mirror Islamic Split," The Associated Press, 24 June 2006.
  [34] Al-Diyar (Beirut), 13 April 2006; "Shia of Lebanon emerge from poverty to face charges of overstepping their powers," The Financial Times, 5 May 2006.
  [35] In fact, there has long been an undercurrent of tension between Hamas and Hezbollah for this very reason. Hezbollah's resumption of hostilities with Israel after the start of the Al-Aqsa Intifada led to a public rift between the two groups that lasted throughout much of 2001 (though this was partly due to Hezbollah's attempts to directly recruit Palestinian terror cells). See "The Terror Twins," Time, 30 April 2001.
  [36] Al-Safir (Beirut), 28 November 2006.
  [37] Al-Diyar (Beirut), 20 February 2007.
  [38] This was confirmed definitively by the identification of militants captured and killed in the recent violence. Of 20 Fatah al-Islam members who appeared before a military court on May 30, 2007, 19 were Lebanese. National News Agency, 30 May 2007.
  [39] Of 25 militants whose bodies had been recovered by the Lebanese authorities as of May 26, four were identified as Saudis, according to the Saudi ambassador in Lebanon. Al-Hayat (London), 27 May 2007.
  [40] Although Lebanese troops imposed a tight blockade of the camp in March, eyewitnesses in the camp said that a large shipment of weapons arrived in early May. [Al-Hayat (London), 27 May 2007.] Officials of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNWRA) later expressed astonishment that such a large influx of men and material went undetected by either the Lebanese government's surveillance of the camp or the mainstream Palestinian militias inside that liaison with the authorities. "Somebody hasn't been doing their job," UNWRA Commissioner-General Karen Koning AbuZayd told The Washington Times. [UN Agency Knew of Armed Foreigners in Lebanon Camp," The Washington Times, 24 May 2007.]
  [41] "A New Face of Jihad Vows Attacks on U.S.," The New York Times, 16 March 2007.
  [42] Seymour M. Hersh, "The Redirection: Does the new policy benefit the real enemy?" The New Yorker, 5 March 2007.
  [43] Al-Hayat (London), 22 May 2007.
  [44] "Fatah al-Islam snipers claim two Lebanese soldiers as fighting rages on," The Daily Star (Beirut), 26 June 2007.
  [45] Absi's lieutenant, Shihab al-Qadur, was a member of Tawhid who spent many years in a Syrian prison. Rahim's main lieutenant until his arrest in 2006, Bassam Hammoud, was also member of Tawhid. "He was merely a committed Muslim in those days," Salafi Sheikh Bilal Daqmaq said of Hammoud's past affiliation. Al-Hayat (London), 6 September 2007.
  [46] Hazim al-Amin, Al-Hayat (London), 6 September 2007.
  [47] "There's a relationship between ourselves and Sheikh Saad [Hariri] when it's needed," Dai al-Islam al-Shahal told The Washington Post in June 2007. "The biggest Sunni political power is Hariri. The biggest Sunni religious power are the Salafis. So it's natural." "Radical Group Pulls In Sunnis As Lebanon's Muslims Polarize," The Washington Post, 17 June 2007, p. A16.
  [48] "Fighting in Nahr al-Bared Splits Tripoli into Two Camps," The Daily Star, 3 July 2007.
  [49] Quoted in "Maronite archbishop accuses Cabinet of 'Islamizing' Lebanon," The Daily Star (Beirut), 7 July 2007.