(Cairo) Al-Qaeda chief and Egyptian national Ayman Al-Zawahiri has
died in Afghanistan from natural causes, Arab media reported on Friday. The
news reports came a few days after social media carried speculation that the
Al-Qaeda chief had passed away. Zawahiri was last seen in a video message that
was released by the militant group on the 19th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks
in the US. Arab News stated in its report that it spoke to at least four
security sources in Pakistan and Afghanistan - who spoke on condition of
anonymity - out of which two confirmed Zawahiri's death. An Al-Qaeda translator
said Zawahiri had died last week in Ghazni. ‘He died of asthma because he had
no formal treatment.’ A Pakistani official has been cited by Arab News as
saying that he believed Zawahiri had died, most probably by natural causes.
Another source close to the Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan said Zawahiri had died this
month and that a few followers had offered his funeral prayers. He did not
elaborate as to whether the funeral prayers were offered in absentia or as his
body was buried in the grave. "What we know is that he was having some
breathing issues and has passed away somewhere in Afghanistan;’ said the
source. ‘We have received the same information that Zawahiri died about a month
ago;’ a Pakistani source, privy to anti-terror operations in Afghanistan,
reportedly told Arab News. However, Arab News said it spoke to another
Pakistani official who said that Zawahiri was in Afghanistan and had been ‘extremely
ill’ but said he was not aware whether the Al-Qaeda leader was dead or not. To
my knowledge he was extremely ill and had the issue of kidney failure;’ the
intelligence official said. ‘He was unable to manage his dialysis but I still
need to confirm if he has died.’ The US has said that it has received news of
Zawahiri's death but had not verified it yet. The reports have come as
questions grow over Al-Qaeda's future intentions; with the network radically
different from the franchise that spread fear around the world under the
leadership of the charismatic Bin Laden. The killing of Bin Laden in a US
operation in Pakistan in 2011 left the group in the hands of al-Zawahiri; an
Egyptian veteran of jihad and the key Al-Qaeda ideologue; but without Bin
Laden's ability to rally radicals around the world. Hassan Hassan, director of
the US-based Center for Global Policy (CGP); said at the weekend that
al-Zawahiri had died a month ago of natural causes. And Rita Katz, director of
the jihadist media monitor SITE; said unconfirmed reports were circulating that
al-Zawahiri had died. ‘It is very typical of AQ to not publish news about the
death of its leaders in a timely manner," she said. Nonetheless; this is
not the first time there have been reports of al-Zawahiri's death, only for him
to re-emerge on several occasions. ‘Intelligence agencies believe he is very
sick;’ said Barak Mendelsohn, associate professor at Haverford College and
author of several books on Al-Qaeda. ‘Ultimately; if it did not happen now; it
will happen soon;’ he told AFP. If either or both men are dead, the group they
have left behind can in no way be compared to the network which planned and
carried out the September 11 attacks; analysts say. Its ideology has spawned
several franchises across the world that bear its name, including in Africa's
Sahel region; in Pakistan as well as in Somalia; Egypt and Yemen. But it does
not control their actions or the alliances that they may forge on a local
level. Mendelsohn said he expected Al-Qaeda's leadership to act more along the
lines of a ‘board of advisors’ in the future. ‘People will listen to AQ central
leadership if they want to, not because they think they are bound to obey its
view;’ he said. No longer the supreme militant group; Al-Qaeda has seen other
outfits grow and has sometimes clashed with them on the ground. It has been
overshadowed by Daesh which sought to carve out a caliphate in Iraq and Syria
and coordinated attacks in Europe. The key challenge of a new leader would be
to retain the group's potency within this context. Many analysts point to one
key candidate - Saif al-Adel; a former lieutenant-colonel in the Egyptian armed
forces who joined the Egyptian jihadist movement in the 1980s. He was arrested
and then released; ending up in Afghanistan which was the base for Bin Laden
and al-Zawahiri; and joining Al-Qaeda. According to the US-based Counter
Extremism Project (CEP) think tank, he was arrested in Iran in 2003 and freed
in 2015 in a prisoner exchange. He was still believed to be in Iran in 2018 as
one of al-Zawahiri's key deputies. ‘Adel played a crucial role in building
Al-Qaeda´s operational capabilities and quickly ascended the hierarchy;’ the
CEP said. Mendelsohn said Adel was a ‘big name’ in the movement and ‘should be
the next in line’. But he stressed that Adel; along with Abdullah, spent several
years hiding in Iran, thus possibly staying away from Al-Qaeda's new generation
of leaders. ‘I'm not sure how strong his position is within Al-Qaeda;
especially now that the old generation, basically all the old guard; is dead.’
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