Zawahiri's getting an earful from a former Libyan mujahadeen. Evidently Numan Bin Uthman, now residing in London, is less than thrilled with the results of the AQ inspired attempt to wage successful jihad. Mind you, as a "retiree", I'm not sure how much weight Uthman carries, as he's a new entity to me. But you gotta love the message, if not the messenger.
"Dear Doctor Ayman, as I told you during a meeting in Kandahar [in Afghanistan] in 2000, the experience of the Jihadi groups in Arab countries is failed and despite our appeals, the armed groups are divided and will not unite," he said in the letter, a copy of which was published in the London based pan-Arab daily al-Hayat.
snip
"I ask you and whoever is behind you to review the way you behave because the Jihadi groups are acting very badly towards those who think differently from the way they do," said Uthman in the letter.
"I aks you to stop the armed operations in the Arab countries, to guarantee the security of Muslims and to retract your threats toward the West, to take away from them the terrorism card used by some Western governments to hate Islam and Muslims," he said.
snip
"Only in this way, will it be possible to rebuild ties with other Sunni guerilla groups," he said.
Note that the alliance with other Sunni's - i.e. Iraq - still weighs prominently on Uthman's mind.
But wait... just when you think it couldn't be any more of a slap in the face to a high profile Eqyptian terror leader, it does get better. The "na na na naaaa na" really comes out. Uthman apparently took umbrage with OBL's suggestion that the quest to obtain and use WMDs was a "Sharia obligation" back at a summit meeting in 2000.
"During this occasion, I had a strong dispute with the martyr Abu Hafs al-Kumandan, because he was heavily involved in acquiring weapons of mass destruction," he said in the letter.
"He wanted to use these weapons to dissuade the United State from attacking Afghanistan. And yet I knew that al-Qaeda did not have any strategic vision and would have used the weapons to kill indistriminately and not to dissuade".
According to the former jihadi, if al-Qaeda had chemical or nuclear weapons, they would only increase their destructive power to the detriment of Arab countries in particular.
"After seven years since that meeting, my convictions on these issues have only grown stronger," he said.
"At that time I said that provoking the United States would turn them against the Taliban and by striking the country in an unconventional way would bring occupation to the entire Middle East and not only Afghanistan and that's what's happened," he said.
Can't argue with the man's final point. We are far more visible in the ME now. Yet OBL banked on the US's further encroachment on Islam lands to boost their jihad goals amongst Muslims.
I'm sure he never dreamed that the vast jihadist family that they've put together would be so dysfunctional, and do more damage to their quest than a US footprint in the Middle East could ever do. They are literally cracking at the foundations in multiple fronts now.
2 comments:
I just finished reading 'The Looming Tower' by Lawrence Wright, a simply amazing book about the path to 9/11. He writes that Bin Laden's purpose in his attacks on the US was to lure the US into Afghanistan, where the mujihadeen would bleed another invading foreign army. Bin Laden believed his fantasy that his Arab Fighters with Allah defeated the Soviets, then brought down the USSR. He wanted to repeat this with the US.
So, if the Libyan Jihadi is telling the truth, he didn't understand the purpose of Bin Laden's war on the US. The purpose was to bring about the occupation of the Middle East. He believed that would grow his movement.
Bin Laden was kicked out of the Sudan and went to Afghanistan before the Taliban took over. He lost everything in the Sudan and was left with almost nothing.
So, what did Bin Laden do? He declared war on the US. That excited the Islamist wackos and brought Bin Laden recruits and money.
Then he attacked Khobar Towers, the US Embassies in Africa and the USS Cole. These attacks lead to even more money and more recruits. 9/11 would push Bin Laden even further up and gain even more recruits and funds.
In some ways, that's what's happened. What's happened too, is that al Qaeda indiscrimate murder of Muslims has turned Muslims against al Qaeda.
Welcome jabba the tutt.
I haven't read Wright's book yet. After reading the reviews when it came out last year, I have a problem that he, like so many others, tend to believe Bin Laden and AQ operate in a vacuum without the support and aid of other jihadist organizations.
Fact is, it ceased to be Bin Laden vs the West as of 1998 with the World Islamic Front statement, signed by OBL, Zawahiri and another Egyptian terrorist representing the Egyptian Islamic Group, Rahman from Bangladesh (not to be confused with Pakistan's Maulana Fazlur Rahman, co founder of the Taliban), and a representative of Pakistan's Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Pakistan.
The point to the union of these various jihadist factions was to obtain the religious authority for fatwa for the 911 attacks. OBL did not have the status to declare religious authority. That authority is noted by the signature of Fazlur Rahman Khalil of Bangladesh on the World Islamic Front.
This means that war on the US, it's citizens and allies was declared by several jihadist groups... not just Bin Laden.
The reasons for 911 and this jihad were well stated in the 1998 World Islamic Front - for the war and sanctions on Iraq, for the US presence in Saudi Arabia.
Now let's bring this back to Wright's notion that Bin Laden was trying to lure the US into Afghanistan... an opinion I find questionable.
The most obvious flaw in Wright's theory is that OBL could not have the 911 attack sanctioned by the Deobandi/Wahhabi community without the religious authority of a fatwa. And those capable of issuing that fatwa for OBL's actions were not in support of the US military's entry further in the Middle East.
In the list of AQ assaults - direct or by background involvement - you missed 1993's Blackhawk Down events in Somalia. Mohammad Atef supplied training and equipment to the Somali Islamics, used in their attack. And notably, Atef did so just two days after being instructed by Saddam to "hunt the Americans" in Somalia. The US didn't discover AQ's involvement until 1996.
Post a Comment