The mass-media often give us the image of Chechnya as being a "Jihad land", in which the war against Islamic terrorism is led. In fact, the lack of valid information from Chechnya can be misleading and it does not actually guarantee an accurate report of the advances of Chechen Islamism: facts must be treated with caution. Nevertheless, the traditional place of Islam in the Chechen Society is important and the two wars of independence led by the Chechen resistance against Russia contributed to a radical Islam impulse.
[...] The radical Islam allows younger people to assert themselves in its name, and to go past a traditional social hierarchy judged rigid and heavy. Wahhabism which is recommended by the fundamentalists preaches a direct relationship with God, contrary to the traditional practice of Chechen Muslims who privilege ceremonies and celebrations. Therefore, when they gain the status of “freedom fighters”, youngsters can more openly criticize the social order and reshape it to their advantage. This youth which has suffered from the war is more naïve and vulnerable and therefore receptive to the “simplistic” message of the Islamists. [...]
[...] The radicalization of the discourse is also a change in strategy from the resistance compared to before the Second war: before, the language used towards the Western World mostly put forward the non-respect by Russia of the self-determination right of people, and the Human rights transgressions perpetrated by the Russian army The Jihad's speech. The Jihad rhetoric permits the connection of the Chechen resistance to other lands of Jihad, particularly Palestine; but the foreigner's Jihadist discourse sees the Chechen conflict as any other jihadist conflict instead of taking into account its specificity. [...]
[...] First, it enabled to break the Chechen isolation, at least in a symbolic way, as is was supported by Muslim countries of the area or of the Middle East. The Chechen Diaspora also played a role as some governments partly financed the resistance, especially in Jordan. This foreign support should not be overestimated, as most of the helpers were still scared of Russian retaliations. Islam has above all been a refuge value as well as a cultural mark for the population: it was mean of setting themselves apart from the Russian enemy. [...]
[...] Although there is an intensification of the Chechen resistance, we shouldn't think it concerns the whole Chechen people (Bassaev lost the 1997 presidential elections for instance): Jihadism is over-represented in the resistance in comparison to its part in the whole population. It's also true in Daghestan: when Bassaev and Khattab tried to free the area in 1999, they had to cope not only with the opposition of the Russian troops, but also with the opposition of the local people. Moreover this episode reinforced the resentment of the Chechen population against the Islamists, who were blamed them for having given the Russians an excuse to invade Chechnya again. [...]
[...] Moreover, most of those taking part in the two wars considered the fight as above all for national independence: the religious discourse integrated itself in the national discourse, but also stayed independent from it. Then, the supposed bonds between the Chechen resistance and the international Jihad are probably not as important as they claim: Chechnya is not a priority for the international Jihad, which would rather fight in Iraq or Palestine, directly against the Jews or the “crusaders”. This connection is widely exaggerated, not only by the resistance leaders but also by the Russian power, as they both find advantages in it. [...]
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