The UN recently presented a report in which it is stated that most member states are now of the opinion that it is al-Adel who leads Al Qaeda and that he is staying in Iran. – Our assessment is in line with the UN – that AL Qaeda’s new de facto leader Saif al-Adel is based in Iran, says a spokesperson for the US Foreign Ministry. Risky to harbor Al Qaeda’s leader After Al Qaeda’s attack on the twin towers on September 11, 2001, the United States and its allies attacked Afghanistan. al-Adel helped train several of the hijackers who took part in the terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001, according to the organization US Counter Extremism Project Photo: Spencer Platt / Getty Images The reason for the US attack was that the Taliban regime let the then Al Qaeda- leader Osama bin Laden stay in the country. The Taliban were considered co-responsible. In other words, it is risky for a regime to house such a person. anti-Al Qaeda fighter looks into a cave where Al Qaeda fighters stayed in the Tora Bora mountains of Afghanistan. Photo taken 18 December 2001. Photo: DAVID GUTTENFELDER / AP Shortly after the US Foreign Ministry last night pointed to Iran as the whereabouts of the person they believe is the new Al Qaeda leader, the reaction came from Iran. The country’s foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian believes the claim is ridiculous: – It is the creators of Al Qaeda and IS who are responsible for increased terror in the world, he writes on Twitter today, with an obvious reference to the USA. Special soldier in the Egyptian army Adel, who will be 62 years old, is a former lieutenant colonel in the Egyptian security forces and has long been central to the leadership of Al Qaeda. Adel is also wanted by the FBI for involvement in the bombings of the US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya in 1998. A guard watches the destruction of the US embassy in Nairobi, Kenya August 7, 1998. 111 people were killed and at least 4,000 were injured. Photo: ALEXANDER JOE / AFP The United States has promised a reward of up to 10 million dollars for information that could lead to his arrest. Not designated Al Qaeda has not formally designated a new leader because the Taliban in Afghanistan have not wanted to acknowledge that former leader Ayman al-Zawahri was killed in a US attack in Kabul in July, the UN report says. For Sunni Islamist Al Qaeda, it is also difficult to acknowledge that Adel is hiding in the mainly Shia Muslim Iran. – His whereabouts raise questions that have to do with al-Qaeda’s ambitions to take leadership of a global movement in the face of challenges from IS, the UN writes in the report. Al Qaeda versus IS – The two jihadist organizations IS and Al Qaeda have been in rivalry since 2012-2013, says Brynjar Lia, professor of Middle Eastern studies. Brynjar Lia is an expert on militant Islamist organizations at UiO. Photo: news – IS was bigger than Al Qaeda when they established a caliphate in Syria and Iraq. Then this collapsed, and IS is today more closely related to Al Qaeda. – Sometimes there are skirmishes between them, as for example in West Africa. This area is called the Sahel and stretches along the southern side of the Sahara. The two groups have no desire to merge. The map shows Al Qaeda and IS’s groupings on the globe. The arrows indicate whether they are growing or falling. Source: USA, Foreign Ministry’s country information. Waiting for Al Qaeda’s confirmation Lia will wait until Al Qaeda itself announces who the organization’s new leader is. – I think it is so special that Al Qaeda should choose a leader who stays in Iran, he says. I am therefore waiting to see if it is correct. If al-Adel is actually the new leader of Al Qaeda, he is a gagged leader, says Lia. Iranian authorities will monitor everything he does. According to the researcher, he lives almost as if under house arrest. Al Qaeda still large, but more spread Whatever the truth, Al Qaeda today is far less dependent on a charismatic leader than during its inception under Osama bin Laden. Lia points out that Al Qaeda has become a more widespread organisation, with activities in both Africa, the Middle East and several regions in Asia. – These operate far more independently today, and carry out terrorist attacks on their own. Lia singles out al-Shabaab in Somalia as one example. Al-Qaeda’s branch in Somalia. “As far as international terrorist attacks are concerned, Al Qaeda’s leadership has often made statements suggesting that the terror was carried out by Al Qaeda, even though the leadership has had no operational role in the attacks,” says Lia. The question is whether al-Adel will be allowed by the Iranian authorities to call for terrorist attacks around the world, from his home in Iran.
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The US points to this as Al Qaeda’s new leader – news Norway – Overview of news from various parts of the country
