http://www.thenational.ae/thenationa...qaeda-in-syria
.Al Qaeda in Syria?
Arabic News Digest
Feb 20, 2012
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-------Al Qaeda in Syria may regroup after the release of Abu Musab Al Suri, the 'mufti of murder'
Abu Musab Al Suri, one of Al Qaeda's foremost strategists, was recently released from an Aleppo prison but the story somehow did not make big news, wrote Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi writer, in Saturday's edition of the London-based newspaper Al Hayat.
Mr Al Suri was reportedly captured by the US army in Pakistan several years ago and, oddly, handed over to the Syrian authorities. Now he is out there, but nobody knows where exactly in a very unstable Syria, the writer said.
Soon after his release, two bomb attacks hit security buildings in the city of Aleppo, north-west of Syria. Sure enough, Al Qaeda's Iraq branch issued a statement endorsing "jihad in Syria," though not explicitly claiming responsibility for the attacks.
"The Al Qaeda statement was credible, unlike the awkwardly worded and flagrantly fabricated statements the [Syrian] regime sometimes comes up with," the writer said. "It also revealed in some detail the migration of Al Qaeda's followers from Iraq into Syria."
Reports from Iraq's Anbar province, which is close to the Syrian border, say there are concerted efforts to fundraise and stockpile medicines - and even weapons - to bring support to the Syrian people against the regime of President Bashar Al Assad, the writer said.
"You can see that the right conditions are there for Al Qaeda to recruit."
Indeed, the probability of Al Qaeda becoming a key factor in Syrian affairs is undeniable, and the release of Mr Al Suri makes that probability a solid one.
He is one of "Al Qaeda's theorists," the writer said. "And I dare say that he, Abu Qatada Al Filistini and Abu Mohammed Al Maqdisi are the ones who made Al Qaeda as we know it …
"They did not join Osama bin Laden; he joined them," he went on.
"I know the man well. I interviewed him before … He is radical beyond limits. He theorised terrorism in Algeria, and issued fatwas to kill and made violating people's privacy and possessions permissible.
"He used to record his gibberish in cassette tapes and weekly pamphlets that were distributed at the entrance of mosques around London and from there would find their way to Algeria. He was the mufti of murder and blood par excellence."
If Mr Abu Musab managed to stoke fitna (instability fuelled by religious or sectarian differences) in a country like Algeria, which has an overwhelming Sunni majority, it is anyone's guess what he could achieve in Syria, which boasts an intricate constellation of sects