After fighting for the Tuareg cause, Iyad Ag-Ghali joined the jihadist struggle by establishing an affiliate of al-Qaeda in the Sahel. Az-Zallaqa
In a video broadcast by JNIM on Tuesday, Iyad Ag-Ghali criticizes the new juntas in Mali, Burkina and Niger, which have called in new “infidel allies”, Russian mercenaries.
“The confrontation has entered a new phase.” In a video broadcast on December 12, Iyad Ag-Ghali, the head of the JNIM (Islam and Muslim Support Group) in Mali, explained his goals with regard to the new situation in the Sahel. As the French army withdrew from the area, driven out by military juntas in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, the Islamist leader castigated these “treacherous forces” and their new “infidel allies,” the Russian mercenaries.
In this more than two-minute video – the first since 2017 – Iyad Ag-Ghaly, one of the main jihadist leaders in the Sahel, denounces “the massacres of the FAMA and Wagner” as well as of Captain Traoré, the head of the junta in Burkina Faso. The Islamist leader reads his press release behind his HP computer and recalls the fate of the civilians who “during this bloody time (…) found themselves between the anvil of the extremists and the hammer of the army, the apostasy and the mercenaries of Wagner “,” translated the Arabic-speaking specialist Wassim Nasr. He reiterates that the alliance with Russia will be a loser, just like the one with “infidel France,” whose presence “has led to the expansion of jihad.”
The Islamist leader ends his speech with the conflict between Israel and Hamas, which began “nine weeks ago” – which attests to the timeliness of the recording. He particularly thanks the Malian imams who rejected secularism and supported “the mujahideen of Gaza.”
Two enemies, the Islamic State and Russia
The Malian jihadist delivers this speech as more and more attacks by local forces and their Russian auxiliaries are reported in the Sahel region. The NGO Human Right Watch regularly documents mass executions, enforced disappearances of civilians, looting and torture.
After fighting for the Tuareg cause in the uprisings in northern Mali in the 1990s, Yiad Ag-Ghali joined the jihadists' fight by founding a Sharia-enforcing affiliate of al-Qaeda in the Sahel want. Since the EIGS was linked to Daesh, the JNIM was fought by French soldiers from Operations Serval and then Barkhane between 2013 and 2019, before being pushed aside by the putschist authorities of the Sahel states.
Since the withdrawal of the French soldiers, Iyad Ag-Ghlai, who was one of the main targets, has had “greater freedom of action and activity,” explains journalist Wassim Nasr on France 24 in this new speech. As part of this “new phase”. In view of the beginning of the fighting, the jihadist leader announced that he would fight not only against the rival jihadist group EIGS, but also against the Russian ally, and declared that he would open his ranks to numerous recruits.
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