- Local Name: جماعة جند الإسلام
- Transliteration: Jama’at Jund al-Islam
- Alternatives: N/a
- Status: 2011 – Active
- Conflicts: Sinai Islamist Insurgency
The Assembly of the Soldiers of Islam [JJaI; Jama’at Jund al-Islam] is a Salafi jihadi group operating on Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. Its ideological background and objectives are similar to those of al-Qa’ida.1 The group is headed by an unidentified man known only as “Abu Ayub”.2 The JJaI probably has at least 120 fighters at its disposal, including former members of the Partisans of the Holy House [ABaM; Ansar Bait al-Maqdis].3 The group is relatively well-armed.4 In the past, the JJaI operated from Mahdia, areas south of Sheikh Zuweid and Mount Halal.5 Since the late 2010s, the group is believed be based in the village of Barth.6 The JJaI appears to be tolerated or protected by elements within the government-allied Bedouin tribal militias.7
The JJaI is an adversary of the Islamic State’s Province of Sinai [DaIWS; Dawlat al-Islamiya Wilayat Sina’a]. The group is put off by its liberal targeting policies and drive to monopolize the insurgency on the peninsula.8 It advocates more restrained tactics and wants to focus on attacking Islam’s alleged external enemies.9 Despite occasional violent confrontations and hostile rhetoric, the JJaI seems content with waiting for the defeat of the DaIWS to take over the insurgency in the Sinai.10
Historical overview
The JJaI was established in the aftermath of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution.11 Some of the group’s first members reportedly went to Libya to acquire weapons and receive training.12 On Oct. 27, 2012, the outfit published a video in which its formation was officially announced.13 In the following months, the JJaI was allegedly involved in gas pipeline bombings and several battles with Egyptian security forces.14 In May 2013, the outfit reportedly staged a small public parade to mark the death of al-Qa’ida leader Osama Bin Laden.15 On Sep. 12, 2013, the JJaI carried out a double suicide car bomb attack on the local headquarters of the intelligence services and a nearby security checkpoint in Rafah. Six soldiers were killed and seventeen others were wounded in the blasts.16 Following the attacks, the JJaI went quiet for more than a year.
The JJaI reemerged in late April 2015, when its members launched a missile towards Israel.17 The group later released a video with footage of the incident. A month later, it released a statement denouncing the hanging of several ABaM terrorists who had been condemned to death.18 On Aug. 08, 2015, the JJaI published a video with the testament of the two attackers of the September 2013 operation.19 In late October, the group released another video showing its members conducting training exercises and manning roadblocks.20
The JJaI’s increasing public profile, its refusal to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant [DaIISh; Dawlat al-Islamiya fi-Iraq wal ash-Sham] and its ties to al-Qa’ida-linked jihadis clearly bothered the DaIWS. The local DaIISh branch forced the JJaI to submit itself to arbitration before a DaIWS-affiliated Shari’a court which subsequently banned the outfit.21 The DaIWS went on to capture several JJaI operatives and confiscate many of the group’s weapons.22 By late 2015, the weakened JJaI retreated into the shadows to quietly rebuild itself.23
The JJaI reappeared about two years later after the DaIWS had suffered under the army’s offensives and confrontations with Bedouin militias.24 If felt emboldened enough to challenge the local DaIISh branch which in turn tried to thwart its rise. On Oct. 11, 2017, JJaI fighters attacked a vehicle carrying DaIWS members in retaliation for their rivals’ failed bid to infiltrate their base and seize their weapons.25 Two JJaI militants and four DaIWS operatives were killed in the confrontation. More than a month later, the JJaI released a statement in which it acknowledged the clashes. It brazenly demanded that four leaders of the DaIWS surrender and called on the rival group’s fighters to repent and defect.26 In November 2017, the JJaI exacerbated tensions with the DaIWS by denouncing its killing of truck drivers and rejecting the bloody attack on a Sufi mosque in two separate communiqués.27 In January 2018, the JJaI again reported on DaIWS attempts to infiltrate the group. It announced the killing of a DaIWS infiltrator and later released a video showing the confession of a dissident.28
In the summer of 2018, the JJaI suffered serious setbacks after it had to expel its military commander and his loyalists for their insubordination.29 The renegades went on to attack an army position, triggering a military operation against the JJaI in which its leader was allegedly killed.30 Conflict with the DaIWS again flared up in 2020. Seven JJaI members died when DaIWS fighters attacked their compound in the village of Barth on Jun. 23.31
The JJaI remains active but appears to refrain from conducting attacks in recent years. In the summer of 2018, the JJaI acknowledged having lost fourteen of its members while fighting in the Sinai since its inception.32
External Linkages
The JJaI is seen as an ally of al-Qa’ida.33 Although the outfit was never recognized as an affiliate or even acknowledged in communications by al-Qa’ida, it maintained close ties to the late Hisham Ashmawi who was a key Egyptian associate of the movement.34 Ashmawi is said to have inspired the 2017 revival of the JJaI.35 The group is also believed to have to have followed his directives during that time.
Despite its troubled relationship with the DaIWS, the JJaI was initially tolerated by the local DaIISh branch and its predecessor.36 The JJaI in turn sought to avoid conflict with the DaIWS. It claimed that the two organizations had the same goals, but different ways to achieve them.37 This approach did not last long and by late 2015 relations between the JJaI and DaIWS had become openly hostile.38
References