Hezbi Islami (also Hezb-e Islami, Hezb-i-Islami, Hezbi-Islami, Hezb-e-Islami), meaning Islamic Party is an Islamist organization commonly known for fighting in the Marxist Government of Afghanistan and their close ally the Soviet Union. Founded and led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, it was established in Pakistan in 1975. It grew out of the Muslim Youth organization, an Islamist organization founded in Kabul by students and teachers at Kabul University in 1969 to combat communism in Afghanistan. Its membership was drawn from ethnic Pashtuns, and its ideology from the Muslim Brotherhood and Abul Ala Maududi's Jamaat-e-Islami [1] Hezbi Islami seeks to emulate the Ikhwan militia of Saudi Arabia and to replace the various tribal factions of Afghanistan with one unified Islamic state. This puts them at odds with the more tribe-oriented Taliban.[2]
In 1979, Mulavi Younas Khalis split with Hekmatyar and established his own Hezbi Islami, known as the Khalis faction, with its power base in Nangarhar. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's faction is referred to the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin, or HIG, and is considered a terrorist organization by Coalition Forces in Afghanistan. Neither Hezbi Islami nor Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin were on the U.S. State Department list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations from 2001 to 2006. [3] However, Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin is on the additional list called "Groups of Concern."[4]
Today, the non-violent faction of the Hezbi Islami is a registered political party in Afghanistan, led by Arghandiwal.[5]
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