Zawahiri: 'Prepare for the next jihad'
Pastor Dale Morgan
Zawahiri: 'Prepare for the next jihad' *
Al-Qaida Deputy Leader Seen in New Video
Jul 5, 10:35 AM (ET)
By LEE KEATH
BAGHDAD (AP) - Al-Qaida's deputy leader sought to bolster the terror
network's main arm in Iraq in a new video released Thursday, calling on
Muslims to rally behind it at a time when the group is on the defensive,
faced with U.S. offensives and splits with other insurgent groups.
Ayman al-Zawahri defended the Islamic State of Iraq - the insurgent
umbrella group headed by al-Qaida - against critics among Islamic
militant groups, saying it was a vanguard for fighting off the U.S.
military and eventually establishing a "caliphate" of Islamic rule
across the region.
Al-Zawahri, the top deputy of Osama bin Laden, called on Muslims to
follow a two-pronged strategy: work at home to topple "corrupt" Arab
regimes and join al-Qaida's "jihad," or holy war, in Iraq, Afghanistan
and Somalia to fight and train "to prepare for the next jihad."
He urged Hamas not to compromise and bend under Arab and international
pressure to end its rule in the Gaza Strip and make way for a unified
Palestinian government that could pursue peace with Israel.
"As for the leadership of Hamas, I tell it: return to the truth, for you
will only get something worse than what (late Palestinian leader Yasser)
Arafat got" from the Israelis in negotiations, he said. The peace
process, he said, is a U.S. attempt to "deceive the Islamic nation and
say that America solved the issue of Palestine, so what need is there to
fight it and wage jihad against it?"
In an earlier message after its seizure of Gaza, al-Zawahri urged Hamas
to form an alliance with al-Qaida, a call the Palestinian militant group
shunned.
The Egyptian militant did not mention last week's failed car bombing
attempts in Britain, which British authorities are investigating for
al-Qaida links. That suggested the video, posted Thursday on an Islamic
militant Web site, was made before the events in London and Glasgow.
Al-Qaida's declaration of the Islamic State of Iraq last year was a
dramatic move aimed at staking out its leadership of Iraq's insurgency.
Allying itself with several smaller Iraqi Sunni insurgent groups, it
presented the Islamic State as an alternative government within Iraq,
claiming to hold territory.
The move quickly met resistance. Some Islamic extremist clerics in the
Arab world said it was too soon to declare an Islamic state because the
Islamic law qualifications were not yet met and argued that a true
Islamic state is not viable while there are still U.S. forces in Iraq.
Several large Iraqi Sunni insurgent groups publicly denounced al-Qaida,
saying its fighters were killing theirs and pressuring them to join the
Islamic State. One group, the 1920 Revolution Brigades, has begun
overtly cooperating with U.S. forces and Sunni tribal leaders to attack
al-Qaida.
At the same time, increased U.S. forces sent to Iraq this year are
waging a number of offensives in suspected al-Qaida strongholds north
and south of Baghdad and in western Anbar province, claiming to have
captured and killed a number of significant figures in the group.
The offensives have caused an increase in American casualties, but
insurgent and militia attacks appear to have fallen in the past week. On
Thursday, Baghdad was relatively quiet, with police reports of a
policeman and a civilian killed in a shooting and bombing. A roadside
bomb hit a police patrol in the northern city of Mosul, killing a
civilian and wounding three police.
The U.S. military said a helicopter crash on Wednesday that killed an
American soldier in western Iraq was caused when the craft hit
electrical wires, adding that ground fire was not a cause. The Islamic
State of Iraq said in a statement Wednesday the crash happened during a
battle, and that "God blinded" the pilot, causing him to hit the wires.
Iraq's Shiite and Kurdish leaders on Thursday were trying to overcome a
Sunni Arab boycott of the Cabinet of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki,
which threatens to hold up a key new oil law. The United States is
pressing hard for passage of the long-delayed oil law in hopes it will
encourage Sunni support of the government.
Al-Zawahri spent much of the unusually long video - at an hour and 35
minutes - defending the Islamic State, criticizing those who refuse to
recognize it "because it lacks the necessary qualifications" even while
he acknowledged it had made unspecified mistakes.
"The Islamic State of Iraq is set up in Iraq, the mujahedeen (holy
warriors) celebrate it in the streets of Iraq, the people demonstrate in
support of it," al-Zawahri said, "pledges of allegiance to it are
declared in the mosques of Baghdad."
He said Muslims around the world should "support this blessed fledgling
mujahid garrison state with funds, manpower, opinion, information and
expertise," saying its founding brought the Islamic world closer to
"establishment of the caliphate, with God's permission."
He urged critics to work with the Islamic State "even if we see in it
shortcomings," and said Islamic State leaders should "open their hearts"
to consultations. "The mujahedeen are not innocent of deficiency, error
and slips," he said. "The mujahedeen must solve their problems among
themselves."
Al-Zawahri appeared in the video - first reported by IntelCenter and
SITE, two U.S.-based groups that monitor militant messages - wearing a
white robe and turban and, as he often does, took a professorial tone,
making points by citing Islamic history and by showing clips of experts
speaking on Western and Arabic media.
He denounced Egypt, Jordan and Saudi at length. He warned Iraq's Sunni
minority against seeing them as allies, saying they pretend to support
the Sunni cause while allying themselves with the United States.
If Saudi Arabia controls Iraq or Sunni regions of Iraq, "the Iraqis
would then suffer the same repression and humiliation which the people
suffer under Saudi rule under the pretext of combating terrorism - i.e.,
combatting jihad and preserving American security," al-Zawahri said.
The al-Qaida deputy also laid out an al-Qaida strategy, saying in the
near-term militant should target U.S. and Israeli interests "everywhere"
in retaliation for "attacks on the Islamic nation" in Iraq, Afghanistan
and Somalia.
The long-term strategy calls for "diligent work to change these corrupt
and corrupting (Arab) regimes." He said Muslims should "rush to the
fields of jihad" in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia "to defeat the enemies
of the Islamic nation" and for "training to prepare for the next jihad."