The Impact of the Iranian Revolution in South Africa: Al-Jihad and Qibla Movements

Abstract

For Iran, an important ally of the USA against the Soviet Union, the revolution in 1979 was a breaking point in its relations with the West. At the same time, security concerns originating from Israel pushed Tehran to follow sectarian-based policies in its domestic and foreign policy by sticking to Ayatollah Khomeini's velayet-i faqih project. On the other hand, in the African policy of Iran, which has turned to South-South cooperation with the aim of breaking the economic embargoes, the politics followed in the political, economic, security and religious fields are not independent of each other. Therefore, it has become a matter of curiosity whether there are Shiite Muslims in the Republic of South Africa, the most powerful economy of the African continent. In this context, as a result of our research, we were informed about al-Jihad, which took on a Shiite character by being influenced by the Iranian revolution, and the Qibla Movement, which emerged 12 years after the revolution in question. In this study, it will be tried to look closely at these two formations and at the same time, an idea will be gained about whether the sectarian policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran have reached the southernmost part of Africa.