Political Nature of Takfiri Groups of Syria

Start of political protests in Syria in 2011, provided a proper opportunity for involvement of different political actors including Takfiri groups in Syrian political scene. These groups changed the peaceful protests to violent one after their engagement. Concerning their violent political behavior and scope of their power and activities, undrestanding of their nature is necessary question to be adressed. This descriptive-analytical article, inspired by the theory of social cleavages and multi-layer level of analysis theory, is based upon this statement as hypothesis: Takfiri groups have multi-faceted nature. In one hand they represent sectarian nature, based on religious-centered, majority-minority relationship and historical and cultural cleavage of Syrian society and in the other show their multi-national, external-oriented and instrumental aspect which reflet the geostrategic and geopolitical interests of foreign regional and ultra-regional actors such as U.S.A, Saudia Arabia and Turkey.