21 September 2008
Today in the "Religion of Peace™"

On September 21st, in 1997, jihadis killed 53 villagers in Guelb El-Kebir, a small town outside Beni Slimane in northern Algeria.  Most of the dead were women and children, whose bodies were then mutilated and burned.

The attack was committed by the Islamic Salvation Army (AIS),  in revenge for the village's support for the Armed Islamic Group (GIA).

The AIS and GIA resolved their differences as one would expect of two groups based on the peaceful teachings of the Religion of Peace™:  they used car-bombs and assassinations to kill each others' members, and wiped out entire villages for appearing to "support" one or the other.  Each side had their respective clerics writing religious fatwas to justify their mass murders.

The AIS is a salafist Sunni group whose goal is to implement sharia in Algeria.  The AIS is composed of the result of the merger of FIS (Front Islamique du Sálut), MIA (Mouvement islamique Algérien), and MEI (Movement for an Islamic State).

The GIA is a Khawarij group whose goal is to implement sharia in Algeria.  The Khawarijites are distinct from both the Sunnis and Shi'a.  The GIA was formed as a splinter group of the MIA.  In a story reminiscent of this story from the hadiths...

Ishaq:369 “Thereupon Mas’ud leapt upon Sunayna, one of the Jewish merchants with whom his family had social and commercial relations and killed him. The Muslim’s brother complained, saying, ‘Why did you kill him? You have much fat in you belly from his charity.’ Mas’ud answered, ‘By Allah, had Muhammad ordered me to murder you, my brother, I would have cut off your head.’ Wherein the brother said, ‘Any religion that can bring you to this is indeed wonderful!’ And he accepted Islam.”

...several leaders of FIS and MIA left to join the GIA, after the GIA ordered their murder.

Both the AIS and GIA were opposed by the socialist but staunchly Muslim FLN (National Liberation Front), the UGTA (General Union of Algerian Workers), OJAL (Organisation des jeunes Algériens libres), and the RCD (Rally for Culture and Democracy, a Berber group).

In 1995 the GIA killed its former FIS members for trying to take over the GIA.  In 1996, the leader of the GIA was killed by members of the Islamic League for Da'wa and Jihad.  By 1998, the Algerian government had severely weakened the GIA through a program of assassinations.  The GIA was in turn replaced by the GSPC (Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat), a group with ties to Al Qaeda.

The point of this alphabet soup of competing acronyms is not to befuddle the reader.  The point is that within Islam, there are scores of sub-sects (some based on theological differences, some based on tribal or ethnic differences) that constantly, violently, fight each other.  The point is that Muslims kill Muslims every day of the week, using religious justification.  They kill each other independent of U.S. foreign policy, and without regard for whether the nation of Israel exists or doesn't exist.  They killed each other when previous Caliphates existed, and they would continue to kill each other if they ever achieved their goal of a worldwide Caliphate and the forcible conversion of every person to Islam.

Perhaps you should put all of these into one thread.