New Al-Qa'ida Online Magazine Features Interview with a 'Most-Wanted' Saudi Islamist, Calls for Killing of Americans and Non-Muslims
Supporters of the Al-Qa'ida organization in Saudi Arabia launched a new on-line magazine, " The Voice of Jihad." The magazine was described as a "bimonthly dealing with Jihad and the Mujahideen in the Arabian Peninsula." The following are excerpts from the first issue: [1]
Why is Jihad Necessary in Saudi Arabia? - An Editorial
The editorial of the first issue of " The Voice of Jihad" was penned by "Jihad warrior Suleiman Al-Dosari, " who wrote: "A tremendous obligation has been entrusted upon us – Jihad for the sake of Allah… Allah has imposed the obligation of Jihad in [several] cases, all of which exist in this generation: starting from repelling the aggression of the infidels, through fighting the apostates, supporting the oppressed, and liberating captives and prisoners. It includes voluntary Jihad, [that is] fighting the infidels so that they will pay the Jizya [poll tax paid by non-Muslims living under Muslim rule], with humiliation, into the hands of [the Muslim rulers]. All these are commandments that apply to every Muslim individually, or obligations that apply collectively. But as long as they are not carried out by a large enough number of Muslims, they are commandments that apply individually…
"One of the greatest places in which Jihad is a commandment applying to each Muslim individually is the land of the two holy places [i.e. the Arabian Peninsula]. In this land there is the occupying Crusader enemy who steals the land's treasures, determines its policy, and sets out from it to make war on the Muslims. It also has an apostate agent government, and it implements the plans of colonialism, supports the infidels, and rules by a law that is not the law of Allah… Its prisons hold the oppressed who are subjected to insufferable tortures, and in it there are aggression and curses against Allah, insult to the religion, and contempt for the believers, [and all this] under the protection and patronage of the family of Saud, whose members simultaneously silence the reformists [the opponents of the regime demanding 'reform' towards a more fundamentalist state] as well as those who call for virtue, and jail those who call on them to impose the law of Allah.
"It is amazing that many Jihad youths turn to other arenas and abandon this great arena and the [mission of the] liberation of the pure land [namely Saudi Arabia] from the defilement of the Crusaders and their lackeys, even though this land is the worthy land for Jihad that requires purification and liberation more than any other land.
"There are many reasons for this [amazing phenomenon], among them… the cruel attack led by those who abandoned [the Jihad movement] who tremble in fear [the clerics who support the Saudi regime] and who find nothing wrong with their land being occupied by American female soldiers…"
Kill Americans Whose Blood is 'Like the Blood of a Dog' - An Article
The magazine featured an article by Sheikh Nasser Al-Najdi, who wrote: "…Dogs, like other animals, are not assigned [religious] missions and commandments, and [religious prohibitions] are not forbidden them; they were created according to a particular nature, and they do not deviate from their nature. They are different from the infidel, who was created by Allah in order to worship Him and in order to believe in His monotheism, but who denied Him, and took other gods beside Him.
"Anyone who is satisfied with what is said above concludes that the heresy of that infidel and his rebellion against the religion of Allah requires the permitting of his blood and [sanctions] his humiliation, and that his blood is like the blood of a dog and nothing more.
"What is said above is sufficient to cause the monotheist… to burn with desire for the blood of the infidel, to slaughter the enemy of Allah, and to cut him up into pieces. This is not strange at all. If a believer would not be willing to stand the sight of someone walking on the earth whom he had heard cursing his father or harming his honor, then how much more so when someone curses his God, Whom he loves more than the love he feels for his beloved. How [will he stand it] while Allah permits him [to kill the infidel] and he knows that killing this man, as far as Allah is concerned, is like killing a dog?…
"My Jihad-fighting brother, don't you want Paradise? Don't you want to protect yourself from Hell?… Kill the polytheist, kill the one whose blood is like the blood of a dog, kill the one whom Allah ordered you to kill and whom the Prophet of Allah [Muhammad] incited you against. Have you not seen him, whose blood is like the blood of a dog, cursing your religion and taking your sister captive? Have you not seen him, whose blood is like the blood of a dog, occupying the lands of the Muslims, controlling the land of the two holy places, and leading colonialism in Mecca and Al-Madina? The one whose blood is like the blood of a dog that ignored all the nations of the world and chose the Muslims, to make them weep and make the world laugh at them. The one whose blood is like the blood of a dog has introduced his treacherous agents to [rule] over the loyal faithful clerics…
"Bush, the son of Bush, is a dog and the son of a dog; his blood is the blood of a dog; his bark is the bark of a dog; and he has all the traits of a dog except for loyalty. Thus, he is a hyena… [Saudi Interior Minister] Nayef Ibn Abd-Al-Aziz may Allah fight him, has no brains, honor, shame, religion, manhood, morality, or credibility…"
More Articles: The U.S. is the Most Abhorrent Enemy in the History of Islam
The magazine's first issue features numerous articles, including one by Qeis bin Habira that calls on "Jihad warriors for the sake of Allah on the Islamic frontier in Hindu-Kush, Tora Bora, Jenin, Gaza, Grozny, and the land of the two holy places" to wage Jihad. The article concludes with the blessing, "See you in Paradise."
Also featured is a poem cursing Arab rulers, and a translation of "the important excerpts" from an undated and un-attributed New Yorker article on the National Security Agency; the "Voice of Jihad" titled this article "Saudi Arabia As Seen by the U.S."
In addition, the magazine quotes Sheikh Nasser Al-Fahd, who was arrested in Saudi Arabia after expressing support for the May 2003 Riyadh bombings: "I examined at length the history of Islam; I turned its pages; and I looked at the enemies of Islam, their wars against it, the Crusaders, and the idol-worshipers, in the East and the West, over more than 10 generations – and I found no enemy more hostile and abhorrent than America."
The magazine posted a review of Sheikh Abdallah Azzam's book " The Virtues of Jihad Granted to the Slaves of Allah," and published a chapter from Sheikh Ayman Al-Zawahiri 'sbook " Knights Under the Banner of the Prophet" that tells of 'Issam Al-Qamari, a leader of the Egyptian Jihad organization who was killed in 1988 after escaping from an Egyptian prison.
The magazine also offers its readers an article by Abu Abdallah Al-Sa 'di which argues againstthe claim that bombing is not a legitimate way of bringing about political change.
Biography Excerpt: Al-Qa'ida Leader Sheikh Al-'Ayyiri
The magazine includes part of a biography of Sheikh Yousef Al-'Ayyiri, an Al-Qa'ida leader in Saudi Arabia who was on Saudi authorities' list of 19 most-wanted Islamists which was issued a few days before the Riyadh bombings. Sheikh Al-'Ayyiri managed the Al-Qa'ida website until he was killed by Saudi security forces in June 2003. His biography says that he served as Osama bin Laden's personal bodyguard in Afghanistan and then in Sudan until he returned to Saudi Arabia and was arrested following the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing.
Upon his return from Sudan to Saudi Arabia, Sheikh Salman Al-'Odeh told him, "I am proud to be one of the soldiers of Abu Abdallah [bin Laden]." However, when a wealthy Saudi demanded that Al-'Ayyiri bring him a letter from Sheikh Al-'Odeh as a condition for donating 8 million Saudi riyals to Khattab, the commander of the Jihad in Chechnya, Al-'Odeh refused, saying: "I do not believe in the Chechnya matter."
Sheikh Al-'Ayyiri was close to Khattab, and after he was released from the Saudi prison he wrote several essays for the "Voice of the Caucasus" website, among them "A Guide to the Perplexed on the Captives," "Martyrdom Operations: Suicide or Shahada?" and other political articles, the most recent of which was "The Moscow Theater Operation and Its Benefits for the Mujahideen." The second part of Al-'Ayyiri's biography will appear in the next issue.
Interview with a 'Most-Wanted' Islamist Leader
The magazine published an interview with Abd Al-'Aziz bin 'Issa bin Abd Al-Mohsen, also known as Abu Hajjer, another of the Saudi authorities' 19 most-wanted Islamists. In the interview, Abu Hajjer, a Riyadh native, tells of how he was recruited:
"Thirteen years ago, we all used to hear about the events in Afghanistan. In the mosques they talked [about it], with the support of the government, and so did the preachers on television. Jihad was approved of in those days, and the government reduced [airplane] ticket prices [to Pakistan]. We had relatives, neighbors, and friends who went to the land of Jihad, and in the calls to prayer you would always hear news of the brothers and of the heroic deeds of the Jihad warriors in the Afghan land.
"The truth is that [our] souls longed to be with the Jihad warriors, but there were obstacles. Like today, some clerics did not think that the Jihad is a commandment applying individually to every Muslim, and that the individual must go out to Jihad [even] without his parents' permission. Obviously, we tried to persuade everyone, but all attempts failed. Then, one sheikh gave me a Fatwa that said that going out to prepare [for Jihad] is a commandment that applies to every Muslim, and there is no need to ask permission to do so from parents, and so I went to the land of the Jihad…"
Abu Hajjer then tells of the battles he fought in Afghanistan: "Afterwards, I joined the brothers in Algeria. I was in the supply team and our mission was to transfer weapons and equipment from Europe to Morocco and from there to Algeria. I remained there for months, until most of the members of that squad were imprisoned, and six of them were killed… Afterwards I participated [in Jihad] in Bosnia-Herzegovina… [and from there] I continued on to Yemen, and from Yemen to Somalia and Ogadin, a region of the Somali land occupied by the Ethiopian Crusader state that is acting to convert the Somali Muslims to Christianity.
"I saw with my own eyes the churches in this region, although 100 percent of the Somalis are Muslims subject to cruel attack... I joined my brothers in the Somali Islamic Union, and there was a lengthy affair that ended in my imprisonment for a period of two years and seven months, at the end of which I was extradited to the tyrants in the land of the two holy places and was jailed for a time. A month after my release, I traveled to Afghanistan and participated together with the brothers in training and fighting against the Americans.
"Today, Allah be praised, I am [in Saudi Arabia] at the front that we sought to purify and liberate from the defilement of the treacherous rulers and, even before them, from the defilement of the American Crusaders and their allies… [In contrast to the rumors] I did not go to Iraq. I swore to purify the Arabian Peninsula from the polytheists. We were born in this land and we will fight in it against the Crusaders and against the Jews until we expel them or until we taste what Hamza bin Abd Al-Mutaleb tasted [i.e. Shahada]…
I received many offers from sheikhs… [to go to Iraq]. Unfortunately, what they wanted was to get us out of the Arabian Peninsula… True, Iraq is a front, and, Allah be praised, we are investing efforts in it… It is a front that we want to utilize for fighting the Americans, like the other fronts [of Jihad]… To all those who suggested that I [go to Iraq] I say, 'Forget it.' You must think also about the conflict with these infidels [in Saudi Arabia]."
The interview will continue in the next issue, in which Abu Hajjer will talk about "his connection with Sheikh Osama bin Laden, give advice to the wanted men in the land of the two holy places, talk about Jihad in the Arabian Peninsula, and more."
The magazine also published the first of a three-part series by Mus 'eb Al-Sahli, "Sorcery and Jihad Warriors," in which he tells of Jihad warriors who feared that they would be harmed by sorcery and explains how to guard against Satan and his messengers.
The last article, by Sheikh Abdallah bin Nasser Al-Rashid, addresses the question of whether it is permitted to call someone who is killed in Jihad a Shahid. After a final paean to Jihad, the magazine asks its readers not to wait for the next issue, but to go out and fulfill the commandment of Jihad.