Both al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and the Group for Support of Islam and Muslims, al-Qaeda’s branches in North and West Africa, respectively, have openly praised Hamas for its mass killings of Jews in recent days.
Abu Yasir al-Jaza’iri, an Algerian ideologue in al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, offers the group’s harshest rebuke of the Islamic State to date.
Zawahiri lives. The Taliban-Al Qaeda alliance remains strong. The leaders of Al Qaeda’s branches in North and East Africa have assumed roles in Al Qaeda’s line of succession.
France says its forces killed Yahia Djouadi, a senior veteran of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, inside northern Mali. The raid comes after France and its European allies are set to withdraw from Mali.
In a recent statement released online, Jamaat Ansar al Muslimeen, better known as Ansaru, confirmed it maintains its allegiance to al Qaeda after reportedly re-pledging allegiance to al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in 2020.
Baye Ag Bakabo is linked to several of AQIM’s kidnappings in Mali, including the operation that left two RFI journalists dead in 2013.
The U.S. State Department is offering a reward of up to $7 million for information concerning the leader of AQIM, Abu Ubaydah Yusuf al-Anabi. State says al-Anabi “is expected to play a role in al Qaeda’s global management.”
In an interview with the Islamic State’s Al-Naba newsletter, Abu Walid al-Sahrawi, the leader of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, attempts to paint al Qaeda’s efforts in the region as rife with internal squabbles and disunity.
Hosts Bill Roggio and Tom Joscelyn discuss what al Qaeda looks like in 2020.
AQIM has released an audio message confirming the death of its longtime emir, Abdulmalek Droukdel.
Hosts Tom Joscelyn and Bill Roggio discuss the life and reported death of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb’s emir, Abdulmalek Droukdel.
While JNIM has not claimed the assault, its Katibat Macina is widely suspected of perpetrating the attack. This comes after sustained operations against it in the area last month.
French and American officials say the emir of AQIM, Abdelmalek Droukdel (a.k.a. Abu Musab Abdel Wadoud), was killed in a counterterrorism operation in northern Mali on June 3. The U.S. military supported the French-led operation.
Thabat, an al-Qaeda-affiliated media outfit, has released a series of infographics that are intended to highlight the group’s global reach and resiliency. The images trumpet a large number of purported attacks in Afghanistan, as well as America’s withdrawal from the country.
Al Qaeda’s branch in West Africa, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, has released a statement saying it is willing to meet with the Malian government — but only after French and allied forces withdraw from the area.
Al-Qaeda’s senior leadership released a statement praising the jihadists in Mali and elsewhere in Western Africa for confronting the “Crusaders.” Al-Qaeda’s management team encourages them to dismantle the “French and American project” across the region.
Two leaders of al Qaeda’s Group for Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), a Moroccan national and a local Malian, were designated as terrorists today.
In a new audio message, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb’s emir, Abu Musab Abdel Wadoud, tries to capitalize on popular discontent in France. He fuses populist economic arguments with his jihadist ideology to critique France’s intervention in Africa.
Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has released a statement claiming that the victims of an American airstrike on Nov. 29 “were a group of Tuareg youth” and not members of the organization. US Africa Command previously said that 11 AQIM “terrorists” were killed and three vehicles destroyed in the “precision airstrike near Al Uwaynat, Libya.”
The US military hit al Qaeda’s branches in Somalia and Libya twice over the past several days, killing 20 fighters in strikes that appear to have targeted the groups’ military capacity.
The IED claim is the group’s first since July and just the second attack claim of the year for the small Tunisian Al Qaeda wing.
AL Qaeda’s operatives are fighting in more countries around the world today than was the case on 9/11. And its leaders still want to target the United States and its interest and allies. The war they started is far from over.
The State Department announced today that it has designated Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), al Qaeda’s branch in Mali and West Africa, as a terrorist organization. JNIM and its leader, Iyad Ghali, are openly loyal to al Qaeda and the Taliban’s emir.
This is the first strike since early June, when the United States targeted both the Islamic State and Al Qaeda in separate strikes in Bani Walid.
The US military announced that it killed Musa Abu Dawud, a high-ranking al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb leader in Libya, in an airstrike last weekend. Dawud is an established jihadist who has been in the fight with the GSPC and AIQM for at least three decades.
One of the leaders “planned” the March 2015 Bardo Museum attack in Tunis, which was claimed by the Islamic State. Another serves as Shabaab’s deputy emir.
On Nov. 17, The Foundation for Defense of Democracies and FDD’s Long War Journal held an event to discuss the findings from the recently released documents from Osama bin Laden’s compound.
US Africa Command launched airstrikes against the Islamic State in Libya for the first time in eight months. AFRICOM also revealed to FDD’s Long War Journal that an estimated 800 to 900 Islamic State fighters were killed during Operation Odyssey Lightning’s air campaign in Sirte last year.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) presented its written “Worldwide Threat Assessment” to the Senate last week. The analysis confirms that the Islamic State is capable of sustaining insurgencies in both Iraq and Syria, Afghan security continues to “deteriorate,” and al Qaeda remains a threat in several parts of the globe.
On Mar. 2, a new al Qaeda joint venture in West Africa was announced. The “Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims” is led by Ansar Dine’s Iyad Ag Ghaly and is openly loyal to Ayman al Zawahiri. It brings together four groups that were already part of al Qaeda’s international network.
