Al Qaeda Deputies Harbored by Iran Excerpt:
Mr. al-Adel, Mr. Walid and other al-Qaeda fighters are staying in a cluster of hotels in Mashhad, in northeastern Iran near the borders with Turkmenistan and Afghanistan, and in guesthouses in Zabol, about 400 miles farther south on the Iranian-Afghan border, the sources said.
Saif al-Adel |
With Osama bin Laden and his second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, unaccounted for, the sources said, and with the death of the former military chief, Mohammed Atef, the two have assumed operational control of al-Qaeda's military committee, which directs attacks, and its ideological or religious committee, which issues fatwas, or statements, to justify those attacks.
The idea of the transfer of power arose after the attacks in New York and at the Pentagon on Sept. 11, when it became apparent to al-Qaeda that the United States might attack Afghanistan and capture or kill some of its senior leaders, the sources said. The need to put the transfer into practice became even more apparent in March with the capture in Pakistan of Abu Zubaydah, a Palestinian and senior al-Qaeda planner.
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