Berberist Crisis

(1949-1950)

   This crisis refers to the ideological split between the Kabyle leaders who called for a secular and multicultural Algeria and the dominant Arab-Islamist ideology within the Algerian mainstream nationalist movement. Although the crisis alienated many Berbers and many were purged, it did not provoke a mass desertion of Berbers. In addition, Hocine Aït Ahmed was excluded from the leadership of the Organisation spéciale (OS), francophone intellectuals such as Mouloud Mammeri and Mouloud Feraoun were condemned for their reactionary regionalism, and key Kabyle historic leaders of the war of independence, notably Abbane Ramdane and Krim Belkacem, were assassinated. These tensions resurfaced after independence and remain potent down to this day between visions of a secular Algeria and an Arab-Muslim Algeria, although Algeria's 1964 constitution declared Algeria to be an "Arab Muslim country."