Ansar Dine ( ʾAnṣār ad-Dīn, also transliterated Ançar Deen), meaning "helpers of the religion" (Islam)
The organization is not to be confused with the Sufism movement Ançar Dine, founded in Southern Mali in the 1990s by Chérif Ousmane Madani Haïdara, which is fundamentally opposed to militant Islamism.
Ansar Dine was active from March 2012 until March 2017, when it merged with other militant Islamist groups to form Jama'at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin.
Organization
Membership
Ansar Dine had its main base among the
Ifora tribe from the southern part of the Tuaregs' homeland. It had been linked with Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) because its leader Iyad Ag Ghaly is the cousin of AQIM commander Hamada Ag Hama.
In April 2012, Salma Belaala, a professor at Warwick University who does research on
jihadism in
North Africa said that this association was false, claiming that Ansar Dine was opposed to Al Qaeda.
Ag Ghaly was also previously associated with the 1990 Tuareg rebellion.
[ The group's members were reported to come from Mali, Algeria, and Nigeria.][
] Omar Ould Hamaha, who served as Ansar Dine's spokesman after April 2012, became the military leader of the AQIM-affiliated Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MOJWA) in August 2012.
On 24 January 2013, a faction which called itself the Islamic Movement for the Azawad split from Ansar Dine. As of January 2013, this group was led by the prominent Tuareg leader Alghabass Ag Intalla.
In March 2013, it was designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the U.S. Department of State,
Command structure
In Mopti, the Ansar Dine fighters obtained access to heavy construction equipment from fleeing construction workers and used it to build fighting positions. The fighting positions included an elaborate tunnel network and vehicular obstacles such as .
Weapons
Ansar Dine had reportedly put together at least one convoy of 100 vehicles carrying soldiers equipped with small arms.
Ideology
The group sought to impose sharia law across Mali, including the Azawad region. Witnesses had said that Ansar Dine fighters wore long beards and flew black flags with the shahada (Islamic creed) emblazoned in white.
Participation in 2012 northern Mali conflict
March 2012
On 21 March 2012, the group claimed control of Mali's vast northeast regions. The Agence France-Presse reported that Ansar Dine claimed to occupy the towns of Tinzaouaten, Tessalit, and Aguelhok, all close to the border, and that they had captured at least 110 civilian and military prisoners.
On 22 March, Mutiny Malian soldiers unhappy with Amadou Toumani Touré overthrew the Malian government in a coup d'état. Taking advantage of Malian disarray, Ansar Dine and MNLA proceeded to take the towns of Kidal, Gao, and Timbuktu within the following ten days. According to Jeremy Keenan of the School of Oriental and African Studies, Ansar Dine's military contribution was slight compared to the much larger MNLA: "What seems to happen is that when they move into a town, the MNLA take out the military base—not that there's much resistance—and Iyad Ag goes into town and puts up his flag and starts bossing everyone around about sharia law".
April 2012
On 3 April, the BBC reported that the group had started implementing Sharia law in Timbuktu.
May 2012
Ansar Dine was reportedly responsible for the burning of the tomb of the wali Sidi Mahmoud Ben Amar, a World Heritage Site, on 4 May in Timbuktu.
On 26 May, the MNLA and Ansar Dine announced a pact in which they would merge to form an Islamist state called the "Islamic Republic of Azawad".
June 2012
However, some later reports indicated that the MNLA had decided to withdraw from the pact, distancing itself from Ansar Dine.
July 2012
In the summer of 2012, members of Ansar Dine broke down the doors of the Sidi Yahya Mosque, which, according to legend, were not to be opened until the Last Days. They claimed that reverence for the site was idolatrous, but offered roughly $100 U.S. dollars to repair the mosque.
November 2012
Ansar Dine was in peace talks with Mali's neighbours Burkina Faso and Algeria.
January 2013
In late January 2013, during the French Operation Serval against the Islamist fighters in Northern Mali, a faction split off from Ansar Dine, led by Alghabass Ag Intalla(h). It called itself the Islamic Movement of Azawad (MIA) and claimed to be ready for negotiations and to reject extremism and terrorism as well as any association with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
March 2017
In March 2017, Iyad Ag Ghaly appeared in a video alongside leaders from the Saharan branch of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Al-Mourabitoun and the Macina Liberation Front, in which it was announced their groups were merging under Ag Ghaly's leadership, in an organisation called Jama'at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin.
