19 avril 2007

« , a déclaré le ministre, des propos rapportés par le « Quotidien d’Oran ». Et d’ajouter que « l’étude du profil » des terroristes identifiés « accrédite davantage cette thèse » des kamikazes malgré eux: la direction de l’ex-GSPC aurait ainsi instrumentalisé ses terroristes, les envoyant à la mort sans le savoir, pour ainsi mieux terrifier la population en évoquant le spectre des méthodes irakiennes d’Al-Qaïda… C’est en tout cas la version qu’Alger veut faire passer. Associated Press

Titres du rapport

I. Histoire du GSPC

Al-Qaïda et la naissance du GSPC

Trois émirs, le durcissement du radicalisme

Rapprochement du GSPC et d’Al-Qaïda

II. Intérêts d’Al-Qaïda en Afrique du Nord

Première tentative : le réseau de Mohamed Raha au Maroc

III Contribution du GSPC à Al-Qaïda

Le pipeline entre l’Afrique du nord et l’Irak

Menaces à l’encontre de l’Europe

L’Afghanistan après le Sahara

Unifier le djihad en Afrique du Nord

Derniers attentats

Conclusion

(*) Daniel Lav est chargé de recherches au MEMRI

Le rapport intégral a été publié le 7 mars 2007 en anglais (Enquête et Analyse  N° 332 de MEMRI): http://memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=archives&Area=ia&ID=IA33207

March 7, 2007 No.332

By Daniel Lav*

On January 24, 2007, with the blessing of Osama bin Laden, the Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) changed its name to The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb. Thus was cemented a union that had been announced several months previously; this union is the fruit of longstanding relations between the GSPC and Al-Qaeda and represents a further stage in the globalization of the jihad movement. Shortly after joining Al-Qaeda, the GSPC, whose operations had for the most part been limited to Algeria and the Sahara, began to attack foreign interests and to threaten attacks in Europe.

This was not Al-Qaeda’s first attempt to establish a branch in North Africa. In 2005, the Moroccan security forces exposed and captured a cell of Al-Qaeda operatives. The cell’s leaders had close relations with Abu Mus’ab Al-Zarqawi and with other top Al-Qaeda commanders. According to Moroccan and European security sources, they confessed that they were planning to establish what was to be called « The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Arab Maghreb » – nearly the same name as that eventually authorized by bin Laden for the new GSPC. The discovery of this cell delayed Al-Qaeda’s expansion plans by a year, and may also have led it to rely more directly on the GSPC.

Along with joining Al-Qaeda, the former GSPC is working on incorporating other North African terrorist groups into it, on the basis of ties developed over years of cooperation. The organization has also been instrumental in recruiting North Africans for the jihad in Iraq, where, according to the U.S. administration, North Africans make up approximately one-quarter of the foreign mujahideen. With considerable strategic depth in the Sahara and geographical proximity to Europe, Al-Qaeda’s new North African wing threatens to turn the western Mediterranean basin into a live front in the global jihad.

I. The History of the GSPC

Present at the Creation: Al-Qaeda and the Birth of the GSPC

The ultimate origins of the GSPC are the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), [1] a former political party that took to the battlefield in the civil war sparked by the 1991-92 elections and their aftermath. After splitting into several competing organizations, the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) eventually gained dominance and, at the same time, took an extremely radical turn, adopting a virulent brand of takfir ideology and slaughtering civilians by the thousands. In 1997, Hassan Hattab, then a regional commander in the GIA, broke off from the group and founded his own organization, at first unnamed and later dubbed the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC). At the same time, religious authorities close to Al-Qaeda also began to turn their backs on the GIA. This led to infighting in the ranks of the mujahideen, pitting Algerians loyal to the GIA against foreign « volunteers » in Algeria who were close to Al-Qaeda. [2] After the break became definitive, Osama bin Laden reportedly sent messengers to convey his support for Hattab and the future GSPC, and to offer material support. [3] The GIA withered away soon after, leaving the GSPC the only active jihad group fighting in Algeria.

Three Emirs, Increasing Radicalism

One of the GSPC’s goals was to regain the popular support the FIS had enjoyed in the past, which had been lost in the GIA years. The group’s first communiqué, authored by Hassan Hattab and issued on April 24, 1999, was titled « Al-Jama’a Rahma » – Community is a Blessing. The message of this communiqué was clear: Whereas the GIA declared anyone and everyone apostates, the GSPC was only concerned with fighting the government, and would try to win the support of the population. [4]

The Hassan Hattab era was characterized by relative moderation on the one hand and increasing irrelevance on the other. Once the GIA’s wild tactics were abandoned, the civil war fizzled out and it became clear that the GSPC had no chance of defeating the regime by military means. The GSPC’s local commanders grew frustrated with the direction the organization was taking, and in 2004 Hassan Hattab was deposed, though the group kept up appearances and claimed that he had stepped down.

Al-Qaeda seems to have had a hand in this development, though the degree of their involvement is unclear. The first commander to challenge Hattab was the commander of the fifth zone and the group’s number two man, Abderezzak Al-Bara. Al-Bara, who had been a soldier in the Algerian Special Forces before joining the jihad, [5] was an early defector from the GIA and was a member of the founding nucleus of the GSPC. In 2002 he hosted in his district Abu Muhammad Al-Yamani, an Al-Qaeda emissary to the region. Al-Bara broke rank and refused to present him to Hassan Hattab. In early 2003 Al-Bara moved to the ninth zone – the Sahara – and began to conduct independent operations, with at least the tacit consent of the zone’s commander, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, who is known as Al-Aouer – « the one-eyed. » It was Abderezzak Al-Bara who kidnapped the European tourists in the Sahara in 2003 – the first time a GSPC element had acted against foreign interests – and later reportedly received a ransom of several million euros from Germany in exchange for their release. He and his troops – reportedly a 60-man contingent comprising mostly Mauritanians, but including also fighters from Algeria, Niger, and Mali [6] – continued to operate in the desert, and engaged in battles with troops in northern Niger. [7] He was later captured by a rebel group in Chad, who handed him over to Libya, which in turn handed him over to Algeria.

The activities of the GSPC commanders in the Sahara seem to have been generally favored by Al-Qaeda, perhaps due to the activities’ international flavor. Mokhtar Belmokhtar is said to have been the only GSPC commander to have been recognized by Al-Qaeda prior to the union. [8] Belmokhtar is also said to have been at odds with Hassan Hattab. [9]

After Hattab, the next head of the GSPC was Nabil Sahraoui, better known as Abu Ibrahim Mustafa, who served in this position for approximately one year before being killed in an Algerian army attack on a GSPC mountain stronghold in June 2004. [10] His positions were more radical than Hattab, but failed to lead to a breakthrough on the military front; in fact, during his time, the group suffered serious setbacks, culminating in his own death in battle.

Abu Ibrahim Mustafa tried to develop closer relations with Al-Qaeda. He released a statement widely interpreted as an oath of allegiance to Osama bin Laden, but this initiative did not develop into actual contacts with him. [11] In fact, while giving his blessing to Al-Qaeda and global jihad, he nonetheless held several positions that distanced him slightly from Al-Qaeda. For example, he believed that jihad against « apostates » took precedence over jihad against « infidels, » [12] which in the GSPC context indicated that he would focus his activities on Algeria, and not on Europe. He expressed the same idea when he said that the GSPC would, in principle, be in favor of fighting outside of Algeria if it did not have its hands full on the home front. [13]

Abu Mus’ab ‘Abd Al-Wadoud, the group’s current Emir, was the successor of Abu Ibrahim Mustafa. ‘Abd Al-Wadoud, whose real name is Abdelmalek Droukdal, instituted a more militant line, and developed the group’s ties with Al-Qaeda. According to Abu Omar ‘Abd Al-Barr, a former top leader in the GSPC, the earliest contacts regarding a union were with Al-Zarqawi, and dated from 2004, almost immediately after ‘Abd Al-Wadoud became head of the group. From that time on, contacts with Al-Zarqawi were ongoing. One example was a message sent by ‘Abd Al-Wadoud to Al-Zarqawi urging him « to intimidate the French government by capturing as many as possible of the French who have come to Iraq. » [14] The Algerian daily El-Khabar cites unnamed sources in the GSPC as saying that Al-Zarqawi was in favor of establishing an « Al-Qaeda in the Land of the Arab Maghreb » with the GSPC as its nucleus. [15]

Under ‘Abd Al-Wadoud, the GSPC also began to imitate Al-Qaeda’s propaganda techniques. Most significantly, it has begun to film its operations and include them in videos distributed on the Internet, as in its two-part video « Jahim Al-Murtadin » – « The Apostates’ Hell. » This video sets the groups’ attacks, including brutal killings, to a soundtrack of jihad songs performed by a male choir; the attack sequences are interspersed with statements by Al-Qaeda commanders and footage from the GSPC training camps. All of these elements make the film virtually indistinguishable from those of jihadists in Iraq or Afghanistan.

The bilateral contacts with Al-Qaeda in Iraq were part of a more general campaign to officially join Al-Qaeda. The GSPC’s official statement announcing it was joining Al-Qaeda, which was released in late August 2006, described the development as coming « after ongoing effort and contacts that lasted close to a year. » [16] Traces of this campaign could be seen on Islamist forums favored by North African jihadists and their supporters. For instance, on June 22, 2005 a certain Taha Al-Maqdisi wrote: « When will the GSPC change its name to ‘The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Arab Maghreb’?… When, when, when?… » [17]

The GSPC’s Evolution Towards Al-Qaeda

The ideological radicalization led by ‘Abd Al-Wadoud is evident in a virulent February 2005 communiqué he authored, in which he attacked Hassan Hattab when the latter came out in favor of Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s National Reconciliation Plan, under which former terrorists who laid down their arms could receive amnesty. [18] In the communiqué, ‘Abd Al-Wadoud compared Hattab to the early Islamic apostate ‘Abdallah Bin Sa’d Bin Abi Sarh [19] and to the Afghan commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, who had fought against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. [20]

‘Abd Al-Wadoud’s holy wrath was not sparked solely by conviction; if he wanted to keep face with the global jihad movement he had to distance himself as much as possible from the disgrace of the group’s founder and first commander being willing to strike a deal with the « apostate » regime. In fact, this statement was only one part of an all-out campaign against the National Reconciliation initiative and the moderate tendency within the GSPC. Abu Omar ‘Abd Al-Barr, who, before he left the group, had served as its media director and one of its top leaders, related that shortly after Bouteflika announced the National Reconciliation initiative, it was brought for discussion to the GSPC’s 10-member leadership council (majlis al-a’yan), of which he was a member. The council decided not just to reject the reconciliation initiative, but also to eliminate any elements within the GSPC that supported it. [21] It is unclear to what extent (if any) such a violent purge took place, but the threat itself may have sufficed. According to Algerian Interior Minister Yazid Zerhouni, hundreds of former terrorists took advantage of the amnesty provisions and left the GSPC. [22] ‘Abd Al-Barr himself was one of them.

In this sense, it appears that Bouteflika’s strategy has backfired. The intention behind the reconciliation initiative was to strike at the GSPC on two fronts: While the security forces continued the military campaign, the state would open a convenient escape route, in the hope that the organization would thus be fatally weakened. In fact, the GSPC has shown that it still has sufficient manpower to continue operations; in addition, Bouteflika unwittingly helped ‘Abd Al-Wadoud purge the organization of more moderate elements. It appears that this was a major factor in Al-Qaeda’s decision to agree to unite with the GSPC.

Further evidence of the fact that the GSPC had to work hard to dispel the doubts of the Al-Qaeda leadership may be found in ‘Abd Al-Wadoud’s videotaped message (« Innana Qadimun »), released on the holiday of Eid Al-Adha in late 2006. The first segment was addressed to Osama bin Laden and aimed to reassure him of the GSPC’s dedication to jihad and loyalty to Al-Qaeda: « We assure you that the state of your soldiers and your men in the land of jihad in Algeria is going from good to better… [and that] they are steadfast in the covenant and persist in the path of jihad, despite the vast conspiracy against them… » Referring more explicitly to the National Reconciliation, he said: « Their [i.e. the government’s] stratagem has run aground on the rock of the mujahideen‘s steadfastness. » Most significantly, he gave expression to the GSPC’s total subordination to the Al-Qaeda leadership: « Use us to strike wherever you will, and you will never find in us anything but compliance and obedience. » The emphasis placed on these points indicates that they had in the past been subjects of concern for Al-Qaeda.

II. Al-Qaeda’s Interest in North Africa

The Initial Attempt: The Mohamed Raha Network in Morocco

As early as 2005, there were orders from Osama bin Laden to have the GSPC swear allegiance to Al-Qaeda and to take part in the establishment of Al-Qaeda in North Africa; what is not clear is whether it had already been decided to make it the leader of the new Al-Qaeda branch. Details of these contacts were revealed in the course of the trial of a Moroccan terror cell with intimate ties to Al-Qaeda, whose members were arrested in Casablanca in 2005. The details of the affair, as revealed in the trial, indicate that the Moroccan network of 2005 was a direct prelude to the establishment of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in 2006.

The fullest account of the affair was published in the London daily Al-Hayat. According to the paper, the central figures in the Moroccan network were Khaled Azik and Mohamed Raha, both Moroccans with Belgian citizenship; 16 others were arrested together with them. They acknowledged that they were planning to establish an organization to be called « The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Arab Maghreb, » in the framework of the GSPC. (This name is nearly identical to that eventually chosen by bin Laden.) The plan was to recruit volunteers, send them to Algeria to receive training in GSPC camps, and then send them to Syria, where they would establish a rear base from which suicide bombers would be sent into Iraq. In addition, they were to form sleeper cells in North Africa, which would await orders from Al-Qaeda to carry out attacks on security and intelligence offices, foreign and Jewish interests, and other targets.

Khaled Azik began his jihad career in a cell of the Moroccan Al-Salafiyya Al-Jihadiyya group in Agadir, where he met, among others, Hassan Al-Haski, a member of the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) later arrested in connection with the March 11, 2004 Madrid attacks. He later traveled to Syria, where he put Moroccans and Algerians in touch with Khaled Abu Basir « the Algerian, » who is considered to be the « Emir of the Al-Qaeda Organization in Europe. » Among his Al-Qaeda activities, he was sent to Istanbul to meet a Turk named Ismail, to whom he was supposed to pass on two CDs containing Al-Qaeda-related information. While in Istanbul, he met the Moroccan Mohamed Aflah, who was wanted in Spain in connection with the Madrid attacks. He put Aflah in touch with Abu Basir, and they cooperated on logistic issues related to bringing foreign jihadists into Iraq. In mid-2005, Abu Basir wanted to entrust Azik with the mission of going to Afghanistan to receive three letters from Osama bin Laden. (Ultimately, the mission was given to someone else, but the episode demonstrates that Azik enjoyed the confidence of high-level Al-Qaeda commanders). According to Azik, one of the letters dealt with « unifying the devout youth who desire jihad in the Arab Maghreb under the banner of the GSPC. » A Tunisian named Abu Ahmed was to organize them in Europe. Another of bin Laden’s letters explicitly stated that the GPSC should publicly swear allegiance to Al-Qaeda, with the goal of establishing « The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Arab Maghreb. »

Mohamed Raha, the other leader of the cell, wandered throughout Europe, Turkey, and Syria, and even undertook an abortive journey to Afghanistan. In Damascus he stayed in an apartment belonging to a Moroccan sheikh by the name of Abdelkarim, where he met Moroccans who wanted to go to Iraq – among them Khaled Azik. He was entrusted with delivering a letter from Abu Basir the Algerian, which Azik had recovered from the Internet, to Abu Mus’ab Al-Zarqawi. He apparently did not deliver this letter in the end, as he was arrested in Syria and deported to Belgium when he tried to renew his passport after someone else had already used it.

In Belgium, he was contacted by the wife of an imprisoned Moroccan Islamist who told him that there were « wives of imprisoned Islamists who were ready to carry out any kind of jihad action. » Raha informed Azik of this, and asked him to pass on the news to Abu Basir the Algerian. Raha told the woman that they would have to swear allegiance to an Emir, after receiving bin Laden’s consent. The women were interested in conducting a suicide bombing against intelligence headquarters in Holland, but Abu Basir said that « there were two individuals in Britain who were ready to carry out the operation. » A certain Samir Azouz also told Raha of a cell of 20 suicide bombers planning to attack Dutch intelligence headquarters. [23]

At least one of the women, a Belgian convert to Islam, did in fact carry out a suicide operation in Iraq in 2005. Belgian intelligence learned of this in the course of the trial of a GICM cell – a trial closely related to the Mohamed Raha case in Morocco. [24]

The basic pattern revealed by the Raha-Azik trial matches what we know of present-day relations between the Al-Qaeda leadership and the former GSPC: First, the close ties with jihadists in Syria and Iraq paved the way for cooperation between the two sides; and second, the goal of Al-Qaeda in North Africa is threefold: to unite jihadists in the region, to send terrorists to Iraq, and to carry out attacks in North Africa and Europe. The exposure of the Moroccan cell delayed Al-Qaeda’s expansion plans in the region for a year or so, and apparently also led it to open more direct channels with the GSPC.

III. The GSPC’S Contribution to Al-Qaeda

The North Africa-Iraq Pipeline

One of the GSPC’s major activities in recent years has been to enlist young North African mujahideen and send them to Iraq after they receive some basic training in GSPC camps. This serves several purposes. First, in this way, the GSPC has proven its dedication to international jihad and dispelled doubts that it is clinging to a narrow, Algeria-first agenda. Second, some of these mujahideen return to North Africa with combat experience, thus enriching the group’s terrorist capabilities. For the jihadists in North Africa and Iraq, this is a win-win proposition. The potential volunteer base for jihad in Iraq – where the fighting is widely seen as popular resistance against foreign occupation – is wider than that of the GSPC, which is fighting against fellow Algerians. Nonetheless, many North Africans seem to return from Iraq radicalized and willing to continue waging jihad in their home countries. As one Moroccan newspaper put it, « Not long ago, we used to speak of the Afghan Moroccans; now we speak of the Iraqi Moroccans. » [25]

There are indications that the number of jihadists being sent to Iraq has risen sharply since the GSPC officially joined Al-Qaeda. The Algerian daily Liberte reported that while 30 jihadists were sent from Algeria over three years, in the months of December 2006 and January 2007 alone an additional 25 were sent, most of them from the eastern city of El-Oued, on the edge of the Sahara. [26]

Reports on the dismantling of networks recruiting for Iraq appear frequently in the Algerian and Moroccan press. On February 4, 2007 a Moroccan named Mbarak El-Jaafari was arrested in Spain on suspicion of belonging to the GSPC/Al-Qaeda, and of having recruited 32 potential suicide bombers. These terrorists were sent to Iraq after having trained in GSPC camps. [27] The 26-member « Tetouan Cell, » which had connections with Al-Qaeda, the GSPC (before the name change), and the GICM, is currently on trial in Morocco for recruiting Moroccans for jihad in Iraq. [28] December 7, 2006 marked the opening in Morocco of the trial of Belhadi Msahel, a Tunisian residing in Italy who is suspected of having ties to the GSPC and Al-Qaeda, together with eight Moroccans suspected of belonging to his network. The most serious charges were membership in a terrorist organization and plotting attacks in Europe, but the network was also accused of recruiting jihadists for Iraq. [29]

The return of the « Iraqi North Africans » to their home countries is also cause for concern: In early February 2007, Moroccan security forces arrested 32 individuals believed to belong to a cell of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (ex-GSPC). A number of them had fought in Afghanistan and, more recently, in Iraq; others, still at large, are believed to have been in Syria on their way to Iraq. [30] This is a pattern of activity similar to that revealed in the 2005 Mohamed Raha trial.

Threats to Europe

In the past, the North African terror cells operating in Europe have all had ties to the GSPC, but have not been members of it. This was true of the Mohamed Raha cell; it was also true of the Mohamed Belhadi Msahel network.

Mohamed Belhadi Msahel is a Tunisian who resided in Milan and was arrested in April 2006 in Rabat, together with a group of Moroccans. The group is suspected of having plotted an attack on a church in Bologna that contains a fresco depicting the Prophet Muhammad, as well as attacks on a Milan subway station. The attacks were to be carried out on the eve of the April 9-10, 2006 elections, in imitation of the 2004 Madrid attacks. According to the Moroccan police, the group was also planning attacks in France – against a metro line, a commercial center, and the headquarters of the DST (French intelligence). The group was reported to have ties to the GSPC, and the three major figures in the network had traveled to Algeria to meet with ‘Abd Al-Wadoud. [31]

Now that the GSPC has joined Al-Qaeda, it will likely go beyond providing logistical support, and will attempt to strike at Europe itself. Such strikes will depend on operational capability and on the commands it receives from the Al-Qaeda leadership: ‘Abd Al-Wadoud has already said to bin Laden: « Strike with us where you will. » A clue as to « where you will » might be was given by Ayman Al-Zawahiri in his September 11, 2006 videotaped message in which he announced the union of the GSPC and Al-Qaeda: « Our Emir, the sheikh, the mujahid, the lion of Islam, Osama bin Laden, may Allah protect him, has assigned me to bring the good tidings to all Muslims, and to my brothers, the mujahideen, wherever they are: The Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat has joined the Al-Qaeda organization. Praise be to Allah for this blessed union. We ask Allah that it be a thorn in the throats of the American and French Crusaders and their allies, and that it be affliction, anxiety, and grief in the hearts of the apostates [i.e. the Algerian government], the traitorous sons of France. » In the same video, Ayman Al-Zawahiri called for the liberation of « any land that was once Islamic – from Al-Andalus [i.e. Muslim Spain] to Iraq. »

In another statement, in December 2006, Al-Zawahiri referred explicitly to Ceuta and Melilla, the two Spanish enclaves in northern Morocco. [32]

According to Al-Hayat, a leaked top-secret French intelligence report classified the former GSPC as the main terrorist threat to France and Europe, as it had become the locus for Al-Qaeda activity in the region. The report also cited an undated letter (apparently from prior to union) from Osama bin Laden to a GSPC member, in which the Al-Qaeda chief gave his blessing to attacks on France. According to this report, the GSPC/Al-Qaeda may also be planning to carry out a terror attack in France on the eve of the presidential elections, in an attempt to imitate the March 11, 2004 attacks in Spain, which are widely held to have led to the defeat of Jose Maria Aznar and the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq. [33] Taken together with the Msahel plan to influence the Italian elections, it appears that the attempt to influence European elections has become a strategic goal of Al-Qaeda in North Africa.

Afghanistan in the Sahara

The GSPC has an extensive history of operations in the Sahara desert.

As previously mentioned, in February-April, 2003, the GSPC (or renegade elements within the group) took dozens of European tourists hostage in the Sahara. The second major attack in the Sahara was against the Mauritanian army. In the early morning hours of June 4, 2005 the group attacked the Lemgheity military base in northeastern Mauritania, near the borders with Algeria and Mali. In a large-scale four-hour gun battle (several hundred Mauritanian soldiers were on the base, and some 150 GSPC troops participated in the attack), the group managed to take control of the base, killing 17 Mauritanian soldiers and wounding many others. After seizing weapons and military equipment, including army vehicles, the GSPC abandoned the base. [34] More recently, there have been reports of clashes between Tuareg tribesmen and the GSPC, which is said to deploy two « battalions » in northern Mali, made up largely of Mauritanians. [35]

The main danger, however, is in the use of the Sahara as a logistics base; the region’s topography and the lack of effective government control make the border regions of Algeria, Mauritania, and Mali an excellent rear base for the terrorists. The former GSPC runs mobile camps there, where members of various North African groups receive weapons and explosives training. [36] The region is also a major supply route for weapons deliveries to forces in the northern regions.

In response to these developments, the U.S. has launched the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership, which provides counterterrorism training and encourages cooperation among the nine participant countries: Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Mauritania, Mali, Chad, Niger, Nigeria, and Senegal. The latest meeting of the partnership was on February 6, 2007, in Dakar. The meeting was headed by U.S. General William Ward, who warned that the Sahel-Sahara region had become a terrorist « incubator, » playing much the same role as Afghanistan under Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. [37]

Uniting the Jihad in North Africa

Even before joining Al-Qaeda, the GSPC had developed extensive ties with other North African jihad groups, especially in Morocco. The Al-Qaeda name, though, has enhanced the GSPC’s prominence in the region. It remains to be seen whether the informal and personal ties that characterized these relations in the past will develop into fully operational links within a defined organizational hierarchy.

The former GSPC’s extensive ties with Moroccan Islamists have already been described in some detail. Other recent developments include the trial of the Moroccan group Jama’at Al-Tawhid w’Al-Jihad, which is believed to have ties to the GSPC. The commander of this organization is Hamid Marzouq, also known as Abu Al-Zubayr Al-Maghribi. The group is accused of sending a message in 2005 to Al-Zarqawi urging him to execute two Moroccan hostages, Abdelrahim Boualem and Abdelrahim Al-Muhafizi, and of planning to establish a training camp in the Atlas mountains. Members of the group are believed to be capable of manufacturing a remote-control bomb detonated by cellular phone. [38] Also, on January 19, 2007, a Moroccan court in Sale sentenced the leader of the « Sahel and Sahara Cell » to 10 years’ imprisonment. The group was accused of cooperating with the GSPC in establishing terrorist training camps in the Sahara; the other 13 members of the cell also received prison sentences. [39]

The extent of GSPC/Al-Qaeda penetration into Tunisia is less clear. In the first terrorist incident since the Djerba attacks, Tunisian security forces engaged in gunfights with a terrorist cell on December 23, 2006 and January 3, 2007, killing 12 members of the group and arresting the others. Tunisian Interior Minister Rafik Kacem, while not mentioning the GSPC by name, said that six of the terrorists had infiltrated into Tunisia from the Algerian border, smuggling weapons in with them. One of these six was reported to be a Mauritanian. Official Tunisian sources also reported that the group possessed blueprints of foreign embassies, lists of diplomats, and quantities of explosives. [40] The commander of the cell was a certain Lassad Sassi, a former security services member, who had fought in the jihad in Afghanistan and Algeria. [41] The GSPC did not issue a claim of responsibility; instead, an unknown group called « Shabab Al-Tawhid w’Al-Jihad Bi-Tunis » (« The Youth of Monotheism and Jihad in Tunisia) released a communiqué claiming that it was behind the cell. [42]

Recent Attacks

The GSPC has carried out hundreds of attacks in recent years in Algeria, mostly against security forces, but at times against other targets as well. However, two recent GSPC/Al-Qaeda attacks in Algeria are worthy of special attention, as they are the first indications of a change in the group’s pattern of operation since the union with Al-Qaeda.

On December 10, 2006, the GSPC attacked a bus transporting employees of the Brown & Root – Condor Corporation, which is linked to the U.S. construction firm Halliburton. [43] This attack signaled a new strategy of directly targeting Western interests in Algeria.

On February 13, 2007, the GSPC, which in the meantime had become The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, simultaneously exploded seven car bombs in various areas of the Kabylie region, killing six and wounding many others. This attack was clearly patterned on recent attacks in Baghdad and was meant to show a qualitative advance in the capabilities of the new branch of Al-Qaeda. The organization’s communiqué claiming responsibility asserted that it had used new remote-guidance technology for the car bombs. The invention and use of this technology had been announced two weeks previously by jihadist groups in Iraq. If there is substance to these claims, it would be an indication of the timely transfer of technology from the Middle East to Algeria. [44]

Conclusion

Never in the past has Al-Qaeda had such a solid territorial base in such proximity to Western states, and it has threatened to employ this base to attack Europe. The unification of the North African jihad groups under the banner of Al-Qaeda, the use of the Sahara for training and arms-smuggling, and the number of North African cells discovered in Europe in the past all indicate the magnitude of the threat.

In the mid- to long-term, the rise of political Islamism in North Africa may cast a pall over security cooperation among North African states and between them and the West. While the various participationist Islamist movements in North Africa often adopt moderate positions on domestic issues and take pains to distance themselves from terrorists in their own countries, they all have a radical foreign policy agenda, which, were it to influence security policy, would call into question cooperation with the West or with secularist regimes in North Africa. It is also possible that governments that are supportive of fundamentalism, or are tolerant of it, could further erode local traditions of religious moderation and spawn a substratum of armed jihadists, as occurred in Saudi Arabia in the 1980s and 90s.

Morocco’s political culture is quietly undergoing a radical transformation, with the Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD) expected to garner close to 50% of the vote in the September 7, 2007 legislative elections. [45] In the short term, not all of this popularity will translate directly into political power: For one, the sensitive ministries are controlled by the king, not by the coalition; and second, the electoral districts have recently been redrawn to give more weight to the rural vote – which will likely work to the Islamists’ disadvantage. [46] Nonetheless, once the PJD has firmly established itself as the dominant political party in the country, future structural changes may open up new opportunities for it to advance its agenda, which is supportive of jihadists in Iraq, Somalia, and basically anywhere else they fight the West or its allies. [47]

In Algeria, the fact that the Islamist MSP party takes part in the « Presidential Alliance » (the three-party governing coalition) has not hampered the fight against terrorism. However, more heavyweight Islamists from the dissolved FIS have repeatedly made attempts over the last year to reenter the political arena – for the time being without success. As in Morocco, future political reforms may possibly change this dynamic. The newly democratic Mauritania also presents an opening to political Islamists, who have recently struck a deal with presidential candidate Saleh Ould Hanena. [48] The exception to this pattern is Tunisia, where Islamists continue to be categorically excluded from the political process.

In essence, North Africa is today facing the same turning point at which our story began, when the botched 1991 elections in Algeria set off a chain of events that eventually made possible the establishment of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Today, though, circumstances have changed. The political Islamists have learned a patient and incremental approach to gaining political power, and the North African regimes have shown themselves to be more accepting of this process. [49] The flipside of this emerging nationalist-Islamist alliance is that it will likely further erode whatever popular support exists for the jihadists fighting against the governments of the region. On the other hand, the jihadists no longer truly seek popular legitimization in the local arena. The global jihad movement is an autonomous subculture, with its own norms and points of reference. It is something of a historical irony that the GSPC, whose founding rationale was to win back the support of the masses, has now become The Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, which answers not to popular sentiment in Algiers or Casablanca, but to its commanders, somewhere in the mountains of Pakistan and Afghanistan.

* Daniel Lav is a Research Fellow at MEMRI.

[1] The convention is to use the acronym of the French names of the North African groups, even for those that employ exclusively Arabic. The FIS is the Front Islamique de Salut; the GIA is the Groupe Islamique Arme; the GSPC is the Groupe Salafiste pour le Predication et le Combat; and the GICM is the Groupe Islamique Combattant Marocain.

As for proper names, this report generally follows the orthography used in the North African French-language press; i.e. « Mohamed » instead of the standard transcription « Muhammad. » Nonetheless, for the sake of convenience some forms have been altered, i.e. ‘Abd Al-Wadoud (for Abdelouadoud).

[2] El-Khabar (Algeria), January 2, 2007.

[3] http://www.alarabiya.net/Articles/2004/06/20/4501.htm, June 20, 2004.

[4] Majallat Al-Jama’a 1 (May-June 2004), p. 23.

[5] This is the origin of his nickname « Al-Bara, » from « Paratrooper » (Arabic speakers pronounce « p » as « b »). http://www.echoroukonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=4856.

[6] Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), July 3, 2005.

[7] L’expression (Algeria), October 30, 2004.

[8] Liberte (Algeria), November 26, 2006.

[9] L’Expression (Algeria), October 30, 2004.

[10] http://www.alarabiya.net/Articles/2004/06/20/4501.htm, June 20, 2004.

[11] Interview with former GSPC leader Abu Omar ‘Abd Al-Barr; El-Khabar (Algeria), September 10, 2006. However, in an « interview » in Majallat Al-Jama’a 1 (p. 17), when asked about the perception that he had sworn allegiance to bin Laden, he gave an ambiguous answer.

[12] Interview with former GSPC leader Abu Omar ‘Abd Al-Barr; El-Khabar (Algeria), Sseptember 10, 2006, pp.16-17.

[13] Majallat Al-Jama’a 1, p. 19.

[14] Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), July 3, 2005.

[15] El-Khabar (Algeria), September 12, 2006.

[16] http://www.almaqdese.net/a?i=462&PHPSESSID=50a931aff534b807a0a5348f4a5635bd.

[17]http://209.85.135.104/search?q=cache:nZ-_H91Vr1gJ:www.tajdeed.org.uk/forums/showthread.php%3Fs%3D2481416acb668c8a77c76f940755f4c5%26postid%3D141075+%22%D9%85%D8%AA%D9%89+%D8%B3%D8%AA%D8%BA%D9%8A%D8%B1+%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AC%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%B9%D8%A9+%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B3%D9%84%D9%81%D9%8A%D8%A9%22&hl=iw&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=il.

[18] In the meantime, a statement published in Hattab’s name retracted his previous support for the Reconciliation program. El-Khabar (Algeria), August 21, 2006.

[19] ‘Abdallah Bin Sa’d Abi Sarh was a companion of the Prophet Muhammad; the Prophet used to dictate to him the Koranic verses as they were revealed. ‘Abdallah later claimed that not all of the Koran was divinely revealed, and that at times he had suggested emendations which the Prophet had accepted. In Muslim tradition, this claim is considered an act of apostasy.

[20] http://www.tawhed.ws/r?i=4012&PHPSESSID=6e7cd3991ebce2b89175bbbacb81ca16.

[21] El-Khabar (Algeria), September 10, 2006.

[22] El-Watan (Algeria), August 21, 2006.

[23] Al-Hayat (London), November 29, 2005. http://www.alwatanvoice.com/arabic/news.php?go=show&id=31477.

[24] www.elaph.com, November 25, 2005. The European media has since given her name as Muriel Degauque.

[25] Al-‘Alam (Morocco), January 14, 2007. Al-‘Alam also cited U.S. intelligence services as saying that at least nine suicide bombers in Iraq came from Tetouan and its immediate vicinity. (See also « Nos kamikazes a Bagdad, » Le Journal Hebdomadaire (Morocco), November 25, 2006). Al-‘Alam also reported that over the last two years, 100 fighters of Moroccan origin have been arrested in Iraq. According to Moroccan expert Abdellah Rami, some of these Moroccan recruits pass through GSPC training camps before being sent to Iraq. Le Journal hebdomadaire (Morocco), November 25, 2006.

In late 2006, five Algerians were convicted of recruiting youth in Biskra, a traditional GSPC stronghold, for the Iraqi jihad. El-Shorouq El-Yawmi (Algeria), December 6, 2006.

[26] Liberte (Algeria), February 7, 2007.

[27] Aujourd’hui le Maroc (Morocco), February 5, 2007.

[28] Al-Hayat (London), February 16, 2007.

[29] Le Jour d’Algerie (Algeria), December 7, 2007. Msahel himself is believed to have fought in Iraq, after having received training in Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Chechnya.

[30] Aujourd’hui le Maroc (Morocco), February 16, 2007.

[31] La Repubblica (Italy), April 5, 2006.

[32] http://www.muslm.net/vb/showthread.php?t=194321.

[33] Al-Hayat (London), February 9, 2007; http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/615.htm.

[34] http://www.akhbarnouakchott.com/mapeci/Ar/446/national.htm.

[35] El-Shorouq El-Yawmi (Algeria), November 13, 2006, based on report in Le Monde. According to the Spanish daily El Periodico, the GSPC killed some 10 Tuareg in an ambush, and as a result, a Tuareg leader in Mali, Eglasse Ag Idar, declared war on the GSPC. El Periodico (Spain), November 20, 2006. The overall position of the Tuareg in Mali, however, tends toward neutrality; leaders of « The May 23 Democratic Alliance for Change, » which represents the Tuareg of the autonomy-seeking Kidal region, told the president of the World Amazigh [Berber] Congress that they were in favor of stability and peace, but had no wish to be dragged into the conflict. http://www.kabyle.com/Resistance-Touaregue-du-Mali,11840.html, February 4, 2007.

[36] El Periodico (Spain), November 20, 2006.

[37] Aujourd’hui le Maroc (Morocco), February 9, 2007.

[38] Al-Ahdath Al-Maghribiyya (Morocco), November 16, 2006. The Moroccan Jama’at Al-Tawhid w’Al-Jihad had close ties with Abu Bilal Al-Albani, former director of external relations in the GSPC, who turned himself in to the Algerian authorities (together with Abu Omar ‘Abd Al-Barr) on December 26, 2005. This Abu Bilal had close ties to Abu Basir the Algerian. Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), January 3, 2006.

[39] Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), January 21, 2007.

[40] Al-Shorouq (Tunisia), January 13, 2007.

[41] Al-Hayat (London), January 7, 2007.

[42] For their claim of responsibility, see www.muslm.net/vb/showthread.php?t=197589. The communiqué referred to the Tunisian government’s recent campaign against the Islamic head-covering; if the GSPC really was behind the group, it might have considered it convenient to create a front organization for the cell that would address an issue currently popular with large parts of the Tunisian population. The fact that the group chose the name « Al-Tawhid w’Al-Jihad, » which is the name used by Al-Zarqawi before joining Al-Qaeda, may also be a hint of an Al-Qaeda affiliation. It should also be taken into consideration that the cell’s plans were foiled, which is another disincentive to claiming responsibility. At this point in time, though, no definite link can be established between the Tunisian cell and the GSPC/Al-Qaeda.

[43] http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/144.htm, December 12, 2007.

[44] See MEMRI Islamist Websites Monitor Project No. 64 (Special Dispatch No. 1463), January 14, 2007, and http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/522.htm, February 1, 2007.

[45] « Scenario 2007: Et si le PJD prenait le pouvoir? » Tel Quel (Morocco), January 14, 2007.

[46] « Decoupage electoral: La colere du PJD, » La Gazette du Maroc (Morocco), February 12, 2007.

[47] For instance, in a December 26, 2006 communiqué, the MUR (Movement for Unity and Reform, the PJD’s parent movement), sharply denounced the offensive against the Union of the Islamic Courts in Somalia. The communiqué was published in the party organ, Al-Tajdid, on December 28, 2006. Throughout the recent fighting in Gaza, Al-Tajdid regularly used Hamas’s terminology, referring to Muhammad Dahlan and his supporters as « the putschist faction. » A few months earlier, the Palestinian diplomatic representative in Rabat publicly attacked the PJD and Al-Tajdid for their support for Hamas and their opposition to Fatah; http://www.pjd.ma/article_ar.php3?id_article=1625.

[48] Al-Tajdid (Morocco), February 18, 2007.

[49] In an interview with the Algerian weekly Al-Muhaqqiq Al-Sirri, Madani Mezrag, former commander of the AIS (Islamic Army of Salvation, the armed wing of the FIS), outlined his plans to return the FIS to the political scene. At first they will run candidates – not all of them FIS members – on an already existing ticket. Candidates will be presented in only a fraction of the electoral districts, and the sole aim of these candidates is to establish the former FIS as an accepted participant in the political process. He claimed that the regime has already given its consent to this project. Once this has been achieved, the party will try to expand its share of political power. Al-Muhaqqiq Al-Sirri (Algeria), February 17, 2007. This is a strategy patterned on the Moroccan PJD, which, having established itself as a permanent feature of Moroccan politics, will run candidates in all electoral districts for the first time this coming September.