revolutionary ideology of the Egyptian sayyid
qUtb (d. 1966) and helped organize Muslim
students against the growing influence of Marx-
ist political parties in Afghanistan. After being
imprisoned for his political activities in 1972–73,
he joined other Afghan radicals in Peshawar,
pakistan, to plot a violent coup against the Afghan
government with the backing of the Pakistanis.
He was put in charge of recruiting support within
the army. When the coup failed in July 1975,
Hekmatyar escaped capture and execution and
proceeded to create the Hizb-i Islami, a radical
organization consisting of former university stu-
dents and ethnic Pushtuns.
Between 1978 and 1992, Hekmatyar and his
group conducted a ruthless Jihad against Afghan-
istan’s Marxist government, its Soviet allies, and
rival aFghan mUJahidin groups. He proved to be
a charismatic leader known for his strategic skills
and merciless treatment of his enemies. Pakistan’s
Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) helped
equip and train his forces during this time, and
he became the chief recipient of covert support
from America’s Central Intelligence Agency, which
was using the Afghan mujahidin in its proxy war
against the Soviet Union during the closing decade
of the cold war. After the Soviet withdrawal and
the downfall of the Marxist government in 1992,
Hekmatyar established bases south of Kabul from
which he conducted attacks against his Afghan
rivals. The civil war between Hekmatyar and other
Afghan warlords continued even after he became
prime minister in 1993. His most consistent oppo-
nents were Burhan al-Din Rabbani, Tajik leader of
the Jamiat-i Islami (Islamic Society), and Ahmad
Shah Massoud, leader of the Tajik mujahidin.
Kabul suffered heavy civilian casualties as a result
of the conflict. Meanwhile, the taliban, a well-
organized force of Afghan refugees and war veter-
ans, was gaining control of much of the country
with the support of the Pakistani ISI. When they
finally seized Kabul in September 1996, Hekmatyar
and the other warlords were forced to flee the city.
After al-qaida attacked the United states on Sep-
tember 11, 2001, he sided with Usama bin ladin
but was forced to flee to iran when the United
States invaded Afghanistan in October of that year.
Iran expelled him and the Hizb-i Islami in 2002,
and he has since gone into hiding. Hekmatyar has
consistently called for attacks against U.S. and
international armed forces and is considered to be
a terrorist by the governments of the United States
and Afghanistan.
See also commUnism; islamism; terrorism.Further reading: Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret
History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Ladin, from the
Soviet Invasion until September 10, 2001 (New York: Pen-
guin Books, 2004); Oliver Roy, Afghanistan: From Holy
War to Civil War (Princeton, N.J.: Darwin Press, 1995).hell See fire.
Helpers See ansar.
heresy
A heresy is a doctrine or belief that authorities
believe to be false or that deviates from what is
accepted by the mainstream or orthodox commu-
nity. In early Islam, emergence of heresies paral-
leled the competition over power and aUthority
that followed the death of mUhammad (ca. 570–
632). Muhammad’s dual role of prophet and
tribal leader set the stage for the fusion of “right
religion” (orthodoxy) and righteous rule that
subsequently defined the office of his successor,
the caliphate. The holders of this office, caliphs,
justified their rule in religious terms and often
dismissed their opponents as religious deviants.
Heresies, then, were born in conflict and received
their stigma from the winning faction, which by
virtue of its power established the operational
norms of society.
It was the first civil war (656–661), or fitna,
that gave rise to the earliest heresies in Islam: theK 296 hell