WHEN Osama bin Laden's forehead was
blasted open by elite US soldiers nearly three years ago, many hoped it
would also signal the death of al-Qaeda.
But his terror group is widely considered to be on the rise again.The
jihadist organisation has once again made itself known through
bloodshed, just as al-Qaeda death squads made the world pay attention
after they ploughed airliners into the World Trade Centre on September
11, 2001.Masked gunmen captured two major Iraqi cities from
authorities last week. A suicide bombing caused devastation in Beirut -
killing at least 23. And the carnage continues in Syria, most of it
unreported.Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility of each of these attacks."There
has been a resurgence in al-Qaeda related violence," said Clive
Williams, a former Australian intelligence officer and a visiting
national security professor at the Australian National University.
OK, but who are these people?
The terror group affiliate is known as ISIS, which stands for the
Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. In the past it has been known as
al-Qaeda in Iraq, or AQI.Last week, brigades of ISIS gunmen
seized two major Iraqi cities from authorities in a bloody battle:
Ramadi, 110km west of Baghdad, and Fallujah, also known as "the city of
mosques".Fallujah has been in the headlines before. It's the same
city that was home to one of the bloodiest battles after the US invaded
Iraq in 2003.As much as 60 per cent of the city - businesses,
homes, mosques - were destroyed in air strikes and gun battles between
insurgents and the so-called Coalition of the Willing. ISIS is considered such a threat as it's not limited to the one country.
It operates in Iraq and Syria, neighbouring countries, where it battles
for both the Syrian opposition and against the Iraqi government. Ironically,
al-Qaeda in Iraq was formed in response to the American-led invasion of
that country in 2003, according to a former CIA intelligence analyst. "It
was founded by foreign al-Qaeda operatives who entered Iraq in the wake
of the US invasion to kill both Americans and Shi'a," Kenneth Pollack,
former CIA intelligence analyst and expert on Middle East politics and
military affairs, told the US Congress last year.
Hang on, why didn't al-Qaeda die with Bin Laden?
The core organisation which carried out the 9/11 attacks has largely
been destroyed by intelligence agencies and military forces, according
to Western security officials. But it has never been a centralised group. World leaders, including US President Barack Obama, compare the group to cancer. "The
core al-Qaeda is on its heels ... decimated," Obama said at a press
conference in September last year. The main 'tumour' was destroyed by
the military forces that took out Bin Laden and at least 22 of the
group's 30 leaders. But, the president said, "al-Qaeda and other
extremists have metastasised (like tumours) into regional groups that
can pose significant dangers". And that's what the world is seeing
now, particularly in countries such as Iraq and Syria, as well as Libya
and the region known as the Horn of Africa.
So what do ISIS believe in?
Much the same as al-Qaeda's traditional goals. It wishes to
establish, through violent means, a "caliphate" - an Islamic state led
by a caliph, a successor to the Prophet Muhammad. "They are there
for a political reason: to lay the groundwork for a caliphate," Charles
Lister, an analyst of the Syrian rebellion, told
The New York Review of Books
. ISIS is led by the shadowy figure Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi, an Iraqi extremist who has overseen a series of attacks in
Iraq and is understood to have ordered the group to expand into Syria. It is unknown whether he follows any directives from al-Qaeda high command.
Why are there all these different groups that call themselves al-Qaeda?
You're
not wrong if you think sometimes it sounds as if every group that goes
around toting powerful assault weapons and shouting fundamentalist
Islamic phrases claims to be "linked to al-Qaeda". There are
similar groups throughout the Middle East and South-East Asia and Prof
Williams explains there is a clever reason for this. Marketing. In
a world of brands, al-Qaeda's the top name in terrorism. "They're
exploiting the name of al-Qaeda," Prof Williams said. "It's a respected
brand, which is good for recruiting and financing and establishing links
with similar groups."
Can they be stopped?
We don't know - but it's happened before, in Iraq at least. Many
Iraqi tribes, communities and rebels turned their backs on AQI during
the American occupation last decade, bringing a short peace to the
region. The US military has deployed dozens of Hellfire missiles
and small, unarmed surveillance drones in recent weeks, but they won't
be putting troops on the ground. "We're not contemplating putting
boots on the ground. This is their fight, but we're going to help them
in their fight," Secretary of State John Kerry said, the Los Angeles
Times reported. Australia, too, has no plans to intervene. And it's difficult to say things are looking up. Violence even struck the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, on Sunday. Three car bombs and two roadside bombs exploded in several parts of the city, killing at least 18 and wounding dozens.
Source: http://www.news.com.au/world/middle-east/bombs-bloodshed-and-osama-bin-ladens-ghost-the-rise-of-the-new-alqaeda/story-fnh81ifq-1226796468685
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