Salafi jihadism

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Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab Mosque, Qatar
Theology and Influences Ahl al-Hadith Ibn Taymiyya Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya Ibn Kathir Al-Dhahabi Ibn Abd al-Hadi Ibn Muflih Muhammad Hayaat Al-Sindhi Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab Ismail Dehlavi Al-Shawkani
Founders and key figures Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab Syed Nazeer Husain Siddiq Hasan Khan Jamal al-Din Qasimi Rashid Rida Muhammad ibn Ibrahim Al ash-Sheikh Ibn Baz Al-Uthaymin Al-Albani Al-Fawzan Ibn Jibrin Zubair Ali Zai List of Salafi scholars
Notable universities Umm al-Qura University Islamic University of Madinah Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University Jamia Salafia, Faisalabad Jamia Salafia, Varanasi International Islamic University List of Salafi Islamic universities
Related ideologies Ahl-i Hadith movement Islamism Islamic fundamentalism Madkhalism Manhaj Qutbism Sahwa movement Sailaifengye Salafi jihadism Sufi-Salafi relations Hazimism Wahhabism International propagation by country/region
Associated organizations Al-Nour Party Authenticity Party People Party Takfir wal-Hijra Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant al-Qaeda
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Part of a series on
Jihadism
Practices and concepts Jihad Mujahideen Istishhad Shahid Shahidka Inghimasi Martyrdom video Beheading video Islamic terrorism Suicide attack Jihadist flag
Islamic fundamentalism Islamism Qutbism Salafism and Wahhabism International propagation Salafi jihadism
Notable jihadist organisations Taliban Pakistani Taliban Al-Qaeda Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad Al-Shabaab Ansar al-Islam in Kurdistan Ahrar al-Sham Islamic State of Iraq Islamic State Boko Haram Al-Nusra Front Hayat Tahrir al-Sham
Jihadism in Africa Boko Haram insurgency Insurgency in Cabo Delgado Insurgency in the Maghreb and Sahel
Jihadism in Asia Al-Qaeda insurgency in Yemen East Turkestan Islamic Movement Insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Moro insurgency in the Philippines Sinai insurgency South Thailand insurgency Taliban insurgency Arab mujahideen in Afghanistan
Jihadism in the West Islamic terrorism in Europe Islamic terrorism in the Balkans Islamism in the United Kingdom Jihadist extremism in the United States Foreign fighters in Bosnia Bosnian mujahideen Foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq Homegrown terrorism Jihadi tourism
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Salafi jihadism, also known as Salafi-jihadism, jihadist Salafism and revolutionary Salafism,^[1] is a religiopolitical Sunni Islamist ideology that seeks to establish a global caliphate. In a narrower sense, jihadism refers to the belief that armed confrontation with political rivals is an efficient and theologically legitimate method of socio-political change.^[2][3] The Salafist interpretation of sacred Islamic texts is "in their most literal, traditional sense",^[4] which adherents claim will bring about the return to "true Islam".^{[5][6][7][8][9]}

The original use of the term "jihadist Salafists", also spelled "Salafi-jihadi" or "Salafist jihadis",^{[5][6][7][10]} came from French political scientist Gilles Kepel.^{[11][12][13][14]} Kepel used it to refer to international volunteers of the jihad against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan who had come from around the world to fight for Islam against Marxist–Leninist forces in Afghanistan and had lost the American-Saudi funding and interest after the Soviet forces had withdrawn but wanted to continue waging jihad elsewhere.^[15] Their original jihad was against an aggressive anti-religious power (Soviet Union and its allies like the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan), attempting to take over a Muslim region (Afghanistan), and had been enthusiastically supported by large numbers of Muslims including governments. Isolated from their national and social class origins and seeking to "rationalize" their "existence and behavior",^[11] some Arab Afghan volunteers expanded the targets of their jihad to include the United States and various governments of Muslim-majority countries — whom they perceived as apostates from Islam.^[4]

Jihadist and Salafist elements of "hybrid" ideology developed by international volunteers (Arab-Afghan mujahideen) had not been joined previously because mainstream Salafis,^[5][10][16] dubbed by some Western commentators as "good Salafis",^[13] had mostly adhered to political quietism and eschewed political activities and partisan allegiances, viewing them as potentially divisive for the broader Muslim community and as a distraction from the studying and practicing of Islam.^[17] Prominent Quietist Salafi scholars have denounced doctrines of Salafi jihadism as Bid'ah ("innovation") and "heretical",^[18] strongly forbidding Muslims from participating or assisting in any armed underground activity against ruling governments.^{[Note 1][a]} Jihadist salafists often dismiss the quietist scholars as "'sheikist" traitors, portraying them as palace scholars worried about the patronage of "the oil sheiks of the Arabian peninsula" rather than pure Islam,^[4] and contend that they are not dividing the Muslim community because, in their view, the rulers of Muslim-majority countries and other self-proclaimed Muslims they attack are not actually part of the community, having deviated from Islam and become apostates or false Muslims.^[5][7][21]

Early ideologues of the movement were Arab Afghan veterans of the Afghan jihad, such as Abu Qatada al-Filistini, the naturalized Spanish Syrian Abu Musab, and Mustapha Kamel known as Abu Hamza al-Masri, among others.^[4] The jihadist ideology of Qutbism has been identified variously as the ideological foundation of the movement,^[5][22][23] a closely related Islamist ideology,^{[5][24][25][26]} or a variety of revolutionary Salafism.^[5][25] While Salafism had little presence in Europe during the 1980s, Salafi jihadists had by the mid-2000s acquired "a burgeoning presence in Europe, having attempted more than 30 terrorist attacks among E.U. countries since 2001".^[13] While many see the influence and activities of Salafi jihadists as in decline after 2000 (at least in the United States),^[27][28] others see the movement as growing in the wake of the Arab Spring, the breakdown of state control in Libya and Syria in 2014,^[29] and the U.S. retreat from Afghanistan in 2021.^[30]

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