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To inquire about a translation for this video message for a fee email: [email protected]
Click the following link for a safe PDF copy: Dr. Ayman al-Ẓawāhirī — “The Winds of Paradise, 2nd Edition”
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NOTE: For prior posts in The Clairvoyant sub-blog you can view an archive of it all here.
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Over the past few years since the American operation against Usama bin Ladin in Pakistan, there has been much debate over the leadership capabilities and influence that Bin Ladin’s successor Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri still has over the global jihadi movement generally and al-Qaeda branches in particular. Endowing al-Qaeda franchise-status upon Harakat al-Shabab al-Mujahidin in Somalia, slow response to the Arab uprisings, and inability to resolve the conflict in Syria between the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) and Jabhat al-Nusra highlight how many have become skeptical of Zawahiri’s importance or relevance. And while this is all certainly true, those within the movement that are still true believers in the cause and view Zawahiri and al-Qaeda’s general command (AQGC) in Pakistan/Yemen as the fountainhead of the jihad against the Zionists and Crusaders still heed Zawahiri’s advice.
One potential area of measuring this is the guidelines that Zawahiri released for the movement in September 2013. In some ways, it is a codification of issues and ideas that Zawahiri and Atiyatallah ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Libi argued for in letters to Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi last decade when attempting to reign in his excesses during the Iraq jihad. Two recent examples highlight how those that are still loyal to Zawahiri and AQGC have internalized these guidelines. Recently, both al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and the ‘Abd Allah ‘Azzam Brigades (AAAB) apologized for killing civilians and non-combatants in their military operations (more on this below). While not seeming like much, it highlights how those that are tied to AQGC have become very sensitive to Muslim public opinion as well as the movement becoming more mature, even if it is still ideologically fringe and militarily radical overall.
Here are some examples from Zawahiri’s guidelines:
While there is not definitive proof, it is likely that these guidelines helped inform the responses of AQAP and AAAB to acts committed that they then either regretted or realized could harm their public image and therefore apologized and then noted how it was outside the normal framework for how they interpret the shari’a and operate in the battlefield.
On December 21, 2013, AQAP’s military commander Qasim al-Raymi released a video message titled “Comment on the Targeting of the Defense Ministry in Sana’a’” apologizing for members of his organization killing medics and patients in the military hospital as well as those in the prayer room within the ministry. Al-Raymi stated: “We do not fight in this manner, and this is not what we call people to do. This is not our manhaj (methodology) … We confess to this mistake and fault. We offer our apologies and condolences to the families and the victims.” He later offered blood money compensation and medical treatment to the individuals and families affected by the attack.
More recently, on March 7, 2014, AAAB released a statement titled “On the Raid of the Iranian Chancellery in Beirut” claiming that there was faultiness in the second suicide bombers belt. It stated: “The two bombs were meant to be in a place where the explosion would not reach the main road and cause damage to passersby … The military operations of the ‘Abd Allah ‘Azzam Brigades do not target Shiites, or other sects.” Rather the attack was aimed at Hizb Allah, which while Shi’a is actively militarily fighting Sunnis in Syria. Illustrating how AAAB wanted to show that they were attempting to be discriminant in targeting and only defensively responding to attacks upon them and their fellow Sunni Muslim brethren.
Both of these examples highlight that the groups that still maintains allegiance to AQGC have become more astute and smarter in how they massage public opinion. That does not mean though they are now all of a sudden moderate actors. To the contrary, this past week for example, AQAP crucified a man for allegedly spying on them to help with drones strikes, while AAAB’s allies in Syria Jabhat al-Nusra still are actively beheading individuals on the battlefield that fight for the Assad regime (see both graphic photos below).
That being said, it appears that in some areas jihadi groups aligned with Zawahiri and AQGC are indeed listening to his advice and actively attempting to be more mature and pragmatic actors in some aspects. This is in contradistinction with the now rival global jihadi faction ISIS, which appears to have no rules of engagement and does as it pleases no matter what the consequences. How these guidelines continue to play out and what impact they may have with the AQGC-aligned groups remains to be seen, but it appears that as of now it has made slight differences in their on the battlefield methodologies, albeit imperfectly.
Abū Muḥammad al-Jawlānī — “I Wish You Were Eulogizing Me”
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Click the following link for a safe PDF copy: Jabhat al-Nuṣrah — “Condolences on the Killing of Shaykh Abū Khālid al-Sūrī”
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On the evening of February 2, al-Qaeda’s general command released a statement disavowing itself from the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS): “ISIS is not a branch of the Qaidat al-Jihad [al-Qaeda’s official name] group, we have no organizational relationship with it, and the group is not responsible for its actions.” This is the first time in al-Qaeda’s history that the group has publicly disaffiliated itself with a group bearing its name — even though ISIS has not used the name “al-Qaeda” since 2006. While it remains too early to know its effect in the Syrian context, the statement is significant nonetheless — both historically and for what it means for the broader global jihadist movement.
Al-Qaeda’s repudiation of ISIS is highly reminiscent of the withdrawal of support by the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Abu Qatada al-Filistini, and Abu Musab al-Suri from the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) in 1996 during the Algerian civil war. Usama bin Laden himself was highly skeptical of the GIA when it denied his request to set up training camps in Algeria, and he worried that the group had a troublesome ideology. Bin Laden even played a role in the creation of a less radical Algerian splinter entity known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) in 1998, which changed its name to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in 2007.
Similar to the current situation in Syria, the GIA began confronting other Islamists instead of fighting the Algerian regime. Most notably, the GIA killed Muhammad Said and Abdelrazak Redjam, leaders of the branch of the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) that merged with the GIA in 1994, as well as killing Libyan volunteers from the LIFG. Like the GIA, ISIS’s overuse of takfir (pronouncing a Muslim an infidel) and subsequent liquidation of enemies by any means has been a source of intense grievance from other Syrian rebel groups, as has ISIS’s unwillingness to submit to an independent sharia court and its belief that it is a sovereign state in liberated territory. Acting on this belief, ISIS has extrajudicially killed, imprisoned, and punished other rebels and civilians in northern Syria.
The lessons of Algeria played an important role when al-Qaeda first took umbrage at excesses by al-Qaeda in the Land of Two Rivers (better known as AQI and one of ISIS’s earlier names) in Iraq during the last decade, when Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was still the leader. One of the letters al-Qaeda sent in 2005 to Zarqawi was from Atiyah Allah Abd al-Rahman al-Libi, one of the Libyans who went to Algeria and survived any onslaught from the GIA. The letter advised Zarqawi not to be so brutal and to focus the group’s efforts on the American forces. Libi’s lesson from the Algerian experience centered on the importance of not shedding innocent Sunni Muslim blood and the consequences it could create.
Since then, al-Qaeda’s senior leadership in Pakistan has implored its branches to refrain from attacking Sunni Muslim civilians and to focus rather on security and military personnel and their infrastructure. And on the whole, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen and Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Qaeda’s preferred branch in Syria) have stuck to this framework, even though there has been some collateral damage. ISIS has been the exception.
While al-Qaeda’s announcement officially ends an imperfect relationship that began in 2004, signs of a rift date back to May 2013. Following ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s April 2013 announcement of the extension of the Islamic state into Syria, Ayman al-Zawahiri tried and failed to nullify Baghdadi’s power play, calling for ISIS to stay in Iraq and allow Jabhat al-Nusra (JN) to be the preferred actor in Syria. In defiance, Baghdadi released an audio message stating ISIS would remain in Syria and would not adhere to a division based on the Sykes-Picot deal from World War I.
Click here to read the rest.
Click the following link for a safe PDF copy: al-Qā’idah — “On the Relationship of Qā’idat al-Jihād and the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Shām”
Here is an English translation: al-Qā’idah — “On the Relationship of Qā’idat al-Jihād and the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Shām” (En)
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NOTE: An archive of the Musings of an Iraqi Brasenostril on Jihad column can be found here.
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“They have closed ranks and pledged bay’ah to Baghdadi”: Nasheed for the Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham
By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi
Preface
This is an Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham nasheed released earlier in 2013 (around September time) and translated by me below. The term bay’ah means a pledge of allegiance, and in this case it is to ISIS’ leader Sheikh Baghdadi: a fundamental aspect of joining ISIS, not requiring a bay’ah to Sheikh Zawahiri of al-Qa’ida Central (see my previous Jihadology post for more information).
On the other hand, pledging allegiance to Sheikh Zawahiri, according to the testimony related to me by a representative of the Katiba Mus’ab bin Umair- a Deraa-based battalion that recently pledged allegiance to Jabhat al-Nusra- is a key part of properly integrating into Jabhat al-Nusra, Syria’s official al-Qa’ida affiliate that has emphasized its loyalty to al-Qa’ida Central by calling itself “Tanzim al-Qa’ida fi Bilad ash-Sham.”
Contrasting with this point, a representative of Jabhat al-Nusra in Qalamoun, which vowed to protect members of ISIS on the grounds of having the same manhaj (ideological program: i.e. Caliphate and world domination) even as the “politics” differ, affirmed to me that the political difference between Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS is that the latter has no bay’ah to Sheikh Zawahiri.
This point is corroborated by some more testimony I recently gathered from members and supporters of ISIS. Thus, one native Syrian member of ISIS from Aleppo denied to me the existence of an ISIS bay’ah to al-Qa’ida central and affirmed to me that the original al-Qa’ida in Iraq had pledged bay’ah to and thus was absorbed by the Islamic State. Prominent ISIS source and supporter who used the Twitter handle zhoof (who is notably anti-Jabhat al-Nusra, deridingly referring to it on occasion as the “Jowlani Front”) elaborated to me further on whether ISIS has bay’ah to Sheikh Zawahiri:
“Zawahiri is a soldier with Mullah Omar, so if there is a bay’ah [from ISIS to al-Qa’ida Central], it will be to Mullah Omar, but all that there is of bay’ah is on Nusra which Sheikh Baghdadi established for Zawahiri, but every word Baghdadi utters is as though he is under bay’ah to Zawahiri as his sheikh, and this is from the discipline and humility of the sheikh [Baghdadi].”
In objection to these points, it is argued that if ISIS were really independent of al-Qa’ida Central, why does Sheikh Baghdadi not simply say so explicitly? Indeed, he has made no explicit declaration of a break, but I would argue that this is so because it would simply stir up too much fitna in the global jihadist movement. After all, Sheikh Baghdadi understands that al-Qa’ida Central is ultimately working towards the same ideological goals, so why bother deepening an already serious disagreement?
In short, as Will McCants says, Sheikh Baghdadi is playing a “clever game.” I would also agree with McCants about being skeptical of ISIS supporters’ and members’ narrative of the independence of the Islamic State from al-Qa’ida Central from the very beginning with its founding in late 2006, for there is no doubt that al-Qa’ida in Iraq was initially the main component of the Islamic State.
In any case, the lack of an explicit leadership declaration of independence does not mean there is no independence. On this reasoning, one could argue that the Green Battalion- a muhajireen battalion founded by Saudis last summer and primarily operating in Damascus province- is not an independent group. However, all reliable testimony on the ground (e.g. my interview with the Jabhat al-Nusra in Qalamoun representative) points to its independence.
Though it shares the ideology of ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra, the Green Battalion is independent for “personal reasons”: that is, its founders and leaders had personal problems with ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra in that they preferred not to take sides in the dispute over Sheikh Baghdadi’s announcement of a merger. Of course, it is not advantageous to anyone to declare explicitly a break of this sort.
Translation of the Nasheed
“They have closed ranks and pledged bay’ah to Baghdadi,
For [he is] our amir in our Iraq and ash-Sham.
For the Caliphate of God: I am its sign,*
Its glory decreed by our blood.
They have promised each other to protect its [the Caliphate’s] corners,
They have sold life at a cheap price for its survival.
They have closed ranks and pledged bay’ah to Baghdadi,
For [he is] our amir in our Iraq and ash-Sham.
They have undertaken bay’ah together to our amir,
They are your heroic knights and our weapon.
For he [Baghdadi] is the one to whom bay’ah is pledged in our land of Iraq
And [he is] the amir of the Muslims and of our land of Sham.
They have closed ranks and pledged bay’ah to Baghdadi,
For [he is] our amir in our Iraq and ash-Sham.
Preserve the soldiers of God, oh custodian of ours.
The cross has returned to our land and our abodes.
And on our skulls will be our life,
Laying low and vanquishing oppression, our enemy.
They have closed ranks and pledged bay’ah to Baghdadi,
For [he is] our amir in our Iraq and ash-Sham.
We have not forgotten the incident of the throwers,**
Verily it is an excellent lesson for whomsoever after it,
When some of the throwers resisted our Prophet,
For grace remains on our heroes [?].***
They have closed ranks and pledged bay’ah to Baghdadi,
For [he is] our amir in our Iraq and ash-Sham.”
Further Notes
* cf.My previous post for Jihadology in which I discuss ISIS discourses focus on establishing the Caliphate.
**- cf. This video lecture by Yahya Abd al-Rahman.
**- I am slightly uncertain about this phrase. Alternative suggestions are welcome.
UPDATE 2/4/14 10:55 AM: Here is an Arabic transcription of the below video message:
Click the following link for a safe PDF copy: Dr. Ayman al-Ẓawāhirī — “Emancipation From Futility and Failure” (Ar)
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