Baghdad, 4 April (AKI) - The first video attributed to a new Iraqi insurgent group was posted to radical Islamist internet forums on Wednesday. The three-minute film, entitled "The First Operation of Iraqi Hamas" showed the explosion of a roadside bomb in the Baghdad suburbs, as a truck supplying the US military bases passes by. The group is believed to have been formed at the end of March from a split within the 1920s Brigades, a group responsible for numerous kidnapping and suicide bombs. Some analysts believe "Iraqi Hamas" comprises militiamen linked to the Islamic party in parliament and to the local chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood. A man described as the group's representative in Jordan, Muhammad Ayash al-Kubeisi, told Al Jazeera "we fight the infidels and want the withdrawal of the Americans, but we do not consider the other Iraqis as apostates. For us, they are citizens, just as we are, and we want a dialogue with them. "We do not have any organisational link with Hamas [the militant group in the Palestinian territories] but we follow its doctrine and we take our inspiration from them" he said. "We share their vision of carrying out armed resistance and at the same time standing as candidates and being involved in politics."
Regarding the al-Qaeda network, Iraqi Hamas considers its action to be limited to the country and is not interested in taking part in a global battle against the West. In radical Islamist web forums many al-Qaeda supporters have strongly criticisied the birth of this new formation They consider it a provocation; particularly given the recent criticism by al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri, who blasted Hamas for joining a national unity government with the PA president Mahmoud Abbas, of the more moderate Fatah faction.
In recent weeks, most Iraqi Sunni guerilla groups have sided with the tribes of the restive al-Anbar province against the terrorists of al-Qaeda and the government of Nouri al-Maliki has begun negotiations to try to involve them in the political process.