INTRODUCTION

The Algerian government was left reeling with the death of Boudiaf - and Ali Kafi was soon selected as Chairman of the HCE, being acting President until the next elections, which are planned for 1994. The national government focused itself now on stabilizing the regime, as widespread protests and rebellions were increasingly brutal, with molotov cocktails being thrown at police officers that were attempting to contain them; and marches, both pro-FIS and pro-MIA, along with other pro-GIA protests, more aptly named attacks, which claimed over seventeen lives, of which only one was an innocent civilian - the GIA profusely apologized the death of the civilian by donating US$5 thousand to the family.

The government has also drafted a plan in order to sufficiently hold the storm of economic collapse as the oil stops flowing completely from over 70% of the current oil fields in Algeria. The support for Polisario also seems to stop as the land routes are cut off completely. The situation between Algeria and Polisario is growing extremely tenuous as time progresses - and the incumbent President, Ali Kafi, is growing sourer.

THE FIS

FIS was finally outlawed by the Algerian government after the death of Boudiaf - and with it, the fragmentation of FIS into the MIA and other small militant groups that were already combating the Algerian government. In stark contrast with the early 1992 membership of 2,000 men, by late November that number had swelled up to 11,000 soldiers dedicated to fight against the authority of the Armed Forces. The FIS was mostly dominated by Abbassi Madani, Anwar Haddam and others, who are leading members of the moderate Islamist ideology that currently swells up the numbers of FIS. The present problem is maintaining control of the current cadre of members that support the party; slowly but surely, they are seeing their members migrate to the GIA, and more specifically, Abou Zeid’s Qutbist-Azzamist wing of the jihadist group.

THE GIA

In the GIA, two different factions were quickly emerging, Qutbism-Azzamism Jihadism and the Jalalabad veterans; and in those two groups, a takeover had to be done as fiercely as possible, in order to expel the ones that would destabilize the movement, ascertaining authority and all the while managing to not lose momentum. All of these were massively important to making sure the GIA grew exponentially by attracting the impoverished Algerian youth, discontent with unemployment and failed Arabization policies, who, in early 1992 had a total of 400 men and by late November, had swelled up to 4,500 men.

The Qutbist-Azzamist wing was led by Abdelhamid Abou Zeid, who argued against the staunch violence promulgated by the Jalalabad veterans; in fact, during one of the most notorious meetings, the one met in Chenachene in October of 1992, Abou Zeid was quoted saying a hadith to every member of the GIA: “Kind treatment is extended even to enemies … [Islam] has nothing of the barbarism against children, women or elderly people … or the disfigurement of dead bodies.” A clear pivot against the ideals of the Jalalabadis, with their violent intents and their clear desire to commit indiscriminate murder.

Another key point of the ideological basis of the Qutbist-Azzamist faction comes from the vast criticism of Algeria’s current leadership and jurisprudence, based on laws imposed by infidels; and the criminals of Algeria - like the ones imposed by Faraj on Egypt - are the taghut leaders themselves, and thus must be removed through violent jihad and popular uprisings. The ideological basis of the members of GIA were an amalgamation of Qutb, Azzam, Faraj, and other schools of thoughts that were making a severe mixture, one that would still come to reveal itself further along the road.

On the Jalalabadi faction, Mourad Si Ahmed argued that violent jihad had to be conducted across the entire apostate State and that Qutb was erroneous in his dialog that jahili societies are ignorant to their own ignorance, and that they are, in fact, taghut due to their complicity in participating in the error instead of fighting against it. They also argued that the duty of every Muslim was to participate, collectively, in Jihad so that the preservation of the Ummah may proceed as written in the Quran.