DAMASCUS, Syria (North Press) – About three weeks after the death of her brother, Ahmed Jibril, Fayza Jibril, known as Miss Umm Basil, died in Damascus on July 30.
It seems that a large proportion of theSyrians were surprised by the blood relationship between Miss Fayza Jibril, one of the founders of the al-Qubaysiat organization close to the Syrian authority, with Ahmed Jibril, the leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command, which is also under the orders of Damascus, according to experts and numerous reports.
The matter was revealed only when the 87-year-old Fayza was mourned by some of her family members who posted about her death on their Facebook accounts, to also reveal that Jibril’s other sister, whose name is Amira, is the founder of the al-Qubaysiat organization in both Kuwait Banat al-Bayader and Lebanon al-Sahariyat.
An expert of the affairs of the Islamic groups, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons, especially as he lives in Syrian government-held areas said: “Whoever knows the regime of both Assads (Hafez and Bashar), knows that it leaves nothing to chance.”
“The first-degree kinship relationship between Ahmed Jibril, Fayza and Sahar Jibril, the two founders of the al-Qubaysiat organization, cannot be purely a coincidence,” he added.
Ahmed Jibril represents a card in favor of the Syrian government at the political, military and security levels inside Syria and outside to Lebanon and Palestine.
While Fayza and Sahar Jibril, the two founders of the al-Qubaysiat organization, represent a great support for the authority within the Sunni social structure in Damascus and Homs in particular, and in Lebanon, Jordan and Kuwait outside Syria, this relationship cannot be purely coincidental.
Hence, in an exclusive interview with North Press, the expert believed that Hafez al-Assad succeeded in forging strong and stable alliances with effective and influential forces on the internal Syrian scene, and their influence and impact extended outside the country, at the behest or support of him and his intelligence, as is the case with Ahmed Jibril, who remained loyal to both Assads until the moment of his death about a month ago in Damascus.
“Hafez al-Assad was able to find an influential force in the Sunni arena in both Damascus and Homs in particular, after his bloody war against the Muslim Brotherhood in the early 1980s. This soft power,” he added.
However, within a short time, this organization was able to absorb the Sunni anger that followed the massacres of Hama, and prepared the ground for a long relationship between the authority and the Sunni environment of Damascus in particular.
Al-Qubaysiat Birth
The group was founded in the late 1970s, a time that witnessed the armed clash between the Syrian authority and the Muslim Brotherhood.
According to the few references about this group, its name goes back to the group’s female sheikh, Munira al-Qubaysi (1933), who was a biology teacher in Damascus schools in 1960s, then obtained a certificate from the College of Sharia and practiced dawah and attracted many girls to it [group].
Munira al-Qubaysi was one of the students of the former Mufti of the Syrian Republic, Sheikh Ahmad Kaftaro (with a purely Sufi and Naqshbandi inclinations in particular), and she was a student of him for a long time.
The references also mention that Sheikh Muhammad Saeed Ramadan al-Bouti was influential in her and her call, the Mufti gave her support, and al-Bouti gave intellectual and religious advice.
Nevertheless, al-Qubaysi was on a degree of intelligence, as she approached all Islamic preaching groups in Syria, such as the al-Fateh Institute, the ZaydGroup, and the Badr al-Din al-Hasani group, which increased her influence to the point that most of the wives of the well-known Syrian sheikhs are from al-Qubaysiat, or they have a good relationship with their females.
At community-level, the Sufi Islamic groups and their followers began to move with full freedom, reinforced by government support, positions of authority, and the wide dissemination of their books, which prevented rebellion against the ruler, even if he was unjust. “This is point of the reasons of the strong relationship and the embrace that the group enjoyed from the Syria government,” the expert noted.
The expert states that in Damascus specifically, some private schools run by this group began to emerge and spread, whose goal was to limit the spread of political Islam movements and to dominate the society by presenting religion as a solution isolated from any political aspects and portraying religion as it is a set of obligations and worship, in other words as an outlet for religious Syrians to practice their beliefs and worship away from any interference in the political affairs of the country.
The group from inside
Al-Qubaysiat is of a structural and hierarchical nature, as the title “Hajja” is seen as a high rank in the group. It is granted to girls according to the age, seniority, and the scientific and religious level.
Ostensibly, the group’s work is limited to dawa, dhikrs, teaching reciting and memorizing the Qur’an, and bringing the largest possible number of girls into the religious community, while not neglecting studies or the luxurious or velvet community life, according to media references and reports.
The group is home to the wealthy families with high income compared to others, as the researcher of the affairs of the Islamic groups said.
“The charismatic personality of Munira al-Qubaysi and those with her were able to establish a truly organization in a form that is very precise and hierarchical as well as mysterious,” he stated.
Among the most famous women in the first ranks are the two sisters of Ahmed Jibril, Amira, who has a leading role in the group’s transition to universality, and Fayza who has been active alongside Munira al-Qubaysi at home. There are other girls like Khair Juha, Mona Qwaider, Nahida Tarqaji, Fayza Tabba’, Fatima Khabbaz and Nabila Kuzbari, and Raja’ Tsabhaji and others.
The girls of the group are recognized by their semi-uniform dress which is the blue, or white scarf according to their rank. There are some girls who wear niqab and some others who wear the Shami coat.
The expert pointed out that in Damascus only (the group’s headquarters), there are 40 out of 80 schools in all Damascus neighborhoods, affiliated with Sheikha Munira al-Qubaysi. These schools have about 75,000 women (estimates dating back to 2006).
Mutual benefit
After the protests against the Assad’s rule erupted in the country and later turned into a devastating war, this movement showed an absolute loyalty to the ruling authority. In return it was given many privileges, including the freedom to work among children, adolescents and young women, where its girls established their own schools to attract girls in their own way.
The girls worked in the field of teaching, which enabled them to spread the ideology among the public intermediate and secondary school girls. The Ministry of Education became the largest gathering of women affiliated with the al-Qubaysi group.
The expert believed that the group’s influence has dramatically increased after 2011, “One of the most important goals of the authority behind containing the al-Qubaysiat is to change society from inside, as the group relies on the female element in its ideology, and therefore it targets the core of the family, to form a special Islamic case with its own philosophy and values.
Another benefit is preventing the spread of radical movements that pose a threat to the authority, such as the Muslim Brotherhood and others, according to the expert.
In turn, the group, through being close to the authorities, gets many administrative and material benefits, and it is able to license schools and groups affiliated with it without these complications, but the most important of all is that it excludes other competing Islamic groups, according to the expert.
The Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad received delegations from the group’s affiliates in January 2012. The meeting touched on the Islamic Dawa and its “bright” prospects in Syria, as the local press reported at the time.
On February 15, 2017, al-Assad received the group’s preachers within the delegation of the “Youth Religious Team” consisting of preachers, imams and female preachers from all the Syrian governorates, as stated by the Presidency of the Republic’s page on its Facebook account.