Jihad against North Africa : The Arab Muslim aggression against the Berbers of Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco
The Berbers were the ancient indigenous people of North Africa west of Egypt. They were made up of many tribes, but they managed to maintain their culture, their Hamitic languages, and considerable military power during successive invasions of their land. In ancient times, North Africa had been colonized by the Phoenicians (who became the Carthaginians), they were followed by the Romans, the Vandals (one of the Germanic tribes that destroyed the Roman Empire), the Byzantines, and finally the Arabs. Other foreigners, notably Greeks and Jews, also ruled parts of ancient North Africa at different times.

Kahina – the brave Berber Princess held off the Arab hordes for twenty years
At the time of the Arab aggression, the Berbers were ruled by a Queen of Jewish descent. Her name was Kahina (also spelt Cahina). Kahina's name is also given variously as Dahiyah, Dahia, or Dhabba (Women in World History, v.8, p. 414.) The title Kahina meant Prophetess. The Encyclopedia Judaica (v. 10, p. 686) says that the term is derived from the old Hebrew "Kahin" ("soothsayer") while some other sources say that "Kahina" was derived from the Hebrew root of the modern Jewish term "Cohen".
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In the 7th century, the Berbers lived in uneasy peace with the Byzantines, who ruled the coastal cities of North Africa, after defeating the Vandals a century before. The ancient city of Carthage was the Byzantine capital in Africa. Some Berbers were Christians (with a notable tendency towards heresy), some were Jewish, and some adhered to their ancient polytheist religion. Before the end of the century the region faced a new calamity, the traditional rivals of the Berbers, the Byzantines were defeated and driven from Africa by the Muslim Arab hordes who poured out of the Arabian Peninsula and flattened everything in their wake.
The Arab invasion of Egypt that had started in 639 had crossed Libya by 642 and by 643, the Arabs hordes started ravaging Berber lands. In the Arab Muslim invaders, the Berbers who had crossed swords with the Vandals Visigoths, Romans, Greeks faced a foe with a ruthlessness, that the Berbers had never encountered before. Surrender to this invader called for the surrender of not just sovereignty, but also of the ancient Berber religion, language and identity.
At the time of the death of the false Prophet Mohammed in 632, Muslims ruled only in Arabia. But within ten years the Arab Muslims had achieved one of the most spectacular conquests in history. They conquered Palestine (635-636), Syria (638-640), and Egypt (639-642) from the Byzantines and first Iraq (635-637) and then Persia itself (637-642) from the Persians. Wherever they went, most of the people were forced to become Muslims and Arabic-speakers. The converted people forgot their language and identity and started considering themselves to be Arabs. This happened with Palestine (today’s Israel), Syria, Levant (today’s Jordan), Egypt, Libya, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco and also partly with Sudan, and Somalia. This trend was reversed only in Persia, where the people, in spite of the brutal Arab conquest, re-asserted their pre-Islamic Persian language after three hundred years of Arab tyranny. But everywhere else the Arab conquest, Arabized the Middle East and North Africa permanently.
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A typical Berber lady. The Berbers do not traditionally keep their women in the Hijab (the tent-like cloak worn by Arab Muslim women). When the Arabs invaded North-West Africa, the Berbers were ruled by a resourceful Queen of Jewish descent named Kahina.
After the Arab general Hassan ibn al Numan took Carthage from the Byzantines, Kahina's forces defeated him. Then, as during World War II, a single defeat in North Africa might lead to a retreat of hundreds of miles. Hassan retreated, probably all the way back to Egypt. Following his retreat, Kahina took Carthage and ruled most of Berber North Africa.
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In the 680s the Arabs swept across North Africa from Egypt to the Atlantic. For some time the Byzantines clung to their coastal cities, as the Arab Jihadis in their tearing hurry to cover as much land as possible raced towards the Atlantic. When the Jihadi general Oqba ibn Nafi reached the Atlantic in Morocco and, according to legend, rode into the sea and slashed at the water with his sword in frustration that there were no more lands to conquer.
On his return march in 683, the haughty and cruel Oqba was defeated and slain by the Berbers. After this defeat, the Arab aggression paused for a decade but in 698 the Muslims finally took Carthage, evicting the Byzantine Christians completely from Africa. Now the Muslim aggressors faced their last and most stubborn enemy – the Berbers.
Kahina – the brave Berber Princess held off the Arab hordes for twenty years
At the time of the Arab aggression, the Berbers were ruled by a Queen of Jewish descent. Her name was Kahina (also spelt Cahina). Kahina's name is also given variously as Dahiyah, Dahia, or Dhabba (Women in World History, v.8, p. 414.) The title Kahina meant Prophetess. The Encyclopedia Judaica (v. 10, p. 686) says that the term is derived from the old Hebrew "Kahin" ("soothsayer") while some other sources say that "Kahina" was derived from the Hebrew root of the modern Jewish term "Cohen".
The Encyclopedia Judaica notes that Arabic authors, notably the major 14th century historian Ibn-Khaldun, say that Kahina and her tribe, the Jerawa of the Aures Mountains in eastern Algeria and Tunisia, were Jewish. Charles-André Julien, in his History of North Africa, notes that another writer gave Kahina "the picturesque appellation of the 'Berber Deborah'" (after Deborah, the judge of ancient Israel). Julien believes that Kahina 's resistance to the Arabs was "nurtured, as it seems, by Berber patriotism and Jewish faith." On the other hand, the Encyclopedia Judaica concludes "her opposition to the Muslim Arabs was not religiously inspired; some authorities deny she was Jewish. The history of Kahina remains controversial."
What is known is that soon after the Arab general Hassan ibn al Numan took Carthage from the Byzantines, Kahina's forces defeated him. Then, as during World War II, a single defeat in North Africa might lead to a retreat of hundreds of miles. Hassan retreated, probably all the way back to Egypt. Following his retreat, Kahina took Carthage and ruled most of Berber North Africa.
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A Berber warrior. The Berbers differ from the Arabs in their ethnicity. This is reflected in the differences in language customs, dress habits. The schism between the native Berbers and the invading Arabs continues to this day. The Algerian civil war was in part between the Berbers and the Arabs.
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According to Ibn-Khaldun, as she waited for the inevitable renewed Arab assault, Kahina carried out a brutal and disastrous policy. She declared that the Arabs wished to conquer North Africa only because of its wealth. She ordered Berbers who were still nomadic to destroy the cities, orchards, and herds of sedentary Berbers, to make North Africa a desert.
If Kahina actually made this amazing decision, she was tragically mistaken. The Arabs were determined to take North Africa regardless of its wealth or poverty, because their sole aim was to convert the people to Islam, and because North Africa was a gateway to Spain and Europe. Unsurprisingly, according to Ibn-Khaldun, this savage policy of city burning cost Kahina the support of city-dwelling Berbers.
In 702, Hassan again invaded the Berber lands and quickly defeated Kahina. after she lost the final battle, Kahina ordered her sons to go over to the enemy." Her sons had to convert to Islam to seal their defection to the Arabs. Julien believes that for Kahina, the survival of her family and its supremacy over her tribe were ultimately more important than any questions of nationalism or religion.
Accounts differ as to whether Kahina died in battle or was captured and executed.
The advantage which the nomadic invaders like the Arabs had over settled city dwellers like the Persians and Romans did not hold for nomadic Berbers
Over the ages, the conflict between nomadic and settled peoples, and between rural and urban peoples, has been the most important factor in history. This theory seemed to account for many events in the ancient history of the Middle East, as well as the fall of the Roman Empire to the Germanic Goth and Vandals and also for the swift Arab conquest of the Byzantines and Persians. It is still a good theoretical model for some modern conflicts. Many of the wars of modern world have been primarily conflicts between mobile nomadic terrorists and city people. A case in point are the wars of the Taliban in Afghanistan against the settled Govt. of Kabul in the late 1990s.
Obviously the tale of Kahina 's destruction of the North African cities and her subsequent loss of the support of city-dwellers fits well into this worldview. This also explains the stubborn resistance that the Berbers put up against the Arabs, while pushing back the Arabs over and over again in the next few centuries. Even till today the conflict in Algeria is an expression of this hoary Arab-Berber conflict.
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