Al-Qaida, however, has a problem in taking this pro-Hamas stand. This is that some of the key jihadi ideologues who have long supported al-Qaida, and who command a certain following within al-Qaida’s global network, are deeply uncomfortable with it. The most noteworthy of these is Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi (b. 1959), the Palestinian-Jordanian scholar whose many books, essays, and fatwas have profoundly shaped the ideological complexion of the jihadi movement, or “the jihadi current” (al-tayyar al-jihadi) as it is most commonly known in Arabic, going back to the 1980s. Al-Maqdisi has long served as something of the jihadi movement’s ideological standard-bearer, ensuring conformity with Salafi doctrinal principles that emphasize strict monotheism (tawhid) and condemnation and denunciation of all that goes again it, from supplicating saints at tombs to democracy and nationalism and failure to rule by God’s law.

Unlike in previous years when al-Maqdisi used social media accounts and wrote frequently online, over the past year or so his social media usage and his writing have been restricted by the Jordanian authorities. Even so, a number of his messages have appeared online since October 7, and for the most part these have comprised severe criticism of al-Qaida. While al-Maqdisi is not as categorically anti-Hamas as the Islamic State, he has no tolerance for what he sees as al-Qaida’s unprincipled stand of all-out support for the Palestinian militant group, a stand that he sees as representing al-Qaida’s ongoing ideological evolution toward a more generic kind of Islamism. These concerns of al-Maqdisi go to the heart of what al-Qaida is trying to become in the present moment as it repositions itself as the more “moderate” alternative to the Islamic State—and the challenge that this intended makeover entails.

Hamas between al-Qaida and al-Maqdisi

The Islamic State, to reiterate, has nothing positive to say about Hamas whatsoever. Back in January, the Islamic State’s official spokesman urged Hamas to “correct your path,” arguing that its “recent battle in Gaza” was not about “achieving the unity of God and making His word supreme” but rather about “the dirt and the land.” He went on to fault Hamas for failing to implement the Sharia in Gaza and for allying itself with Shiite Iran’s “axis of resistance,” noting that the “expansionary designs” of the “Rejectionists” (i.e., the Shia) are no less a threat to the Muslims than “the conspiracies and enmities of the Jews and the Crusaders.” The only way for Hamas to be worthy of the Islamic State’s support, in other words, was for it to abandon the resistance axis and transform itself into an extension of the Islamic State.

Al-Qaida has also in the past condemned Hamas, but never so severely and never to the point of outright excommunication (takfir). In 2006 al-Qaida’s approach turned negative when Hamas pivoted from being principally a terrorist militia to being a political group as well. That year Hamas participated in the Palestinian legislative elections, and al-Qaida responded by condemning it for participating in these “polytheistic assemblies” and effectively recognizing the Oslo Accords. In 2007 Osama bin Laden famously stated that Hamas had “forsaken their religion.”

Al-Maqdisi was even more critical of Hamas in this period, writing extensively about its perceived transgressions from its embrace of the “polytheistic” religion of democracy to its failure to implement the Sharia in Gaza (after Hamas’s takeover there in 2007) and the nationalism underlying its jihad, among other things. More broadly he critiqued Hamas for not adhering to the correct path or methodology (manhaj), meaning the ideological path associated with the jihadi movement, or Jihadi Salafism, with its emphasis on tawhid and its commitment to overthrowing the “apostate” rulers of the Islamic world.

It was in this context that al-Maqdisi came into conflict with the al-Qaida commander Mustafa Abu al-Yazid (d. 2010), who in a 2009 interview casually stated that “we and Hamas share the same thinking and the same manhaj.” Al-Maqdisi responded with a 20-page rebuttal setting out all the ways in which Hamas did not adhere to “the manhaj of the Jihadi Salafi current” (manhaj al-tayyar al-salafi al-jihadi). Abu al-Yazid duly issued a correction, explaining that he had misspoken (“the phrase was not precise”) and clarifying that al-Qaida’s position is one of distinguishing between the political wing of Hamas, which is deeply flawed, and Hamas’s military wing (i.e., the al-Qassam Brigades), which merits support as mujahidin fighting a shared enemy. Al-Maqdisi has sometimes indicated his agreement with this distinction between the political and the military wings of Hamas, though he has never been entirely comfortable with it. In any event, the episode with Abu al-Yazid demonstrated the kind of ideological authority that al-Maqdisi wielded within al-Qaida circles at this time. In recent years, however, this has changed, with al-Maqdisi finding himself critiquing what he sees as al-Qaida’s ideological drift and al-Qaida only drifting further.

In 2021, for instance, during an earlier round of conflict between Israel and Hamas, al-Maqdisi rebuked al-Qaida’s official media agency, al-Sahab, for its statement mourning the death of a Hamas senior military commander. He framed his criticism as though reflecting the concerns of a great many erstwhile supporters of al-Qaida. “Many mujahid brothers, shaykhs, and preachers,” he wrote,

were displeased by the al-Sahab statement’s exaltation of the al-Qassam leader who was killed in the recent war in Gaza, and they wondered astonishedly: “Are our brothers not aware of the deviation of Hamas and its leadership from the path of tawhid in favor of the path of democracy, and of their alignment with Hizb al-Lat [i.e., Hizbullah] and Bashar [al-Asad] and Iran?” … Has the manhaj changed?! Have the ranks of al-Qaida been penetrated by those who pay no heed to the purity of the manhaj?”

This was a major escalation in al-Maqdisi’s occasional criticism of al-Qaida, which had earlier included reprimanding the group for mourning the late President Mohammed Morsi of Egypt. For the first time, al-Maqdisi had accused al-Qaida of turning its back on the jihadi manhaj that he and others had worked so hard to construct. Al-Qaida was from his perspective trying to remake itself into a more pan-Islamist group that could appeal to the global Muslim community, or umma, more broadly, and this meant dispensing with the jihadi manhaj and all its ideological strictures. Since October 7, al-Maqdisi’s concerns about al-Qaida have only grown greater.

Early reactions

Al-Qaida would waste little time in publishing a statement of support for the Hamas operation. On October 13, the al-Qaida senior leadership, or “general command,” issued a statement titled “But Surely God’s Help is Nigh” (Q. 2:214) in which it hailed the October 7 attack as “one of the most courageous of heroic acts in Islam in this modern time,” and “one of the most important Islamic strides that will lead to the liberation of all the land of Palestine.” Addressing “the knights of Palestine,” the statement declared that “your brothers in al-Qaida, and all the righteous mujahidin worldwide, stand together with you in a single column, in the same trench of battle.” It further called on Muslims around the world to wage jihad against the Jews and their allies, announcing that “we are upon a great transformation in the path of global jihad.”

The October 13 statement was followed at the month’s end by the first essay in a series by Sayf al-‘Adl, al-Qaida’s presumptive leader since the death of Ayman al-Zawahiri in summer 2022. Writing under the pseudonym Salim al-Sharif, al-‘Adl heaped similar praise on the October 7 operation, portraying it as a strategic marvel that heralded the beginning of the end for the Jewish state. Despite the pain and destruction now being visited upon the people of Gaza, he wrote, the operation was nonetheless necessary in order to achieve the ultimate objective of driving the Jews from Palestine. It would further have the effect of lifting the morale of the umma and of the Muslims of the Middle East in particular, leading them “to revolt against their kings and emirs and presidents” who had done nothing over the years to restore Muslim rule in Palestine. With these two statements, al-Qaida was practically claiming October 7 as its own, portraying the attack as both a part of and in furtherance of al-Qaida’s jihad against the standing regimes of the Middle East.

Al-Maqdisi’s initial reaction was somewhat out of character. Rather than polemicizing against Hamas, he counseled restraint in condemning it at this sensitive time. In a comment relayed via Telegram on October 12, he expressed exasperation at receiving numerous inquiries about his earlier writings concerning Hamas. “I have been troubled by the brothers’ repeated questioning concerning our previous well-known statements about Hamas at this time,” he wrote, suggesting that this was not the moment for dredging up this material. At the present time, he continued, “it is obligatory to work to support Gaza and its people by any means possible, by the hand and by the tongue and by beseeching God to support the people of Gaza over the nations of unbelief who have rallied against them,” and it is further obligatory “to avoid all that might be seen as forsaking [the people of Gaza] at this time.” This moratorium on Hamas-bashing was bound to be brief.

Al-Maqdisi’s next comments on Hamas came in an issue of the jihadi magazine al-Mahajja, which appeared on November 6. In his article, titled “Proud Gaza and the al-Aqsa Flood: Studies and Lessons,” he began by praising October 7, saying that “there is no believer of true faith in this world who did not feel joy at the al-Aqsa Flood operation.” Yet this praise soon was shown to be backhanded, as in the very same paragraph al-Maqdisi described Hamas’s jihad as “marked by corruption” as he pondered “what would be the case were it a jihad in the path of God and in the path of applying His law on earth, as our Lord wishes and desires?” From here he proceeded to reaffirm his earlier criticisms “of the deviations of Hamas and its government,” saying that no military operation, no matter how great, can erase these transgressions. “The crime of neglecting the Sharia,” he wrote,

is not erased but by applying it; the sin of democracy is not erased but by dissociating from it; the veneration and adulation of the worst Rejectionist criminals and the showing of loyalty to the murderers of the Sunnis such as [Qasim] Sulaymani and his state and their satanic ayatollahs are not erased but by dissociating from them; and the praising and burnishing of Bashar [al-Asad], murderer of hundreds of thousands of Syrians, rapist of women, and destroyer of lands and persons, are not erased but by dissociating from him and his criminal regime.

Al-Maqdisi went on to note that it was the Hamas government that had instituted a “truce” with Israel in the first place, stifling the efforts of the smaller militant groups in Gaza, including the “Jihadi Salafi” ones, from making war on the Jewish state.

Here was al-Maqdisi returning to form. Whatever reservations he had about criticizing Hamas in the immediate aftermath of October 7 were gone. As al-Maqdisi announced of himself:

I am not one who is deceived by that which is not real, who goes out beating the drum for Hamas and dressing it up and beautifying it, with all its vices and faults, because of a raid it successfully carried out. In this way are people misled and their creed diluted. A great many shaykhs and groups have ridden the wave of this flood such that they have nearly drowned their followers in the misconceptions of innovative groups and ensnared them in contradictions! As if all the grave offenses that the Hamas government has committed and continues to commit are excused so long as it is fighting Jews! As if fighting Jews has become an impediment to condemnation and to takfir!

The criticism of certain unspecified “shaykhs” and “groups” here no doubt encompassed al-Qaida with its statement of unqualified pro-Hamas sentiment.  

Al-Maqdisi’s frustration with al-Qaida became even clearer in his next public remarks concerning Hamas. In this brief commentary, relayed via Telegram on November 15, he argued that there was a major difference between calling on God to support a flawed Islamic group such as Hamas and “misleading the umma” by endorsing it and exaggerating its merits. The former was perfectly in accordance with the Sharia, but the latter was not. Indeed, to take the latter course was “to destroy all that we have built before of doctrinal fortresses examining the deviation of those who fight in the path of democracy and rule by manmade laws.” “What the jihadi organizations and shaykhs are doing today,” he continued, naming al-Qaida, “is precisely this destruction and annihilation of the edifice that they had previously erected,” a structure that was built to show “the falsity of democracy and the blameworthiness of governments that refuse to apply the Sharia.” Al-Qaida and certain unnamed scholars, al-Maqdisi was thus saying, were “misleading the umma” and “destroying” the ideological edifice of Jihadi Salafism. This was heavy criticism indeed.

“Don’t ride a wave that isn’t yours”

It was not till early January 2024 that al-Maqdisi’s next words concerning al-Qaida and Hamas appeared online. What seems to have prompted him to write at this stage was the release by al-Qaida the previous month of a short video featuring footage of Hamas fighters squaring off against Israeli forces. The video, based on an earlier newsletter from November, urged Muslims to join the battle alongside “the heroes” of October 7 by waging jihad against the “Zionist” Arab regimes of the Middle East, in particular “Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Egypt, and Lebanon.” Once again, al-Qaida was presenting Hamas’s war on Israel and the regional agenda of al-Qaida as part of the same general jihad. Another al-Qaida media product from December did even more to portray Hamas and al-Qaida as being in perfect alignment. This was a newsletter released at the end of the month presenting the “the blessed al-Aqsa Flood operation” as the successor to 9/11, and predicting that this “the second September 11” would inevitably lead to “the third September 11.” Notably, the newsletter suggested that the perpetrators of this third 9/11 might even be “non-Muslims,” given how widespread the anger at America in the West had become.

These attempts by al-Qaida to blur the distinction between Hamas’s and al-Qaida’s strategic agendas did not sit well with al-Maqdisi. In an essay published on Justpaste.it on January 8 and shared by followers on X and Telegram, he warned al-Qaida against trying to insert itself into a war it had no business being a part of. Hamas, he explained, “adheres to a Muslim Brotherhood, Islamo-democratic manhaj, it rules according to manmade laws, and it does not fight to establish God’s law!” Implicitly addressing al-Qaida, only later identified by name, he wrote, “You are simply not a part of its [Hamas’s] direction … [and] you haven’t the least participation or say in its vital decisions.” Indeed, Hamas could end this war at any time on the orders of its foreign patrons and without consulting you. The Hamas leadership “disagrees with you in the foundations of belief (usul), not just in the branches (furu‘). You and they are not aligned either in direction or in means or in objectives.” The “Rejectionists” of Iran and Hezbollah are the more natural allies of them. “Therefore,” he concluded, “your enthusiasm for them [Hamas], and your words and your statements about them, as though you are speaking on their behalf, is to be considered fake wailing. Truly, your drumbeating for them without concern for their methodology is a mixture of stupidity and naiveté and foolishness.”

It was at this point that al-Maqdisi finally mentioned al-Qaida by name, noting the fact that it

has begun to draw in its videos from the videos of Hamas’s fighters in order to talk about the global jihad that the Hamas of the Resistance dissociates from, and indeed considers to be terrorism, or to incite through the clips of the al-Qassam fighters against idolatrous rulers and regimes that Hamas is loyal to in the first place! … So long as you have wasted the milk in the summer and have not prepared for this day in terms of men and capabilities and damaging targets, then don’t ride a wave that isn’t yours, and don’t beat the drum and dance to songs that don’t suit you.

Not only was al-Maqdisi calling out al-Qaida’s “stupidity and naiveté and foolishness” in showering praise on Hamas and misrepresenting its loyalties and strategic aims, but he was also calling out al-Qaida’s irrelevance on the Palestinian scene, as an actor that had not mobilized and prepared for battle there. Simply put, this attempt at annexing Hamas’s war with Israel to al-Qaida’s global jihad was disingenuous nonsense.

This was not to say that the only appropriate course of action was for al-Qaida, or other jihadis, to sit the war in Gaza out. But to the extent that one participated, al-Maqdisi counseled, one ought to have a clear-eyed view of what Hamas is and where one fits within the Hamas-dominated battle. “In the event that you must participate,” he wrote, “then participate as one who has become involved in a battle over which one exercises no control, but in which one sees a benefit for the Muslims and through which one aspires to an awakening of the umma and an igniting of the burning coal of jihad.” In other words, participation in Hamas’s jihad against Israel was allowed, but only participation in a supporting role aimed at “an awakening of the umma.”

This was not the only comment by al-Maqdisi to appear on January 8. A second essay, titled “The Spittle of the Stricken One,” also circulated on Telegram that day, though initially without attribution to al-Maqdisi—indeed with a deliberate attempt to mislead as to his authorship by referring to him in the third person. The writing, however, was unmistakably al-Maqdisi’s, and the attribution was soon clarified when reposted by a follower days later. Here al-Maqdisi presented the current controversy surrounding Hamas as the third “tribulation” (fitna) to afflict the jihadi movement in a series of fitnas beginning with that of the Islamic State (too extreme) and that of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (too lax). He reminded readers of what Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri had said about Hamas’s deviations and pointed to his own older statements as well, asserting that Hamas is still Hamas—“a deviant and innovative nationalist group.” “We can take pleasure in their fighting the Jews,” he wrote, “just as we take pleasure in any innovative group’s fighting the Jews, but without endorsing it and deceiving and misleading people concerning its manhaj.” Rehashing many of the criticisms in the previous essay from the same day, al-Maqdisi concluded with the following admonition: “Do not mislead the umma, do not forsake your principles, and do not turn away from your manhaj or corrupt your compass!” These words, one can safely assume, were directed first and foremost at al-Qaida.

Dr. Tariq and al-Qaida’s “end”

Since January, no new writings by al-Maqdisi have appeared online, even as al-Qaida has continued to release statements and essays supportive of Hamas. Al-Maqdisi’s criticisms of al-Qaida, however, continue to circulate and reverberate on jihadi Telegram, and other ideologues of his ilk have made similar al-Qaida-critical comments. Perhaps the most noteworthy of these is the Canadian-based Egyptian jihadi ideologue Tariq ‘Abd al-Halim (b. 1948).

In April, Tariq, who holds a Ph.D. in engineering from the University of Birmingham, called attentiom to a statement issued by al-Qaida on April 22 offering condolences for Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’s political bureau in Qatar, on the death of several of his children and grandchildren in an Israeli strike in Gaza. This statement seemed to be a departure from al-Qaida’s previous stance of distinguishing between Hamas’s political and military wings, as here it was saluting Hamas’s political leader as “the honorable shaykh”—twice.

On April 24, Tariq re-published al-Maqdisi’s essay “The Spittle of the Stricken One” on his Telegram channel, preceded by the words “The statement of the Shaykh Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi,” as if to suggest that this was a response to al-Qaida. Minutes later, Tariq offered some critical commentary of his own, lamenting al-Qaida’s descent into ideological disorder and organizational impotence. “There is no doubt that al-Qaida,” he wrote, “following the martyrdom of its two pioneers,” meaning Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, “has passed into a state of manifest instability, confusion, and waywardness, as is perhaps apparent in its recent statement concerning the family members of Ismail Haniyeh who were assassinated by the hand of Zionist treachery.” Without elaborating, he attributed this “drumbeating” by al-Qaida for Hamas to Sayf al-‘Adl’s father-in-law, Mustafa Hamid, whom he described as carrying on close relations with Iran (where he and al-‘Adl both reside) and as the one in control of the al-Sahab media agency. As for al-Qaida’s health as an organization with real-world influence, Tariq offered a grim prognosis: “Perhaps the organization’s role on the ground has come to an end with the demise of its two pioneers.”

Surely al-‘Adl and his colleagues in the al-Qaida leadership see things differently. For them it is the exclusivist ideology promoted by the likes of Tariq and al-Maqdisi that has run its course, not al-Qaida. In the present global environment, which is witnessing an unprecedented spike in anti-American sentiment driven by Washington’s continued support for Israel, the optimal course is to put exclusivist ideology aside and to unite the umma around al-Qaida’s strategy of attacking the United States as the source of the Islamic world’s ills.

Whether al-Qaida is wisely repositioning itself for future success, or whether its self-transformation reflects profound confusion and impotence, is a question that can only be answered in time. The U.S. intelligence community has been adamant that al-Qaida, at least in Afghanistan and Pakistan, is at its weakest point in decades and is unlikely to see a revival. That assessment would seem to support Tariq’s view that al-Qaida central may well have reached its end point as a force on the ground.

In any event, what is clear beyond doubt is that al-Qaida’s pan-Islamic turn has grown increasingly visible since October 7, alienating some of the organization’s big-name scholarly proponents as never before. The controversy over Hamas and al-Qaida points to a crisis of identity on the non-Islamic State side of the global jihadi movement.

In these addresses, Jawlani mixes themes that he previously spoke on, while adding new details about recent achievements from HTS’s perspective and potential plans to better develop HTS-controlled territory.

The State-Building Project

Jawlani continues to focus on the importance of state-building. He notes the many successes from his perspective in building institutions, but stresses that these efforts must continue: “We have to always think that we need to build more … and organize more.” Even though HTS does not believe in liberal democracy or popular sovereignty, Jawlani tries to frame the state-building project as inherently a population-wide effort. As he puts it in his address to the Idlib notables: “We are all one institution, we all have authority, we are all the people.” This is why “the Salvation Government is a very important stage in the history of the Syrian revolution,” according to Jawlani in his address to the SSG ministers.

Jawlani focuses on the need for there to be a middle ground between total government assistance and constant cycles of chaos for people. He explains in his address to the notables of Jisr al-Shughur that “we are trying to build a society that can live by itself and can protect itself.” He likewise states in the inauguration of the project to deliver water to Sahl al-Rouj that he sees anything else as a “flawed condition”: “As for relying only on assistance or extorting people here for assistance or international negotiations that take place for the sake of some first aid baskets or some milk cartons to reach the liberated areas, this is frankly a kind of humiliation for the Syrian people.” Therefore, there is a need to build greater self-sufficiency. To do this, Jawlani outlines in his addresses what amounts to a three-pronged development plan concentrating on agriculture, industry, and public services.

Agriculture

Jawlani discusses the need to further increase irrigation efforts, which he sees as the biggest barrier to increasing agricultural production. Thus, as Jawlani explains at the dedication of the Sahl al-Rouj water project, there should be a three-stage plan to improve agriculture. First, the “agricultural plan should be integrated between the almanac set by the Ministry of Agriculture and the farming brother.” In other words, farmers should more efficiently take advantage of the seasons to achieve food security. Second, an interconnected local agricultural industry should be developed. And third, there should be exporting to the outside world so that local farmers can take advantage of the global economy. In this way, according to Jawlani, the needs of local residents, the agricultural industry, and the outside market will be met.

Industry

Jawlani notes in his address to the notables of Idlib that Idlib in general lacks an industrial sector compared to, for example, Aleppo. He stresses that there should be “uncomplicated laws” to allow for industrial development with support for local production. As Jawlani explains, creating a conducive environment for industry should be realized through development of technical services, electricity, real estate management, chambers of commerce, and the like. HTS has made such strides in this direction that now if someone wants to build an industrial site, said person only requires three or four days to acquire all the necessary permits. The end goal is that “we must get to the stage in the liberated areas where the rate of exports is greater than the rate of imports,” whereas right now these areas import more than they export by a proportion of around two-thirds. The goal should be first to achieve an export-import balance and then for exports to exceed imports.

Public Services

According to Jawlani, right now HTS and the SSG are focused on providing basic necessities such as street cleaning, electricity, water, and trash. On top of this, they are attempting to assist with things that the industrial and agricultural markets need to better thrive.

During his speeches, Jawlani touts some recent achievements. For example, in his address to the Idlib notables, he claims that during the past year more than 110,000 homes, businesses, and industrial and agricultural sites have been supplied with electricity, which he proclaims to be a big and speedy accomplishment. Likewise, Jawlani admits that the Ministry of Agriculture lacks resources, yet says that because of “cooperation” between farmers, the SSG, and the Ministry, they were able to increase the volume of domestic consumption from 30% to 40%, which he considers to be a good level. From Jawlani’s perspective, the inauguration of the new water pumping system from Ain al-Zarqa to Sahel al-Rouj will add new water that can increase productivity.

Open Dialogue, But Not Free Speech

In his various addresses, Jawlani gives the impression of holding open meetings where everyone can discuss issues and raise problems so that they can be rectified. Thus, in the Jisr al-Shughur meeting, two individuals are featured complaining about the services in the area, such as roads and electricity. One of these goes so far as to say, “[we are] deprived of many services,” arguing that these problems must be rectified to make sure that the “sons [of this area] cling to its soil.” Yet despite this pretense of open criticism and debate, one should bear in mind the number of activists against HTS rule who are either dead or imprisoned because of their outspokenness regarding the failures or inadequacies of HTS’s regime. While HTS may be tolerant of individuals submitting complaints through proper channels to their local officials and the SSG about something not so political like provision of electricity, the same is not the case for people airing grievances openly on social media or to outside media (as opposed to HTS-friendly/approved media) on topics the group might deem more sensitive and potentially “disruptive to public security” (e.g., foreigners living in confiscated homes and causing issues for local inhabitants).

A Ministry of Defense?

In his address to the notables of Idlib, Jawlani refers to the HTS-led military operations room that organizes the military efforts of most of the factions in Idlib. He also highlights the project of the “Military College” that is supervised by “the best of the defecting officers present in the liberated areas.” This college, according to Jawlani, could “perhaps” become the nucleus of a future “Ministry of Defense” with an organized structure that would allow for a departure from the faction model of military organization. Time will tell if this is an avenue whereby HTS as an entity (as well as other groups) subsumes its current infrastructure into such an entity. If this were to happen, from a policy perspective, it would further weaken the case for HTS being designated as a terrorist group, since it would no longer be a separate group but officially a part of the SSG.    

Expanding the HTS State?

Jawlani and other leaders in HTS continue to repeat the claim that their ultimate goal is to liberate Damascus, alongside all the other key cities like Aleppo and Hama. But what’s new this time is that Jawlani notes that their institutions would be ready to expand once HTS gains new territory. This is because in contrast to the regime, HTS wants people “who are liberated to feel that there is a big difference in their lives in terms of security, education, health, agriculture, economic and all parts of life.” While focused on the ultimate prize of Damascus, this could also be an indirect point about rumors that HTS wants to take over territory from its rival in the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army in northern Aleppo province (the area spanning Afrin to Jarabulus).

Some Progress, But Continued Limitations

Based on Jawlani’s meetings, it is clear that HTS strives to make progress in and mature its state-building project capabilities. In particular, the group seeks to develop local industries, open up local markets to the global economy, and perhaps create a Ministry of Defense. Yet there are four issues that will likely continue to give pause to those in the U.S. government who may consider it worthwhile to engage with HTS: (1) HTS’s treatment of minorities in its territory; (2) its top ideologues’ eagerness to eulogize Ayman al-Zawahiri after his death; (3) its public displays of support for the terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad during its recent rocket campaign against civilians in Israel; and (4) the continued presence in HTS territory of terrorist-designated foreign fighter-run organizations.

One of the themes that Jawlani reiterates again in these meetings is that “we have borne the burdens of very long years, we have borne the burdens of 100 years of oppression, humiliation, regression, decline and the like.” The Islamic ummah, he explains in the address to the notables of Idlib, has never faced oppression like the oppression it has faced in the past 100 years, facing threats to its identity besides mere division of political power. This is one of the reasons why, as Jawlani states in his address to the SSG ministers, “the project in the liberated areas is no longer merely a revolution against oppression and tyranny but rather it has transformed into building a Sunni entity, because Sunnis are facing an existential danger in Syria.” There is no doubt that the Assad regime has run a sectarian regime for 50-plus years, which has harmed the majority Sunni population.

Yet in light of HTS’s own sectarian Sunni identity, it is important to temper expectations when Jawlani meets with Christian or Druze notables. The latter were forced many years ago (when HTS was Jabhat al-Nusrah) to renounce their faith and declare conversion to Sunni Islam, and this policy of forced conversion has not changed. Moreover, the original Druze inhabitants still have many grievances over confiscation of homes and inheritance rights and face the risk of being targeted for harassment and even killing at the hands of more hardline jihadis in northwest Syria who consider them “disbelievers,” not accepting the idea of their conversion to Sunni Islam. While the Christians are not accorded the dhimmi status of second-class citizenship for Jews and Christians in a classical Islamic state and are instead given the status of musta’min (i.e. treated as though they have temporary residence with no obligation during that time to pay the poll tax levied on dhimmis), their status is still very much subordinate and based on accepting Sunni Muslim rule and domination.

As for the latter two issues, top HTS leaders and ideologues like ‘Abd al-Rahim ‘Atun and Abu Mariya al-Qahtani put out messages of condolences following the U.S. drone strike that killed al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. ‘Atun described Zawahiri as “a man who lived for his religion, fought, resisted, and struggled in its path for half a century or more,” and expressed hope that he would be “grant[ed] the highest paradise with the prophets.” This was more a case of these ideologues showing respect for a fellow jihadi in the trenches than a sign that HTS might be coming home to al-Qaida. Indeed, al-Qahtani recently called on al-Qaida’s branches to dissolve the organization, in particular urging al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula to “break their external tie,” recalling how HTS came to break off from al-Qaida. Nevertheless, these statements highlight problematic aspects of HTS’s political and ideological orientation, illustrating its sympathies with jihadism and Islamic militancy outside of Syria. This is especially noteworthy in light of HTS’s claims to want to be taken off the U.S. terrorism lists. Likewise, HTS’s Manarat al-Huda Da‘wa Center posted moral support a number of times for Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s rocket campaign against Israeli civilian targets, putting out a graphic with the slogan, “We are all Gaza’s arrows on the Jews.” Finally, the territory that HTS controls is one where other terrorist designated groups affiliated with HTS operate, such as Jama‘at Ansar al-Islam, Katibat Imam al-Bukhari, and Katibat al-Tawhid wa-l-Jihad, as well as non-designated foreign fighter groups.

HTS continues to have what are certainly unpalatable characteristics from a Western perspective. This is likely why Jawlani, in one of his speeches, urged people in HTS-controlled territory to be strong in the face of the West, even if the West does not cooperate. Based on Jawlani’s and HTS’s continued actions, it is clear that he wants to garner legitimacy without having to actually give up on the hardest aspects of his group’s ideology. This is HTS’s conundrum. For until it demonstrates a pronounced shift away from sympathies with jihadi and Islamist militant causes inside and outside of Syria and a willingness to improve the lot of minorities in its territory, it will remain in its current predicament, unable to realize its lofty plans to make its territory a sustainable and vibrant entity.

Early the next day, on March 28, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the Hadera attack. Its A‘maq news agency released a separate report that included an image of the attackers swearing the oath of allegiance, or bay‘a, to the new Islamic State caliph. A video of the bay‘a ceremony appeared online shortly afterwards. The A‘maq report also gave favorable mention to the “commando attacker” (inghimasi) in Beersheeba, though stopping short of claiming the attack outright.

Such attacks by the Islamic State on Israeli soil have been exceedingly rare, the last claimed attack being in June 2017. The recent attacks raise the question of whether more can be expected from the Islamic State in the weeks and months ahead. While the group would like us to believe that is so, the reality is that there are few Palestinians who identify with the cause of the caliphate and the Islamic State is not ideologically disposed to concentrating its efforts on the Jewish state.

Abu Mus‘ab al-Zarqawi

To understand how the Islamic State views Israel, it is helpful to begin with the relevant statements of Abu Mus‘ab al-Zarqawi (d. 2006), the Jordanian founder of al-Qaida in Iraq whose ideas form the foundation stone of the present-day caliphate. Palestine was not a prominent theme in al-Zarqawi’s speeches and lectures. Nor was attacking the Israelis a priority for him. On several occasions, he claimed that the liberation of Palestine would come only after victory had been achieved in Iraq and the Shi‘a had been subdued.

In a speech in July 2005, al-Zarqawi described the conquest of Jerusalem as subsequent to jihad in Iraq. Explaining that he and his followers were not fighting merely to expel the occupiers in Iraq and thereafter lay down their arms, he said,

The totality of what we hope for is that God will grant us victory in Iraq, and then we will head to Jerusalem, the first qibla of the Muslims and the site of the night journey of our noble Prophet. These are developments that we await with great anticipation. “And they will say, ‘When will it be?’ Say: ‘It is possible that it may be nigh’ (Q. 17:51).”

A year later, in April 2006, al-Zarqawi again envisioned the future conquest of Jerusalem, saying in his first and only video address, “My dear umma, we in Iraq are a stone’s throw from the site of the night journey of the Messenger of God. We are fighting in Iraq while our eyes are on Jerusalem, which will be recovered only by a Book that guides and a sword that overpowers.” Similar language was found in a written interview released posthumously in late 2006, five months after his death in June. Here he is quoted saying, “We are fighting in Iraq both for it and for what is beyond it. We are fighting in Iraq while our eyes are on Jerusalem. We are fighting in Iraq while our eyes are on Mecca and Medina.” By adding Mecca and Medina here, al-Zarqawi indicated that he conceived of the jihad in Iraq as the first stage of a much more extensive struggle, one that would include not only Palestine but also Saudi Arabia and other places. While there is certainly nothing in these statements to suggest that al-Zarqawi was opposed to fighting in Palestine, it is clear that he saw the battle there as belonging to a future stage of jihad, not the present one.

It was also his view, as is clear from his lectures on the Shi‘a, that before one could effectively fight the “original unbelievers,” meaning the Jews and the Christians, it was first necessary to fight the Shi‘a. In this he was guided by his reading of medieval Islamic history, in particular the late Crusader period coinciding with rise of Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi (aka Saladin) and his defeat of the (Shi‘i) Fatimid caliphate in Egypt. In 1171, Saladin abolished the Fatimid caliphate and went on to construct a Sunni state spanning Egypt and Syria. A decade and a half later, in 1187, he captured Jerusalem following the decisive Battle of Hattin against the Crusader forces.

As al-Zarqawi saw it, there was “an important lesson” to be gleaned from this history. This was that “there will not be victory over the original unbelievers except after fighting the apostate unbelievers who are allied with the original believers.” In al-Zarqawi’s recounting, the Shi‘i Fatimids were the allies and “clients” of the Crusaders, and thus to liberate Jerusalem it was necessary for Saladin first to eliminate these treacherous “Rejectionists.” “History has shown us,” he stated, “that Jerusalem, which fell into the hands of the Crusaders with the aid of the Rejectionist Fatimids, was only recovered at the hands of Saladin … after he waged war on the Rejectionist Fatimids for several years and destroyed their state entirely.” For al-Zarqawi, then, the blueprint for jihad was clear: First, attack the Shi‘a and other “apostates” collaborating with the Christians and the Jews; then, having destroyed their state, proceed to the next phase of the jihad, which is the battle for Palestine and other captured Islamic lands.

Abu ‘Umar al-Baghdadi

Al-Zarqawi and his group laid the groundwork for the establishment, in October 2006, of the Islamic State of Iraq, whose first leader was Abu ‘Umar al-Baghdadi (d. 2010). A former Iraqi police officer, al-Baghdadi articulated a similar view to al-Zarqawi’s, adding the idea that building a proper Islamic state was a precondition for the conquest of Jerusalem.

In February 2008, amid escalating conflict between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants in Gaza, al-Baghdadi delivered an audio address setting out his organization’s position on “the struggle with the Jews.” After condemning Hamas for participating in democracy and allying with the “apostate” Syrian regime, al-Baghdadi reiterated al-Zarqawi’s Saladin theme, saying, “Saladin did not enter Jerusalem victorious until he put paid to the Rejectionist Fatimid state in Egypt and al-Sham.” Toward the end of his address, he returned to the theme with a new emphasis—the importance of the state built by Saladin and his predecessor, Nur al-Din Zangi. In al-Baghdadi’s view, it was the building of a Sunni Islamic state in Syria and Egypt that paved the way for liberating Jerusalem, and this was the model to be followed. “We hope to God,” he stated, “and we beseech Him, that just as the state of the martyr Nur al-Din was the foundation stone of the return of al-Aqsa to the arms of the umma … we hope that the Islamic State of Iraq will be the foundation stone of the return of Jerusalem.”

In his address, al-Baghdadi did not oppose all efforts of jihad in Palestine, but he maintained that the groups currently fighting there were theologically flawed. He encouraged the Jihadi Salafis in the area to dissociate from them and to rally together under a pure Islamic banner. The true victory, however, awaited the consolidation and expansion of the Islamic State of Iraq.

Abu Muhammad al-‘Adnani and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

Following the death of Abu ‘Umar al-Baghdadi and his lieutenant, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, in a joint U.S.-Iraqi raid in 2010, the role of delivering speeches was assumed by the Islamic State of Iraq’s new leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (d. 2019), and its official spokesman, Abu Muhammad al-‘Adnani (d. 2016). Together, these men oversaw the group’s expansion to Syria and its subsequent declaration of the caliphate in June 2014, after which it would be known simply as the Islamic State. As was the case with al-Zarqawi and the first al-Baghdadi, Palestine did not occupy a prominent place in the words of these new leaders, and its conquest was presented as something to be achieved at a later stage.  

In al-‘Adnani’s speeches, Jerusalem appeared in several lists of places that the Islamic State would one day eventually conquer, together with al-Andalus (Islamic Spain) and Rome. In a 2013 address, for instance, he stated, “We will not rest until we free the Muslim prisoners in all places, and until we recover Jerusalem, restore al-Andalus, and conquer Rome by God’s will.” Similarly, in a speech in 2015, he sought to incite “the soldiers of the caliphate” to action by telling them, “Go forth, for Mecca and Medina and Jerusalem and Rome await you.” In another speech, he remarked of the mujahidin of the Islamic State, “Their bodies are in Iraq, while their souls are in captured Mecca, their hearts are in Jerusalem, and their eyes are on Rome.” How far off such conquests were in al-‘Adnani’s mind is unclear, but at least one of them, Rome (Rūmā), seems to belong to End Times, this being a reference to the prophesied Muslim conquest of Rome in Muslim apocalyptic.

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s mentions of Palestine were also few. On one occasion, in November 2014, he praised the Islamic State’s new Sinai Province for its “support for Jerusalem” and for “terrorizing the Jews,” and on another, in May 2015, he expressed his hope, addressing the Sinai Province, “that we will see you in Jerusalem soon.”

The most extensive remarks of al-Baghdadi’s on Palestine came in a speech in December 2015, in which he sought to reassure his audience that the Islamic State had not forgotten about the Jews. Commenting on the establishment of the Saudi-led Islamic Military Counter Terrorism Coalition, al-Baghdadi called into question the coalition’s Islamic character, arguing that a truly Islamic coalition would, among other things, make its objective “killing the Jews and liberating Palestine.” He continued as follows:

Yes, Palestine, which the Jews thought we had forgotten about and which they thought they had distracted us from. That is not the case, o Jews! We have not forgotten about Palestine for a second. God willing, we will not forget it, and soon, God willing, you will hear the approach of the mujahidin and their vanguards will encircle you, on a day that you see as distant but we see as near. We are drawing nearer to you day after day, and your accounting with God will be harsh indeed! You will never be at peace in Palestine, o Jews! It will never be your home or your land. Palestine will only be a graveyard for you. God has only gathered you there so that the Muslims may kill you, when you will be hiding behind the trees and rocks, as you know well. “So await. We are awaiting with you” (Q. 9:52).

It is hard to escape the conclusion that al-Baghdadi saw the coming confrontation with the Jews in Palestine as belong to End Times. In the unfolding of the apocalyptic narrative as understood by the Islamic State, Jesus will one day return to the earth to lead the Muslims in a war against the Antichrist and the Jews in Jerusalem. Thereafter, the Muslims wil go on to conquer Rome. Whether that is the only scenario that al-Baghdadi (and al-‘Adnani) entertained for Palestine is unclear. What is clear is that these leaders, like their predecessors, saw the battle for Jerusalem and Palestine as belonging to a future phase of jihad.

Abu Hamza al-Qurashi

A rather different approach to the Palestine issue was articulated by al-‘Adnani’s successor as Islamic State spokesman, Abu Hamza al-Qurashi (d. 2022). In a January 2020 address, Abu Hamza presented the war against the Jews as a matter of great urgency. Midway through the address, he related that the new caliph, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi (d. 2022), had resolved to initiate “a new stage” of jihad consisting of “fighting the Jews, recovering what they have stolen from the Muslims—which will not be recovered but by a Book that guides and a sword that overpowers—conquering Jerusalem, and delivering the banner to the mahdi Muhammad ibn ‘Abdallah, God willing.” Abu Hamza went on to incite the “soldiers of the caliphate,” especially those in Sinai and Syria, to attack “the settlements and markets of the Jews,” and to use them as a testing ground for “your weapons and your chemical-laden missiles.” He also called on Palestinians to join the ranks of the Islamic State and to rise up and fight the Jews in Palestine, “bringing failure to their plans, such as their deal of the century.”

The latter reference was to former President Donald Trump’s Middle East peace plan that was rolled out beginning in 2019. Abu Hamza’s announcement of a “new stage” of jihad against the Jews thus seems to have been calibrated to exploit the grievances, real or imagined, generated by the Trump peace plan and rumors of Arab-Israeli rapprochement. It did not have the intended effect—no Islamic State attacks in Israel would be reported for more than two years.

Abu Hamza’s announcement was quite a departure from precedent—a call for escalation in Palestine rather than the studied focus on fighting the “apostates” as the precondition for a future showdown with the Jewish state. It should be understood, however, that this announcement was both brief and isolated. The more familiar approach, which sees jihad in Palestine as a lesser priority, has dominated discussions of the issue in Islamic State discourse, including in the pages of its weekly Arabic newsletter, al-Naba’.

Al-Naba’

It is in several articles in al-Naba’ where the Islamic State’s most extensive treatment of the subject of Palestine is found. These articles echo the views of al-Zarqawi and his successors in deprioritizing the fight in Palestine, but they go even further in deemphasizing the importance of the issue in general, dismissing the idea that Palestine is some sort of exceptional theater of jihad deserving of special attention.

The first of these articles, which sets out the main themes and arguments that would be reiterated in subsequent ones, was published in March 2016. Titled “Jerusalem: A Shari‘a Issue First and Foremost,” its main point is that “the issue of Palestine” must always be placed in “its correct legal framework,” meaning the framework of the Shari‘a with its objective of advancing monotheism (tawhid) and destroying polytheism (shirk). Jihad in Palestine will not be legitimate unless it is in service of advancing tawhid and destroying shirk. “Indeed,” the article says, “jihad for the purpose of recovering Jerusalem from the hands of the Jews is not permissible unless it be in the path of eliminating the rule of the idol-rulers (tawaghit) there and establishing the religion there completely.” This is largely a dig at “the apostate Hamas movement,” which is accused here of practicing “the polytheism of democracy” and failing to apply the Shari‘a. Were Hamas to take the place of Jews as the rulers of Palestine, this would be merely the substitution of one idol-ruler (taghut) for another.

The underlying grievance of the article is the view that the Palestine issue has been held up by opportunistic political actors as “the first issue of the Muslims,” becoming in effect an “idol” that has been worshiped for decades. These actors, beginning with the Arab nationalists, have manipulated and exaggerated the issue, pretending that nothing else can be addressed until Palestine is liberated. Yet as far as the Shari‘a is concerned, the article retorts, no issue ought to be placed ahead of tawhid, and no land should be placed above any other when it comes to where jihad should be waged. “Were the merit of a land to determine the preference for jihad there,” it adds, “then jihad to recover Mecca and Medina from the hands of the idol-rulers of the Al Saud would undoubtedly take precedence over all other lands.” When it comes to the struggle for Palestine, the editorial concludes, “it is wrong to exaggerate it and to place it above the tawhid of God.”

For the authors of al-Naba’, fighting the Jews in Palestine is of course an individual obligation on all Muslims, but this applies first of all to the Palestinians themselves, given the legal dictum that one should fight those nearest to them. For most Muslims, however, the reality is that the only viable path to fighting the Jews and destroying Israel involves first fighting and defeating the idol-rulers in nearby lands, who are the protectors and defenders of the Jewish state. Moreover, the Jews, being one of the categories of “original unbelievers,” are of lesser priority than apostates: “The apostate idol-rulers ruling in the lands of Islam are more severe in unbelief than [the Jews], and fighting them is of higher priority than fighting the original polytheists.”

Subsequent articles in al-Naba’ touching on the Palestine issue have come in response to various developments. These include an editorial responding to Israeli military operations against the Islamic State, in May 2016, and another responding the relocation of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, in December 2017.

A more substantive editorial appeared in May 2021 in response to a crisis in Gaza that saw Hamas fire numerous rockets at Israel. Titled “The Road to Jerusalem,” the editorial argues that only jihad, properly conceived, holds the promise of conquering Palestine and other places. “The path to Jerusalem and Mecca and al-Andalus is one path,” it says, and that is the path of jihad, not the Iranian-led “resistance” represented by Hamas and like groups. The soldiers of the Islamic State are the ones following this path, and they are the ones who will one day conquer Jerusalem for Islam: “All of their battles today, east and west, are but stations on the path to Jerusalem and Mecca and al-Andalus and Baghdad and Damascus, and all the captive Islamic lands. It is one battle.” The editorial also reiterates the Islamic State’s position on not overstressing the importance of the Palestine theater. “The soldiers of the caliphate,” it states, “have not exaggerated the issue of Palestine and have not made it an exception among the issues of the Muslims … They have not differentiated between the blood of their Muslim brethren in Palestine and the blood of their brethren in other lands.”

The most recent al-Naba’ editorial about Palestine was published at the end of March, coming in response to the Beersheeba and Hadera attacks. The editorial celebrates the Hadera attackers and ridicules those who claimed that they were driven by “purely nationalist motives.” The reality, it says, is that they were driven by purely Islamic motives, the Islamic State’s war against the Jews being “purely Islamic and theological,” not nationalistic. The editorial also responds to the allegation that “that the Islamic State does not fight the Jews because it does not wish to do so,” this being a “lie” circulated by the group’s enemies to deter potential recruits. The truth, it counters, is that numerous obstacles—governments and parties and militias—have prevented a rise in attacks, not a lack of desire. In saying this, the editorial reaffirms that the Islamic State’s stance regarding the struggle in Palestine remains the same as outlined previously in the speeches of its leaders and the articles in al-Naba’. This is a stance of neither “exaggeration” nor “laxity,” one that conceives of jihad in Palestine within the framework of the Shari‘a.

At the end of the editorial, the Palestinian youth are encouraged to awaken from their inactivity and to rise up, but they are also called upon to correct their false beliefs and to free themselves from “the slavery of nationalism.” Only then will their jihad will be in accordance with the Shari‘a.

Conclusion

As has been seen, for most of its history the Islamic State has not prioritized or put great emphasis on the fight against Israel. From al-Zarqawi onward, the general pattern has been one of deprioritization and deemphasis, the assumption being that victory in Palestine will only come at a later stage and that it would be folly to focus on Palestine to the neglect of other, equally important theaters of jihad.

Al-Zarqawi argued that before conquering Jerusalem it was necessary to fight and defeat the surrounding apostates, particularly the Shi‘a, on the model of Saladin in the twelfth century. Abu ‘Umar al-Baghdadi expressed the same view, adding that it was necessary to build a proper Islamic state as Saladin and his predecessor, Nur al-Din Zangi, had done. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Abu Muhammad al-‘Adnani depicted Jerusalem as a place to be conquered sometime in the future, together with al-Andalus and Rome. The articles of al-Naba’ have condemned the idolization of the Palestine issue, arguing that the greater priority should go to “the apostate idol-rulers” who form the main line of defense for the Jewish state. The lone exception to this pattern of deprioritization and deemphasis was the announcement of a “new stage” of jihad in Palestine by Abu Hamza al-Qurashi in January 2020, though the announcement came to little and has been overshadowed by the standard themes.

What does all of this suggest for the future of Islamic State terrorist acts against Israel? The general lesson seems be that the Islamic State will not devote considerable resources or energies to the issue of Palestine, where the number of its supporters is “relatively small” to begin with. To give sustained attention and emphasis to the Palestine issue would be out of keeping with more than a decade and a half of strategic and theological pronouncements. The occasional attack may occur, and the Islamic State will gladly claim it, saying that it has never opposed jihad in Palestine, which it has not. But unless the group manages to find a new base of support in Palestine, there is likely to be little change.

In light of the Frontline interview, the authors decided to interview a prominent jihadi source who actively monitors the ongoing conflict between HTS and Hurras al-Din (HaD), the new Syrian al-Qaida affiliate in Syria, and the state of al-Qaida and the Salafi-Jihadi movement globally. The source, who goes by the name Muzamjir al-Sham, is known for revealing, via his Twitter account, detailed information about the inner workings of the various jihadi groups in Syria. While his identity remains unknown, his Twitter page describes him as “a shami voice from within the jihadi current.” According to Aaron Zelin, he is believed to have once belonged to Ahrar al-Sham, a Syrian Islamist militant group.

The interview, which was conducted remotely between 11 and 18 June 2021, covered a number of topics, ranging from whether the jihadi groups opposed to HTS can form a united front (Q1) and whether al-Jolani will tolerate foreign jihadis in his territory (Q4) to the possibility of a reconciliation between al-Qaida and HTS (Q6) and the current state of HaD (Q7). Muzamjir al-Sham further discussed the state of the al-Qaida leadership and its control of its affiliates (Q10-12), as well as Ayman al-Zawahiri’s oath of allegiance, or bay‘a, to the Taliban (Q8-9). Finally, he touched on the differences between al-Qaida and the Islamic State (Q13-14) and the capabilities of these groups to conduct international terrorist operations (Q16-17).

Perhaps the most remarkable detail to emerge from the interview is the assertion that the leader of the Taliban, Hibatullah Akhundzadeh, refused to accept al-Zawahiri’s bay‘a, meaning that the leader of al-Qaida’s pledge of allegiance to the Taliban was rejected. While the source did not substantiate his claim (and has not responded to further queries regarding the matter), it is a potentially significant revelation if proven true. As of now, no other jihadi source has corroborated the assertion, and the relationship between the Taliban and al-Qaida is widely seen as strong and enduring. Muzamjir al-Sham appears to disagree, arguing that there will be little al-Qaida activity in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

It is also interesting to note that, according to this source, al-Qaida made the unofficial decision to dissolve HaD and to operate in smaller cells in Syria, thereby avoiding a fratricidal confrontation with HTS. This would seem to confirm the weakened state of al-Qaida in Syria as reported by the United Nations Security Council sanctions monitoring team for al-Qaida and the Islamic State.[2] The source indicates that this decision came from Sayf al-‘Adl, the Egyptian al-Qaida leader in Iran who appears to manage and communicate with al-Qaida central and the al-Qaida affiliates. Given al-Zawahiri’s rumored ill-health, al-‘Adl’s current role is significant as it could undermine the idea of a power vacuum in the event of a leadership transition.

The source was skeptical of the rumors that al-Zawahiri had died, suggesting rather that he could be merely ill. On 10 September 2021, an 852-page book by al-Zawahiri was published by al-Qaida central, and the introduction is dated 21 April 2021. Presumably, therefore, the al-Qaida leader is alive—or least he was until that date—though the text does not reveal anything about his health. The rumors about his death or serious illness could be exploited in an instrumental way by the organization to create confusion around its real condition, allowing al-Qaida to continue to work under the radar.

Jihadi organizations remain a threat not to be underestimated. Al-Qaida’s strategy of keeping a low profile has facilitated its reorganization, allowing it to build ties with other jihadi groups, tribes, clans, and minorities. The Islamic State was too quickly declared defeated; it was also forming new alliances and planning new strategies. In Muzamjir al-Sham’s words, “fighting and struggle are a lung with which Salafi-Jihadism breathes, as it thrives in such circumstances.” Cutting off the air will require specifically tailored policies for each local condition.

Q1: After the separation of the Islamic State from al-Qaida, and the subsequent separation of al-Jolani from al-Qaida, al-Qaida’s position in Syria has become very precarious. HaD found itself fighting alone on multiple fronts, squeezed between the Asad regime, the international coalition, and al-Jolani’s HTS. HTS has imprisoned several members of the al-Qaida shura council and several HaD leaders, transforming Idlib into a new Guantanamo. In your opinion, what are the chances that al-Qaida and HaD will be able to form a united front with the other Salafi-Jihadi factions of Idlib, such as Ansar al-Islam, Ansar al-Tawhid, Ahrar al-Sham, Jundullah, and al-Ghuraba, against HTS?

There will be no united front between al-Qaida and the rest of the Salafi-Jihadi factions in Syria for several reasons.

First, some of these factions have been won over by al-Jolani by his providing some support to them, and thus he neutralized them from the conflict with al-Qaida. Ansar al-Tawhid is an example.

Second, there are some Salafi-Jihadi factions that do not agree with al-Qaida in terms of ideology and consider it deviant. This is the case with Jundullah, which is close in ideology to ISIS.

Third, entering into a front or union with al-Qaida means entering into a comprehensive war with HTS, and this is something the results of which these factions are currently not able to bear.

I expect the formation of something that looks like an alliance, not a merger or a single front. I mean an alliance that looks like a joint operations room, similar to the previously formed Wa-Harrid  al-Mu’minin room[3] that HTS was able to dismantle.

This is a step [the formation of an alliance or united front] that cannot take place right now for several other reasons. The position of al-Qaida and the factions that could ally with it is very weak because of arrests and security operations against them and because of a lack of funding.

However, I believe that the regime’s assault on Idlib will strengthen the position of al-Qaida and the factions that could ally with it, as these factions thrive in chaos.

Q2: Is Ahrar al-Sham still close to al-Qaida and HaD?

Al-Zawahiri sent a letter to Ahrar al-Sham calling for the unification of all factions in Syria. But the factions fell into heresy or deviation.

They are no longer close to al-Qaida, especially after the murder of its first leaders.

Q3: Going back in time to the early quarrel between al-Qaida and ISIS, the Khurasan cell [i.e., a group of senior al-Qaida members who travelled from Iran to Syria in 2013 involved in the reconciliation process between al-Qaida and ISIS] and many of its prominent members from Iran were very critical of the way al-Jolani ran the al-Qaida branch in Syria. It seems that al-Jolani may have facilitated or helped in the killing of a number of members of the Khurasan cell in Aleppo and Idlib, before separating from al-Qaida in 2016. Given the high rank of the members of the Khurasan cell, one would think that it would have been very difficult to betray them without consequences. Does anyone suspect al-Jolani?

The Khurasan cell was not satisfied with al-Jolani’s management of al-Qaida in Syria. Al-Jolani is in origin a son of the Iraqi school [of jihadism], and al-Qaida did not know him or anything about him. Neither did al-Qaida know anything about al-Baghdadi’s policy and management of the [Islamic] State group. Its relationship to the Iraq branch was only superficial. Thus when al-Qaida got the opportunity to get to know al-Jolani and the Iraqi school closely, it did not like any of it. What they were being told was one thing, and what they saw was something else.

Al-Jolani is unknown to the leadership of al-Qaida, unlike the Khurasan cell or members of al-Qaida’s shura council who came to Syria, and unlike Abu al-Hammam [al-Suri], the current leader of HaD, who was a leader in the al-Qaida training camps in Afghanistan. So all of them are known to al-Qaida, while al-Jolani was completely unknown and his bay‘a to al-Qaida occurred suddenly and without complete coordination.

As for how they [the Khurasan cell’s members] were killed, some were killed in coalition strikes, while others were killed by improvised explosive devices. Others were deliberately pushed into battles with the [Asad] regime and were killed.

Even those who were killed in the coalition strikes, I think that they were betrayed from within by HTS, because some of the leaders were liquidated while walking on the road without using any machinery or electronic device. Some of them, such as Abu Firas [al-Suri], were targeted minutes after meeting with al-Jolani and his leaders.

Q4: According to some sources, HTS specifically targeted foreign fighter groups in Idlib, most notably Omar Omsen of al-Ghuraba [Omar Diaby, the leader of the French foreign fighters]. What is the current status of Salafi-Jihadi groups made up of foreigners in Idlib? Do you think they will have to leave Syria and move to other theaters?

Yes, al-Jolani is pushing them to leave Syria by putting great pressure on them: arresting and kidnapping them, preventing them from fighting, and preventing them from working to earn money.

Al-Jolani is pushing them to leave for two reasons: (1) foreign agreements with some countries; (2) the presence of these emigrants hinders his project in Idlib, and therefore it is necessary to get rid of them.

Indeed, the condition of the [foreign] jihadi groups is very bad. They are completely surrounded and prevented from working or raising funds, and they are being arrested, pursued, and severely restricted. They have become just scattered cells.

Q5: Moving away from the Syrian theater, many analysts and researchers claim that there is no longer an al-Qaida group in Iraq. Is this true? Is Ansar al-Islam[4] still operating in Kurdish areas? Are they still connected to al-Qaida? Are there any brigades or battalions linked to al-Qaida in Iraq?

There are no groups connected to Iraq except for ISIS and Ansar al-Islam. Ansar al-Islam is a very old group with popular support and roots in the areas of Kurdistan, so it is difficult to completely eradicate. However, most of its members are now working in Syria, being in contact with their cells in Iraqi Kurdistan. In Syria they are operating in the western areas of Idlib.

Q6: It is quite clear that reconciliation between al-Qaida and HTS is currently impossible, at least as long as al-Jolani remains HTS’s leader. Do you think that al-Qaida’s opposition to HTS is limited to al-Jolani and his entourage (such as controversial members like Abu Ahmad Hadd, Abu Muhjen al-Hasakawi, Abu Hafs Binnish), or does it also extend to the model of the Salvation Government? If al-Jolani weren’t the leader of HTS, do you think that HaD and other Salafi-Jihadi factions in Idlib would be ready to hold peace talks, similar to what is happening in Afghanistan with the Taliban or what has been proposed by the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) in Mali in the past? Will HaD be willing to join the Salvation Government or a similar authority?

No, this is almost impossible. I mean the possibility of reconciliation between HTS and al-Qaida in the event of al-Jolani’s death. This is for a simple reason: when al-Jolani defected from al-Qaida, the entire current that adopted his position left with him. Meanwhile, the other group opposed to al-Jolani’s line and his orientation formed al-Qaida with its new name, Hurras al-Din.

The issue, then, is not about people only; it is about difference in ideology, thought, and methodology. Even if al-Jolani were killed, all the leaders of HTS today are people who have completely severed their ties with al-Qaida.

As for the HaD’s willingness to join a government or authority, this is also entirely out of the question. HaD does have permission from al-Zawahiri to merge with [other] factions, but only after consulting with and obtaining permission from the al-Qaida leadership. However, al-Qaida does not want to repeat the al-Jolani scenario.

Q7: And do you think that HaD will be able to resist in such a hostile environment? Or will it be disbanded?

HaD has already been dissolved, though it was an unofficial decision. It now takes the form of small cells only.

Al-Qaida’s policy was to avoid confrontation with al-Jolani, directing many of its members to remain within the ranks of HTS—a kind of flexibility for absorbing al-Jolani’s attacks.

Q8: And do you think that HaD could eventually migrate from Syria to other areas, such as Afghanistan? What is HaD’s view on what is happening there?

Both HTS and HaD glorify what the Taliban are doing in Afghanistan, and they sing the praises of their victories. HTS thinks that they are the Syrian Taliban, while HaD thinks that the Taliban are the same Taliban of yesterday that embraced al-Qaida.

However, the emir of the Taliban recently rejected the bay‘a of al-Qaida. Therefore, there will not be significant al-Qaida activity in the areas of the Taliban. It is completely unlikely that fighters will leave the base in Syria for Afghanistan, with the possible exception of the fighters of the Turkistan Islamic Party [TIP, a Uyghur jihadi group].

Q9: What do you mean that the Taliban rejected al-Zawahiri’sbay‘a? Did Akhundzada explicitly say he rejected al-Zawahiri’s bay‘a? We only know that Suhail Shaheen recently said that there is no allegiance between al-Qaida and the Taliban[5]. Can you explain to us what you mean?

The emir of the Taliban rejected al-Zawahiri’s bay‘a to him.

Q10: I see. Back to HaD. Is al-Qaida central controlling these new cells? Because many researchers and analysts claim that al-Qaida does not have control over its affiliates, and therefore that they operate independently from the central leadership. Do you agree?

Yes, that is correct. Al-Qaida now operates in a decentralized manner. Al-Qaida central is disconnected from the branches and does not interfere much in their policies or operations. Thus most of the branches operate without referring to al-Qaida central.

As for the Syrian branch, it is still linked to al-Qaida central through Sayf al-‘Adl, who is in Iran and is the supervisor of the Syrian branch. However, the contact with him is weak as well.

Q11: During the last several months, several intelligence services and researchers have reported that al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri could be seriously ill or even dead. There are also rumors that his possible successors could be Sayf al-‘Adl and ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Maghribi. What is your opinion?

Recently, al-Zawahiri appeared in an audio recording after the news reports speaking of his death. Al-Qaida also released a statement regarding the recent events in Gaza.[6] Therefore, I don’t think he has died. It is possible he is just ill.

Regarding his possible successor, there is a document by some al-Qaida leaders from a number of branches entrusting the leadership to a number of persons. I have it, though I cannot remember where it is right now. Perhaps I can find it for you.

In light of the killing of Abu al-Khayr [al-Masri] and Abu Muhammad al-Masri, Sayf al-‘Adl is certainly the most likely successor. However, some branches do not support this.

Q12: And apart from Sayf al-‘Adl, is there any other senior member of the Hittin Shura[7] who is still connected with Syria?

Abu Abd al-Karim al-Masri[8] is still based in Syria.

Q13: For many years, both official and unofficial Islamic State propaganda accused al-Qaida of having a too populist, sort of wait-and-see strategy, of not applying the Sharia, and of betraying the Salafi-Jihadi ideology. What is your opinion on this?

Indeed, al-Qaida does not agree with ISIS on many matters. Al-Qaida is more populist because of the ideological revisions that took place among the al-Qaida leaders—I mean here the Egyptian leaders. And al-Qaida was influenced by the ideas of Abu Yahya [al-Libi] and Atiyatullah [al-Libi].[9]

Therefore al-Qaida appears to be more realist as it takes into account some aspects of society. However, the difference between them is not huge as regards the issue of applying the Sharia. Jabhat al-Nusra was also close to ISIS when it came to implementing the Sharia in the liberated areas, where it established the role of the judiciary and carried out some of the canonical punishments. But it did not follow ISIS’s policy of giving media coverage to them.

Q14: You say that the difference between al-Qaida and ISIS on the matter of Sharia rulings is not that huge. However, the Islamic State has repeatedly published magazines and videos in which they declare al-Qaida and its leader to be apostates for their operational choices, such as their alliance with the Taliban. What do you think?

ISIS’s relationship with al-Qaida has passed through three stages:

[First,] a stage in which there was a kind of agreement. This was the stage that preceded the establishment of Jabhat al-Nusra and the outbreak of the Syrian revolution. Al-Qaida continued to recognize the [Islamic] State of Iraq as its branch in Iraq, and ISIS continued to regard al-Qaida with a kind of appreciation, despite the reports that reached al-Qaida concerning violations and abuses committed by the [Islamic] State of Iraq.

As for the second stage, this is the stage of discord. It began with al-Jolani’s announcement of his bay‘a to al-Qaida and opposition to al-Baghdadi, and al-Qaida’s judgment in support of al-Jolani. Here ISIS began to view al-Qaida as a competitor, given that it had encouraged al-Jolani to defect from the [Islamic] State, and accusations began to be hurled between the two sides.

The third stage began after the killing of Abu Khalid al-Suri, the leader in Ahrar al-Sham who was the person appointed by al-Qaida central as arbiter between al-Baghdadi and al-Jolani. This stage came after the fighting between ISIS and the rest of the Syrian factions, including Jabhat al-Nusra, and here the dispute reached the point of accusing ISIS of being on the path of the Kharijites, while ISIS accused al-Qaida in Syria of showing loyalty to apostates and allying with them, and thus of having apostatized as well. Then all of al-Qaida was accused of apostasy.

As for the Taliban, they have been apostate for ISIS for a long time, even before the dispute with al-Qaida … But these matters were not leaked to the media.

Q15: Today, many Salafi-Jihadi groups, including al-Qaida, are still engaged on several fronts, fighting a number of different actors. However, in some areas, some groups appear to be inclined towards abandoning the armed struggle and concluding peace agreements with the governments they are fighting. Do you think such a strategic choice could be a valuable option for Salafi-Jihadi groups, or do you think that there can be no peace deal between them and their opponents?

There are several interrelated factors regarding this issue.

First, fighting and struggle are a lung with which Salafi-Jihadism breathes, as it thrives in such circumstances.

Second, there are many elements that used to be part of jihadi factions that made [reconciliation] agreements.

Third, it seems that after years of conflict Salafi-Jihadism has lost much of its momentum and strength, especially with the disintegration of Ahrar al-Sham, the decline of ISIS, and the cutting of ties between Jabhat al-Nusra and al-Qaida.

Fourth, there is no doubt that ending a conflict in an unjust manner and without equitable solutions will generate a backlash among many factions and elements that do not belong to Salafi-Jihadi groups. Thus, the slogans raised by Salafi-Jihadism to the effect that it is necessary to continue the struggle will appear as truthful slogans and will attract more elements to them from beyond Salafi-Jihadism. Thus Asad’s success in regaining control of the country and resolving the conflict in his favor, or imposing unfair solutions, will strengthen the Salafi-Jihadi narrative and position.

Q16: Do you think that al-Qaida and ISIS are still capable of waging a global armed struggle against the far enemy? Or will they decide to exclusively concentrate their attacks on the near enemy?

I believe that ISIS is still capable of launching external attacks despite its weak state at the present time. ISIS has gone through similar stages previously and it was eventually able to reassemble its ranks and restore its activity, and this is what it is doing now in Syria, Iraq, and Africa.

As for al-Qaida, external operations are limited to the Yemen branch only, and to a lesser extent to the North African branch. As for the Syrian branch, it is forbidden from launching any external attacks, and it is in a very weak state now.

Q17: So, you say that al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and maybe al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghrib (AQIM) are still capable of conducting external attacks, as they are allowed to do so. But as you may be aware, many scholars and politicians claim that al-Qaida no longer has the strength to carry out attacks in the West. What is your opinion? Does al-Qaida still have the capability to attack the West?

I think that al-Qaida is still capable of launching small attacks in Europe, such as stabbings or tramplings. As for major operations, I do not think that it is capable of that at the present time.

[1] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/interview/abu-mohammad-al-jolani/.

[2] https://undocs.org/S/2021/68.

[3] The operations room referred to by the interviewee is the “Rouse the Believers Operations Room,” a coalition of Salafist-Jihadi groups that rose up in northwest Syria during the Syrian civil war. The coalition included Hurras al-Din, Jabhat Ansar al-Din, Ansar al-Islam, and Ansar al-Tawhid. On 12 June 2020, the member groups of the “Rouse the Believers Operations Room” (excluding Ansar al-Tawhid), along with two other Salafi-Jihadi groups (the al-Muqatileen al-Ansar Brigade and the al-Jihad Coordination Group) led by former HTS commanders, reorganized into a new operations room called “So Be Steadfast,” which was quickly routed by HTS.

[4] Ansar al-Islam is a historic Salafi-Jihadi group originally based in Iraqi Kurdistan. In 2014, it shifted its operations to Syria. In February 2015, it announced the creation of a branch in the north-western Syrian province of Idlib that has been mainly active in the northern area of Latakia. It cooperates with HaD in their fight against the Syrian regime and Russian troops.

[5] See Nihad Jariri’s interview with Suhail Shaheen https://mobile.twitter.com/NihadJariri/status/1391155623534989314

[6] The video referenced here is from 12 March 2021, “The Wound of the Rohingya is the Wound of the Islamic Nation”; see https://jihadology.net/2021/03/12/new-video-message-from-al-qaidahs-dr-ayman-al-%e1%ba%93awahiri-the-wound-of-the-rohingya-is-the-wound-of-the-islamic-nation/.

[7] The core leadership of al-Qaida.

[8] Abu ‘Abd al-Karim al-Masri is a veteran member of al-Qaida and a senior leader of HaD. In 2018, al-Masri, was a member of HaD’s shura council, the group’s senior decision-making body, and served as a mediator between it and Jabhat al-Nusra.

[9] Abu Yahya al-Libi was a prominent al-Qaida leader who rose to become al-Qaida’s second in command. He was killed in a drone strike in 2012 in Mir Ali, Pakistan. Atiyatullah al-Libi was a senior member of al-Qaida who worked as general manager for the organization. He was killed in a drone strike in 2011 in North Waziristan, Pakistan.

It is important to note that jihadi activity in Tunisia has been on a decline in recent years due to counterterrorism and military efforts locally against al-Qaeda (AQ) and the Islamic State (IS), as well as the waning fortunes of foreign fighting endeavors in Iraq, Libya, and Syria as IS lost territory. Nevertheless, it is worth considering the issue given the large-scale mobilization seen in Tunisia over the past decade, and since any form of instability is seen as an opportunity by the jihadi movement. Plus, what initially might appear as rhetoric, as was the case with jihadis speaking on the 2011 Tunisia uprising and having no part in it, could lead to a re-energized mobilization, in the same way that Ansar al-Sharia in Tunisia (AST) was able to take advantage of new conditions following the overthrow of former president Bin ‘Ali.

How Jihadis Have Framed the Crisis

Much of the messaging from jihadi thinkers surrounding the latest political events in Tunisia boils down to gloating over the embarrassment that al-Nahdah has suffered as a consequence of the freezing of parliament. In their telling, this is another example of democracy failing Islamist parties and further evidence that fighting jihad and instituting sharia are the only way to push back against local deep states and perceived anti-Islamic authoritarian forces. The Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS)-affiliated cleric Shaykh ‘Abd al-Razzaq al-Mahdi also views what happened through the prism of a conspiracy from outside forces, in this seeing similarities with what happened in Egypt with ‘Abd al-Fatah al-Sisi and the Muslim Brotherhood: “[Sa‘id] is leading a coup with the support of France, Sisi, and [the Crown Prince of the UAE] Ibn Zayed… if the lunatic is able to he will do as Sisi of Egypt.”

Meanwhile, the Syrian-based Tansiqiyyat al-Jihad’s Abu al-‘Abd Ashida, seeking to undermine democracy as a legitimate form of governance, rhetorically and cynically states and then asks the following: “Bloody red democracy. Coup in Tunisia. Coup in Egypt. Coup of [Libyan strongman Khalifah] Haftar. So this is considered democracy?” Abu Mahmud al-Filastini, a London-based ideologue and acolyte of Abu Qatada al-Filastini, argues that “no change will come without an effective force that loosens the joints of the deep state and undermines its pillars. The path of democracy cannot lead to the rule of sharia and the building of an Islamic state.” His mentor, Abu Qatada, gets to the point and bluntly states: “Jihad is a necessity. Almost all Muslims commenting today, from all walks of life, in their comments on what happened in Tunisia agree that jihad has become a necessity… They have no other choice.”

Alluding to what has become of al-Nahdah, the leader of Jaysh al-Ummah in Gaza, Abu Hafs al-Maqdisi, quotes a saying of the second caliph ʿUmar Ibn al-Khattab: “We are a people whom God has honored with Islam, so whenever we seek honor through anything else, God will humiliate us.” Adding onto the critiques of al-Nahdah is the London-based ideologue Abu Basir al-Tartusi, who addresses the party saying, “You will not find anyone crying for you … this is the reward of those who raise the slogan ‘separating da‘wa from politics’ and the slogan ‘freedom before Islam, and before applying the teachings and laws of Islam.’ You have neither achieved freedom nor supported the religion!” Al-Tartusi goes on to call al-Nahdah out for having tried to build relations with France while the latter is, in his view, domestically attacking Islam. Therefore, “[al-Nahdah] paid the price of this stance of vacillation and dilution … and this is the fate of every movement or group that follows this false and vacillating approach of theirs!”

As for the Tunisian ideologue in HTS who goes by the name al-Idrisi, his approach is more localized since he is originally from Tunisia: “The Tunisian revolution is paying the price of not purging the country of the remnants of the former regime, from the security [services], the army, influential businessmen, and the media. The parties are paying the price of living in an illusion and wishful thinking.” Of course, since al-Idrisi is with HTS and based in Syria now, he heavily criticizes on a regional level al-Nahdah’s and the Muslim Brotherhood’s role in failing the revolution: “Peoples’ relying on the Brotherhood in leading the Arab Spring revolutions is like relying on a mirage.” This leads to a key point in buttressing his own position on leaving Tunisia, which is that the best model today is that of HTS in Syria and the Taliban in Afghanistan. “The success of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham and the Taliban,” he says, “calls for the umma’s reconsideration of the moderate jihadist movements that have proven their political and military sophistication in managing conflict, establishing existence, and seizing freedom from the clutches of evildoers.”

Beyond specific ideologues, the pro-AQ news agency Thabat and the official IS newsletter al-Naba’ also commented on the events in Tunisia. The Thabat article was penned by an Abu al-Bara’ al-Libi, who portrays the recent experience of al-Nahdah as part of a long history of Muslim Brotherhood organizations being used and betrayed by local regimes they had engaged with. He points in particular to what happened to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt under Gamal ‘Abd al-Nasir and more recently in the coup of ‘Abd al-Fatah al-Sisi. Sudan and Turkey are mentioned as cases too. Whereas Brotherhood organizations, including al-Nahdah, do not not heed the lessons of the past, he claims, the jihadis are never fooled since they have “a firm and unchanging stance regarding every tyrant (taghut) who substitutes God’s law and accepts democracy.”

Tracking with the rest of the aforementioned critiques, IS’s editorial in al-Naba’ directly attacks al-Nahdah’s embrace of democracy:

And among those who have most opposed God and His Messenger in this time are the seekers, advocates, and followers of democracy, who have believed in it and taken it as a path and course, and thus have contravened the Sunna and the precepts. God has imposed on them humiliation, destitution, and becoming lost, and that has become appended to them in all of their circumstances like a collar around their necks. This is the very thing that has happened today to the apostate Ikhwan in Tunisia after they contravened the path of the believers, followed democracy, sought help in it, glorified it, and made it a judge among them and a guide for them to the path of Hellfire. The result resembled what happened to them before, when the one they were content with as a taghut for themselves turned on them.

The IS editorial also uses the downfall of al-Nahdah as an opportunity to win points with AQ and its supporters, since in the past Abu Qatada al-Filistini, whom IS sees as a pro-AQ ideologue, had commended Qays Sa‘id when he won the 2019 Tunisian presidential election. Recalling the former praise of “some of the theoreticians of al-Qaeda” for Sa‘id, the editorial notes: “Indeed the stance of the dimwits of al-Qaeda regarding the Tunisian taghut is no less than the stance of the apostate Ikhwan in its naivete.” It is possible that Abu Qatada and others favored Sa‘id because of the latter’s traditional views on the death penalty, criminalization of homosexuality, and opposing equal inheritance between men and women.

Will These Words Amount to Anything?

It is hard to believe that Sa‘id would follow the mistakes that were made in the aftermath of the revolution as it relates to the jihadi movement. There have been too many hard-fought lessons learned by the state. It will not repeat the mistake of doing a prisoner amnesty like the transitional government did in February 2011 or having a light touch policy vis-à-vis AST as al-Nahdah did following its coming to power in the October 2011 Constituent Assembly election. That said, it would not be surprising if either AQ or IS attempted to prod the capabilities of the Tunisian state if these groups foresee some opening for themselves in the medium term. If Sa‘id goes full authoritarian, however, it is likely that dynamics will play out as they did under former Tunisian dictator Bin ‘Ali: suppression of local mobilization, with much of Tunisian jihadi activity occurring outside its borders in Europe or the latest foreign fighter destination—potentially Afghanistan again in light of the Taliban’s methodical takeover of Afghan territory.

The recent hostilities between Hamas and Israel have brought the controversy over Hamas back to the fore, shedding new light on the jihadi movement’s ideological fault lines. The first division is that between al-Qaida and the Islamic State, and as one would expect it is the Islamic State that takes the harder line against Hamas. There is another fault line, however, that runs between two ideological camps on the pro-al-Qaida side of the jihadi movement. It is here, as will be seen, where the most intense debate has taken place. One of the camps has not shied away from criticizing al-Qaida itself.

Al-Qaida vs. the Islamic State

Shortly after the conflict between Israel and Hamas began on May 10, when Hamas fired more than 150 rockets into Israel and Israel responded with airstrikes, most jihadi groups, including the various branches of al-Qaida, issued statements of solidarity with the Palestinians. The statements also decried the perceived Israeli aggression on the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, where clashes had been taking place between worshippers and Israeli security forces since May 7. Al-Qaida central, through its al-Sahab media outlet, issued three such statements between mid-May and early June.

The first statement appeared on May 11 in the form of an issue of al-Qaida’s occasional newsletter, al-Nafir. Titled “Al-Aqsa in the Care of the Descendants of al-Bara’ ibn Malik,” it appears to have been written before the air war began as its focus is the Palestinian demonstrations around the al-Aqsa mosque. Al-Qaida here likens the fearlessness of the demonstrators to that of the Prophet’s companion al-Bara’ ibn Malik, who was launched into a walled area of thousands of apostates in the so-called “wars of apostasy” in early Islam. The issue also quoted at length from a March 2002 speech by Osama bin Ladin in which he inveighs against normalization with the Jewish state and encourages Muslims to kill Americans and Jews by any means possible.

Several days later, on May 17, came a more controversial statement from al-Qaida’s “general leadership,” titled “Statement of Love, Honor, and Support for Our People in Palestine.” The purpose of the statement was to salute the “mujahidin” in Gaza and their launching of “jihadi missiles toward the Zionists.” The statement never mentions Hamas, but it does mourn the death of one of its military commanders. Toward the end, the al-Qaida leadership offers its condolences (or congratulations) to the Palestinians on “your pious martyrs, foremost among them the heroic leader Basim ‘Isa Abu ‘Imad.” Basim ‘Isa, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on May 12, was a top military commander of the al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing. As noted by the analyst Wassim Nasr on Twitter, the praise for Basim ‘Isa here was in keeping with a preexisting al-Qaida policy to distinguish between the political and military wings of Hamas. That policy was elucidated over a decade ago by the al-Qaida commander Mustafa Abu al-Yazid (d. 2010) after he made the mistake of saying in an interview that “we and Hamas share the same thinking and the same methodology.” Following criticism of his remark, Abu al-Yazid issued a clarification acknowledging that he had misspoken and explaining that the approach of the al-Qaida leadership is to distinguish between Hamas as a political organization, which had committed terrible methodological errors such as embracing democracy, and the righteous mujahideen fighting under Hamas’s banner (i.e., the al-Qassam Brigades, or at least some of them).

The third al-Qaida statement appeared on June 2, two weeks after a ceasefire was reached between the warring parties on May 21. Once again taking the form of an issue of al-Qaida’s al-Nafir newsletter, the statement hailed Hamas’s “sword of Jerusalem” campaign as a great victory that should be seized on “to revive the duty of jihad” in the youth of the Muslim umma. The model of initiating battles to defend mosques under siege from unbelievers and apostates was one to be followed across the Islamic world. The statement went on to praise “the mujahidin in Gaza” and in particular “their heroic leader Muhammad al-Dayf,” the supreme military commander of the al-Qassam Brigades. The singling out of al-Dayf further exemplified the al-Qaida leadership’s fondness for Hamas’s military wing to the exclusion of its political wing.

Taken together, the three statements show al-Qaida posturing as the ally of the al-Qassam Brigades and trying to portray the hostilities with the Jewish state as part of al-Qaida’s larger war with the Americans, the Zionists, and the “client” Arab regimes. Nowhere in these statements is there any hint of criticism of Hamas as a political organization, unless that is to be read in the omission of Hamas’s name. In the past al-Qaida has issued harsh condemnations of the Hamas political leadership, but here no such thing is to be found.

The Islamic State could not have responded more differently to the war between Hamas and Israel. After more than a week of silence on the matter, the official line came in the editorial of the May 20 issue of the Islamic State’s weekly newsletter, al-Naba’. Titled “The Road to Jerusalem,” the editorial condemned Hamas (never mentioned by name) as a proxy of Shiite Iran and as part of its axis of “resistance.” Hamas’s warfare was not to be considered jihad as it served the interests of the Iranians and their plot for regional domination. “The difference between jihad and resistance is as the difference between truth and falsehood,” the editorial read. “Whoso allies with those who curse the Prophet’s wives [i.e., the Shia] will never liberate Jerusalem … and whoso differentiates between the Rejectionists [i.e., the Shia] and the Jews will never liberate Jerusalem … Indeed, we consider the mujahid who lies in wait for the Rejectionists in Iraq to be closer to Jerusalem than those who show loyalty to the Rejectionists and burnish their image.” The editorial went on to claim that all of the Islamic State’s battles “east and west are in fact steps in the direction of Jerusalem, Mecca, al-Andalus, Baghdad, Damascus, and all other captured Muslim lands.” In other words, it is the Islamic State, and not Hamas, that holds the promise of liberating Jerusalem.

Perhaps the most notable line in the editorial was a remark toward the end rejecting the idea of Palestinian exceptionalism. “The soldiers of the caliphate,” it stated, “have not exaggerated the issue of Palestine and have not made it an exception among the issues of the Muslims … They have not differentiated between the blood of their Muslim brethren in Palestine and the blood of their brethren in other lands.” This is a remarkable statement, and one that illustrates a stark difference between the Islamic State and al-Qaida regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Unlike al-Qaida, the Islamic State is not interested in posing as the ally of whatever Sunni Muslim group is waging war against the Jewish state. For the Islamic State, any group that deviates from its methodology (manhaj) is simply not worthy of honor and support.

On June 21, the Islamic State’s official spokesman, Abu Hamza al-Qurashi, delivered an audio address that echoed much of the sentiment of the editorial. Al-Qurashi ridiculed the idea that Hamas could ever bring victory to Palestine and urged the Palestinians not to be deceived by the rockets launched by Hamas “in service of their Iranian masters.” Hamas was hypocritical for condemning the Gulf states’ normalization with Israel when it had normalized relations with “Zoroastrian, Safavid Iran.” As in the editorial, the idea here is that it is folly to differentiate between the Jews and the Shia.

Al-Maqdisi vs. Abu Qatada

Among jihadis opposed to the Islamic State and generally aligned with al-Qaida, a divide has emerged in recent years between two competing ideological camps—namely, those who side with the more hardline ideologue Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, and those who ally with the relatively more moderate Abu Qatada al-Filastini. Both men, who are Palestinian-Jordanians, have active social media presences and devoted followings. Much of their disagreement has revolved around the issue of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) in Syria, which al-Maqdisi has condemned and Abu Qatada praised. The matter of Hamas has proven equally controversial.

The war of words over Hamas, which played out on the messaging app Telegram, began on May 13 when al-Maqdisi responded to a comment by the jihadi scholar Na’il ibn Ghazi Musran, who is aligned with Abu Qatada. Musran had written that Gaza was “the standard of distinction between faith and unbelief, and the line separating monotheism (tawhid) in its entirety from apostasy in its entirety.” The author was referring to the different reactions in the Arab world to the Gaza conflict, his point being that those unsupportive of the Palestinian belligerents were in “the camp of apostasy” and those supportive were in “the camp of truth.” In his response, al-Maqdisi ridiculed the idea that “Gaza is the standard,” as the ongoing battle was not one between tawhid and unbelief. He cited what he saw as the outright apostasy of some Palestinian youth and their adherence to pagan nationalism. Addressing the people of Palestine, he wrote: “Do not expect victory from God so long as you are silent about the reviling and cursing of God around you.”

Later that day, Abu Qatada authored a brief response in which he objected to such casual dismissal of unspecified Palestinian youth as apostates. “It is incumbent upon us,” he wrote, “to treat the Muslim youth, even if they are people of sin, as belonging to us. We should understand them as belonging to us and being of us, for the call to expel them from the umma means making them the soldiers of Satan, and making them against us and against Islam. This is a profound error.” Abu Qatada did not believe that Hamas’s efforts would achieve “complete victory and the elimination of the Jewish state,” but nonetheless “these winds of faith in Palestine,” he said, referring to Hamas’s military operations, keep “the spirit of jihad” alive and renew faith in “the necessity of waging jihad against the unbelievers and the apostates.” And likewise, “they teach us to keep in check our quarrels with the Muslim sinner, the Muslim innovator, and the Muslim who errs.”

If Abu Qatada’s view was that the Gaza conflict ought to teach jihadis to be more tolerant and openminded, al-Maqdisi’s view was the opposite. In a post published on May 14, al-Maqdisi accused a certain unnamed shaykh (ba‘d al-shuyukh) of “exploiting these events to spread error and confusion.” “What is necessary,” he retorted, “is that these occasions and battles and wars be exploited to teach people their tawhid and their true religion, not to dilute it, change it, and distort it with false conceptions.” The problem with “making Gaza and Palestine the measure of unbelief and faith,” he reiterated, was that it overlooked the transgressions of the those purporting to wage jihad. “It is impossible for victory to come,” he declared, “from the exaltation of the Rejectionists of Iran and its affiliated parties that attack the honor of the Prophet’s wives, pronounce takfir on the Companions, and kill the Sunnis in Iraq and al-Sham.” In a subsequent post published the next day, al-Maqdisi clarified that while he supports the military efforts of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad against the Jews, he nonetheless does not consider them “jihad in the path of God”; for the path of these groups is not “tawhid and dissociation from all forms of polytheism and idolatry,” but rather “exalting and burnishing of the image of Rejectionist Iran.”

Al-Maqdisi vs. al-Qaida (and Abu Qatada)

The war of words between al-Maqdisi and Abu Qatada went on hiatus for about two weeks. It resumed on June 1 when al-Maqdisi authored a post condemning al-Qaida’s statement mourning the death of the Hamas military commander Basim ‘Isa. In the post, titled “Questions Posed to the Brothers at al-Sahab,” al-Maqdisi presented his criticism in the form of questionings attributed to others. “Many mujahid brothers, shaykhs, and preachers were displeased,” he wrote, “by the al-Sahab statement’s exaltation of the al-Qassam leader who was killed in the recent war in Gaza, and they wondered astonishedly: ‘Are our brothers not aware of the deviation of Hamas and its leadership from the path of tawhid in favor of the path of democracy, and their alignment with Hizb al-Lat [i.e., Hizbullah] and Bashar [al-Asad] and Iran?’” Al-Maqdisi continued in this way, referring to the “surprises, shocks, and perturbations” that have succeeded one after the other since the mourning of former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi by some of the al-Qaida leadership. “Has the methodology (manhaj) changed?” he asked. “Or have the ranks of al-Qaida been penetrated by those who pay no heed to the purity of the manhaj? … It is presumed that al-Qaida continues to condemn the advocates of democratic Islamism and to dissociate from their manhaj, so how can it mourn their dead when they died on behalf of democracy? And how can it exalt their military leaders who in turn exalt Iran and Bashar and choose the path of democracy?” Al-Maqdisi was putting it out there that a lot of supporters of al-Qaida, himself included, were aghast at such praise for Hamas, even if the praise was restricted to Hamas’s military wing.

The following day, Abu Qatada responded to al-Maqdisi with a brief post implicitly rebuking him for suggesting that Hamas’s war dead were not martyrs (al-Maqdisi had pondered how al-Qaida could “mourn their dead when they died on behalf of democracy?”). Hamas was far from perfect, Abu Qatada explained, yet it nonetheless deserved praise for having “returned the Islamic identity” to the Palestinian cause that had been dominated by leftist and secularist parties. For this reason, he said, and because the secularist alternative is far worse, the critics of Hamas have generally been restrained in their criticism. The right way to deal with them, he declared, was to seek their improvement (ta‘dil) and not their destruction (tadmir). “Their dead are martyrs and their legal status is Islam,” he concluded. “Patience concerning their errors, together with the proffering of advice, is the right-guided sunni way.”

Al-Maqdisi’s response, which appeared the next day, was to insist that “whoso is killed in the path of democracy, and in support of a group that refrains from implementing the Sharia and chooses democracy, is not a martyr; rather he is a corpse (fatis), bother some though it will.” In the same post, al-Maqdisi launched into a comparison of Hamas and the Islamic State, both of which, as he explains, have killed their opponents and exposed their civilian populations to bombardment. Though al-Maqdisi has long been a critic of the Islamic State, here he suggests that the caliphate is superior to Hamas in that it has implemented the Sharia as opposed to democracy and does not show loyalty to idolatrous tyrants (tawaghit). Why then, he asks, addressing Abu Qatada (though not by name), is it your view that we must approach the Islamic State as something to be destroyed (tadmir) but Hamas as something to be improved (ta‘dil)? Al-Maqdisi’s point here was not that the Islamic State is improvable while Hamas is not. His point, rather, was that if the Islamic State is irredeemable then Hamas is doubly so, since Hamas is worse than the Islamic State in certain ways.

This time Abu Qatada did not respond. Al-Maqdisi would follow up to reaffirm that “whoso dies in the path of democracy is a corpse, not a martyr,” and later he would author a long post quoting some of Abu Qatada’s older works that were highly critical of Hamas and its ilk. The most recent post by Abu Qatada regarding Hamas was actually a statement condemning the group for allying with Iran and its Shiite proxies, and particularly the Houthis whom a Hamas representative had recently honored with a medal. Yet even here it was clear that Abu Qatada considered Hamas a Muslim group; the criticism was harsh but still intended as constructive.

Whither al-Maqdisi and al-Qaida?

As noted above, the jihadi reactions to last month’s Israel-Hamas war point to two fault lines in the Sunni jihadi movement: one between the Islamic State and al-Qaida, and one in the pro-al-Qaida side of the movement between the followers of al-Maqdisi and the followers of Abu Qatada. Al-Qaida, as I have written before, almost certainly would like to hold on to both ideological camps, but increasingly it is alienating al-Maqdisi and his followers. The change in approach appears to be by design. With the Islamic State representing the more extreme and intolerant version of Jihadi Salafism, al-Qaida is intent on presenting itself as the movement’s more moderate face. To that end, it has taken a softer line on mainstream Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas and played down the emphasis on ideological exclusivism promoted by al-Maqdisi and his camp.

Al-Qaida has long wavered between a more pan-Islamist and a more Salafi (i.e., doctrinally exclusivist) tendency, and today the pan-Islamist tendency has the edge. Al-Maqdisi has taken note of this development, hence his questioning whether al-Qaida has “changed its methodology.” For the supporters of the Islamic State, the answer to this question is obvious and al-Maqdisi knows it. As one Islamic State supporter recently wrote, addressing al-Maqdisi, “Yes, it has changed, and you have ceased to have any value to them and they no longer pay any heed to what you say. Soon they may issue a statement in which, implicitly or explicitly, they dissociate from you and your extremism.” The writer was probably overstating the divergence between al-Maqdisi and al-Qaida; neither is eager for a divorce. But if al-Maqdisi continues to express outrage at what he see as the accumulating deviations of al-Qaida, then a breakup of sorts may well be inevitable.

The rise to power since 2015 in Saudi Arabia of Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman (MBS) has presented jihadis with a new target of opportunity and additional material with which to attack the kingdom. His social reforms, especially the relaxation of strict norms on women’s public behavior, the mixing of the sexes, and promoting live musical concerts have elicited the ire and condemnation of traditional elements in Saudi society, and the jihadis aim to capitalize on these sentiments.

Two recent messages from al-Qaida illustrate how the group is attempting to exploit the potential for disaffection occasioned by the rise of MBS. The first is a two-page issue of the group’s occasional newsletter, al-Nafir (“The Battle Call”), titled “al-Dir‘iyya from the Mission of Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab to Formula E”; the second is a 23-minute audio address by al-Qaida’s leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, called “The Zionists of the Arabian Peninsula.” Both were distributed on December 24, 2018 via Telegram by the media company al-Sahab, the same outlet that has produced most of al-Qaida’s messages since 9/11. The two adopt somewhat distinct arguments. The first message makes the case for a religious and theological condemnation of MBS, whereas the second, by al-Zawahiri, is more openly political and strategic in its analysis and prescriptions. Let us take each of the messages separately and offer an examination of their respective contents.

Dancing in al-Dir‘iyya

The December 2018 issue of al-Nafir—which claims to be a “consciousness awakening” publication (nashra taw‘awiyya)—is not the first to focus on MBS and Saudi Arabia. Previous issues have attacked the kingdom’s new counterterrorism initiatives as part of the “war on Islam” and ridiculed MBS’s pronouncements in favor of “moderate Islam” as tantamount to endorsing “American Islam.” The latest issue, however, is the most detailed in its condemnation of MBS’s social policies and the most exhortatory yet, concluding with an appeal for action.

The publication depicts MBS as the devil incarnate, labeling him the “Awaited Corrupter” (al-mufsid al-muntazar) and the Abraha of the Saudi family. The first name is a play on the name of the prophesied Islamic messianic figure, al-mahdi al-muntazar (“the awaited redeemer”), who will appear before the end times. The second moniker is a reference to the pre-Islamic Abyssinian Christian viceroy of Yemen who is alleged to have led a military expedition with elephants against Mecca in the year 570 with the aim of destroying the Ka‘ba (cf. Q. 105). (An earlier issue described him as “the Arabs’ Ataturk.”)

Interestingly, and not entirely in keeping with al-Qaida’s ideology, the tone of the piece is apocalyptic, warning that MBS’s liberalizing reforms, aimed at destroying Islam, are perhaps a harbinger of doomsday. MBS, according to the piece, is “spreading the symbols of Westernization, the rituals of secularism, and liberal values” in a conservative Muslim society in order to promote social corruption, deviance, and debauchery, especially among the young men and women who hail from the pure Arabian tribes of the Peninsula. In a reference to the dancing at several recent musical concerts in al-Dir‘iyya, the capital of the first Saudi-Wahhabi state, the author asks rhetorically whether the gyrations of the women’s backsides are indeed a sign of the imminence of Judgment Day, as predicted in one of the traditions of the Prophet Muhammad. This is the hadith narrated on the authority of Abu Hurayra in which the Prophet says, “[One of the signs of] Judgment Day is the jiggling of the backsides of the women of the tribe of Daws around the shrine of Dhu al-Khalasa.”[1]

The piece goes on to criticize all of MBS’s social reforms, complaining of the appearance of uncovered women on Saudi television, mixed-sex singing parties, professional wrestling matches, and circus shows, as well as women’s driving and Formula E racing in al-Dir‘iyya, ground zero of the Wahhabi mission. All this is said to be intended by the government to spread depravity and vice and to cause people to abandon God’s religion. The public appearance and assertiveness of women are particularly galling for the author, as these echo the habits and practices of idolatrous and polytheistic pre-Islamic Arabia, the Jahiliyya. The document clearly intends to provoke the patriarchal and ultra-conservative attitudes of Arabian society in the hope of delegitimizing MBS’s regime, which is also described, for good measure, as inclined toward Zionism (mutasahyin). And while all this merriment and debauchery is taking place in Arabia, the piece adds, the innocent Muslims, whether in Syria, Myanmar, Xinjiang, or Gaza, are either being bombed by the Americans or Russians or being brutalized by autocrats like the Chinese or Burmese rulers.

The Saudi regime is also condemned for unjustly imprisoning and torturing Muslim scholars and preachers, a theme that al-Nafir has touched on before. In the September 2017 issue, for instance, which appeared shortly after the arrest of several high-profile Islamist scholars including Salman al-‘Awda, al-Qaida announced its support for the recently detained. Without mentioning any of them by name, it praised those scholars and preachers who have long operated in the “grey zones” of support for Islam. Similarly, nearly a year later, al-Nafir would laud the efforts of the Islamist scholar Safar al-Hawali, who was arrested in July 2018 following the release of his 3,000-page book that included stinging criticism of the Al Saud.

The prescription offered to al-Nafir’s readers is for the young men of belief to gather, plan, and organize to stop MBS’s “westernizing and liberalizing project,” which has established roots in the “land of faith and divine revelation.” They must also seek and engage the truthful scholars, who have not been imprisoned, as well as communicate with and solicit the advice of the global jihadi leadership. The recommendations are vague and most likely to be ineffectual, but at any rate the piece demonstrates a concerted effort by al-Qaida to stir the emotions of a religiously conservative society against MBS’s socially liberalizing policies, in particular those that accord greater agency to women as well as promote their increased visibility in public.

Zionists in Arabia

The second al-Qaida message, al-Zawahiri’s audio statement, aims to provide a more developed political and historical framing of MBS’s reforms, as well as to instruct Muslims in Arabia as to how to resist the Saudi government. In keeping with his roots in the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Zawahiri offers a conspiratorial narrative to explain regional and global politics over the last century. His argument is that there is an unholy alliance that unites Crusaders (Britain and the United States), Zionists (Israel), and Safavid-Rejectionists (Iranians and Shiites) to destroy true Islam, by which he means Sunni Islam. This three-pronged alliance plots ceaselessly to weaken and attack Muslims and to pilfer their material resources. The Saudi ruling family, along with every other leader of a Sunni majority country (Egypt, the UAE, Yemen, etc.), are agents and enablers of this alliance. The message itself takes the form of a video featuring al-Zawahiri’s still image, with documentary-like clips that cut to highlight the points al-Zawahiri is making.

As the title of the message suggests, al-Zawahiri asserts that the Saudi ruling family, from the time of its founder King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud (r. 1902-1953) until MBS today, are concealed Zionists who pretend to be Muslims. They have ceaselessly plotted to destroy Islam in alliance, first with the British, and since WWII with the United States. Ibn Saud helped the British defeat the Ottoman caliphate, he says, which paved the way for the Zionists to establish the state of Israel in Palestine. Later, Ibn Saud’s children, as kings of Saudi Arabia, persisted in their betrayal by allowing America to steal Arabia’s wealth (i.e., the oil), establish military bases, and impose non-Islamic laws and rules. The late King Fahd, whom al-Zawahiri derisively nicknames Abu Rughal—an infamous traitor of pre-Islamic Arabia—not only offered Israel recognition with the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002, but was also the one who invited the U.S. military into Arabia, where it remains t0 this day.

Al-Zawahiri’s condemnation of the Saudi rulers continues unabated and reaches a crescendo with his treatment of MBS, whom he accuses of fully revealing the “Zionist face” of the government in Riyadh. MBS, according to al-Zawahiri, not only spreads sin and debauchery, but also executes and imprisons religious scholars, whether they be openly sympathetic to al-Qaida or sycophants of his rule. More pernicious yet, MBS openly avers that Israel has the right to exist and that cooperation with it is necessary. Al-Zawahiri’s conspiratorial narrative, however, stretches credulity when he then asserts, without adducing any evidence, that the Americans have plotted with the Houthi rebels to achieve control over the government in Sanaa. This plotting, which also includes the United States conspiring with Iran, now means that Arabia has become completely dominated by America and “the Muslims in Arabia are besieged by the Shiites (al-hisar al-Rafidi) from the north, east and south.”

Given this parlous state of affairs, al-Zawahiri turns to his recommendations for the Muslims of Arabia. They must, according to him, do three things: emigrate (hijra), conduct jihad, and unite (ittihad). In terms of emigration, al-Zawahiri recommends that those who oppose the Saudi and American-Iranian conspiracy leave Arabia for the outposts of warfare (thughur al-jihad), likely meaning the areas under the control of al-Qaida, such as the borderlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan. (In an earlier address, Hamza mentioned Yemen as an ideal destination for hijra.) It is only in such “free” regions that Muslims can properly confer, plan, and organize, whereas this is not possible under the tyrannical pressure of autocratic “idols” (tawaghit) such as MBS in Arabia, Crown Prince Muhammad bin Zayid in the UAE, and President Sisi in Egypt. Emigration furnishes the Muslim with the ability to imagine, the practical experience to learn, and the mobility to wage proper resistance, all of which are otherwise impossible. Al-Zawahiri proudly asserts that it was such advantages that permitted the “high state” of planning for the 9/11 attacks by al-Qaida. As for jihad, it begins with educating and speaking the truth about the battle that the Muslim community is waging and the threats it faces. Jihad, however, must ultimately lead to warfare and martyrdom operations against God’s enemies: the Americans and the Zionists. Such attacks will be the downfall of the Saudis and the Emiratis. Unity, the final recommendation, is briefly mentioned as being necessary because all Muslims are being targeted and only if they are united can they hope to repel the aggression.

Al-Zawahiri ends his message with an aesthetically second-rate poem that recapitulates some of his main points and aims to spur his followers to action in defense of Islam. He appears to add this flourish to keep up with the tradition followed by Usama bin Ladin and other jihadis who often embellish their oratory with verse. Yet, as with so many of al-Zawahiri’s other messages, the effect is diminished by his lack of personal charisma and rhetorical skill.

Two audiences

It appears that there are two different audiences being addressed by al-Qaida’s recent releases. The first message seems to be aimed at Saudi Arabia’s conservative Salafis, or Wahhabis. The references to hadith, ritual purity, and the violation of Islamic morality, particularly in al-Dir‘iyya, are all intended to raise the ire of devout Wahhabis by highlighting the chasm that now separates MBS’s policies from the message of principled enmity toward practices of unbelief that characterized original Wahhabism. This is an audience that the propaganda of the Islamic State has often sought to target. Al-Zawahiri’s speech, by contrast, does not invoke creedal matters that would necessarily arouse the sentiments of Wahhabis. His conspiratorial analysis about global affairs, rooted in a view of the United States and Israel as the eternal enemies of the Islamic world, is meant to have pan-Islamic appeal.

In the final analysis, these messages should be seen as part of al-Qaida’s attempt to recapture a constituency for itself in Saudi Arabia, where it has not carried out an attack in years, as well as to stake its claim as the standard bearer of the Jihadi Salafi movement in light of the Islamic State’s rapid decline. That al-Qaida can project its message on multiple registers, creedal as well as geopolitical, is a testament to the protean nature of its ideology.

[1] The Dhu al-Khalasa was a Ka‘ba-like structure in which an idol was worshipped in pre-Islamic times, and is located in the region of Tabala in Asir in southwest Arabia. The Wahhabis are alleged to have destroyed what remained of this structure during the reign of King Abdulaziz (r. 1902-1953).

On October 23, 2015, ISIS released its first video in Hebrew addressing “the Jews occupying Muslim lands.” “Not one Jew will remain in Jerusalem,” a masked ISIS member warns. “Do what you want in the meantime, but then we will make you pay ten times over.” This video is the latest in a string of statements made by ISIS threatening to invade Israel and slaughter its citizens.

Does ISIS’s rhetoric match its strategic reality? Does it really have its sights set on Israel?

To be sure, Israel has seen an uptick in ISIS activity along its southern border in recent months. In July 2015 ISIS’s Egyptian affiliate “Wilayat Sinai” claimed responsibility for three rockets that exploded in southern Israel. The Gaza-based jihadist organization Sheikh Omar Hadid Brigade, which might have ties to ISIS, launched a rocket attack on the Israeli port city of Ashdod in May 2015.

ISIS itself makes the occasional threat. In February 2008, for example, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, then leader of the al-Qaeda affiliated Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), announced his intention to oversee “the liberation of Al-Aqsa,” stating, “…we ask God and hope that the [Islamic State of Iraq] will be the cornerstone for the return of Jerusalem.” In widely circulated videos released in June 2014, an ISIS member states that Anbar is “only a stone’s throw away from Al-Aqsa Mosque.” In another video message released in July 2015, ISIS members threaten to “uproot the state of Jews,” which will be “run over by our [ISIS] creeping crowds.”  More recently, ISIS released a series of videos encouraging Palestinians to engage in lone wolf attacks against Jews. “Bring back horror to the Jews with explosions, burnings, and stabbings,” says one ISIS militant in a propaganda video, circulated with the hashtag “#The_slaughter_of_ Jews.”

Despite its threats, ISIS tanks won’t be rolling into the Holy Land anytime soon. Overthrowing the Israeli government is not a pressing priority for the ISIS high command. It’s more interested in taking over Sunni lands where state authority has broken down. Dabiq, ISIS’s English-language magazine, summarizes its strategy: weaken Muslim governments through terrorism, thereby creating security vacuums (literally, “chaos” or tawahhush). ISIS fighters will move in and  establish new state-like structures (idarat). So far, ISIS has stuck to this plan; its fighters are most active and successful in areas where there is a security void. Israel, which has one of the mightiest militaries in the Middle East, is the opposite of a security void.

Theologically, the defeat of Israel is also a low priority. Unusual for a Sunni group, ISIS is motivated by Islamic prophecies of the End Times—or at least pays a lot of lip service to them. Those prophecies envisage the conquest of Jerusalem and a war with the Jews as the final act in the End Times drama. ISIS is still in the first act, the reestablishment of the caliphate. It still has to spread the caliphate throughout the world and defeat the Christian infidels.

So despite its combative messaging, ISIS’s threats to storm Israel are empty, meant to recruit Muslims angry about the occupation rather than signal an invasion. ISIS is focused on consolidating its state and expanding it into Sunni Muslim lands; its gaze will remained fixed on Jerusalem but it won’t try to plant its flag there anytime soon.

With that said, al-Qa`ida has long strived to promote religious scholars in its ranks, such as Abu Yahya al-Libi and `Atiyyatullah al-Libi, who proved to be major influences in the militant landscape and in jihadi sympathizers’ circles. However, a sustained U.S. drone strikes campaign in Pakistan’s tribal areas removed these well-known heavyweights.

Over the remaining ideologues, the Palestinian Abu al-Walid al-Ghazi al-Ansari, also known as Abu al-Walid al-Filistini, represents the closest thing to a formal al-Qa`ida scholar today.

An Authoritative Jurisprudential Figure

Though not a household name like his longtime comrades Abu Qatada al-Filistini or Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, Abu al-Walid al-Ansari has managed to establish himself as a prominent voice among the global Salafi-jihadi ulema, with numerous jihadi militants or supporters having read, discussed, or disseminated his work. As of today, al-Ansari has published dozens of articles, letters, and fatawa (with a few audios in the mix) which predominantly pertain to doctrinal issues, such as jihad jurisprudence (fiqh al-jihad) or exegesis (tafsir) of the Islamic sacred texts. For example, his widely-read book Unsheathing the Sword upon the Claim That There can be no Jihad without an Imam argues that jihad can be waged without the sanction of a Muslim ruler. His corpus also includes an autobiography aimed at bolstering his credentials by detailing his full religious curriculum (more below).

Despite being a wanted jihadi leader, al-Ansari holds a quite public profile compared to his fellow Arab-Afghans. Indeed, not only does he own a website called Aknaf Bayt al-Maqdis (The Environs of Jerusalem), which used to compile his latest publications until it went offline; he is also present on twitter, through an account managed by some of his students. More surprisingly, al-Ansari’s email and Skype contacts were shared on his account and personal information related to his family, including the woman he married in 2013 and the daughter he had in 2010, are also available on the web. Finally, it should be noted that the forum Shabakat Ansar al-Mujahidin had announced an “Open Meeting” with al-Ansari in late May 2013, even though the event never materialized.

In addition to having a special file on al-Maqdisi’s website Minbar al-Tawhid wa-al-Jihad, al-Ansari and his works have also been mentioned or recommended by notorious names. The most significant of these was certainly Ayman al-Zawahiri who, in The Exonaration, praised “Abu al-Walid al-Filistini” as an “active emigrant scholar” combining the pen with the sword. As for Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, the late head of al-Qa`ida in Khurasan, he too evoked al-Ansari and his “beneficial book” Unsheathing the Sword to refute the argument that launching jihad has to be tied to the demand of an Imam. Highlighting its importance in the jihadi current, the leading spiritual figure of al-Qa`ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) Ibrahim al-Rubaysh also made reference to the book as part of the jurisprudential readings of Abu Yaqin al-Qasimi, another Saudi AQAP cadre. As a last sign of his revered pedigree, in its statement renewing its allegiance to al-Zawahiri, al-Qa`ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) referred to al-Ansari as among the most important living jihadi clerics, along with the likes of al-Maqdisi or Sulayman al-`Ulwan.

It is noteworthy that while topical issues related to the Muslim world or jihadi universe do not appear to be predominant in his writings, al-Ansari nevertheless weighed in on jihad in Syria and most importantly on the creation of the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) in a series of tweets in April 2013. Having emphasized the shar`i (legal) foundations governing the caliphate and the importance of garnering the allegiance (bay`a) of the “people of authority and contract” (ahl al-hall wa-al-`aqd), al-Ansari questioned the legitimacy of the ISIS. Just as with the establishment of the Islamic State in Iraq in 2006, al-Ansari laments, the sudden announcement of al-Baghdadi was another unilateral initiative violating the principle of shura (consultation) with competent authorities, in this case the “leaders of the jihadi groups in the Levant and their ulema.” The Palestinian ideologue is deeply preoccupied with the potential “dire consequences” of the caliphate’s establishment that could serve their enemies’ interests by creating sedition (fitna) among Muslims. Worrying that the lessons of Algeria and Iraq have not been learned, al-Ansari thus positions himself as a concerned observer fearing that the past tribulations endured by the older generation could be replicated by the younger one in the Levant.

Abu al-Walid al-Ansari’s Peregrinations in the Militant Landscape

On the basis of his autobiography, Abu al-Walid al-Ansari was born Khalid bin Fathi al-Agha in Gaza in August 1966 and raised in Saudi Arabia, where he completed his education. In the mid-1980s, he was influenced by `Abdallah `Azzam’s books on the Afghan jihad and interacted with participants in the conflict, including the Salafi Shaykh Shams al-Din al-Afghani as well as `Azzam himself, who incited him to join the caravan. He left the kingdom in 1986 and travel to Peshawar.

During the anti-Soviet jihad, al-Ansari’s profile was much more that of a seeker of knowledge (talib al-`ilm) than that of an active fighter. The young émigré specialized in the religious sciences, including Qur`anic interpretation and Islamic jurisprudence, by studying with numerous theologians and jurists. Apart from `Abdallah `Azzam, from whom he learned Shafi`i jurisprudence, and some other Arab figures, notably from North Africa, al-Ansari was largely mentored by Pakistani clerics. Many of these were affiliated with the Salafi current, like his main teacher Naqib al-Ribati, a professor at the University of Imam Bukhari, or Ikram al-Din al-Badkhashi, the director of the University for da`wa to the Qur`an and the Sunna. Al-Ansari was also taught by a number of Hanafi minded professors, including from the Dar al–`Ulum Haqqaniyya madrasa.

In Pakistan, al-Ansari espoused a rigid Salafi-oriented methodology (manhaj), as shown by his stance on the Afghan jihad. Indeed, he soundly rejected operating under the Afghan mujahidin parties, deeming their banner to be un-Islamic, and opposed al-Qa`ida during debates on this issue. Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, who used to live as a guest in al-Ansari’s house in Peshawar, even contends that the latter succeeded in convincing him not to fight alongside the Afghan factions.

Al-Ansari maintained particularly close ties to Ahmad al-Jaza`iri, an Algerian doctor widely described as a takfiri in the jihadi literature. The two came to be active in the Afghan province of Nuristan on account of the strict religious practices of the locals and worked on relief work to assist the population.

One militant source linked al-Ansari to Jama`at al-Muslimin (JAM), an extreme militant group known to have proclaimed its leader Abu Hammam caliph in 1993. Yet, this claim contradicts al-Ansari’s sentiment about JAM, as he would later admonish the faction for having “made licit the taking of Muslim blood and property” and for “expiating those who reject their caliphate”.

After his departure from the Khurasan region, al-Ansari relocated to Yemen before heading to Britain around the first half of the 1990s, where he emerged as a familiar figure in the “Londonistan” scene, especially thanks to his proximity to Abu Qatada. Acting as his deputy, al-Ansari shared Abu Qatada’s inflexible doctrinal beliefs and the two formed a resilient duo that provided legal guidance to the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) in Algeria. Their closeness was further illustrated by al-Ansari’s defense of Abu Qatada against his ideological adversaries, such as the Jamaican `Abdallah al-Faysal or the leaders of JAM. While primarily known to be the main figure of Abu Qatada’s inner circle, al-Ansari maintained contacts with a broader network, from the Syrian Abu al-Dahdah to Abu Zubayda al-Filistini and his Khaldan camp.

In the highly divisive radical landscape, al-Ansari and Abu Qatada came to earn the enmity of other senior militants like Abu Mus`ab al-Suri who vilified their “destructive role” in the Algerian jihad, derisively comparing their function to that of the Saudi religious establishment for the Royal family. The Syrian strategist scolded their narrow Salafi leanings, prompting al-Ansari to denounce him as “among the innovators.” Furthermore, according to al-Suri, while the rest of the jihadi community had publicly repudiated Jamal Zaytuni’s GIA in June 1996, al-Ansari was strongly reluctant to add his voice to his colleagues’ and eventually decided not to. “You’ve done more than just release some statements: you’ve caused a catastrophe!” he reportedly said to al-Suri, who saw al-Ansari’s move as a maneuver to secure the support of GIA’s hardcore followers. Later, al-Ansari eventually disowned the GIA.

In 2000, the Palestinian preacher returned to Afghanistan and settled in the Wazir Akbar Khan area of Kabul. By that time, he had revised his takfiri beliefs and as a result, became involved in toning down the hard-liners among the Arab-Afghan community. During this period, his activities do not seem to have fundamentally changed, as he was mainly involved in preaching and teaching theological lessons to newcomers and more senior militants from various nationalities either at his home in Kabul or in training camps, but always in an individual capacity. Al-Ansari is reported to have given such lectures at a camp in Kabul managed by Abu Dhahak al-Yamani, the representative of Commander Khattab in charge of foreign volunteers willing to fight on the Chechen front. In another instance, he served as a teacher to Bilal al-Turkistani, a slain historical figure of the Turkistan Islamic Party, who studied Fath al-Bari (a commentary on the Sahih al-Bukhari) under al-Ansari’s tutelage. Lastly, it is worth noting that al-Ansari’s acquaintances also included Abu Mus`ab al-Zarqawi, his neighbor in Wazir Akbar Khan. Their relationship began in Peshawar in the early 1990s, with al-Ansari playing a key role in connecting al-Zarqawi with his future mentor al-Maqdisi. During the Taliban’s era, al-Ansari and al-Zarqawi came together again and further nurtured their ties. After al-Zarqawi’s killing in 2006, his “old friend” (as Abu Qudama Salih al-Hami put it) al-Ansari dedicated an intimate eulogy to him, recollecting his memories with the “glorious Shaykh” (al-Shaykh al-jalil).

Allying with al-Qa`ida

The Arab-Afghan community being a microcosm, it should come as no surprise that al-Ansari interacted with al-Qa`ida once he returned to Afghanistan in 2000. Based on the few available sources on this topic, al-Ansari does not appear to have developed a close-knit bond with the organization. According to one source, he “had direct, but strained relations with (Bin Ladin).” This did not prevent al-Ansari from visiting al-Qa`ida’s Shari`a Institue run by Abu Hafs al-Mawritani. Additionally, it was al-Ansari who related to Djamel Beghal that Bin Ladin had some mission for him in Europe and that he should prepare accordingly by undertaking advanced training courses, prompting Beghal to be trained by al-Qa`ida in Kandahar. But overall, this connection seems to have been peripheral.

The 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan and the subsequent downfall of the Taliban led al-Qa`ida and al-Ansari to warm to each other. Over the years, their increasingly strong ties led jihadi supporters to discuss and speculate over al-Ansari’s organizational affiliation. For instance, in October 2008, a certain “Abu Ibrahim al-Khurasani” (who once depicted al-Ansari as “one of the most (humble Shaykhs) I ever met”) claimed that “the Mufti of al Qaeda [is] Sheikh Abul Waleed Al Ansaari.” Asked about further details, al-Khurasani admitted that while he did not know if al-Ansari had been formally granted with such a position. But “the muhajireen and ansaar brothers in waziristan call him that (Mufti al Qaeda)” and “if anyone of the brothers needed a fatwa they would direct him to the sheikh”.

The mystery was recently solved by “Usama Khurasani”, a core al-Qa`ida member in Jabhat al-Nusra. Last May, he was asked about al-Ansari’s affiliation and whether he remained a freelancer. The answer was unequivocal: “Abu al-Walid al-Ansari is a member (`udw) of the Shura of al-Qa`ida at the behest of Usama [bin Ladin] and Ayman [al-Zawahiri]”. On the other hand, Usama Khurasani pointed out that al-Ansari had never actually given bay`a to the organization. This somehow corroborated the account of Shaybat al-Hukama, an al-Qa`ida insider, declaring that al-Ansari had never been a core member, implying the absence of an oath. As such, al-Ansari would be best understood as an unsworn al-Qa`ida leader walking a fine line by working hand in hand with the organization while retaining a semblance of autonomy by not pledging loyalty to its emir.

Several earlier materials had clearly hinted at al-Ansari’s standing as a primary theological reference point for the militant milieu in the Tribal Areas and his entry into al-Qa`ida’s fold. Although al-Ansari was he never featured on al-Sahab releases, he was a regular contributor to the official al-Qa`ida in Khurasan’s bulletin Tala`i’ Khurasan (Vanguards of Khurasan), having published articles in eight issues of the magazine, including his major piece entitled “The Assassination of Jihad.” Another revealing work was his introduction to the book Martyrs in a Time of Alienation, a compilation of hagiographies of militants killed in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region between 2002 and 2006 authored by Abu `Ubayda al-Maqdisi, a seasoned Arab-Afghan security commander close to the senior leadership of al-Qa`ida.

Also, as mentioned earlier, al-Zawahiri had complimented al-Ansari for his role as a “teacher, mufti, and judge of the mujahidin”, echoing Usama Khurasani’s words by portraying al-Ansari as a “judge of the mujahidin in Khurasan” (qadi al-mujahidin fi Khurasan). These descriptions were supported by the audio series “Chanting of the Loved Ones in Proud Waziristan,” with two tapes where al-Ansari can be heard lecturing Arab fighters in Waziristan. The spiritual preparation offered during these closed sessions evidently impacted the young militant generation, as attested by Abu Dujana al-Sana`ani, a renowned explosives expert killed in 2010, who named al-Ansari as one of the most influential Shaykhs he met throughout his jihadi career.

In addition to his clout among the Khurasan-based Arab youth, al-Ansari closely associated with the top echelon of al-Qa`ida. The Palestinian jihadi scholar was sought after for guidance on spiritual matters, including by veterans. For example, Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, the head of al-Qa`ida in Khurasan, recounted that as his suicide mission was near, the high-ranking al-Qa`ida military commander Abu al-Hasan al-Misri went to al-Ansari to interpret a dream he had. Though unaware of al-Misri’s forthcoming operation, al-Ansari is said to have defined the dream as a sign that “(al-Misri) was now close to martyrdom in Allah’s path.” Among the other senior al-Qa`ida leaders frequented by al-Ansari was `Abd al-Majid `Abd al-Majid, a now-deceased member of the group’s Shura Council, with whom he notably participated in a lecture for some Arab mujahidin in North Waziristan. Finally, Shaybat al-Hukama related that `Atiyyatullah al-Libi too attended these type of meetings along with al-Ansari and `Abd al-Majid.

Unanswered Questions

As of this writing, there have been reliable indications that Abu al-Walid al-Ansari is still part of the game. He recently wrote the forward a book by the senior al-Qa`ida leader Husam `Abd al-Ra`uf and various writings released on his behalf since the past few months. Nevertheless, his Twitter account states al-Ansari had not published anything since last December.

According to one of al-Ansari’s critics, Abu Hamid al-Barqawi, an al-Qa`ida defector now with the Islamic State, the scholar is “under the protection of Lashkar-e-Taiba,” and, by extension, Pakistan’s intelligence service. Judging by elements in al-Ansari’s background and Lashkar-e-Taiba’s history, there might be some truth in it. But as a well-read person told me, “I would not rule it out, but I think you are correct to look at this allegation with a very skeptical eye.”

While the conversation, denoted by the Arabic hash tag for “martyrs of the American strike in Yemen” #شهداء_القصف_الأمريكي_باليمن)) was short-lived and quickly reached its peak when the majority of the martyrs had been announced. However, we also find that while a division between pro-ISIS and pro-AQ users can be identified, there is a shared positive opinion on AQAP and drone strikes in general, independent of the leaning of individual accounts towards ISIS or AQ Central.

Independent of the hash tag, AQAP’s media department issued two responses to the drone strikes end of April. The first response is a direct reply to the statements made by the Yemeni President Hadi, the other one is a commentary of AQAP commander Hamza al-Zinjibari; both documents were quickly translated into English and dispatched via Twitter and the ‘old media’ jihadi forums (here, here).

The Impact of Drone Strikes on Physical Networks – Limiting Online Jihadism?

The deaths of high ranking ideologues and leaders by missiles fired from unmanned aerial vehicles, that have in the past years become the operational backbone of the “war on terror”, have risen and seem to be the operational weapon of choice by military planners. With ideologues and media-valued activists such as U.S. citizens Anwar al-Awlaqi and his media operator Samir Khan killed in Yemen in 2011, or the targeted killing of the Libyans ‘Attiyatullah and Abu Yahya in 2012 in Pakistan only highlight prominent drone operations recently. Nevertheless, the extrajudicial killing of al-Awlaqi and Khan did not kill off the English jihadi magazine Inspire that had published a new edition in May 2012 under the title “winning on the ground.” This ninth edition (Winter 1433 / 2012) addressed its readers on the cover page, asking

“does the assassination of senior jihadi figures have any significance in validating Obama’s claims? After a decade of ferocious war, who is more entitled to security?”

It may be asserted that the U.S. operated drone program has similar affects on local populations as in Pakistan, although the degree differs from country to country. According to The Long War Journal, 354 drone strikes had taken place inside Pakistan and 95 bombing runs in Yemen. The impact of frequent or more regularly occurring drone strikes on the people on the ground is devastating and generates new grievances with innocents being either mistaken for legitimate targets or are nevertheless considered as acceptable collateral damage. A study on the impact of drone strikes in Pakistan is available here. The long-term side affects of drone warfare are open for debate, however, the tales of drone strikes and civilian suffering as a result of missile strikes have become a frequent narrative for jihadi videos and forums and are also addressed by scholars and journalists alike.

Killed civilians, mainly children, are pictured in jihadist propaganda material with the vow for revenge. The Shumukh al-Islam Forum in early May 2014 responded to the continuing drone activity inside Yemen that had recently killed a number of AQAP operatives. The administration of the forum via its media “workshop” (warsha) issued a forum thread showing several propaganda pictures and a video showing scores of killed people allegedly the result of drone strikes in Yemen. The “official account of warsha shumukh al-Islam for incitement” of the Shumukh al-Islam forum on Twitter is @warshshomokh1, which promoted both pictures and the video. The pictures in the forum thread relate the death of children to calls for revenge on a wider scale; other pictures visualized the close relationship of the U.S. and Yemeni government, in extremist reasoning defined as ‘one’ enemy, committed to the “war on Islam” likewise.

Drone Strikes in Yemen and the Response on Twitter

The posting of SSI in early May was the direct response to a drone strike that had killed about 40 AQAP members on April 21, 2014, as the New York Times reports. Shortly afterwards, on April 24, 2014, jihadi-linked accounts on Twitter started posting pictures and names of the alleged slain AQAP fighters. By using the hash tag #شهداء_القصف_الأمريكي_باليمن

All in all about 200 Tweets were issued from April 24 to April 27; all Tweets are in Arabic. The hash tag translated to “the martyrs of the American strike on Yemen.”

The distinctive feature of this Twitter network analysis is set on two key findings:

1. a division between pro-ISIS and pro-AQ can be identified. The main underlining finding, however, is the common relation to the U.S. drone strikes in Yemen against AQAP, whereas most pro-ISIS media activists and followers nevertheless have high, if not higher, sympathies for AQAP. There is a shared opinion on AQAP and drone strikes, independent of the leaning of individual accounts towards ISIS or AQ Central.
2. The hash tag referring to the drone strike was short-lived and quickly reached its peak when the majority of the martyrs had been announced on Twitter.

Four major hubs can be identified within this network on Twitter, with the respective accounts @_Glibeb, @AbuUsamh, @Adnan_Alawlaqi, and @al_khansaa2 as the most influential. These four major nodes are connected to each other by shared followers, who (re-) tweeted using the hash tag and by addressing accounts directly. Some of the interlinking accounts are further analyzed below.

Networking about 200 Tweets relating to the U.S. drone strike in Yemen the fatter the arrow the more often the source mentions the addressed account (click to enlarge and zoom in)

The biggest node in this network analysis is @Adnan_Alawlaqi, some of his followers are connected to the other three major nodes. By choosing “Alawlaqi”, the account claims a direct relationship to the Yemeni tribe and to the U.S.-Yemeni cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi who had been killed in a drone strike in 2011. For the avatar of this account Osma bin Laden has been chosen, the background picture shows “the martyr: Abu ‘l-Ghayth al-Shabwani”, a Yemeni AQAP fighter killed in a drone strike. For his web interface Twitter account, he has chosen the cover of the book “Why I Chose al-Qa’ida” which has been written by Abu Mus’ab, an AQAP affiliate who claimed being a member of al-Awlaq tribe. According to the book, Abu Mus’ab al-Awlaqi “was martyred in an American strike on Wadi Rafd in the Shabwa Province” in 2009. His full name is given as Muhammad ‘Umayr al-Kalawi al-‘Awlaqi. The foreword of the book has been written by AQAP chief Abu Basir (Nasir al-Wuhayshi), which evidently was finished shortly before the death of Abu Mus’ab. The about 80-page long book outlines in simple words and reasoning the motivation to have joined al-Qa’ida and serves as a guide to inspire and indoctrinate a non-Arabic audience. The English-language magazine Inspire has a regular section entitled “Why did I Choose Al Qaeda” where selected parts of the book are made available in English.

The most mentioned users in this data-set highlights the impact and importance of the major nodes, with @Adnan_Alawlaqi ranging at the top. @Qaadayaalumaa1 has been omitted in this analysis, although rank 4, it is not connected to the above network analysis. Instead, it is an independent sub-network that uses the same hash tag and shares similar content.

 A not connected network sharing same content on Twitter

 @Adnan_Alawlaqi has a little over 4,000 followers and issued more than 2,000 Tweets as of May 12, 2014. The account is primarily affiliated with “the organization of al-Qa’ida on the Arab Peninsula” and pictures from within Yemen and of drones are frequently published. It seems to be following the strict AQ conduct and has little to none connection to any ISIS related material.

Another major node in the network is @abuUsamh, as seen on the bottom right. According to his online profile, this is the account of Abu Usama al-Abini. His profile further states his clear favor of ISIS, hoping that

“the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham will remain and expand, by the will of God, #the lion cubs of jihad (#شبل_الجهاد) // my backup account is @abuusamh1.”

He refers to the “soldiers of Yemen” (jund al-Yemen) and lists his YouTube channel “greebe1.” His focus is also set on Yemen, but he approves and idealizes ISIS and their war in Syria as the future and considers them as an avant-garde that will soon arrive in Yemen as well. He has about 2,300 followers and issued 1,300 Tweets as of May 12, 2014.

@abuUsamh posted pictures of alleged victims of the April drone strike and provides further information. The name of the deceased seen here is given as “the Mujahid: Abu Tamim al-Qayfi (…) killed in the despicable American [missile] strike. Look at his smile!”

@abuUsamh is connected to @Adnan_Alawlaqi by three accounts, two of which also interlink to @_Glibeb. @Jeefsharp and @911Fahd interlink these two major nodes.

@_Glibeb refers to Jilbib al-Sharruri and has about 2,500 followers and issued close to 9,000 Tweets as of May 12, 2014. He too has a greater leaning towards ISIS and re-tweets and disseminates videos published by ISIS’s media channel al-Furqan:

“Special report on the civil service work by the Islamic State in Aleppo before ISIS was betrayed; preparing: Flour and bread – health care – electricity – overall services.” Two links are set in the Tweet, the first leads to YouTube where a sequence of the video Services provided for by the State of the ISIS series Rasa’il min ard al-malahem, part 14, is shown. The second link extends the civil aspect of ISIS by directing to a Facebook group.

Like most other Twitter accounts linked to this hash tag, @_Glibeb posts pictures of male victims of the airstrike with the impression that they indeed had been AQAP members. He may be of Yemini origin and possibly related to some of the deceased by tribal relations. The name “al-Sharruri” pops up frequently in Yemen and has also come to use among ISIS members in Syria. Abu Jandal al-Sharruri appeared in a video a while ago and the picture used to commemorate him on Twitter is a screen grab thereof.

The fourth most important node in this mini-network of approximately 200 Tweets is an account the reader of our work may already be acquainted with: @al_khansaa2. This account in this network is only linked via the account @aboyahay88 to the main node of @Adnan_Alawlaqi. The main objective, as for the others, is to document the martyrs of the drone strike and provide affirmative comments on pictures of killed AQAP members. All pictures issued within this particular hash tag are male, some are flashing weapons, and others are a screen grab from a jihadi video. One of the pictures shared by @al_khansaa2 is a typical Yemeni dressed man flashing his janbiyya ­ a specific type of dagger with a short curved blade that is worn on a belt. This is a sign of male hood and pride and very common on the streets in Yemen.

@aboyahay88, the account linking @al_khansaa2 to @Adnan_Alawlaqi also connects to two other nodes, @alabjani_21 and @Mooneer55. @aboyahay88, whose screen name is the sincere (الصديق) referring to Abu Bakr further states on his profile “We belong to God and to Him we shall return”, taken out of the Qur’an (2:156). This part of the Qur’an is often cited at funerals and generally expressed to sympathize with the deceased, emphasizing the conviction in the existence of the afterlife. Apart from this @aboyahay88 is a low-key and low profile node with only 438 followers and over 4,000 Tweets as of May 12, 2014. The majority of his shared pictures are Yemen related with some pictures apparently taken by a cell-phone, perhaps implying he has taken these himself. Other pictures are from ISIS accounts on Twitter. His Twitter account is linked to the open Facebook group al-Ta’ifa al-Mansura that has eleven members but no actions or shared material whatsoever. All eleven members are part of the jihadist cluster network and show related iconography.

@alabjani_21 is one of the more prolific Twitter accounts in this network, although not the biggest node in this particular network analysis. He has over 9,000 followers and Tweeted close to 17,000 times as of May 12, 2014. The chosen avatar is Ayman al-Zawahiri with both of hands held up towards the viewer – in a praying fashion, although it is clearly a screenshot of one of al-Zawahiri’s sermons televised by as-Sahab. @Mooneer55 in turn only has 787 followers but Tweet an impressive 11,700 times as of May 12, 2014. This account clearly aligns itself to ISIS with an avatar showing Abu ‘Umar al-Baghdadi and referencing “the book leading the right way” (kitab yahdi) and the “sword that assists” (sayyf yansur), as detailed in the chapter The ‘Arab Spring’ as a Renaissance for AQ Affiliates in a Historical Perspective.

Of greater interest are the two accounts linking the three nodes of @Adnan_Alawlaqi, @_Glibeb, @abuUsamh, which are:

@JeefSharp: This account is also in clear association to ISIS, stating in his profile,

“I pledge allegiance to the amir al-mu’mineen Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.”

He has a meager 185 followers and around 3,500 Tweets. The majority of these are retweets of ISIS related accounts and material, that is in parts also anti-Muslim Brotherhood who demand action instead of passive protests.

And @911Fahd: This account showcases the killed leader of the TTP, Hakim Allah Mehsud with an ISIS related avatar. He has a little over 1,000 followers and Tweeted an incredible 66,454 times as of May 12, 2014. The majority of his shared pictures are related to Iraq and ISIS but also include a picture of the Gaza-based Jund Allah and their leader Abu al-Nur al-Maqdisis – all of whom had been wiped out by their rival HAMAS in 2008. Like the above account, @911Fahd mainly retweets and is interlinked to high profile users such as @al_khansaa2 or @Adnan_Alawlaqi.

Conclusion

The analysis of this mini-dataset has shown that jihadist groups are framing the impact of drone strikes to strengthen the remaining fighters, celebrate the martyrs, and attempt to derive sympathy from a wider audience.
Drone strikes are a unifying issue, while a division between pro-ISIS and pro-AQ users is visible in terms of who they interact with, we did not find the same division in the content of 200 tweets which used this specific hash tag. On this specific issue, jihadist opinion appears to have been independent from individual allegiance to or sympathy for AQ or ISIS. While some pro-ISIS users openly wish for the emergence the Islamic State as a part of ISIS in Yemen, the pro-AQ accounts stuck to what al-Zawahiri had called for, unity among the Mujahideen. Other users simply admired the martyrs and sought to document and share as widely as possible reports of this ‘crusader’ attack.
This mini-dataset from Twitter has focused on two specific drone strikes in April 2014 in Yemen, but it is just one part of a wider cluster of jihadist content that has been exploding in terms of quantity and quality, particularly in relation to the war in Syria. In this wider context, drone strikes have impacted jihadist activity and ideology. For example, with the reality of drone warfare hitting jihadist groups hard in recent years, jihadist videos and ideological writings have adopted the theme of spies among the Mujahideen. A number of videos have emerged showcasing the confessions and subsequent execution of alleged spies. In addition, Abu Yahya al-Libi commemorated his friend and comrade Abu ‘l-Layth al-Libi after he was killed in a drone strike in 2008 and subsequently published a detailed book on shari’a law policy for jihadist groups a year later. Ironically, Abu Yahya was killed himself in Pakistan in a drone strike in June 2012 but his work has become an integral handbook for jihadist implementation of shari’a law in dealing with indicted Muslim spies among the ranks of the Mujahideen. It is often referenced in videos showing the execution of alleged spies in Yemen and Somalia. Through the combined analysis of the written and audio-visual layers, the way alleged Muslim spies are framed for jihadist propaganda can be assessed and tied into events such as this case study – the topic of a future post on Jihadica.