Rasul Makasharipov was a native of Dagestan's south-western Tsumadinsky District, bordering Chechnya and inhabited by Caucasian Avars.

In 1997 his father expelled him from the house and he moved to Chechnya, where he became an Avar interpreter of Arab warlord Khattab and the rogue Chechen field commander Shamil Basayev during their abortive Invasion of Dagestan in 1999.

[1][2] The same year, Makasharipov found his new group, the Shariat Jamaat, which in May 2005 became part of the Caucasian Front established by the new President of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria Abdul-Halim Sadulayev after the death of Aslan Maskhadov.

On January 15, 2005, the FSB reported his death in an attack on a Jamaat safehouse, but Makasharipov surfaced four days later to refute these claims.

Makasharipov was eventually killed in a shootout with Russian troops on July 6, 2005;[3] his deputy Rappani Khalilov became his successor as the leader of the Shariat Jamaat.