Al Qaeda No.2 Addresses US

As part of the string of videos being released by Al Qaeda, Ayman Al-Zawahiri has released a new one making various threats against the US and the West. Here a summary of the video courtesy of MEMRI;

First, Al-Zawahiri expresses his condolences for the death of the martyr cleric Maulana Abd Al-Rashid Ghazi in Afghanistan, promises to avenge his death, and calls on Muslims to follow in his path and in the path of other jihad-fighting clerics. Al-Zawahiri then accuses Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf of selling Pakistan's honor and religion, and says that Musharraf's forces are serving "the hunting dogs of the Crusaders-Zionists."

He then spoke of the Americans' defeat in Iraq by the jihad fighters; an announcer then attributes this to the "sacrifice of the jihad fighters, first among them Abu Mus'ab Al-Zarqawi." Al-Zawahiri then advised the Americans, "Do not ask President Bush when the soldiers will return; ask instead how many of them will return."

Al-Zawahiri called on the Muslims in the Maghreb to bring Andalusia [Jeff's note: That would be the Iberian Pnnisula; Spain and Portugal.] back into the fold of Islam, and stated that this could only be done by "purging the Islamic Maghreb of the French and the Spanish who have returned there."

He calls on the Sudanese to wage jihad against the Crusader invasion of Darfur, as their brothers did in Iraq and in Afghanistan.

Further on in the video, Al-Zawahiri addresses the issue of jihad in Somalia, Chechnya, and Palestine, and calls on the Islamic nation to support the jihad fighters "under the victorious banner of the Prophet."

So, while we still seem confused about the scope the war (just ask the Democratic Party), the enemy certainly seems to be convinced that this a conflict global in scope with the end goal being the destruction of the West and the creation of a global Islamic state. They keep telling us this, but too many of our "leaders" seem to be deaf.

(Source: MEMRI)