Protesters wave a black jihadi flag as they demonstrate to denounce air strikes by U.S. drones, outside of the house of Yemen's President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi in Sanaa, on January 28, 2013. (Khaled Abdullah Ali Al Mahdi/Reuters)
Al Qaeda Is Back -- Bruce Riedel, Daily Beast
Jailbreaks in Iraq. A surge in Syria. A growing presence in Lebanon. The terrorist group’s influence is on the rise, says Bruce Riedel.
Two spectacular al Qaeda prison breaks in Iraq, freeing over 500 of its members in two separate prisons simultaneously this week, demonstrate the group is back with a vengeance. Al Qaeda’s Iraq branch is also the moving force behind the jihadist success in Syria. The resurgence of al Qaeda in Iraq has sobering implications for what is likely to follow the drawdown of NATO forces in Afghanistan for the al Qaeda mother ship in Pakistan.
The double jailbreaks at Abu Ghraib and Taji prisons were massive attacks. Suicide bombers, teams of attackers using mortars and small arms, and two dozen car bombs were used. The firefight killed over a hundred Iraqi guards. The attackers also had inside help within the Iraqi security forces. The attacks were the culmination of what al Qaeda in Iraq’s leadership had promised a year ago when it launched the “Breaking the Walls” offensive to free its prisoners from Iraqi jails.
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My Comment: I concur with this assessment. Rumors and assertions that Al Qaeda's was dying were/are greatly exaggerated.
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