The Death of a Face: On the Elimination of Al-Qaeda Leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri

Assassination of Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-ZawahiroI am in the safe house of Kabul by an American drone in a clear blow to Sunni Islamists terrorist organization. ZawahiriThe Egyptian doctor-turned-terrorist-in-chief, has been leading al-Qaeda since the 2011 killing of his predecessor Osama bin Laden in a US commando raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Zawahiri was an important figure in most Major attacks by Al QaedaFrom the August 1998 bombings at the US Embassy in East Africa to the September 11, 2001 attacks. Inspired by the teachings of Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood cleric Sayyid Qutb, who was executed by the administration of President Jamal Abdel Nasser, Zawahiri formed an underground Islamist organization as a teenager. Later, he led the dreaded Egyptian Islamic Jihad, which merged with al-Qaeda a few months before the 9/11 attacks. He has since been number two in al-Qaeda, which he took over after bin Laden’s death. Like his former boss, he is also believed to have been hiding in Pakistan. But US officials say Zawahiri moved back to Afghanistan earlier this year, perhaps in the hope that he would be safe in the Taliban-controlled country. This turned out to be his last hiding place.

The killing marks a rare battlefield victory for the Biden administration in the fight against terrorism. It builds on the administration’s claim that it can continue to conduct successful operations “above the horizon” without deploying troops in countries like Afghanistan. US intelligence officials worked for months to confirm Zawahiri’s identity and establish a pattern of life before carrying out the attack. But this attack also raises many questions. The withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan was based on the Doha Agreement reached between the Trump administration, which was later accepted by the Biden administration and the Taliban. Under the agreement, the Taliban promised to cut all ties with terrorist organizations such as Islamic State and al-Qaeda in exchange for the US withdrawal. The US completed its withdrawal on August 31, 16 days after the Taliban captured Kabul. While the Taliban are fighting Islamic State, their links with al-Qaeda remain mysterious. The leader of the Haqqani faction, Sirajuddin Haqqani, who is currently the Taliban’s interior minister, is known for his close al-Qaeda links. Given the history of al-Qaeda and the Taliban, it is hard to believe that Zawahiri was living in one of the wealthiest areas of Kabul – it also housed many high-profile Taliban leaders, technocrats and former warlords without the Taliban’s knowledge. Huh. Leadership. Whether the killing of Zahawiri would undermine decentralized al-Qaeda without an organizational hierarchy is unclear. But a major challenge before the US and other countries is to ensure that the Taliban regime does not help terrorist organizations regroup in Afghanistan. This is the spirit of the Doha Agreement.