Ayman al-Zawahiri in a 2006 broadcast following the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq, though the two had split on al-Qaeda doctrine (Al Jazeera via AFP/Getty Images)
The enduring danger of Zawahiri’s vision
A new biography reveals how the slain al-Qaeda leader created an ideology and infrastructure that outlived him.
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Sajjan Gohel’s important work on deceased al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri is not only highly readable but constitutes a much more complete biographical study than the very few works previously published on one of the most significant Islamist leaders.
The value of the book lies in its more contemporary warnings, alerting readers as to the dangers that this legacy poses for international security in the foreseeable future.
As the security focus of the West today has shifted to the great power competition with China and Russia, the jihadist movement may well use the opportunity to replenish and reorganise its ranks.
The irony being that more than two decades after the 9/11 attacks and the US counter-strike against al-Qaeda in an operation named “Enduring Freedom”, the counter-terrorism successes have not endured at all.
Zawahiri’s youth is well-covered – his path to becoming a successful doctor, hailing from an illustrious Egyptian family of physicians, lawyers, politicians and religious scholars, to later being exposed to the jihadist thought of Egyptian ideologues such as Sayyid Qutb and Muhammad Abd al-Salam Faraj. Gohel traces the story of how Zawahiri dedicated his life to waging a violent struggle against his contemporary Egyptian rulers whom he considered “corrupt apostates” or “internal enemies,” and their “Zionist-Crusader sponsors” or “external enemies”.
Gohel also takes care to discuss the splits within the Islamist movement: how Zawahiri disagreed with the parliamentary electoral approach of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood to establish an Islamist government, and his later tense relationship with, and alleged murder of, Palestinian ideologue Abdullah Azzam. The author further sheds light upon how this led to the Egyptian doctor’s everlasting friction with the Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who saw Azzam as a mentor to the movement. Even though Zarqawi was technically subordinate to Zawahiri within al-Qaeda, he never heeded the latter’s instructions in 2005 to not brutalise and sow discord with civilian Muslims in Iraq.
Hunted for decades, and the leader of al-Qaeda after bin Laden’s death in 2011, Zawahiri was eventually killed in Kabul in 2022 by a US drone strike.
There is little doubt that al-Zawahiri’s multi-faceted contribution has left the al-Qaeda organisation, and indeed the global jihadist industry, stronger than prior to his appearance on the scene. The platform Zawahiri created together with bin Laden might have been set back following the 9/11 attacks by sustained counter-terrorism operations. Yet Gohel emphasises that the situation has grown more perilous as Afghanistan has become a breeding ground for jihadist groups from across the globe.
Zawahiri had pledged allegiance to the leader of the Taliban in Afghanistan, a part of his doctrine of terrorist organisations acquiring “safe bases” across the Muslim world from where to operate. Gohel appears to evince little faith in the Taliban’s pledge to stop Afghanistan becoming a refuge for terrorism.
Zawahiri had played a key role in evolving al-Qaeda’s ideology, strategy, tactics and recruitment pattern. As a jihadist teacher, he pioneered the use of new media to disseminate his organisation’s messages and benefit from what the author calls the “oxygen of publicity.”
Cover of Sajjan Gohen's book on Ayman al-Zawahiri
But Gohel shows how Zawahiri’s role was far more practical, in employing double and triple agents internationally and even working on developing chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear weapons for deployment against Western enemies.
In Afghanistan, it is evident that Zawahiri’s dream of establishing an Islamist authority for progressing the global jihadist cause – as reflected in this quote copied in Gohel’s book – has been realised:
“Liberating the Muslim nation, confronting the enemies of Islam, and launching jihad against them require a Muslim authority, established on a Muslim land, that raises the banner of jihad and rallies the Muslims around it. Without achieving this goal our actions will mean nothing more than mere and repeated disturbances that will not lead to the aspired goal, which is the restoration of the caliphate and the dismissal of the invaders from the land of Islam … This goal must remain the basic objective of the Islamic jihad movement, regardless of the sacrifices and the time involved.”
Thus, the book warns of the strong possibility that under Afghanistan’s present ruling regime, aspiring foreign fighters from the West or elsewhere could travel to the country to acquire terrorist training. While there are splits within the Islamist movement, between differing approaches of al-Qaeda, Daesh, Daesh-Khorasan, etc., the common thread is the danger.
Gohel worries the West may find itself unable to handle this potential new wave of Islamist fighters because there are no allies in abandoned Afghanistan who might be in a position to curb terrorist training and recruitment. As Zawahiri is quoted having observed, “We adapt to the practical reality wherever it is.” The irony being that more than two decades after the 9/11 attacks and the US counter-strike against al-Qaeda in an operation named “Enduring Freedom”, the counter-terrorism successes have not endured at all, nor has the freedom for the Afghan people ushered in by the operation. Zawahiri did not find a lasting haven for himself, but in Afghanistan, the violent ideology he fostered lives on.
