CAIR hardest hit…Thousands of former Hamas members have switched their loyalties, and now belong to a Salafi terrorist group inspired by Al-Qaeda, a Gaza terrorist told the Palestinian Authority-based Maan news agency.

The terrorist, Abu Al-Hareth, is the founder of Jund Ansar Allah, a Salafi group that has clashed with Hamas and challenges its control of Gaza. There are more than 11,000 Salafists in Gaza today, Hareth claimed, 70 percent of them former members of Hamas.

The once-Hamas, now Salafi terrorists are termed Jaljalat, he said. Jund Ansar Allah is one of the four groups comprising the Jaljalat; the others are Jund Allah, A-Taweed wa-Jihad, and the Army of Islam (Jamat Jaish al-Islam).

The Army of Islam was behind the kidnapping of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was later turned over to Hamas. It also kidnapped British journalist Alan Johnston, who was released unharmed after several weeks in captivity.

The Jaljalat is not officially linked to Al-Qaeda but is influenced by its worldview and models itself after Al-Qaeda cells in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, Hareth said. Its followers obey religious figures such as Shiekh Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi, a senior figure in Al-Qaeda’s Iraq branch.

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