Resumen de Jihad e fondamentalismo in Mali: percorsi di comprensione e sviluppi futuri. Il caso della Katiba Macina
In Mali, traditional Maliki Islam has been confronted, over the last decades, by growing proselytism and activism from a hybrid form of Islam, which is inspired by Wahhabi/Salafi preachers and charities. Its main features are the return to a so-called «Islam of the origins» and a restrictive interpretation of the Sharia that refuses many of the features of contemporary social life. While this process has reshaped the Malian society as a whole, promoting widespread adoption of more conservative social and religious attitudes, it has also created a fertile ground for the Jihadist movement operating in the country. The movement, a real insurgency, now controls vast areas in the North and central regions of the country and seeks to establish a new Islamic state based on this restrictive interpretation of the Sharia. The catalyst for this development was the turmoil across the country that resulted from the chaos provoked by the Touareg rebellion of 2012. When things fell apart, these groups occupied a vacuum, forcing communities to acquiesce and accept their presence.
In the central region (the so-called inner delta of the river Niger), one of these insurgent/jihadist groups presents a strong ethnic identity and has gained consensus, if not legitimacy, by framing longstanding socio-economic and political grievances within the context of a religious discourse inspired by the aforementioned idea of Islam. So strong is its religious message, that when the Malian residents, local authorities, and NGOs have engaged the movement in dialogue, the conversation focused on issues of interpretation of Islam and Sharia. Unexpectedly, the process produced positive compromises and agreements with regard to issues such as humanitarian access to specific territories and sensitive features of communal life (primarily the role of women in society), revealing some degree of pragmatism among the militants. In the end, it showed Malian authorities and the international community that they should seek wider dialogue on religious and social matters in the region as a way to find possible paths to solve existing conflicts.
