Salafism and salafi movements in Syria

Many different schools of thought have emerged within Islam with the spread in different geographies. One of these schools was characterized as "scientific salafiyya (İlmi Selefiyye)" and systematized by İbn Taymiyyah. This school lost its efectiveness after the death of İbn Taymiyyah. In the 18 th century a movement of salafism led by Muhammed bin Abd-al-Wahhab emerged. Salafi movement have different mindset from "scientific salafiyya (İlmi Selefiyye)". This mentality (Salafism) known as politically institutionalized and call other muslims as infidel in line with their own political interests. Especialy Saudi Arabia took advantage of this mentality in the establishment phase tried to export to other countries in the following periods/years. Therefore, it (this mentality) was called as Saudi Salafism or Wahhabism. Another movement which was emerged in the 19 th century is Neo-Salafi movements. This mentality (Neo- Salafi) pursued political purposes, such as Saudi Salafism and emphasized the need for a new understanding of religion with the necessities of the time. Salafi Saudi understanding was split up in 1980 with the adoption of Neo- Salafi understanding in the Saudi Arabia foreign policy and this paved the way for the creation of militant salafi movements. This militant salafi movements accused Saudis to stop" jihad and emerged as a salafi understanding within different structure After the start of the Arap spring revolts, political salafi movement emerged that attemp to achieve objectives through political means. However militant salafi movement has dominated in the countries experiencing civil wars. With the splash of rebellion into Syria, demonstrations were tried to be suppressed by weapon and the demonstrations have evolved into a major civil war. In the civil war process, different actors have emerged in many different structures. Some of these actors are the salafi groups. Salafi groups in Syria are İslamic front, al-Nusra and ISIS. These groups differ from each other by methodological differences rather than ideological differences. İslamic Front and al-Nusra cooperate with other opposition groups and focus exclusively on Syria. DAIS (Dawlat al-Islamiyah f'al-Iraq wa al-Sham) have adopted violence as a method and fought all non-obeying groups and have great impact on the formation of the Syrian policy of other countries by organizing attacks on other countries with as well. In this thesis, after scientific salafiyya and salafism were systematically analyzed, has been tried to explain the Role of Salafi militarism in Syria civil war.