ji·had·ica

The future approach of al-Qaeda

Tore Hamming September 23, 2016

This is the second Q&A of the interview series with Ahmed Al Hamdan (@a7taker), a Jihadi-Salafi analyst and author of “Methodological Difference Between ISIS and Al Qaida“. Al Hamdan was a former friend of Turki bin Ali, and a student of Shaykh Abu Muhammad Al Maqdisi under whom he studied and was given Ijazah, becoming one of his official students. Also, Shaykh Abu Qatada al Filistini wrote an introduction for his book when it was published in the Arabic language. The interview series contains contains five themes in total and will all be published on Jihadica.com. You can find the first Q&A here.

Tore Hamming:

In July 2016, Jabhat al-Nusra broke away from AQ and established Jabhat Fatah ash-Shaam with the blessing of the senior AQ leadership. In his most recent speech (Brief Messages to a Supported Ummah 4) Zawahiri furthermore encouraged Jihadi factions in Iraq to unify and fight IS and Iran. Is the approach of a popular front not necessarily with allegiance to AQ, but simply being sympathetic to the movement, becoming the future for AQ?

Ahmed Al Hamdan:

There is a mistake in the question, as al Zawahiri did not seek the factions in Iraq to unite to fight the Islamic state, not in episode 4 nor in any part of the series.

Secondly: we must understand that wars and battles are magnets which attract Jihadi thinkers and I do not think that you would find a battle front or any popular movement whose people are not sons of the Jihadi movement. And we must understand that al Qaeda do not look to the matter from the perspective of upholding its name and achieving its organisational goals and if that was indeed the case, then they would not have accepted the breaking of ties with al Nusra for the benefit of the Muslims in Syria.

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Jabhat al-Nusra’s Rebranding in the Eyes of the Islamic State

Cole Bunzel September 22, 2016

When Abu Muhammad al-Jawlani, the leader of al-Qaida’s Syrian affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra, announced on July 28, 2016 that he was dissolving his group and setting up a new one, Jabhat Fath al-Sham (JFS, “the Front for the Conquest of Sham”), that would not be subordinate to al-Qaida, he put to rest more than a year of speculation that such a move was in the offing. Jabhat al-Nusra had been, after all, prepared to end its formal relationship with al-Qaida. But in settling one question Jawlani raised two more: Was Jabhat al-Nusra (now JFS) really distancing itself from the terrorist organization? And had al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri really given this separation (real or nominal) his blessing?

The first question is perhaps best left to governments and journalists, but there is at least one reason to see the rebranding as more than superficial. This is that Jawlani’s maneuver alienated a number of prominent Jabhat al-Nusra hardliners who have yet to join JFS. (One rumor puts the number of these “defectors” at well over a hundred.) Presumably these men felt that joining JFS would amount to endorsing an excessively moderate and inclusive political vision.

The second question, whether Zawahiri blessed this rebranding, also remains open. To be sure, Jabhat al-Nusra and al-Qaida portrayed the move as having al-Qaida’s support—as an amicable separation. But the Islamic State has begged to differ. The true story, in its view, is that the “traitor” Jawlani struck again: having betrayed Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and the Islamic State back in 2013, he turned on Zawahiri and al-Qaida in 2016. Such a view should perhaps be viewed with skepticism, but it also deserves consideration. Understanding both sides of the story requires first revisiting some of the words of Zawahiri that are key to both narratives.

Zawahiri’s mixed message

On May 8, 2016, al-Qaida’s official al-Sahab Media Foundation issued an audio statement from Zawahiri concerning the war in Syria. Coming to the issue of Jabhat al-Nusra’s relationship with al-Qaida, Zawahiri delivered a most mixed message. That it was mixed is shown by the contradictory headlines it generated. “Zawahiri: Syria’s Nusra Free to Break al-Qaeda Links” was the title of an al-Jazeera English article. “Zawahiri Warns Nusra against Separating from al-Qaida” was the title of an article in an Arabic newspaper. Evidently, what the al-Qaida leader had said was unclear.

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Analysis of the current situation in the global Jihad total war

Tore Hamming September 13, 2016

This is the first Q&A of the interview series with Ahmed Al Hamdan (@a7taker), a Jihadi-Salafi analyst and author of “Methodological Difference Between ISIS and Al Qaida“. Al Hamdan was a former friend of Turki bin Ali, and a student of Shaykh Abu Muhammad Al Maqdisi under whom he studied and was given Ijazah, becoming one of his official students. Also, Shaykh Abu Qatada al Filistini wrote an introduction for his book when it was published in the Arabic language. The interview series contains contains five themes in total and will all be published on Jihadica.com

 

Tore Hamming:

Back in 2014, the Islamic State (IS) was winning territory while IS affiliated media and its official spokesperson Abu Muhammad al-Adnani were extremely active propagating its successes. In the meantime al-Qaida (AQ) leader Ayman al-Zawahiri remained quiet. Now, in mid-2016, it seems to be the opposite situation as IS is loosing territory, while al-Adnani is increasingly absent from the media scene. Zawahiri, on the other hand, has lately been very active with several speech series e.g. The Islamic Spring and Brief Messages to a Supported Ummah. What does this development tell you?

Ahmed Al Hamdan:

This is due to several reasons. Firstly, during the period in which Adnani came out several times, there were several successes achieved by this group such as them conquering large areas of Iraq and Syria and the opening of branches outside the region of Iraq and Syria. Normally when commercial companies make any profit, they exploit these profits for strengthening their advertising and marketing. So the multiple appearances of Adnani during that period is a normal thing and in accordance with the circumstances which his group was going through at that time. However as for Zawahiri appearing only rarely, there are a number of reasons such as:

Firstly, Al Fajr centre (the media forum for the Mujahideen) which releases publications of all the branches of Al Qaeda contained within its ranks people who were sympathetic to the Islamic State. And these people would delay any verbal attack that would be launched from any branch of Al-Qaeda…!! And they would delay any correspondence relating to the same matter and would even send it to the leaders of ISIS and then the leaders of ISIS would make preemptive attacks in advance to absorb the effect of the publication of Al-Qaeda that was sent to Al Fajr Centre to be released. An example of this is the seventh interview by As-Sahab Foundation with Sheikh Ayman al Zawahiri which got published under the title “The reality between pain and hope”. They released the speech of Adnani “This was not our methodology and it will never be” before releasing the interview, and also the release of this seventh interview by As-Sahab Foundation with Dr. Zawahiri was delayed for around twelve days, even though the date of this interview by As-Sahab was before the speech of Adnani. But the speech of Adnani got released before it. So Al Fair centre played the biggest role in transforming the sympathy of many in the Jihadi movement to make them support the Islamic State through this manipulation by them, in addition to Al Fajr center turning to be a defence for ISIS.

And when the well known Jihadi researcher, Abdullah bin Muhammad, wrote about the possibility of the ranks of ISIS being infiltrated as had happened in the Algerian Jihad, this centre took an unusual step of issuing an official statement… !!! They falsified this man and accused him of lying..!!!! And so the branches of Al Qaeda began to ignore this centre and they changed their means of publication by using their own two media delegates in the social media sites in a direct manner. For example the account ‘Abdullah al Mujahid’ belongs to Al Qaeda of Yemen, and ‘Abu Mus’ab Ash-Shanqiti’ belongs to Al Qaeda of Khurasan. And so they began to release all the publications directly without having the need for any intermediaries.

And what must be noted is that these are not exclusive information that are known only to those close to these sources, but they are known to anyone who used to follow the Jihadi forums. And the reality is just as a friend had said, that the Jihadi groups and their media establishments were like closed boxes which not even those close to them would know as to what they contained inside them. However the Fitna (tribulation) of ISIS caused every secret to become publicly known..! And I don’t say known only to the supporters of these groups but also to all the people. This relieved the intelligence and the security agencies a lot, and so they no longer have to tire themselves much like how it was in the past in order to know what is inside the house of their enemy..! Thus there occurred polarization between two competitors and each would speak publicly on secret issues causing the other party to be the accused one which would make them want to defend themselves. And so they too would speak publicly about secret issues..!!. Due to this rivalry a lot of secrets became publicly known. And all praise belongs to Allah in every case.

Secondly, another matter is that Al-Qaeda needed to get its internal ranks to be set in order after they got swept by a tide. Previously there had been elements within Al Qaeda who were sympathetic towards the Islamic State but now the matter has developed and these sympathizers began to pledge allegiance to the Islamic state…! And they began to promote it from inside the ranks of Al Qaeda. So it would not be wise at such a time to come out in public frequently and release statements while your internal ranks have become flimsy and shaky. The priority was to rectify the internal ranks and absorb this attack. And in fact because of the stupidity of ISIS in taking the initiative in attacking the leaders of Al Qaeda in their other branches and slandering them and spreading doubtful allegations which would reach to the point of Takfeer upon them, this contributed to the awareness of some of those who were deceived by ISIS previously and they said that yes it is true that we differ with Al Qaeda in some issues, but not to the extent of Takfeer.

Yet despite that, I used to think and still now think that the role of Al Qaeda’s media was negative to some extent because of them continuing to have hopes that ISIS would return back to the right path. Also from the mistakes committed by the media of Al Qaeda in general was to not confront in an official manner the charges made against them by ISIS. For example Abu Ubaida Al-Lubnani who was the former security official of Al-Qaeda before being expelled and giving the pledge of allegiance to ISIS, was one of the members of Al-Qaeda of Khurasan, and he had written his testimony in the official publication of ISIS known as ‘An-Naba’. And then his former friend known as Abu Kareemah wrote an article in refutation to his testimony, but this was done in his individual capacity through the website of “Justpaste”, and he made evident many of the lies and contradictions that were present in this testimony..!

However I ask, which would have a greater impact- when the group Al-Qaeda officially adopts this article and publishes it through a media wing, or when its author publishes it by himself on his own capacity? By this, you will cause people to ask as to what is the evidence that Abu Kareemah is actually a Mujahid from Khurasan?! And what is the evidence that he is the actual author of this article? There is no doubt that the people will take the official publication as being more credible. On the other hand we see that in every issue of Dabiq, ISIS would heap allegations against Al-Qaeda even to the point of saying that they are agents and disbelievers, while the official media of Al-Qaeda represented by their two magazines “Resurgence” and “Inspire” would completely avoid responding to these allegations and would be content with the writings of some of the leaders and soldiers who would publish them in an unofficial manner.

And if I was a simple Jihadi follower, I would interpret the lack of official response by Al-Qaeda as a weakness in their standpoint, and I would not interpret this as a desire to not escalate the matter so as to not cut off the road for ISIS to come back to the right path. Rather I would say “If the talk that is being spread regarding this matter is not correct then they would have responded to it at the earliest”. But this is a mistaken policy which contributed to increasing the number of ISIS followers from amongst the Jihadi supporters.

With regards to the frequent appearances of Dr. Ayman lately, I sat down with my companions and I said to them “Let us think in the way how the men of intelligence agencies think. Can it be reasonable that these speeches are recent ones? That is they are published just a few days after been recorded? Or are they all recorded before some weeks, if not months, and then published gradually? Obviously it is the second one that is correct. And it is never wise in terms of security for the one who is number one in the wanted list of the security agencies to publish his statement in close intervals as this strengthens the chances of getting hold of the link in the thread which will lead towards him. The security official of Al-Qaeda, Abdullah Adam [1] has said “Two people who keep moving will definitely meet each other at some point”.  But when you decrease the movement, then there is a greater level for your safety.

Brief analysis of answer:

In the early stage after the Islamic State left the al-Qaida network (or was thrown out depending on the perspective), it won the fight both on the battlefield and in the media. Al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri simply did not respond forcefully enough as the fitna erupted. In this regard, however, it is interesting to consider the position and influence of the Jihadi media foundations. If the account Ahmed Al Hamdan gives of the Al Fajr Centre’s role in delaying Zawahiri’s attempt of responding to the attacks from the Islamic State holds true, this would point to a critical interference of the media foundations. Interestingly, Al Fajr was also accused of refusing to publish Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s response (titled “Remaining in Iraq and the Levant”, 14 June 2013) to Zawahiri’s ruling that the Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham should remain in Iraq only. If both stories are true, it shows an ambiguous role of Al Fajr, fighting an internal struggle to choose side.

Al Hamdan’s account also pinpoints another important factor in order to grasp Zawahiri’s initial passivity. Due to the increasing sympathy towards the Islamic State within al-Qaida, Zawahiri needed to get his house in order before publically taking a stance. Had he been too explicit in his critique of the Islamic State at this point, he would have risked to push away many al-Qaida members. This probably happened anyway though as his passive approach was interpreted as weakness by many.

Perhaps al-Qaida did not realise the seriousness of the situation quickly enough. Whereas the Islamic State utilised all channels of communication and propaganda as efficiently as possible, al-Qaida was hesitant and too conservative (well they are Salafis after all) in their communication instead of empowering its followers through the use of official media centres. On this point, Ahmed Al Hamdan is correct.

In summary, as the Islamic State challenged al-Qaida neither Zawahiri nor his organisation were prepared to counter the aggressiveness of its renegade affiliate. Baffled by the context where it found itself abandoned by its media foundations and its followers, al-Qaida was left in the backseat. But the tide is changing. The Islamic State has less and less to brag about, while Zawahiri is taking the position of the old wise man, who is following a long-term strategy, slowly attracting public support and taking back followers from the Islamic State. This is evident from the number of piblic statements from the two organisations’ leaders. While statements from Baghdadi or Adnani (before his death) have become increasingly rare, Zawahiri has released two series of speeches (first “the Islamic Spring” series followed by “Brief Messages to a Supported Ummah”) recently, giving the impression that he is now once again the main authority within the Global Jihadi movement.

UPDATE: Ahmed Al Hamdan responds to analysis and elaborates on the role of the Jihadi media

The release “Remaining in Iraq and Sham” by Abu Bakr al Baghdadi had been previously published by the Islamic State independently, and it is capable of spreading its material quickly and directly. And this is different to the one who has committed himself to method of publishing specifically through Al Fajr Centre. So if this person wants to change his policy it will take him a long time to search for alternative means and he must increase his security before replacing the method of publication. Those who sympathised with the State within Al Fajr Centre took advantage of the fact that the centre was the only source for spreading the material of Al Qaeda to delay or even prevent the arrival of communications between the different branches of Al Qaeda concerning the matter of the Islamic State. And I will give some examples:

The brother Abu Umar al Najdi is a Mujahid from Yemen who wrote under the name “The loyal companion” on twitter and was recommended by the other Mujahideen from Yemen who were present on twitter, for example “Mohamed al Malaki” who is one of the Mujahideen who had previously been in Afghanistan and then went to Yemen. This person published a confidential letter which had been sent from a veteran leader of Al Qaeda who was present in Syria i.e. Muhsin Al Fadli, to the leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. He said in it:

Attached with this letter is the letter of Shaykh Abu Khalid al Suri, may Allah accept him, which he sent to Dr. Ayman during the first day of the Fitna, also the statements and the claims of both Al Nusra and The State [IS] which I have previously sent to Dr. Ayman, may Allah protect him, and the audio message of Al Jawlani clarifying the causes of the problem and also the audio witness testimony of (…..) and Abu Azeez al Qatari. And for your information I have sent it to you again despite having sent it before through (…..) who is the representative of the leader of Al Fajr Centre – I sent it to you again to make sure that it would reach you.

Abu Umar al Najdi said, commenting in the margin of this letter about the text:

The attachments and testimonies which the writer of the letter sent at the beginning of the Fitna of the State by way of Al Fajr Centre, never arrived to Shaykh Abu Baseer [Wuhayshi] and only arrived with this letter. And he warned everyone to be careful in dealing with Al Fajr Centre and there are suspicious and frightening dealings which did not come from new members, rather from the senior members within the centre. And Allahs refuge is sought.

This explains why the branch in Yemen stopped publishing articles through al Fajr Centre and instead began publishing through their own representative “Abdullah Mujahid”

So, if the Islamic State had not been able to publish their material in any way other than through Al Fajr Centre and despite that the Centre did not publish their material, then at that time we would be able to have doubt and ask if it was true that those people were really sympathetic to the State?

Interestingly, my opinion matches his opinion regarding the reason why fighters went over into the ranks of the Islamic State. And look what this leader said to Abu Baseer:

Now the third generation of the Mujahideen are influenced by the thinking of the State and this is due to a number of reasons, including the strength of the State media, another reason being the silence of the leaders of Al Qaeda and the absence of clarifying the methodological mistakes of the State, making the youth of the Nation go to them and here the Nation has lost out by the silence of the Jihadi movement about these errors.  And may Allah reward you with good for publishing the statement of Shaykh Harith al Nadhari as it clarified and made plain many rulings, however while we have now spoken of the reality, it has unfortunately come too late. And why did you not previously speak out and clarify the ruling about the fake Khilafah of Al Baghdadi. This is necessary for us to restore the confidence of the rational, confident and self-assured youth of the Ummah in Al Qaeda, so don’t postpose the speech beyond its time in order to take a neutral position as this policy is no longer going to work in the face of the behaviour and folly of the state.

Office Space

Will McCants May 31, 2013

Earlier this week, the AP’s Rukmini Callimachi revealed one of the memos she discovered in the sixth trashbag full of AQIM documents she collected in the aftermath of the French attack on jihadis in Timbuktu in January. The memo, dated October 2012, is from the shura council of AQIM to the shura council of the Masked Brigade, a subsidiary of AQIM at the time. Until October 2012, the Masked Brigade had been run by Mokhtar Belmokhtar, the most infamous jihadi in Africa. We previously knew that AQIM leadership had removed Belmokhtar from his position in that month, afterwhich he established his own group, the Blood Signers left to run the Masked Brigade as a separate organization. But we did not specifically know why AQIM had taken its decision until now.

The memo is AQIM’s response to a letter sent by the Masked Brigade that criticized AQIM leadership and recommened a course correction. For AQIM’s leadership, the letter was a final act of insubordination in a long history of such behavior by Belmokhtar, which they recount in scathing detail.

Several things stood out:

  • Belmokhtar wanted to sever his group from AQIM and pledge allegience directly to AQ Central. In addition to being a play for more autonomy, the move calls to mind the recent attempt of Nusra to get out from under AQ Iraq’s control and pledge allegience directly to Zawahiri. Combined with Shabab infighting over leadership and appeals to Zawahiri to intervene, the three episodes suggest that AQ Central does not have a firm hand on the reins.
  • Zawahiri is hard to reach. In rebuffing Belmokhtar’s desire to pledge allegience directly to Zawahiri, AQIM’s leadership explains that it would do nothing to elicit more attention from AQ Central because the organization rarely communicates with AQIM as it is. AQIM states that they have received just a few letters from Bin Laden and Zawahiri and a handful from Atiyya and Abu Yahya al-Libi, “despite our multiple letters to them for them to deal with us effectively in managing jihad here.”
  • Al-Qaeda is run like a business or government agency. As long-time AQ watchers know, Bin Laden established orderly administrative procedures for conducting the business of terror. AQIM’s memo is one more window into how the adminisrative machinery functions. The leadership gripes at Belmokhtar for not filing expense reports, not playing well with the other vice presidents (ie emirs) in the region, and not returning headquarter’s phone calls.
  • Even if jihadis recognize Internet communication is compromised, they still do it. The memo from the Masked Brigade to AQIM reminds AQIM’s leaders that they should not try to communicate with their subordinates over the Internet, referencing a message from Zawahiri saying the same (anyone know if this letter was public?). AQIM’s leadership retorts by observing that Belmokhtar is the one who is carelessly communicating with Internet forum administrators (they mention Ansar al-Mujahideen forum in particular) and airing AQIM’s dirty laudry to the media.
  • Spectacular attacks can be motivated by petty infighting. It is natural to look to a group’s ideology and strategy first when explaining a sudden change in attack patterns. This year’s attack on the gas fields in Algeria elicited just such commentary. While such explainations paint part of the picture, the AQIM memo suggests infighting can also be a big motivation for action and target selection. According to the memo, Belmokhtar criticized AQIM’s leadership for not carrying out any “spectacular military action” over the last decade despite having the resources and permission to do so. AQIM turns this charge back on Belmokhtar, saying that he was the one who was charged with carrying out such attacks. Belmokhtar answered by carrying out the spectacular attack on the Algerian gas field three months later.
  • Something is brewing in Libya. AQIM and Belmokhtar trade barbs over who was the first to try and consolidate jihadi groups fighting in Libya. I’ll leave it to folks like Clint Watts and Andrew Lebovich to surmise how successful AQIM and Belmokhtar have been in that endeavor. I’d only note that in the midst of their success in Mali last year, AQIM was already looking over the horizon at Libya as the next theater. If the jihadis in Mali continue to be squeezed by the French and others, they may head northeast.

Al-Qaida Advises the Arab Spring: Egypt

Joas Wagemakers April 22, 2012

The number of jihadi publications on the Arab Spring is increasing dramatically as the months go by and my time has – as always – been very limited, hence my recent absence from Jihadica. I have several posts about al-Qaida’s advice to the Arab Spring lined up, however, including this one about Egypt.

Scepticism

When one thinks of Egypt and jihadis, the first person that comes to mind is probably Ayman al-Zawahiri. Al-Qaida’s leader has issued many a “letter of hope and good tidings to our people in Egypt” since the beginning of the Arab Spring and although that title may sound as if these epistles contain Christmas greetings to the country’s Coptic community, they offer nothing of the sort.

In part three of his series of letters to the Egyptian people, al-Zawahiri spends most of his time warning his countrymen about the supposedly evil intentions of the United States and their Arab henchmen (“the Arab Zionist rulers of injustice and betrayal”). The US, al-Zawahiri claims, conspires with the rulers of the Arab world to “wage war on Islam and its sharia”, expressed in banning the headscarf, spreading evil and besieging the people of Gaza. All of this happens, of course, under the guise of the “war on terrorism”, al-Zawahiri explains.

Such talk about strong ties between the US and Arab regimes sounds quite familiar, but al-Zawahiri needs it to make his point, which is that current events in Egypt are not going to give Egyptians what they really want: “These international powers and particularly the US”, al-Zawahiri writes, want to “change the old faces for new faces to deceive the people with some reforms and freedoms”. Such token gestures will give people the idea that things are changing but this will actually only serve “the interests of the world powers of arrogance and injustice”. Egypt, al-Zawahiri maintains, “will remain the basis of the Crusader attack and a founding partner in the American war on Islam”.

Al-Zawahiri thus offers nothing but the same old arguments. One could argue that his scepticism is somewhat understandable. Having grown up under the repressive regime of Gamal ‘Abd al-Nasir (Nasser), whose revolution was als0 hailed as a liberation of Egypt at the time, having seen several Egyptian dictators come and go and having suffered from brutal torture in prisons in his own country, one could forgive him from not immediately jumping up and down with glee at seeing the first signs of a revolt. Al-Zawahiri has seen it all before and has been disappointed too many times to believe it all.

Agenda

There may be some truth to the above. Reading the fourth part of his series of letters to the Egyptian people, however, should convince anyone that al-Zawahiri is not so much a sceptic, but rather someone with his own agenda aimed at claiming credit for overthrowing Mubarak. In this letter, he repeats the same stuff mentioned above and then claims that “your mujahidun brothers are with you fighting the same enemy and confronting America and its Western allies that have made [Egyptian President] Husni Mubarak rule over you”. America, he says, is now trying to reverse its previous policy of supporting dictators and currently wants to co-operate with the people. This policy change, he claims, “only came as a direct result of the blessed raids in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania”.

So apparently the Arab Spring came about as a direct result of 9/11 and the US is now on the people’s side. Yet doesn’t that last bit clash with his earlier statement that the US only cares about token reforms and “changing the old faces for new faces” while retaining its own interests? Yes it does, and al-Zawahiri is therefore quick to point out that this revised US policy is something that “is not enough and does not satisfy any noble and free Muslim”. In a seemingly reassuring way, he adds that “your mujahidun brothers […] will continue to strike America and its partners and hurt them until they leave – with God’s permission – the lands of the Muslims and have had enough of supporting the tyrants in these countries”.

Al-Zawahiri pushes his own agenda a bit further by claiming that the problem with Egypt lies in the secularism of its state: “This was not the choice of the Egyptian people”, he states. “On the contrary, the Egyptian people have demanded and have repeated their demand numerous times to have the Islamic sharia as the source of laws and legislation so that Islam is the ruling system in Egypt.” This call for being ruled by Islamic law, al-Zawahiri claims, “is still and has been the demand of the overwhelming majority of the people of Egypt since the 1940s”.

Democracy

Al-Zawahiri’s reasoning is obviously meant to show that the US, by waging a “war on Islam” is going against the will of Egyptians but that he and al-Qaida are actually on the people’s side. In this sense, al-Zawahiri appears to be the real supporter of democracy. He quickly dispels this idea, however, since he explicitly rejects the “democracy that America wants for us, a special democracy for the Third World in general and the Islamic world in particular”. Such American-sponsored democracy, al-Zawahiri states, could be seen in Algeria, when that country cancelled elections in the early 1990s after they had been won by Islamists, or in Gaza, when the world refused to deal with Hamas after it had won elections there.

Al-Zawahiri does not just object to democracy because he associates it with injustice, however. He also claims it is an idol that is worshipped by its followers since they blindly follow what the majority wants, irrespective of what religion says. The majority thus becomes the object of worship instead of religion. As an alternative, the current Egyptian regime should leave and the country should be ruled by a pious, Islamic regime instead. The people will have the right to choose their leaders, al-Zawahiri claims, but obviously within the bounds of the sharia. The misery of the people should be ended, the West should be confronted and the oppression should be lifted “in Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and every corner of the world of Islam”. Jihad should therefore be continued until this goal has been achieved.

Peaceful

Unlike al-Zawahiri, who basically extends his old ideas to the new situation created by the Arab Spring, the Syrian-British jihadi scholar Abu Basir al-Tartusi actually comes up with something new. As we saw in my previous two posts in this series (here and here), Abu Basir is much more nuanced and practical than the likes of al-Zawahiri in what he has to say about the Arab Spring and his advice to Egyptians is no exception.

In a response to questions about political participation by radical Islamists in Tunisia and Egypt, Abu Basir states that Muslim youngsters should ensure that any participation in Egyptian politics should be in accordance with the Qur’an and the Sunna as understood by the first three generations of Muslims (al-salaf al-salih). Establishing a political party is allowed, he says, but only if it does not fall into the trap of acting on behalf of party interests instead of those of the Muslim community as a whole. Such remarks may seem nothing special, but considering the widespread opposition to political participation among jihadis, such answers are quite remarkable.

Also worthy of note is Abu Basir’s advice to Egyptians to use peaceful methods, unlike al-Zawahiri who – as we have seen – actually calls for continued jihad. Abu Basir claims that the current circumstances in Egypt (and Tunisia) are dominated by freedom and tolerance and this calls for peaceful means, not violence. “As long as the conflict with others can be fought by words, communiqués and dialogue […] we don’t have to resort to violence”. Abu Basir gives three reasons for this: firstly, he says, there is no need for violence; secondly, Muslims are the strongest in using words “because they posses the strongest arguments”; and thirdly, he claims, a kind approach is more likely to be accepted by others and yield results.

Humanist

Abu Basir is by no means satisfied with the situation as it is in Egypt right now, but he states that at least everyone can agree that it is better than under the tyrants. Muslims should therefore make use of the possibilities that have opened up for them, as long as it accords with Islamic law. Interestingly, Abu Basir explicitly allows political acts of an executive or bureaucratic type and also believes that things that serve the people and society as a whole are permitted. He draws the line, however, at participating in legislation, since coming up with your own laws instead of leaving this to God is, in effect, polytheism by violating God’s absolute unity in the legislative sphere.

This latter bit is familiar ground for jihadis, but Abu Basir’s explicit endorsement of participation in other branches of politics than the legislative branch is quite astonishing. Without changing his earlier views, he reconsiders his beliefs in light of new circumstances and condemns only those things that he believes really need to be condemned, thereby going quite far in accommodating those Muslims who want to participate in politics after the Arab Spring. Abu Basir ends his epistle by saying: “Know that Islam has come for the protection of man and saving him. Its goal is man.” Although this remark should be read in the context of the rest of his epistle, whose contents do not differ all that much from what al-Zawahiri believes, the phrasing itself is quite different and almost makes Abu Basir sound like a humanist alternative to al-Qaida’s leader. Not bad for a jihadi!

Al-Qaida advises the Arab Spring: Syria

Joas Wagemakers November 19, 2011

With the Arab Spring going strong in several countries, al-Qaida (in a broad sense, so including ideologues and scholars supportive of the organisation) still finds it necessary to comment on what is happening. In a series of posts, I will deal with the advice al-Qaida is giving the people of several countries, starting with Syria.

Praise

One of the men “advising” the Syrians currently revolting against the regime of President al-Asad is Ayman al-Zawahiri, the current leader of al-Qaida. In an epistle meant solely to greet, encourage and heap praise on the people he is addressing, al-Zawahiri spends one of the first paragraphs of his letter saying “salamun ‘alaykum” to his audience no fewer than eight times. He addresses them as “the mujahidun who command good and forbid evil”. This seems to be an attempt to claim that al-Qaida-like people are the ones trying to overthrow the Syrian regime, which is a good thing from his point of view because it allows him to create the idea that his organisation is alive and kicking and busy overthrowing “infidel” rulers, as it should be. From the Syrian people’s point of view, however, it is doubtful whether this is going to do them any good. As radical scholar Abu l-Mundhir al-Shinqiti pointed out in a fatwa that I wrote about in a previous post, it may actually be more advisable for Syrian jihadis to lay low, not giving the regime any extra excuse to crack down on them with the argument that the demonstrators are, in fact, terrorists. Al-Zawahiri doesn’t seem to realise this, urging his audience to tell President al-Asad that he is “a partner in the war on Islam in the name of terrorism and a protector of the borders of Israel”. Even more explicitly – in a phrase that sounds better in Arabic than it does in English – he tells them to say to al-Asad: “We have broken the shackles of fear and smashed the prison of weakness. The free [men] of Syria and its mujahidun have decided that they will live as honourable people and die as martyrs (ya’ishu a’izza’ wa-yamutu shuhada’).”

Al-Zawahiri also keeps going on about the supposedly strong American ties to the Syrian regime. He states that “America, which has co-operated with Bashar al-Asad throughout his reign, now claims that it is on your side”. He advises the Syrian protestors to say to the U.S. and President Obama that “we are the sons of the conquerors, the offspring of the mujahidun and the heirs of the murabitun (fighters operating from garrison cities).” The battle fought against the Syrian regime, al-Zawahiri claims, will obviously continue until “we raise the banners of victorious jihad” over Jerusalem. How exactly this is to be achieved in the face of a brutal regime that is not afraid to kill thousands of its own people is not entirely clear.

Syrian sectarianism

A more rational and level-headed approach is taken in another document, this one by Abu Basir al-Tartusi, a scholar living in London who is in no way part of the core leadership of al-Qaida but is one of the major thinkers reponsible for the organisation’s ideology. The originally-Syrian Abu Basir is churning out writings on Syria faster than you can say “the people want to topple the regime”, which may force me to dedicate another post to this country. In any case, Abu Basir wouldn’t be a true Salafi if he didn’t start by criticising the sect of the al-Asad family, the ‘Alawites, which Salafis (and, to a lesser extent, Sunnis in general) view as deviant or even infidel. He claims that they – among other things – are batinis (i.e. people who believe the Qur’an has an inner, esoteric meaning apart from its outer, exoteric meaning), idol worshippers and people who claim that caliph ‘Ali b. Abi Talib is God.

These ‘Alawites, Abu Basir claims, do not care about their homeland, or about its citizens. They have never amounted to anything and have never given any thought to what the people need. Abu Basir claims that the Syrian sectarian system is largely to blame for this, probably because the large number of sects and the differences between them encourage their members to act only on behalf of their own group, at the expense of loyalty to the country and the people as a whole. As a result, this regime has only brought awful things such as destruction, division and poverty. Surprisingly, however, given Abu Basir’s views of ‘Alawites in general, his approach is nuanced enough to distinguish between ‘Alawites who are part of the governing circle of President al-Asad and the majority of ‘Alawites, who suffer from poverty just like other Syrians. His wrath is therefore directed towards the regime and he thus advises the Syrian people to unite and express only one demand: the fall of the regime. Raising any other demand, Abu Basir claims, would be quite unwise, presumably because he realises that Syrians are not united enough to form a coalition on the basis of any demand other than the fall of the regime.

Practical advice

In two other writings (here and here), Abu Basir continues about the situation in Syria and stresses the need for peaceful resistance but also the legitimacy of self-defence. The regime, he says, has killed or wounded tens of thousands of people and the latter should therefore learn how to protect themselves by setting up security committees that can defend the protestors. These committees, he states, should not participate in demonstrations or in any peaceful activities, so as not to give the regime an extra reason to crack down on protestors. Abu Basir also wants “the noble free officers” (i.e. the ones that abandoned the regime’s army) to increase in number, expand their military activities and co-ordinate them with the aforementioned security committees.

Apart from advising the Syrian people on using non-peaceful methods, he tries to convince them that violence is justified. While he keeps stressing that peaceful resistance is good and commendable, he fails to see its use after so much bloodshed and scolds Syrians for refusing even to take violent means into consideration after it has become clear that sit-ins and other peaceful means have proved useless. He encourages the people to obtain arms and even quotes a verse from the Qur’an about military preparedness to underline the legitimacy of the use of violence. After having compared the Syrian regime with the French colonialism of the past, he wonders what the difference between the two of them really is and calls on the remnants of the army to fear God and take their responsibility towards Syria and its people by defending them and their honour “against the imperialism of the sectarian regime of al-Asad”.

If and how this advice is accepted by Syrians in general and jihadis in particular is unclear. What is clear from Abu Basir’s writings, however, is that he obviously cares about Syria. The tone of his work here is not one of fighting against “infidel” rulers who fail to apply the shari’a but much more one of concern for his native land, which he even refers to as “the beloved Syria”. Whether this is also the case with other commentators “advising” demonstrators in other countries is something I intend to explore in future posts.

Zawahiri at the Helm

Will McCants June 16, 2011

In a statement released online nine hours ago via the Fajr Media Center and dated June 2011, the General Command of al-Qaeda declared its decision to appoint Ayman al-Zawahiri the new head of al-Qaeda.  This move was not unanticipated except by those with strange Awlaki/Libi fixations.  Leah Farrall guessed it would be so on organizational grounds and Murad and I parsed Zawahiri’s eulogy to Bin Laden to arrive at the same conclusion.

In addition to naming Zawahiri as the new amir, here are other highlights from the statement:

  • A special shout out to Palestine, promising its people that al-Qaeda is fighting for their liberation.
  • A reaffirmation of Zawahiri’s oath of allegiance to Mullah Omar, saying that “We stress to our brothers in Afghanistan that we are with you, in spirit and what we possess, under the leadership of commander of the faithful Mullah Muhammad Omar. “
  • A shout out to Umar Abd al-Rahman and other imprisoned mujahids.
  • Encouragement for the uprisings in the Middle East but also a caution that true change will only come after implementing the Sharia and that won’t happen until all forms of occupation are gone.

Update: A great Foreign Policy round table on the significance of Zawahiri’s elevation.

Sayf al-‘Adl and al-Qa’ida’s Historical Leadership

Vahid Brown May 18, 2011

In light of the widely reported news that Sayf al-‘Adl (also spelled Saif al-Adel) has taken the reins of operational leadership within al-Qa’ida in the wake of the death of Osama bin Laden, I thought it would be useful to Jihadica’s readers to provide a bit of context about this man and about the significance, if any, of these reports (see, e.g., Musharbash and Bergen), all of which rely on the testimony of Noman Benotman, a former leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.

First of all, it would be more correct to say that Sayf al-‘Adl remains the operational leader of al-Qa’ida rather than that he has lately assumed this rank. (Nor is this the first time that Benotman has called attention in the press to Sayf’s operational re-emergence in al-Qa’ida. He discussed Sayf’s release from Iran and return to headquarters, as it were, with Der Speigel last October)  Several al-Qa’ida insiders have reported since 2009 that Sayf took the top slot in al-Qa’ida’s military committee after the 2001 death of Abu Hafs al-Masri (Muhammad Atef). These sources also evidence long standing tensions within the organization about Zawahiri being AQ’s second-in-command, next in line to lead should Bin Laden exit the scene.

This much can be gleaned from Abu Jandal (Nasser al-Bahri), the Yemeni former bodyguard of Bin Laden, who has much to say on both points in his 2010 memoir.  Abu Jandal broke with al-Qa’ida after 9/11, but according to him up to that point the chain of command in operational terms was clearly Bin Laden, Abu Hafs, Sayf, and then Abu Muhammad al-Masri (Abdullah Ahmad Abdullah). With Abu Hafs dead, Sayf took the operational lead as head of the military committee. As for the doubts about Zawahiri, at the end of his book Abu Jandal asks himself what would happen if Bin Laden died, and answers that while Zawahiri would theoretically replace him, “to me, Zawahiri does not possess the requisite qualities to lead the organization.” He goes on to say (translating from the French here):

“Bin Laden is a born leader. He commanded al-Qa’ida with a certain transparency, rendering him universally acceptable; he is open to dialogue; and he has historical legitimacy. Zawahiri, though, conducts his affairs in secret. There are numerous members of al-Qa’ida that would not accept Zawahiri taking over. His behavior and that of the Egyptians have generated a great deal of reserve, sometimes very harsh criticism. All of this has left its mark. His statements, as we have seen, are sometimes dismissed. I doubt he has sufficient authority for such a position, even with his well-known authoritarianism and his penchant for centralizing power in himself” (p. 281).

Much more revealing is Abdullah Muhammad Fazul’s two-volume autobiography, released online in early 2009. Fazul joined al-Qa’ida as a teenager in 1991, and his trainer at al-Faruq Camp – then located at the Haqqani compound at Zhawara, in southeastern Afghanistan – was none other than Sayf al-‘Adl. Fazul is no fan of Zawahiri, of whom he sometimes writes dismissively, as a Johnny-come-lately hanger-on. He repeatedly emphasizes that he is loyal to what he calls “mother al-Qa’ida,” and says that the “historical leadership” of this old-school al-Qa’ida did not change when Zawahiri decided in 2000 to merge up his all-but-defunct Jihad al-Islami organization with Bin Laden’s. Here are two representative excerpts, one from 2007, the other from late 2008 or early 2009, in both of which Sayf is clearly identified as al-Qa’ida’s operational boss:

“After we learned of the death of Dadullah there was a reorganization of the leadership of the old guard of al-Qa’ida. It was announced today [late May, 2007] that Shaykh Sa’id (Abu Yazid), who was in charge of al-Qa’ida’s financial affairs since its founding and was the first leader of the former Finance Committee, has been made the new Amir of al-Qa’ida’s branch in Afghanistan. This is of a new strategy to confuse the Americans and is the best way to turn the people to the new leaders…This is also to show the Americans and Westerners waging their war on us that they fail to understand our leaders and that the central leadership is fine. So the general Amir Usama bin Ladin is fine and in good health, and the financial leadership is fine and under the command of Shaykh Sa’id. As for the shari’a leadership, all of them are in Iran and living safely under the leadership of the esteemed shaykh Abu Hafs al-Muritani. As for the military and security leadership, it is no secret to anyone that the strikes in Afghanistan have proven the preparedness of these leaders. All of them are fine, and brother Shaykh Abu Muhammad al-Masri and Shaykh Sayf al-‘Adl are both well and in Iran and continue the struggle in consultation with their brothers the field commanders in Afghanistan, such as brother Khalid al-Habib and Abu Islam al-Masri known as Shu’ayb. We were gladdened by the announcement of Shaykh Sa’id’s new amir position, as it came after the capture of our beloved brother Shaykh ‘Abd al-Hadi al-‘Iraqi, may God break his bonds. So long as the heads of the committees that comprise the mother al-Qa’ida remain fine, then insha’allah all things will be fine.” (From vol. 2, p. 310)

The following excerpt is from a lengthy discussion of al-Qa’ida’s quest for nuclear weapons (vol. 2, p. 499):

“I say that the mystery of the word al-Qa’ida is one that few have understood. There is the mother al-Qa’ida, there are the collaborators, and there are the Afghan Arabs who worked together during the Afghan jihad, and now all are characterized as “al-Qa’ida.” In the same way, the Egyptian Islamic Jihad under the leadership of Ayman al-Zawahiri is referred to as “al-Qa’ida” even before the unification and integration. He is called the number two man in the organization, but we don’t have firsts and seconds in Islam, all are equal before God, and in any case I have never once taken orders from Zawahiri. Although he became the deputy of the Shaykh [UBL] after unification, and followed the same management style, the number two man in the mother al-Qa’ida organization is brother Sayf al-‘Adl, after the killing of Shaykh Abu Hafs the Commander (God have mercy on him), and we do not take orders from anyone but our historical leadership.”

(For more on Fazul and the al-Qa’ida succession question, see Nelly Lahoud’s recent article here.)

That Sayf has been hands-on with al-Qa’ida field operations since 2001 is well-known; some of the evidence was rehearsed in a backgrounder put out by longwarjournal today.  (See also my profile of Sayf as of 2007, here at p. 119.) Sayf was responsible for forging al-Qa’ida’s ties with Zarqawi, as we know from Sayf’s own memoir on this published by Fu’ad Hussayn in 2005.  More recently, US military intelligence claimed to have intercepted letters in 2008 between al-Qa’ida leaders – including Sayf, who is referred to as a second-in-command in this context – and AQI, which show al-Qa’ida Central struggling to clean up Zarqawi’s mess in Iraq.  Less well known is Sayf’s role in the killing of Daniel Pearl. Khalid Sheikh Muhammad told FBI interrogators in 2007 that it was Sayf who tipped him off about Daniel Pearl’s kidnapping and directed him to make an al-Qa’ida propaganda coup out of it.

During all this time, then, Sayf and Abu Muhammad al-Masri retained operational leadership of al-Qa’ida from their hideouts in Iran, but more recently Sayf and other members of the “historical leadership” have gone public again. Readers of Jihadica will know this already; I wrote about Sayf’s first batch of new letters here and Will has begun to shed light on the newest batch of letters here. What changed?

The story goes something like this. In late 2008, Iranian diplomat Heshmat Attarzadeh was kidnapped in Peshawar, and then sold down the river to Pakistani Taliban custody in South Waziristan. Iran, in pursuit of his release, sought the good offices of the Haqqani network leadership, who engineered a swap in 2009: Attarzadeh for Sayf and a number of other “house arrested” al-Qa’ida figures, including Abu Hafs al-Muritani, Sulayman Abu al-Ghayth, and several members of Bin Laden’s family. The story first broke in the Afghan press at the beginning of April, 2010, in a story in Pastho on Weesa.net (no longer available online). Abu’l-Walid al-Masri then posted a translation of the story to a forum, and at the end of the month Syed Saleem Shahzad came through with one of his characteristically colorful stories about the whole affair. Some of the details remain slightly fishy – why, for example, would Iran trade such potentially valuable bargaining chips for a minor diplomat? – but whatever the case it was only after this that all of the above-named folks began releasing statements via Abu’l-Walid’s blog. That al-Qa’ida’s operational commander, top religious cleric and former spokesman all released new statements on the website of one of al-Qa’ida’s most virulent critics, and not through official al-Qa’ida channels, does indicate a certain amount of distance between these men and Zawahiri, commander-in-chief of al-Qa’ida TV.

This is already a too-long blog post, so I’ll leave it at that and try to return this weekend with some comments on Sayf’s strategic outlook and what it might mean for al-Qa’ida if he, and not Zawahiri, were to become the face of global jihad.

UPDATE – May 19, 2011

Two further points of interest. Asra Nomani today shared further details about Sayf al-‘Adl’s role in the Daniel Pearl case, pointing out that Sayf had advised KSM not to kill the journalist.

Secondly, Sayf al-‘Adl is not Muhammad Ibrahim Makkawi. Colonel Makkawi is ten years older than Sayf and a number of insiders who knew both men in Afghanistan – including Abu Jandal, Noman Benotman, Abu’l-Walid al-Masri and Yasir al-Sirri – have confirmed numerous times over the years that they are two different people. Both were officers in the Egyptian military; Sayf was a paratrooper and colonel in the Egyptian special forces before his 1987 arrest. Both fought at the infamous battle of Jalalabad in 1989, and around that time Sayf joined Bin Laden’s group and Makkawi remained with Zawahiri’s EIJ, though in the early 1990s he had a falling out with Zawahiri and quit the group. Sayf himself, at the end of the fifth letter in his most recent batch of communications posted on Abu’l-Walid’s blog, also emphatically states that Colonel Makkawi and Sayf are two different people.  The one photo we have and which has become ubiquitous in the press lately is indeed of Sayf, not Makkawi, though since that photo was taken Sayf was injured in his right eye. It is surprising that the Makkawi-Sayf confusion persists, given that Muhammad al-Shafi’i drew attention to this case of mistaken identity seven years ago.

Al-Qa’ida Publicy Cements Ties to the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan

Vahid Brown October 14, 2009

The official al-Qa’ida media outlet al-Sahab has released a flurry of videos in the past two weeks featuring leaders of the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP), both living and dead, in what amounts to a media campaign announcing their open alliance with Pakistan’s deadliest militant network.  On September 28, Zawahiri’s video eulogy for the slain TTP leader Baitullah Mehsud – the “role model of the youth” (ritha’ qudwat al-shabab) – was posted to the forums, followed two days later by a similar video message on the “martyrdom” of Baitullah starring Mustafa Abu’l-Yazid.  On October 2, al-Fajr Media distributed a third al-Sahab video eulogy for Baitullah, but this time featuring Wali ur-Rahman, the new TTP commander for the Mehsud tribal areas (an English transcript of which can be downloaded from here; links to all three videos can be found here).  

This series of al-Sahab celebrations of Baitullah, released two days apart over the course of a week, is itself a rather unusual concentration of al-Qa’ida media attention on a single non-al-Qa’ida member, and is totally unprecedented in terms of the al-Sahab air time devoted to the TTP.  Prior to these developments, the closest that al-Qa’ida came to officially signaling its ties to the TTP was in the release of an al-Sahab interview with Mullah Nazir shortly after he and Gul Bahadur joined Baitullah Mehsud to form the Shura Ittihad ul-Mujahidin this February.  Aside from the brief mention of Baitullah in that video, these recent releases are to my knowledge the first official al-Qa’ida communiqués to give any significant attention to the TTP and its leadership.

But that’s not all, folks. Yesterday, an Urdu newspaper reported that Aqil, alias Dr. Uthman, the sole surviving attacker in this weekend’s dramatic assault on the Pakistani Army’s General Headquarters in Rawalpindi , is the subject of an al-Sahab video released to a private television station in Pakistan, in which Aqil is shown receiving training in Waziristan and casing targets in Rawalpindi (Khabrain, 13 October 2009, pp. 6 and 8; article unavailable online, but there is an OSC translation).  And today, Pakistan’s ARY TV aired an al-Sahab video that they’d received, featuring TTP amir Hakimullah Mehsud, appearing alongside Wali ur-Rahman, in which both of them deliver statements to the people of Pakistan regarding their jihad against the state. (Ironically, both TTP leaders emphasize in the video that the TTP is not a servant of foreign masters, and that the TTP are “sons of Pakistan”).

While the close relationship between al-Qa’ida and the Pakistani Taliban has long been known, this release of multiple joint AQ-TTP messages from the al-Sahab production outlet is nonetheless extremely significant.  First of all, these developments indicate that al-Qa’ida has successfully seized the moment in the wake of the death of Baitullah to dramatically increase its influence over the TTP.  But this series of videos is perhaps also evidence of a decreasing willingness on al-Qa’ida’s part to remain in the shadows of its Pakistani partners as they unleash yet another bloody campaign of violence in Pakistan’s cities.  If so, this would represent a very important strategic shift in the thinking of al-Qa’ida’s senior leaders, who have thus far been content to provide largely anonymous guidance, training and force-multiplication assistance to their Pakistani jihadi allies.

UPDATE, 10/22/09: The video mentioned here as being aired in part by ARY TV on 14 October was distributed on the forums today by al-Sahab.  It is a little over thirty minutes long and, after opening invocations in Arabic, features Hakimullah and Wali ur-Rahman speaking in Urdu. There is no subtitling.

Zawahiri, France and Napoleon

Jean-Pierre Filiu September 10, 2009

Allow me to briefly go back to the last Zawahiri interview, put on-line through Sahab media on 5 August 2009. To my knowledge, this is the first time Bin Laden’s deputy has expressed such articulate hatred for France:

“France claims secularism, while her heart pours grudge towards Islam. Napoleon Bonaparte announced his famous statement to the Jews in 1799 in Akka, in which he promised to support the Jews in stealing Palestine. France is the one whose soldiers went with their horses into al-Azhar University and stood on its Qur’anic Books, and they took it as a stable to their horses. France is the one who fought Islam and Arabs in Algeria, and France is the one who supplied Israel with a nuclear reactor, and France fights Muslims in Afghanistan, and France fights hijab, and France will pay for all her crimes”.

Zawahiri has long be known for his French-bashing. In the late eighties, when he launched a vicious campaign against Ahmad Shah Mas’ud among the jihadi community in Peshawar, he accused the Tajik leader to be a French agent and to be surrounded by French women (in fact humanitarian workers who had walked their way up to Panjshir).

In his pamphlets, he repeatedly branded colonial France for carving up the Middle East through the Sykes-Picot agreement. During the Algerian civil war, he endorsed the attacks against the “French party” (hizb Fransa), as the secular camp came to be known in the jihadi propaganda. And he listed consistently the French among the “enemies of Islam”, along with the Americans, the Jews and the British. He was the first one to threaten France in February 2004, after a law banning the veil at government schools was passed.

What is fascinating in Zawahiri’s recent outburst against France is his ideological focus on Napoleon Bonaparte, who was only a general at the time he invaded Egypt in 1798. He insists on the sacrileges perpetrated by the French revolutionary armies (although they were probably more respectful of the Arab mosques than of the European churches) and he gives utmost credit to a “famous” letter to the Jews of Palestine, a standard of anti-Zionist propaganda, that French historians have proved to be a forgery (originating from European messianic Jewish circles). The key to the argument is that Napoleon embodies the innate hostility of France against Islam, in its two secular and Zionist dimensions. France becomes in Zawahiri’s rhetoric a new brand of Crusader state, more “secular” than Christian.

Apart from Zawahiri’s Egyptian obsessions, two other developments could have contributed to this aggressive emphasis against France. First, Barack Obama’s Cairo speech on 4 June makes it more difficult to portray America as waging an all-out war against Islam, no matter how hard jihadis propagandists try, so France provides a welcome alternative target for his secular commitment (that even Obama indirectly criticized in Cairo).

Second, and probably more important, the merging of the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) into Al-Qaida as its branch for the “Islamic Maghrib” (AQIM) has introduced more anti-French content to the global jihadi propaganda, with Zawahiri himself taking the lead. (Incidentally, a similar process occurred after the incorporation of Zarqawi’s network in Iraq, when al-Qaida’s media coverage included more anti-Shi’a rhetoric). Drukdal, AQIM’s emir, went as far as labeling France “mother of all evils”, on 30 June this year. And those are not just empty words, since Zawahiri’s “Napoleonic” interview was followed, three days later, by a foiled AQIM suicide attack against the French embassy in Mauritania.

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