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 Asbat al-Ansar has had a rather ineffectual history compared to many of the other groups on the State Department's list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs), yet its control of a tiny but significant piece of southern Lebanon threatens to return the country to civil war and derail the Middle East peace process.
The organization is based in the Palestinian refugee camp 'Ayn al-Hilwah, near the port town of Sidon in southern Lebanon. Comprised of about 300 militants, mostly Palestinians who operate in Lebanon, the Sunni extremist group advocates Salafism, a return to the ancient caliphate system of government under a sole leader called the Prince of Believers. The group's members believe their struggle justifies violence against civilians. They are also opposed to any peace with Israel.
Abou Mahjan, also known as Abdel Karim as-Saadi, is the leader of Asbat al-Ansar. He has been sentenced to death in absentia three times in Lebanese courts for the murder of a rival Sunni religious leader in 1996. Mahjan is closely aligned to another Sunni prelate, Sheikh Saad Shaaban, who controlled one of the most radical Islamist militias in northern Lebanon. Both groups are splinter factions of the Muslim forces that fought towards the end of the 1975-1990 civil war. Both would like to replace Lebanon's struggling power-sharing government with an Islamic state.
Since the early 1990s, Asbat al-Ansar has carried out a series of low-level attacks and bombings against domestic 'un-Islamic' targets such as churches, bars, and casinos. The group is accused of bombing a customs building and killing four judges in 1999. It has also been linked to a string of murders perpetrated against rival Palestinian and Islamist groups operating in southern Lebanon.
In 2000, now supplied with funds from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, Asbat al-Ansar began to increase the profile of its attacks. On Jan. 3, Asbat al-Ansar member Abu Kharab fired rocket-propelled grenades at the Russian embassy in Beirut in an apparent act of solidarity with Chechen rebels. He injured seven Lebanese policemen and killed one before being shot to death himself. Then, on Jan. 20, Asbat al-Ansar leaders allegedly organized and funded a failed coup near Tripoli, Lebanon that was staged by their allies, Sunni fanatic group Takfir wal-Hijra. The week-long battle pitted 150-200 rebels against 3,000 Lebanese troops and resulted in the deaths of 45 people, among them 11 soldiers and five civilians.
Asbat al-Ansar was featured in the headlines again shortly after Sept. 11, 2001. In October of that year, Jordanian and Lebanese authorities helped expose plots against U.S., British, Jordanian, and other embassies in Lebanon planned by Asbat al-Ansar. However, since then the group appears to have been preoccupied with internal 'housekeeping' issues with assassinations ordered against people both in and outside the organization who would seek to diminish its leaders' control of 'Ayn al-Hilwah and other Palestinian refugee camps.
This small amount of control is at the heart of what makes this group so troubling. The refugee camps, spread throughout Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon are home to approximately 3.8 million Palestinians who fled the Arab-Israeli wars of 1948 and 1967. In Lebanon, Arab League accords have stripped governmental jurisdiction over these camps, making them autonomous units governed by radical Islamic groups like Asbat al-Ansar, Yassir Arafat's Fatah party, and Hizbollah. Asbat al-Ansar is thus a leading authority over a crowd of disenfranchised, largely radicalized Palestinians operating under the protection of the Arab world (though not a particular state) and responsible to no one.
Since the Israeli pullout from southern Lebanon in June 2000, the Lebanese government has increased its efforts to regain control over the region. The government has increased the police presence around the refugee camps and, on occasion, entered them to make arrests. But these forays rile anti-government sentiment among the refugees, whom many Lebanese still blame for their civil war.
Further complicating matters, and affecting the delicate balance of power in the region, is the presence of approximately 25,000 Syrian troops stationed near the disputed borderland between Lebanon and Israel. Syrian officials claim the force is necessary because the Lebanese military cannot keep order in the camps without their help. The international border between Lebanon and Israel has not been officially demarcated. It is one of the terms to be decided in the framework of an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement.
It seems likely that the militants of Asbat al-Ansar will continue to act to prevent such a peace agreement from coming about. Furthermore, with a supply of funds from Osama bin Laden and other international Sunni extremist networks, and under the continued protection of the Palestinian refugee camps in southern Lebanon, Asbat al-Ansar will be difficult to eradicate.
Sources
Background Note: Lebanon, www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/5419.htm, U.S. State Deptartment.
Patterns of Global Terrorism, 2001. U.S. State Deptartment.
Robert Fisk, "Lebanon Moves to Enforce Its Will; A Standoff with a Palestinian Group's Leader Threatens War," The Independent, Jan. 12, 1996.
"Charge Sheets Link Authors of Lebanese Unrest and Embassy Shooting," Agence France Presse, Jan. 27, 2000.
Lauren Gelfand, "Portraits of Groups U.S. Links to Terror," Agence France Presse, Sept. 25, 2001.
"Palestinian Group Asbat al-Ansar Denies Links with Bin Laden," Deutsche Presse-Agentur, Sept. 25, 2001.
Jamal Halaby, "Officials: Jordan Foils Terrorist Attempts Against U.S., Other Embassies," The Associated Press, Oct. 16, 2001.
Shafika Mattar, "Thousands of Refugees Protest in Middle East Against Violence in Palestinian Territories," The Associated Press, March 8, 2002.
Tim Cornwell, "War-ravaged Lebanon a Haven for Terrorist Groups," The Scotsman, May 21, 2002.
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