Al Qaeda Now Controls More Territory Than Ever

Image from the Blog of Jim Craven

Al Qaeda Controls More Territory Than Ever In Middle East -- Peter Bergen and Jennifer Rowland, CNN

(CNN) -- From around Aleppo in western Syria to small areas of Falluja in central Iraq, al Qaeda now controls territory that stretches more than 400 miles across the heart of the Middle East, according to English and Arab language news accounts as well as accounts on jihadist websites.

Indeed, al Qaeda appears to control more territory in the Arab world than it has done at any time in its history.

The focus of al Qaeda's leaders has always been regime change in the Arab world in order to install Taliban-style regimes. Al Qaeda's leader Ayman al-Zawahiri acknowledged as much in his 2001 autobiography, "Knights Under the Banner of the Prophet," when he explained that the most important strategic goal of al Qaeda was to seize control of a state, or part of a state, somewhere in the Muslim world, explaining that, "without achieving this goal our actions will mean nothing."

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My Comment: Throw in the territory that they control and/or have an influence over in Africa, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, etc. .... one can then say that if they were a country they would then be one of the "largest" in the world. But here is the scary part .... they are still expanding.