Al-Qaeda terrorist group released statement condemning Arab nations for peace deal with Israel

Al-Qaeda terrorist group released statement condemning Arab nations for peace deal with Israel

On October 13, Al-Qaeda’s main media wing, Al-Sahab Media Foundation released a two-page statement titled, “Statement on the Normalization of Ties with Israel by Arab Zionists”. The statement has been released in Arabic and English and minces no words in condemning those countries of the Arab world that have signed the deal for normalisation of ties with Israel.

According to the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), in its Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor section, Al-Qaeda begins the statement by condemning the deal saying, “The complete sell-out of the Palestinian cause by the rulers of the Gulf statelets and the normalization of political, economic and diplomatic relations with the Zionist state that occupies Jerusalem and the Masjid Al-Aqsa, the destination of the night journey of the Prophet (peace be upon him), should hardly surprise anyone.”

The group further said, “This is what was precisely expected from the rulers of the Gulf statelets who are spearheading the Crusade in the Arabian Peninsula. Nor should it surprise anyone that their Crusader master, [U.S. President Donald] Trump, exposed their treachery.”

The statement of Al Qaeda comes after a month the group released a nearly 43-minute-long video message in Arabic with English subtitles from the group’s Emir, Ayman al-Zawahiri. The video focussed mainly on the recent peace deals signed by the Middle Eastern countries with Israel.

Al-Zawahiri addressed U.S. President Donald Trump’s peace plan for the Middle East in the first part of the video, and then went on to refute allegations made in a documentary aired in September 2019 on Al-Jazeera regarding cooperation between his organization and official elements in the Arab countries. It should be noted that Al-Zawahiri’s message does not appear to have been recorded recently, seeing that he does not address any of the momentous events of 2020. The events mentioned by Al-Zawahiri himself can be dated to the Al-Jazeera documentary from September 2019, and the Peace to Prosperity conference which took place in Manama, Bahrain, in June 2019.

Zawahiri then continues to describe the historical “struggle between the Muslims and the Crusaders,” and claims that the interests of these two groups lie in diametrically opposite domains. He then criticises the leaders of the treacherous Muslim States who “build mosques, encourage the memorisation of the Qur’an, and support the needy and immigrants across the Islamic world”, but who are, in reality, allies of and slaves to the West. Countries like the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia have renegaded on the Palestine issue and abandoned the larger cause of Islam.

“Some of them maintain secret ties with Israel, while others do so openly and normalize their relations with Israel in full view of the world. Ironically, some of these states claim to support and defend the Arab Revolutions and the Palestinian cause, while in reality they are fully submerged in the swamp of their security agreements with Israel, and their lands are occupied by American bases. They even send their forces to fight under the auspices of NATO regional security alliances in Afghanistan and Somalia,” he said.

Al-Qaeda condemnation of the Arab countries normalising ties with Israel is nothing but its agenda of spreading the seeds of extremism and fundamentalism in the name of religion.

Source: New Delhi Times