Bin Laden's No. 2 is Al Qaeda's new chief

The LA Times ^ | June 16, 2011 | Ken Dilanian

[Pinkbell]

In July 2005, Al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman Zawahiri sent a long letter to the group's lead operative in Iraq, urging him to tone down his activities.

In Iraq, Abu Musab Zarqawi had been orchestrating suicide bombings of Shiite Muslim shrines. His followers frequently videotaped the beheading of hostages. Zawahiri, an Egyptian doctor who helped organize the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S. and other violence, told Zarqawi he was going too far.

"We are in a media battle, in a race for the hearts and minds" of Muslims, wrote Zawahiri, who was named Thursday to succeed Osama bin Laden as Al Qaeda's leader. And most Muslims "will never find [such tactics] palatable."

Zarqawi didn't heed the counsel, and a year later he was killed in a U.S. airstrike, aided by some of his growing number of enemies. If the attempt to rein him in revealed Zawahiri as a canny strategist, it also illustrated how little control Al Qaeda's leaders had over their affiliates even then.

Zawahiri, who has a $25-million American bounty on his head, will be looking to launch a major strike to prove himself and avenge Bin Laden, say U.S. officials and terrorism experts. But he may find the organization even more difficult to manage.

Al Qaeda and its offshoots have further splintered, Zawahiri lacks Bin Laden's charisma, and the U.S. drone campaign in Pakistan, where Zawahiri is presumed to be hiding, will make it more difficult for him to communicate, said Daniel Byman, director of research at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center for Middle East Policy, a Washington think tank.

[Bobalu]

Bin Laden's No. 2 is Al Qaeda's new chief

What a great headline :-)

[DeaconRed]

Calling Seal Team 6. . . . . . . .

[CitizenUSA]

Kinda hard to call in Seal Team 6 when the Pakistani informants who helped lead us to Osama are in Pakistani custody. Nice job, Obama. While you were crowing about killing Osama, you no doubt helped reveal the fact that we received help from said informants.

[21twelve]

Posted on FR last week, a sign board that said:

Being a terrorist is like a King Salmon.
Life is good, until the SEALS show up!

[alloysteel]

Can you say, “Paint a target on him”?

Because this person is now doomed.

No significant change in status.

[SunkenCiv]

Free pun.

[norwaypinesavage]

"the attempt to rein [Zarqawi] in revealed Zawahiri as a canny strategist"

canny strategist??? It certainly doesn't take much to impress the editors at the LA Times, at least if you are a Muslim.

[BuffaloJack]

Ayman Zawahiri has always been the head of al-Qaeda and Osama bibLaden has always been the pocketbook and figurehead.
Zawahiri’s only change has been to now become the figurehead too
This scumbag needs killing.

[TheOldLady]

Do not read this headline.

[Slings and Arrows]

Do not read this headline.

Eh? Seems perfectly factual to me.

[Slings and Arrows]

[Tijeras_Slim]

If it was the comapny I work for they’d bring in somebody from Hamas or Hezbollah because they never promote from within.

[TheOldLady]

I asked you not to read it!!

[TheOldLady]

Pun is in prison? Been banned? What?

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

Pun is in prison?

Poor pun.

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

Do not read this headline.

Sorry. I accidentally read it.

[TheOldLady]

It’s okay for you to read it.

Slings and Arrows is the one who shouldn’t. ;-p

[TheOldLady]

Yeah, free pun.

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

---

To: TheOldLady

Free me! Free me! Free me!!!!!!!

19½ posted on 6/17/2010 4:02:35 PM EST by Pun (I just wanna be free!)

[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies | Report Abuse ]

---

To: TheOldLady

Lol. Should we start a free pun campaign?

Free me! Free me! Free me!!!!!!!

Lol. Should we start a free pun campaign?

[TheOldLady]

I'm not sure how popular that would be. Some people really groan when they hear pun.

I really can't believe how short this thread is. I figured it would be at 200 Number-2-joke posts by this time.

I guess you, Deo, and I just can't help a good thread hijacking. Sigh...

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

I figured it would be at 200 Number-2-joke posts by this time.

Yeah, I can't figure it out either. This thread was just asking for jokes and pics like this:

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

I guess you, Deo, and I just can't help a good thread hijacking.

Did someone say thread hijack? :-)

[TheOldLady]

I moved that one, sorry. Here it is again:

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

Thanks. I didn’t know it posted wrong. This computer that I am on right now has suddenly decided it wants to block photobucket, so currently all photobucket picks are just little red x’s until I can get this thing fixed.

[TheOldLady]

It’s showing a “moved or deleted” box on mine, but the one I posted is the De Niro “hijack” pic.

I hope that you get that fixed up soon.

For a while, I couldn’t get on the Astronomy Picture of the Day NASA web site unless I used the IP instead of the http://apod.nasa.gov link.

Then my computer did a couple of upgrades, and suddenly the link worked again.

[Slings and Arrows]

We could start a “Free Pun-Pun” campaign. (100 geek points to all who catch that reference.)

[Revolting cat!]

Ay, man!

[DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis]

Computers can be funny things.

[TheOldLady]

D&D? (I looked it up, and I just know you’re a grand master, Slings)

Fine. Free Pun-Pun!!

[TheOldLady]

Hilarious.

[dixiechick2000]

This headline is factual.......

and deadly...for AQ leaders.

I would hate to be #2 for more than one reason.

[Slings and Arrows]

Yep, Pun-Pun: Patron god of Munchkinry.

[Slings and Arrows]

I’ll say this much for Al Qaeda - they make it easy to keep our target list current.

[Lancey Howard]

The SEALS will No. 1 all over his grave.

[dixiechick2000]

ROTFLOL!

Very true. ;o)

[TheOldLady]

Oh! Then you’re a Real Man™, of course.

[Slings and Arrows]

Of course.

[a fool in paradise]

[a fool in paradise]

Johnny Cash famously played the punk rock bar Emo's back in the mid-1990s.

The club owners were so in awe that they nailed his stool to the ceiling afterwards...

.

.

.

.

.

[Slings and Arrows]

I’ll bet he sang “Hurt.”