Comments on: Al-Qa’ida and the Afghan Taliban: “Diametrically Opposed”?

By: Mansoor

Mansoor — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 22:28:13 +0000

Dear All,

Its about time that Talibans realize the importance of securing and looking after their own people. Millions are starving, dieing and misplaced for the sake couple of foreign Lunatics using the Afghan-Land to do their Dirty Wars.

Its time for us Afghans to come under one umbrella of unity and peace and start extending our hands to our Dear Neighbors (Iran, Pakistan, Uzbakistan, Tajikistan, etc.). Why shouldn’t we? WHO WANTS A BAD Neighbor, DO YOU?

I think its still time for all Afghans to come together and rid ourselves from the disease of dis-unity and wars, and foreign lunatics!! For the foreign lunatics, go start a war in your country leave Afghans alone, before they turn on you!

Zinda-Bad Afghanistan!

By: MILNEWS.ca

MILNEWS.ca — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 08:50:27 +0000

Good piece – keep up the great work!

Re: the comment on fora postings to the effect that “Mullah Omar’s messages imply some level of recognition of the United Nations, an organization which al-Qa’ida has unequivocally labelled as “infidel,” and that these opposing moves seem to him to signal “the beginning of the end of relations between al-Qa’ida and the Taliban.” ”

would the Taliban be swayed by this sort of debate that it would be a reason behind the 12 Oct 09 statement condemning the UN as harshly as it did for the passing of the latest resolution mandating the ISAF mission (since old Voice of Jihad URLs no longer work, PDF of official English version here http://xrl.us/bfx6y6 )? Or is the timing out of whack with the other material?

I can’t remember seeing other specific statements along these lines immediately after such UN Security Council resolutions, and thought of that one when I read your piece.

By: Amm Sam

Amm Sam — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 10:04:13 +0000

Vahid, I do remember the Yazid interview that Maqdisi slammed, but wasn’t aware of the response from Yazid. Interesting stuff. Deference to the scholar. Strategy vs. doctrine, I suppose?

Thanks for the response.

By: Vahid Brown

Vahid Brown — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 00:27:00 +0000

Talib,
Yep, it’s the same one that was sent to ARY last week. I put a link in the update to my post on those videos.

By: Vahid Brown

Vahid Brown — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 23:19:02 +0000

Amm Sam,
Just one follow-up point regarding Maqdisi’s influence on AQ. You will recall that in June Abu’l-Yazid created a furor by saying apparently nice things about Hamas in an al-Jazeera interview, which predictably led to Maqdisi writing one of his “corrective” diatribes. On July 26, 2009, Abu’l-Yazid, writing on behalf of AQ’s “General Command,” issued a clarification, saying his nice words were a slip of the tongue and the Hamas leaders are misguided sinners. AY closes by writing that he’d like to particularly thank Maqdisi, “as I have read his letter and its helpful explanations.” (http://alflojaweb.com/vb/showthread.php?t=82730). AQ is keenly aware of Maqdisi’s power over their audience.

By: Vahid Brown

Vahid Brown — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 19:36:42 +0000

Amm Sam,
Thanks for the comments. I agree that the shift in strategic communications by the Taliban-Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (Taliban-IEA, the Kandahari-Quetta bloc) is primarily targeting Western publics and politics. This is a full-court PR press to undermine a central pillar of the “war of necessity” argument, which is that a successful Taliban would threaten regional and international security (partly, so the argument goes, b/c of its links to AQ). As Peter Bergen noted in the TNR piece that I linked to, the Taliban (and here I think he means the Taliban-IEA) does not need AQ, and the IEA appears willing to accept the risk of alienating AQ and its supporters with this campaign. But there is more going on here than clashing PR; AQ and the IEA do have serious disagreements about a lot of things, and this is not the first time that their post-9/11 conflicts have emerged into the open. What I think Rohde and Bergen are shedding light on is the increasingly intertwined nature of AQ and the Taliban-Islamic Emirate of North Waziristan (Taliban-IENW, the Karlanri tribal bloc and its allies), which has indeed “drifted into the global jihadist perspective.” In a sense, though, this is not new; for who, virtually alone among Afghan field commanders, welcomed the Afghan Arabs on the battlefield in large numbers in the ’80s? Haqqani.
I don’t conflate Maqdisi w/ AQ, and never have. Maqdisi is a Salafi jihadi thought leader with a lot of influence over AQ’s primary constituency. You can be sure that Zawahiri and Libi were well aware of Maqdisi’s rebuke when they were preparing their scripts for the videos I mention, and I don’t think the online jihadis are necessarily over-reacing when they see dots to connect b/w Maqdisi’s slam of the Taliban via Hamas and Zawahiris (indirect) slam of a Taliban strategy via Hamas and Hizbullah. Clearly, within that universe of discourse folks are seeing trouble, and this is important (see Marc Lynch’s comments on parallels with Iraq over at FP). This is how the jihadis are seeing it; I’m not trying to stretch anything here.

By: CWOT

CWOT — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 14:53:44 +0000

Vahid,
thanks for posting. Once again, analysis is better if you know the language and culture. Jihadica brings this into context because all of you have the appropriate skills as opposed to the many other terrorism pundits out there that provide their opinions based on english news media, the use of Google translator, and their lack of overseas travel. Thanks to jihadica for maintaining a high standard.

By: Amm Sam

Amm Sam — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 09:38:54 +0000

The Taliban’s statements of late have to be understood in the context of the US debate on what strategy to pursue in Afghanistan. Mullah Omar is trying to influence the debate by signaling to the Obama Administration that they aren’t a threat – but should we take Mullah Omar’s word for it? Of course not. If you look at the discourse of the Taliban, from spokesmen and commanders to the footsoldiers quoted in David Rhodes’ excellent 5-part NYT series (http://www.icsr.info/blog/Account-of-NYT-journalist-held-by-Talibanand-another-story-too), you see that the Taliban as a semi-coherent movement has drifted into the global jihadist perspective over the last several years. They are still primarily focused on the region, but less so now than ever.

Only now do we see this shift from Omar in the heat of Washington deliberations on Afghanistan.

Maqdisi is a hothead and, like any good Salafi, regards any departure from dogma – even a strategic one – as deleterious. That explains his reaction. You also shouldn’t conflate Maqdisi with the AQ-Central leadership. He is the most influential scholar in the Salafi-Jihadist movement, perhaps (or he was a few years ago), but he is not an AQ commander or spokesperson. And remember, Maqdisi is aggresively near-enemy focused in his writings, not far-enemy focused like Al Zawahiri. I think it is a stretch to say Al-Zawahiri’s speech that you cited was aimed at the Taliban. And Al-Libi’s was a direct response to Han-Uighur tensions and violence – nothing new in AQ trying to tap into local grievances and causes to promote its global vision.

The statements you report on here by Mullah Omar are a recent shift in the discourse designed to influence the judgment of Washington.