Saturday, April 16, 2011

The Salafi challenge to Hamas

Before the video on YouTube, then the denial of today, always entrusted to the Internet. But then, the kidnappers and killers of Vittorio Utopia Arrigoni lurk in the galaxy Salafi or not the Gaza Strip? And 'they are likely to be, judging from early indications coming from the Hamas authorities, even if the enemies were really a lot of Vik Arrigoni.

His blog was, in fact, the only window open on the daily suffering of the Gaza Strip population. This story posted on the website had attracted many attacks, including the web (Facebook included) keeps testimony. Therefore, if there is a hand behind the tragic death of Salafi most famous pacifist and international activist in Gaza, because right extremism of Hamas has decided to raise the bar in the clash with the authorities in power in the Gaza Strip for nearly four years? It is a question that is difficult to answer, because saying 'Salafi' in Gaza means to refer to a complex and confusing galaxy is being strengthened, especially in recent years.

Accomplice, in particular, the isolation of the Gaza Strip, the Israeli blockade and Egypt, which makes that piece of land of four square kilometers a place where radicalization seems one of the few ways out. Salafis, therefore, means little in itself. The literal galaxy of Hamas and the radical right is a collection of groups of different origins, all united by dissatisfaction with a policy, that of Hamas, which they regard as a loser.

All Islamist groups in the galaxy, for example, are for the military option, the proof is the signature that many groups have put the firing of rockets into Israel. Soloists, so to speak, not adhering to the truce, in periods of calm, which in turn contracted with Israel Hamas. Soloists, in some cases, are repressed by Hamas, as happened in early March, when one of the many leaders of the Salafist galaxy was arrested for not having respected the ceasefire.

An arrest which resulted in very bad mood because it is only the latest in a long chain of repression, which began a year and a half ago. The most important operation against the Salafist, Hamas took it in August 2009, the mosque in Rafah, which became the headquarters of one of the most extreme groups, which had just decided to set up a small emirate in the south of the Strip.

Operation result: 25 dead, hundreds injured, almost as many taken to jail. Because Salafis marry the idea the military? First, because the other - the policy option - failed to break the isolation of the Strip. It is no coincidence that much of the Salafist militancy, as time passes, it is increasingly made up disappointed by Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and also from the Popular Resistance Committees.

Disappointed, and very young. A dangerous potential for a movement such as Hamas, in which the discipline has always played an important role, also because the Muqawwama Harakat Al Islamiya (Hamas in Arabic) to resist Israeli attempts to undermine the organization. Since, however, Hamas has become more government and less resistance, and that the coup against Fatah in June of 2007 (the party of the President of the Palestinian National Authority) which took full control of Gaza's crisis consensus has increased.

Especially towards the radical groups. And 'So first of all the political influence of Salafism to worry about Hamas, because the groups that offer a very narrow and literal view of Islam are now competitors. That undermine even the image of Hamas as a movement that operates 'law and order'.

Finally, the galaxy Salafi is a thorn in the side on the level of reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas. A file open for years, and that Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and his intelligence chief Omar Suleiman had kept in a water bath, just to weaken Hamas. Now things have changed in Cairo, and many more.

The case was reopened, with more spirit. The contacts are continuing, and there are many, including in Gaza, who would do anything to close it quickly. Paola Caridi

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