Islamist radicalisation the challenge for euro-mediterranean relations

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among Salafists in Lebanese political affairs. It also broke with a long 
tradition of aversion to politics that had been inherited from the 30 years of 
Syrian presence in Lebanon. With the assassination of Hariri in February 
2005, the Salafist movement embraced political Sunnism as a political 
ideology. Under the slogan of ‘defending ahl al-sunna’, some Salafists lifted 
the ban on engaging in politics. This interest was clearly manifested during 
the 2005 elections, when they helped Tayyar al-Mustaqbal (the dominant 
political movement among Lebanon’s Sunnis) through campaigning and 
votes to achieve a landslide victory.  
It is difficult, however, to measure the influence of the Salafists as a 
political force on the scene today. While some observers suggest that the 
strength or the weakness of any Salafist organisation should be measured 
in terms of the number of institutions it owns and the number of personnel 
it employs, others believe that the Salafists are powerful in as much as they 
mobilise the street. Hence, in times of deep polarisation and sharp sectarian 
divisions, as is the case in Lebanon today, the balance is tipped in favour of 
those Salafists who embrace an extreme hard-line discourse against 
Hizbullah and by association the Shia. There is another view that suggests 
the Salafist movement derives its significance from the crucial role it could 
play in exacerbating sectarian tensions and conflicts. This is evident in the 
statements and religious sermons of some Salafist figures, who conjure up 
the threat that the Shiites, and with them the Alawites, pose to the Sunnis.  
5.2
 
The ‘new Salafists’ 
What is significant about the 2008 MOU between Hizbullah and the 
Tripoli-based Salafist group is that it has brought into focus those Salafists 
whose discourse differs from the mainstream Salafist movement. The 
differences between the two parties – those who signed and those who 
opposed the move – are old ones. These clearly surfaced during the 
meeting convened by the Mufti of Tripoli, Sheikh Malik Shaar, in mid-July 
at the Islamic Sunni Centre. This meeting brought together 50 Salafist 
personalities, among whom were the previously mentioned Hassan al-
Shahal and Safwan Al-Zo’abi, the latter being one of the architects of the 
agreement with Hizbullah. Absent from the meeting was Dai al-Islam al-
Shahal, a representative of ‘official’ Salafism.  
This meeting saw the birth of what came to be dubbed in the media 
as the ‘new Salafists’, a term coined to refer to those Salafists who have 
adopted a discourse different from the conventional one. They have 

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championed dialogue with Hizbullah, refused to be party to sectarian-
inspired conflict with the Shia and refused to be subservient to either the 
political establishment (Tayyar al-Mustaqbal) or the religious establishment 
(Dar al-Fatwa). In this sense, the initiative with Hizbullah can be seen as the 
outcome of this new Salafist discourse. The new Salafists claim to represent 
most Salafists in the north. The main association leading this new current 
among Salafists gets its funding from Kuwait, as opposed to the rest of the 
Salafist associations, which obtain their funding from Saudi Arabia and the 
United Arab Emirates. Its charity projects are spread across every village in 
the miserable north.  
Underlining the divergences between these new Salafist forces and 
other Salafist groups, the former have opted for the following approaches: 
a)
 
They have offered a discourse about Salafism that differs from that prevailing 
among Muslims and the Lebanese. In this respect, as Zo’abi declared, the 
meeting and the dialogue with Hizbullah are intended to show the 
“true moderate face of Salafism”. Zo’abi denounces some Salafist 
groups that are interested in “fomenting tension and intimidating 
others”
12
 – an allusion to the alliance between Dai al-Islam al-Shahal 
and the Future Movement.  
b)
 
They have refused to be used as a scarecrow to frighten the Shiites, as one of 
Tripoli’s Islamists put it. Nor does this Salafist faction want to be 
implicated in a battle against the Shia to the benefit of Tayyar al-
Mustaqbal, which many Salafists consider a secular movement. 
According to Zo’abi, “[p]eople viewed Salafists as backward and 
barbarians…we wanted to tell them that we are human beings, we 
want to dialogue, we recognise the other. We have proven that we are 
by far more moderate than many political parties described as 
such.”
13
 
5.3
 
A reformist Salafist: A voice in the wilderness 
Sheikh Muhammad Al-Khoder represents a group of Salafist figures who 
are leading a reformist movement. He formed the Lebanese Islamic Forum 
for Dialogue and Dawah. Being critical of the state of Islamist movements 
                                                      
12
 Author interview in Beirut, September 2008. 
13
 Ibid. 

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in Lebanon today, Khoder believes the forum is an attempt to search for 
common ground on which to found a common Islamic project/vision. 
Khoder considers the traditional Salafists to be out of touch with reality. 
Although it has a wider following among the young, the movement has 
nonetheless failed to articulate a political project. Khoder explains that 
“Islamist activists – Salafists in particular – lack both a leadership and a 
vision for political and social change”.
14
  
Khoder has articulated what can be described as a reformist vision. It 
is a view that accepts ‘the other’. His is a Salafism that adapts itself to a 
multi-confessional society such as that of Lebanon. The challenges facing 
Khoder and his supporters include how to change the perceptions and 
views of their followers – mostly young men – who have been fed a rigid 
religious discourse. “We want to move our young men from ideas of 
extremism and we are receiving a positive response to that,” he said. The 
real challenge, however, is the internal schism within the Salafist 
movement itself. This schism has been exacerbated by the position adopted 
by the traditional Salafist leaders, who block any initiatives for change and 
reform. “There are attempts to project us as undermining the Salafist 
traditions [and as having] given up our principles and therefore not 
representing the Salafist movement.”
15
 
His views on relations with the other sect of Islam make him part 
company with his traditional Salafist counterparts. While he acknowledges 
the doctrinal differences with the Shia, he insists that the Salafist ulema 
[scholars] have not called the Shia apostates. It is not their approach to 
exclude the Shia altogether. The conflict in Lebanon is not a sectarian one, 
he believes. It has a regional edge to it. The biggest threat according to 
Khoder is the US–Israeli hegemony: “It is the new Middle East Project 
which aims to change the identity and culture of the region that remains 
the biggest threat to us.”
16
 Accordingly, Khoder takes the same position as 
Hizbullah, a fact that he acknowledges yet is hesitant to go public with for 
fear of being undermined by other more traditional Salafists.  
                                                      
14
 Derived from an author interview in Tripoli in September 2007 for O. Abdel-
Latif,  Lebanon’s Sunni Islamists: A Growing Force, Carnegie Paper No. 6, Carnegie 
Endowment for International Peace, Washington, D.C., January 2008. 
15
 Ibid. 
16
 Ibid. 

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