With the approaching first anniversary of the US' announcement of Ayman al-Zawahiri’s death in an airstrike in the Afghan capital of Kabul, this report will analyze the present condition of Al-Qaeda, noting the organization’s apparent inability to replicate the large-scale terrorist attacks it executed during its prime in the late 1990s.
Additionally, this report notes a decrease in Al-Qaeda's branches following its previous strategy under former leader Osama bin Laden, which prioritized targeting what is referred to as the “distant enemy.”
It also brings attention to the growing demand from affiliated groups to dismantle “Al-Qaeda” following the assumption of leadership by Saif al-Adel, who is believed to be currently residing in Iran.
Armed Groups, Local Targets
The years following the new millennium witnessed a fundamental change in the modus operandi of extremist groups in several Arab countries.
In the 1990s, the primary objective of these groups was purely local: to overthrow the ruling regimes, accusing them of “apostasy.”
However, by the second half of that decade, it became evident that extremists had failed to achieve their goals. They suffered military defeats, their cells disintegrated, and many of their senior leaders were arrested or killed.
This was the case with the Armed Islamic Group in Algeria, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, as well as the Jihad Group and Islamic Group in Egypt.
Alongside those defeats, the emergence of Al-Qaeda took place. Bin Laden had relocated to Afghanistan in 1996 after losing favor in Sudan.
The same pattern repeated with the leader of the Egyptian Jihad Group, al-Zawahiri, who was also expelled from Sudan and found refuge in Afghanistan after failing to reach his initial target, Chechnya.
From his new headquarters in Afghanistan, bin Laden sought to persuade “defeated” groups to join him in a “global war” targeting Americans and the West in general, rather than local regimes.
This shift in strategy became known as the “distant enemy” approach, contrasting with the previous focus on the “near” enemy.
Al-Qaeda’s global project was launched in February 1998 with the establishment of the “International Islamic Front for Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders.”
In addition to Al-Qaeda, it included the Egyptian Jihad Group, a faction of the Egyptian Islamic Group (led by Rifa'i Taha), and other groups in Southeast Asia.
Within months, this alliance began implementing its plan to target Americans, starting with the bombings of the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in August 1998. The attacks continued with the bombing of the USS Cole off the coast of Yemen in 2000, culminating in the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York and Washington.
- Global Project
Naturally, new allies joined Al-Qaeda’s “global” project. Initially, the attacks were directly linked to Al-Qaeda’s leadership, as seen in the Indonesian Bali bombings in 2002, carried out by members of the “Islamic Group” under the leadership of Hambali, a prominent figure within Al-Qaeda.
In 2005, London experienced its worst terrorist attack, targeting train stations and a public bus.
Most of the suicide bombers in the London attacks were British individuals of Pakistani origin, some of whom had visited the Afghan-Pakistani border regions, where Al-Qaeda’s leadership was based.
Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the bloody London bombings.
In turn, Al-Qaeda’s branches joined this “global” effort.
Its Yemeni branch (Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) attempted to send a suicide bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, in 2009, to detonate an explosive device on an American passenger plane.
The following year, the organization made another attempt by sending explosive packages to destroy several planes bound for the US.
This global trajectory persisted for Al-Qaeda and its allies until the phase known as the “Arab Spring” in 2011, when several countries were engulfed in revolutions and internal unrest.
Al-Qaeda swiftly attempted to exploit this situation, taking advantage of the fall of regimes that had previously defeated extremist groups in the 1990s.
However, during that period, Al-Qaeda faced two fundamental problems.
The first problem was that the US had killed bin Laden after a 10-year manhunt following his escape from Tora Bora at the end of 2001. He was found hiding in a villa in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and was killed on the night of May 2, 2011.
Al-Zawahiri was swiftly announced as bin Laden’s successor, but the former leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad did not enjoy authority over the terrorist organization and its branches the same way bin Laden did.
The second problem was the issue of ISIS.
This terrorist group, which emerged from the branches of Al-Qaeda, quickly found itself in conflict with al-Zawahiri, bin Laden’s successor.
Syria was the cause of their disagreement.
ISIS, led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, sought to expand into Syria, taking advantage of the weakening of President Bashar al-Assad’s regime amid the revolution against him. However, al-Baghdadi soon faced internal rebellion.
The Decline of the ‘Global War’
Over time, it became noticeable that the “global war” launched by Al-Qaeda against the West in general and the Americans in particular since the 1990s has significantly receded, if not completely disappeared.
In recent years, Al-Qaeda has demonstrated its inability to replicate the major attacks it previously carried out, such as the bombings of the US embassies in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi, the USS Cole bombing, and the September 11 attacks in Washington and New York.
The end of “global attacks” did not just affect Al-Qaeda’s leaders, but also its branches that were supposed to target enemies far away.
These branches themselves stated that their activities were now only focused locally, which is a significant shift from the original idea of a global Al-Qaeda project.
Perhaps it is necessary to pause here and consider the situation of Al-Qaeda’s leadership, which found itself in recent years clearly isolated from its cells and branches due to the circumstances of al-Zawahiri’s hiding and his inability to communicate with his supporters.
He compensated for this by releasing occasional videos and audio recordings, in which he incited continued war against the West, alluding to “lone wolf” attacks.
The chaotic and sudden US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 provided a golden opportunity for Al-Qaeda to regroup.
It appears that al-Zawahiri himself felt some reassurance in this new situation, relocating to Kabul, where he lived under the protection of the influential “Haqqani network’ within the Taliban.
However, the Americans managed to kill him in a drone strike in July 2022.
Despite months passing since al-Zawahiri’s killing, Al-Qaeda has not yet announced his successor. This may be linked to the Taliban, as acknowledging his death in Kabul would embarrass the Afghan movement that denied his presence.
The delay in announcing a successor to al-Zawahiri may also be associated with the fact that the most likely person to assume his role, Saif al-Adel, resides in Iran. This situation could potentially embarrass the organization in front of its members and defenders.
A former member of Al-Qaeda, who defected from the organization due to its extreme bloodshed, explains that there are two reasons for the shift towards fighting the “near enemy” rather than the distant one.
“The first reason is the inability,” explained the defector who requested anonymity.
“The problem with Al-Qaeda is that it has lost the ability to communicate with its cells and smuggle individuals to form cells and recruit members in distant countries like the US, Canada, Australia, Europe, and others,” they told Asharq Al-Awsat.
Moreover, the former Al-Qaeda member noted that the group has also lost the ability to finance these entities.
“It only has the ability to inspire lone wolves,” they added.
Moreover, the terrorist organization has even failed at times to operate within Arab countries, affirmed the defector.
Today, it appears that “lack of capability” is the same reason that prompted Al-Qaeda and its branches to cease launching attacks against the “distant enemy,” perhaps except for lone wolf attacks.
The problem will arise, of course, when the reason for the “lack of capability” disappears. Until then, it seems that the West’s priorities will remain focused on China and Russia.
