{"id":1808,"date":"2014-09-15T07:20:21","date_gmt":"2014-09-15T07:20:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=1808"},"modified":"2014-09-15T07:20:21","modified_gmt":"2014-09-15T07:20:21","slug":"algerias-al-qaeda-defectors-join-is-group","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=1808","title":{"rendered":"Algeria\u2019s al-Qaeda defectors join IS group"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"nrelate_flyout_placeholder\">\n<p>A new armed group calling itself the \u2018Soldiers of the Caliphate in Algeria\u2019 has split from al-Qaeda\u2019s North African branch and sworn loyalty to the Islamic State group, fighting in Syria and Iraq.<\/p>\n<p>In a communique released on Sunday, a regional commander of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) said he broke away from the group, accusing it of \u201cdeviating from the true path.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gouri Abdelmalek, nom de guerre Khaled Abu Suleimane, claimed leadership of the splinter group, and was joined by a AQIM commander of an eastern region in Algeria.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou have in the Islamic Maghreb men if you order them they will obey you,\u201d Suleimane said in reference to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the self-professed \u2018caliph\u2019 of IS.<\/p>\n<p>Algerian officials did not immediately comment on the statement.<\/p>\n<p>The \u2018Soldiers of the Caliphate in Algeria\u2019 is the latest group to break with AQIM and side with Baghdadi, after veteran Algerian jihadist, Mokhtar Belmokhtar\u2019s group, \u201cThose who sign in Blood\u201d pledged allegiance to IS.<\/p>\n<p>But experts say the announcement will not have a major operational impact on the ground as AQIM has been focused on the Sahel region rather than OPEC member Algeria.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe new group will try hard to make some noise, but it will be very difficult to execute big terrorist actions as Algerian security forces have knocked out most of the armed groups in Algeria,\u201d Security analyst Anis Rahmani told the Reuters news agency.<\/p>\n<p>AQIM is a mostly Algerian and Mauritanian group that has been present in northern Mali since 2003, and a source of thousands of young fighters travelling to Syria and Iraq.<\/p>\n<p>Tuaregs and Arabs joined AQIM in Mali, and youths from Senegal, Niger and other countries have also reportedly joined the group\u2019s fight.<\/p>\n<p>Baghdadi, who has declared himself the \u201cleader of Muslims everywhere\u201d, fell out with al-Qaeda in 2013 over his decision to expand into Syria, where his followers carried out beheadings, crucifixions, and mass executions.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new armed group calling itself the \u2018Soldiers of the Caliphate in Algeria\u2019 has split from al-Qaeda\u2019s North African branch and sworn loyalty to the Islamic State group, fighting in Syria and Iraq. In a communique released on Sunday, a regional commander of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) said he broke away from the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-international-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-ta","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1808"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1809,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1808\/revisions\/1809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}