Junud al-Makhdi

Katibat Junud al-Makhdi
كتيبة جنود المهدی
Flag of Junud al-Makhdi
Leaders	Sayfuddin al-Tatari
Dates of operation	July 2016 - present
Group(s)	Jamaat Bulgar Jaish al-Shomal al-Islami
Headquarters	Latakia Governorate, Syria
Active regions	Latakia Governorate, Syria
Ideology	Salafi Jihadism Wahabism Separatism
Size	400
Allies	Tahrir al-Sham Turkistan Islamic Party in Syria Syrian Turkmen Brigades
Opponents	Syria  Russia  United States  Iran Hezbollah
Battles and wars	Syrian Civil War 2016 Latakia offensive[1]

Katibat Junud al-Makhdi (commonly referred to as just Junud al-Makhdi) is an active armed jihadist group created by a merger of two smaller groups operating in Northern Syria, composed exclusively of Tatar and Bashkir fighters mainly from Tatarstan and Bashkortostan as well as other areas in Russia with Tatar and Bashkir populations.

History

The group was created by a merger of Jamaat Bulgar and Jaish al-Shomal al-Islam in mid-2016 (each made up of Tatar fighters from Russia). Jamaat Bulgar was initially founded in Afghanistan with its headquarters in Waziristan by an Avar from Dagestan and its fighters fought alongside the Taliban while not being formally part of it for 10 years [2][1] and became involved in the Syrian Civil War during the beginning with several fighters arriving in 2012. The second group was founded in Syria to combat the Assad regime. The leader of Jaish al-Shomal al-Islam is the current leader of the Junud al-Makhdi.[3]

The group cooperates with the Turkistan Islamic Party in Syria as well as local Syrian Turkmen Brigades in the Latakia Governorate because of linguistic similarities in the Turkic languages. The group also calls on Russian Muslims to join its ranks as well as wage war domestically, and claims to have members active in both Russia and Yemen.[4]

References

1. Caleb Weiss (11 July 2016). "Foreign jihadists advertise role in Latakia fighting". FDD's Long War Journal. Retrieved 6 August 2018.
2. Weiss, Caleb (Spring 2017). "Transformative Networks: The Case of North Caucasian and Central Asian Jihadist Networks" (PDF). Program in Arms Control & Domestic and International Security. IJOIS. 3. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2019-06-09. Retrieved 2018-03-26.
3. "The Path of Jihad from Turkestan to Syria". Syrian War Daily. 11 April 2017. Archived from the original on 27 March 2018. Retrieved 26 March 2018.
4. Joanna Paraszczuk (3 July 2016). "More Detailed Information & Interview With Newly-Formed Tatar Group Junud Al-Makhdi Whose Amir Trained in North Caucasus With Khattab". From Chechnya to Syria. Archived from the original on 4 July 2016. Retrieved 2 December 2024.