DAR AL ISLAM - AL QAEDA: IS AL-QUAEDA'S JIHAD ENTERING THE TERMINAL PHASE?!?

Al Qaeda’s jihad against West entering terminal phase?

The United States government has disclosed that it has custody of an Al Qaeda operative by the name of Abdul Hadi Al Iraqi at the Guantanamo Bay camp, but it will not reveal how he got to the camp and from where. The only information given out is that Al Iraqi was trying to return to his native country, Iraq, to manage Al Qaeda’s affairs and possibly focus on operations outside Iraq against Western targets. He is also the man who had planned an unsuccessful attempt on the life of President General Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan.

The Pentagon officer who announced the capture of Al Iraqi also announced that the Al Qaeda man had “met with Al Qaeda members in Iran”. Pakistan and Afghanistan have welcomed Al Iraqi’s arrest, with Pakistan’s interior minister, Aftab Sherpao, saying that the arrest was “a significant development and would help the ongoing fight against terrorism”.

In another development, Saudi forces have swooped down on an Al Qaeda cell in Saudi Arabia after tracking the cell members for three months. The 170 arrested two days ago were young men trained secretly in Al Qaeda camps in Iraq’s Anbar and Diyala provinces and had returned to Saudi Arabia to carry out suicide attacks against the Saudi ruling family and destroy important installations. The authorities found over $5 million in their hideout. What should one make of these developments?

Al Qaeda is obviously under pressure to make its mark again. This is evident from the increase in suicide-bombings in Pakistan, often against state forces. Under normal circumstances, Al Qaeda would be more motivated to attack somewhere in the West, if not the United States. It is active now in Iraq where it is killing far more Shias than Americans. In fact, by going sectarian Al Qaeda has come close to the original Saudi worldview. But is Iran complicit with Al Qaeda through Al Iraqi?

The idea is far-fetched. Iran gave right of way in 2001 but gradually became scared of the Arab warriors as America prepared to attack Iraq. Today, Iran’s real enemy is Al Qaeda. It is killing Shias in Iraq at the rate of one hundred a day. It has destroyed the famous shrines of Samarra and forced the population of Iraq to kill one another. It is only logical to assume that going sectarian has blunted its anti-West edge.

In 2007, the decline of Al Qaeda into a schismatic organisation is owed to a number of factors. First, it remained a predominantly Arab enterprise where authority was bestowed on Arabs or half-Arabs, in the latter case based on their linguistic ability. Second, it linked up in Pakistan with jihadi militias whose hinterland seminaries were already funded by Saudi Arabia to confront the sectarian challenge of Iran. Third, Al Qaeda tolerated the sectarian violence perpetrated by its jihadi protégés in a policy of laissez faire which nevertheless gave protection to them when confronted with state action from Pakistan. Fourth, because Al Qaeda relied on the approbation of the religious leaders in the Islamic world, it could not oppose their schismatic leanings, since Islamic sectarianism can be avoided only through non-religious nationalism. Fifth, because of the non-intellectual nature of Al Qaeda and his own non-cerebral charisma, Osama bin Laden allowed ideological transition from Abdullah Azzam to al Zawahiri and Al Maqdisi and other Hanbalite thinkers without any deep thinking or analysis.

Now Al Qaeda stands poised against Iran. In Iraq, where it has chosen to base itself, it will ultimately be less safe than in Pakistan. Apart from the Americans — who might leave next year — Syria is an unfriendly state with a lifeline to Iran’s strongest bastion in the Middle East, Lebanon. The Iraqi majority community will also be backed by the Kurds of the north because of Iran’s old ties with the Kurdish leaders, and both together will take on Al Qaeda.Given this situation, a strange new relationship is likely to develop between Al Qaeda and Jordan and ultimately Saudi Arabia, too, the two countries greatly upset over the growing dominance of Iran across the Gulf. Both will be interested in training the Sunni Iraqi refugees and sending them back home to face the Iran-backed forces in Iraq. As for the expat Muslims in the West, most of the money is being funnelled by them to the sectarian warriors. The rise of Zarqawi as the Shia-hating Al Qaeda leader was owed to their money.

America may be exaggerating the Al Qaeda threat because of President Bush’s own problems at home and his reluctance to let go of Iraq. But the truth is that Al Qaeda in Iraq has got its hands full facing equally lethal foes backed by Iran. Its sectarianism might well push it into its terminal phase. *


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1) Al Qaeda’s jihad against West entering terminal phase?