Posted on 05/03/2011 8:32:29 PM PDT by DTA
4 May, 2011, 05.43AM IST,ET Bureau Osama dead: The captains of terrorism: Ayman al-Zawahiri, Abu Yahya al-Libi, Khalid Habib, Saif al-Adel, Abu Obaidah al-Masri Ayman al-Zawahiri
Long-time deputy of Osama bin Laden at al-Qaeda , Ayman al-Zawahiri is a trained surgeon from a prominent Egyptian family of doctors and scholars. In recent years when bin Laden has been on the run, 56-year-old Zawahiri is believed to have been the operational head of the organisation. Influenced by the radical preacher Sayyed Qutub, Zawahiri joined the Muslim Brotherhood when he was 15, and rapidly gained prominence as an ideologue and organiser. He used to run al-Jihad , an organisation that would later form the template for al-Qaeda . Lacks the charisma and visionary aura of bin Laden and is known to be argumentative and dogmatic.
Abu Yahya al-Libi
A member of al-Qaeda's high-ranking Shariah council , the 48-year-old Libyan has risen fast within the ranks of the global jihadist movement. While bin Laden is an engineer and al-Zawahiri a doctor by training, al-Libi is an Islamic scholar, having devoted years to the study of the religion. "He's a warrior. He's a poet. He's a scholar. He's a pundit. He's a military commander. And he's a very charismatic , young, brash rising star within al-Qaeda , and I think he has become the heir apparent to Osama bin Laden in terms of taking over the entire global jihadist movement," former CIA analyst Jarret Brachman once remarked. His dramatic escape from the high-security US military prison in Bagram , Afghanistan, has contributed to his legend.
Khalid Habib
He serves as a field commander for al-Qaeda on the critical Afghan-Pakistani border. He is thought to be of Egyptian or Moroccan descent . He is a battle-hardened combatant with field experience in Iraq and Chechnya, among others. There have been reports about his death in a US drone strike, which were later denied. Regarded by the FBI as "one of the six most capable, most experienced terrorists in the world" .
Mustafa Abu al-Yazid
Also known as Saeed Sheikh, the 51-year-old financial brain behind al-Qaeda , is a prominent figure among the Egyptians who have dominated the network's core. He is close to the Talibal leader Mullah Omar and was al-Qaeda's commander in charge of operations in Afghanistan. He was ooposed to the September 11 terror attacks on the US as he feared that the retaliation would bring down Taliban . Served as a close associate and finance manager for Bin Laden for over a decade.
Saif al-Adel
Believed to be under house arrest in Iran, 44-year old al-Adel is a dreaded terrorist indicted in the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed more than 200 people. A veteran of the Egyptian military, he made his name fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s, when Bin Laden gained his first battle experience. Valued within al-Qaeda for his military capabilities, al-Adel has had frequent differences with bin Laden and Zawahiri.
Abu Obaidah al-Masri
Little is known about this Egyptian military veteran, thought to be in his forties, who also fought the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s. Intelligence officials believe that he was the senior operations planner of the 2005 public transit bombings in London, and acted as a conduit between the British-Pakistani cells that executed the plan and al-Qaeda . He is also thought to be behind the failed transatlantic airliner-bombing plot in Britain in 2006. He was thought to have died in multiple US drone attacks, but seems to have survived thus far.
They’re all Seal food.
Abu Yahya al-Libi, also known as Hasan Qayid and Yunis al-Sahrawi, is thought to have been a member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) before he allied himself to Osama Bin Laden.
He has since emerged as al-Qaeda's leading theologian, and most visible face on video, surpassing Ayman al-Zawahri in recent years.
Libi is believed to have spent five years as a religious student in Mauritania in the 1990s.
He claims he was captured by Pakistani forces in 2002 and then sent to the US military airbase at Bagram in Afghanistan, from where he escaped in July 2005 along with three other al-Qaeda members.
Al-Qaeda has named Libi as a field commander in Afghanistan, though he has styled himself in his many videos as a theological scholar, and spoken on a variety of global issues of importance to the group.
Probably #1 of AQ owing to his alliance with NATO
Our New President in 2012 will carry on the Great Job President Bush has done......
Islamic cartoons! I love it!
Is there any mention of what was discovered at OBL’s place that could, also, lead to more terrorist captures and/or killings? I do hope that anything and everything discovered at OBL’s place is kept secret from the MSM!
They’re all Seal food.
Soon to be!!!
The 6 mentioned and their wannabee underlings better find a good cave to hide in. “Wanted Dead or Alive” posters and matchbook pics should be distributed around the world...sort of a free-world fatwa.
Just look for them in the luxury estates surrounded by barbwire in the same village as Osama was.
Thanks DTA.
Perfect!
... and deep down, they know it.
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