Two decades of targeted killings of Al Qaeda leaders

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The United States avenges 9/11 with operations like the ones Osama Bin Laden ended in 2011 or Al-Zawahiri a month ago in Kabul

Whenever the calendar reaches September 11, the memory of the Al Qaeda (AQ) attacks in the United States in 2001 is present. Twenty-one years later, US authorities have settled one by one the leaders of the organization that planned and carried out the attacks. Just a month ago, Joe Biden announced to the world the death of Ayman al-Zawahiri during an operation in Kabul; He is the last leader to join this long list of revenge attacks. Osama Bin Laden’s successor, 71, was living with his family under Taliban protection in an exclusive area of ​​the Afghan capital and was killed by a drone while taking off from the balcony of his home. Since then, AQ’s only response has been silence, but sooner or later they will reveal the name of the chosen one to lead an organization that strives to remain a global threat. Once appointed, he will be in Washington’s crosshairs.

Then-President George Bush’s initial response to the 9/11 attacks was to launch what he called the “war on terror.” First they invaded Afghanistan, the country where AQ was based, then they did the same with Iraq, relying on non-existent “weapons of mass destruction”, and then they launched a program of selective assassinations that little by little put an end to the great figures. the center of AQ and its foreign affiliates, especially in Iraq and Yemen.

Osama Bin Laden was the number one target and the big hit on AQ came on May 2, 2011 in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad, 150 kilometers north of Islamabad. That night, twenty-three members of the Special Forces (SEALs), a translator, and a dog killed the person who had outwitted the most powerful army in the world for ten years in a movie operation. They disembarked from their helicopter in front of one of Pakistan’s main military bases and searched room by room for the Saudi. After a few minutes, the most anticipated message was heard: “Geronimo EKIA (Geronimo was the code name to refer to Osama and EKIA is the acronym in English for enemy killed in action)”. Nine years, seven months and twenty-five days later, Americans avenge the victims of 9/11. It was later decided to throw his body into the sea to prevent the place where he was buried from becoming a place of pilgrimage.

Although Al-Zawahiri picked up Osama’s witness, the United States never took bin Laden off the radar, and in September 2019 Donald Trump announced the death of Hamza Bin Laden. This was Osama’s son, born in 1989 in Saudi Arabia, the fruit of his third marriage to Khairiah Sabar, a Saudi professor of child psychology who earned “favorite” status from the leader of Al Qaeda for his love of jihad. . Hamza aspired to one day fill the void left by his father, and during his final years he sent several messages calling for “rebellion against the United States and its agents.” His surname and his marriage to the daughter of another historical figure like Abu Mohamad al-Masri weighed heavily, but his real role within the organization was a mystery.

“Selective assassinations are effective in terms of counter-terrorist strategy in scenarios where conducting detention operations is nearly impossible. This has been the main reason for prioritizing this type of action, which has been devastating to central Al Qaeda, not only because of the elimination of commanders, but also because it forces leaders to give absolute priority to security, to control communications. operational capacity,” explains UAM professor Luis de la Corte, who specializes in terrorism and organized crime. “Technological development combined with intelligence has led to greater precision and a reduction in the number of secondary casualties,” recalls De la Corte.

The first leader to join this blacklist of selective assassinations in Iraq was Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a selective bomb attack in 2006. Al-Zarqawi had become the true black beast of the occupying forces. His witness at the head of AQ in Iraq was picked up by Abu Ayyub al-Masri, an Egyptian explosives expert, but he decided to relinquish the position of leader of the Iraqi insurgency to a local fighter like Abu Omar. al-Baghdadi and the group’s name to the Islamic State of Iraq. Both died in another US operation in 2010 in Tikrit, then it was the turn of a hitherto unknown Abu Baker al-Baghdadi, who was responsible for formalizing the split between AQ and IS and proclaiming the Caliphate in Mosul. in 2014.

Five years later, in October 2019, Al-Baghdadi also lost his life in a US special forces operation in northern Syria, on the border with Turkey, and IS lost its major credential. From then on, Washington combined the hunt for AQ leaders with that of the new IS leaders.

Yemen is one of the countries where AQ has a stronger presence and where US intelligence has completed successful operations against Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), a branch of the group that has been bringing together jihadists from Saudi Arabia and Yemen since 2009. Shortly after the operation against Osama, CIA-controlled drones killed Anwar al-Awlaki, who was described by the United States as “head of AQAP’s external operations” and accused him of being behind the group’s last major cross-border operations. . Al-Awlaki was a cleric who preached cyberjihad, had a US passport and survived two previous attacks.

Four years later, intelligence agencies and unmanned aerial vehicles achieved what they described as the “greatest success in the fight against Al Qaeda” since the operation to end bin Laden after the killing of Nasser al-Wuhayshi, aka “Abu Baseer”, then leader of AQAP and number two in the organization. Each selective murder is followed by another appointment in a hunt that seems to have no end.

Source: La Verdad

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