Al Qaeda controls more territory than ever in Middle East

Posted on January 9, 2014 by DrJohn ( 2 comments already! )

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(CNN) — From around Aleppo in western Syria to small areas of Falluja in central Iraq, al Qaeda now controls territory that stretches more than 400 miles across the heart of the Middle East, according to English and Arab language news accounts as well as accounts on jihadist websites.

Indeed, al Qaeda appears to control more territory in the Arab world than it has done at any time in its history.

The focus of al Qaeda’s leaders has always been regime change in the Arab world in order to install Taliban-style regimes. Al Qaeda’s leader Ayman al-Zawahiri acknowledged as much in his 2001 autobiography, “Knights Under the Banner of the Prophet,” when he explained that the most important strategic goal of al Qaeda was to seize control of a state, or part of a state, somewhere in the Muslim world, explaining that, “without achieving this goal our actions will mean nothing.”

Now al-Zawahiri is closer to his goal than he has ever been. On Friday al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Iraq seized control of parts of the city of Falluja and parts of the city of Ramadi, both of which are located in Iraq’s restive Anbar Province.

Another Obama legacy

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Nanny G

11 years ago

If Obama’s underlying ”strategy” has been to deflect Islamic killings away from us here in the USA and Western world and instead focus all their murderous intent on fellow Muslims, then he’s been successful.
Shiite and Sunni are at one anothers’ throats.

Iran’s proxy Hezbollah on the Shiite side, and al Qaeda types and the Muslim Brotherhood on the Sunni side.
Just today I read how the Saudis have turned their backs on Obama by giving $3 billion in arms aid to Lebanon provided they buy their arms from FRANCE instead of from the USA.
This $3 billion will be used to take down Hezb’allah in Lebanon even as Hezb’allah have 100,000 modern missiles via Iran and Russia’s help.

Ditto

11 years ago

Iraqi ambassador slams Obama, praises Bush’s ‘ownership’ of relationship

Iraq’s ambassador to Washington says the Obama administration doesn’t fully grasp the consequences of failing to more aggressively combat a surging al Qaeda threat inside his country, pointedly suggesting that President Obama has been less engaged with Baghdad than his predecessor.

…Asked whether the White House could do more to facilitate a tighter relationship with Iraq, Mr. Faily said, “to a certain extent they can. But we are no longer in a period in which we had President Bush, who took ownership of that relationship.”

With al Qaeda-linked violence surging in Iraq, Mr. Faily urged U.S. leaders in both parties to stop allowing military and nation-building resources for his country to become embroiled in domestic U.S. politics even as he dismissed suggestions that Iraq is in danger of falling into a full-fledged civil war between its Shiite and Sunni populations.

…Al Qaeda’s gains in Anbar have added fuel to a political fight in Washington over whether the U.S. military should return to Iraq. Some Republicans argue that the Obama administration moved too hastily in pulling U.S. forces out of Iraq two years ago and has not done enough since to help the U.S.-trained Iraqi military maintain security.

The administration announced this week that it would increase and accelerate delivery to the Iraqi military of surveillance drones, as well as air-to-surface Hellfire missiles. But the situation presents a difficult challenge for the White House — particularly because Mr. Obama ran for office six years ago on a promise of ending the war in Iraq.

…“It’s not a matter of blame. It’s a matter of short-termism arriving over the national strategic interests of the countries,” he said. “For example, the U.S. forces left, but by the time they left, we had no air force. And then we were blamed [by Washington], why the Syrian overflights took place. We had no air force, we can’t force a plane down. And now we’re asking for F-16s, and the U.S. says, why do you need F-16s?”

Mr. Faily said Baghdad also has struggled to cope with the flow of al Qaeda-linked Sunni Muslim extremists across the Syria-Iraq border.

…He said the al-Maliki government is trying to come to grips with how to respond effectively but carefully to the developments in Fallujah in such a way that does not inflame moderate Sunnis. “We have not made an attack on Fallujah because we don’t want to cause casualties. So we don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water,” he said. “We want to distinguish and isolate the terrorists or the extremists from the people.

“We do not want to be indiscriminate in our killing of al Qaeda and others as well,” he added, asserting that the al-Maliki government wants citizens in the region to feel that “their lives are sacred” as Iraqis.

Obama’s answer, ‘send in the drones.’ We know how indiscriminate Obama’s drone program has been.