Focus on Jihad: Hezbollah Signs Pact with Salafis

Amidst a growing world crisis, new developments in Lebanon may signal what lies ahead in the sphere of global Jihadist forces in the near future. A memorandum of understanding has been signed by Hezbollah, the main pro-Iranian organization in the region, and a number of Salafist groups outlining efforts to "confront America."

Innocent minds may question how that impacts our lives. However, events that unfold in Beirut have a direct effect on the war on terror, or to be more precise, on the Jihadist war on democracies. Here is why:

The Two Trees

In my last three books (the "Future Jihad Trilogy") I depicted the world web of Jihadism as two large trees. The Salafist tree, emanating from radical Sunni circles and encompassing mainly the Wahhabis, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Deobandis, is the largest. But it has been evolving and some of its branches have mutated into layers of radicalism. Al Qaeda is one of the latest mutations, for now the most radical.

The Khomeinist tree, centered on the Iranian regime, has a single branch. It is centralized and has disciplined extensions in the region, mostly Hezbollah out of Lebanon.

Each "tree" has a worldview and a future Jihad to accomplish. In many realms they oppose each other and they compete for the hearts and minds of Muslims worldwide.

But despite their "brotherly enmity" their respective agendas have two goals in common: one is to oppose the rise of democracy in the region, and the second is to defeat U.S. support for that democracy.

Salafist and Khomeinist Jihadis have always claimed they reject each other's doctrines and plans. But despite their ideological bickering they have been able to find common ground -- when it suits them -- and some Jihadist Salafis have collaborated with Iran and its Syrian ally, even though most Salafis heavily criticize Khomeinism.

The Lebanon "understanding" between some Salafis and Hezbollah is the first open joint declaration between followers of Tehran's Jihadism and the followers of Salafist Jihadism. It is a "premiere" with significant consequences. ....