Salafi-Jihadists in Jordan to protest for release of prisoners Amman – Osama Al Rantissi More than 200 members of the Salafist group in Jordan organised a sit-in outside the Jordanian Prime Minister\'s headquarters to demand the release of their members in Jordanian prisons. Mohammed al-Shalabi, known as Abi Sayaf, declared jihad in Syria outside the Prime Minister’s office. He said: “The Salafist jihadist group which achieved victory was based on a creed and on the grounds that no other party or entity was able to bring. The Salafist jihadist group was able to come alive in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Chechnya, Burma, Iraq and now in Syria. We will not shy away from the Syrian regime and we will fight against it as long as it fights the Sunni congregation. We tell Bashar al-Assad to Keep his hands off the Sunni people or he will find will find herds of people from here and from all Islamic countries because Muslims and the Salafists believe in jihad. The conditions of Jihad are for the sake of Allah which will be met in Syria.”
Abi Sayaf said that the aim of holding the sit-in was not for the Salafist group or for the sake of demonstrating but it was an order made by the prophet to release those detained: “For this reason, we decided to go into the street because as long as we have brothers in prisons, we will not give up. We met with the concerned Jordanian representatives and they promised us that within 30 days, the detainees from the group will be released. Based on this, we decided to turn our sit-in from a permanent one to one hour and a half because of the promise made to release all detainees. This includes Sheikh Abu Mohamed al-Maqdesi who was imprisoned for collecting money for a poor Islamic country.”
Salafist member Iyad al-Qoneibi defended the participation of followers in Syria and Iraq to defend Muslim women’s rights that were violated by occupation forces and the regimes. In his words, he considered arresting members as an attempt to join the jihad struggle in Syria and other countries and by prosecuting them was contrary to Shariah law. He criticised the charges made by the state security court against Salafist members who were charged for carrying out acts banned by the state. This would often result in disturbing relations with foreign countries.
Al-Qoneibi accused Jordanian security bodies of humiliating Salafist members in detention. Investigations explained that members are stripped completely such as medicine.
He pointed out that the state promised many times to release the detainees but failed to fulfil their promise of releasing stream members.
Intellectual member of the Salafi group in the north Abd Al-Shahada Al-Tahawi, said: “There is the era prior to the Arab Spring and there’s an era after. Before the Arab Spring there were martial laws, arrests, and people being crushed. After the Arab Spring, the single leader era has gone.”
He called on reasonable people to release the detainees and affirmed that the aim of the sit-in is the release of all prisoners.
The sit-in was characterised by extreme organisation as the organisational committee maintained the sit-in and distributed water bottles on all participants.