Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

46 • ARMED ISLAMIC GROUPbombs in France, injuring 31 people, and three massive car bombs inAlgiers, killing 57 people and injuring more than 359 others.In 1996 car bombs struck Algiers several times, with one on 11February killing 17 and injuring 93 and another on 30 November killing15 and injuring 30. During December the GIA conducted massslayings in five villages in which they slashed and hacked to deathmen, women, and children using knives and axes. A total of 82 civilianswere killed in this grisly manner in December 1996, which theAlgerian press came to call the “month of horrors.”In 1997 the GIA carried out several mass killings of entire villagesviewed as disloyal to the GIA cause. On 24 September 1997, whenthe Islamic Salvation Army called for a truce beginning 1 October,the GIA disregarded the AIS call for peace and continued its assaults,killing 11 female schoolteachers in a remote town 260 miles southwestof Algiers.In 1998 another four massacres occurred in the period 7–20 January,killing 98 in total, while a car bomb outside an Algiers café killed10 and injured 20. In July and December authorities uncovered massgraves of victims of the GIA, one of which contained over 110 bodies.By 1999, while a few isolated GIA attacks occurred, Algeria wasbeginning to experience a return to normalcy. On 15 April Algeriaelected a new president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who convinced someFIS leaders to agree to a national referendum to be held on 16 Septemberto formalize an end to the civil war. Over 5,000 imprisonedmilitants were released in July. Some have called the civil war from1992 until 2000, in which over 120,000 people were killed, the secondAlgerian war; killings by GIA and other aggrieved groups orarmy units have continued sporadically to the present.On 13 January 2000, about 600 GIA members surrendered while1,500 more received amnesty. In February 2002 GIA leader AntarZouabi was killed, and by October, 1,200 GIA fighters had also beenkilled by government forces. In February and March of 2003 the GIAheld about 32 European hostages but freed 17 of them and negotiatedthe release of 14 others, although one died in captivity. By 2004 theGIA had been driven out of central Algeria. Islamic Salvation Frontleaders Abbassi Madani and Ali Benhadj were released from prison inlate 2003 but were banned from participating in politics. Beginning in1998 the GIA went into decline and has been replaced by the SalafistGroup for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), which has since become