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Al Qaeda Says It Has Broken Ties With Syrian Affiliate Al Qaeda Breaks Ties With Syrian Affiliate
(about 5 hours later)
Al Qaeda’s top leadership moved publicly on Monday to sever the organization’s relationship with its Syrian affiliate, which has been widely blamed in recent months for stoking rebel infighting in Syria’s civil war. ISTANBUL — Al Qaeda’s central leadership has officially cut ties with a powerful jihadist group that has flourished in the chaos of the civil war in Syria and that rushed to build an Islamic state on its own terms, antagonizing the wider rebel movement.
In a statement distributed on jihadist websites, the Qaeda leadership said it no longer had any connection with the affiliate, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, also known as the Islamic State of Syria and the Levant, which has asserted an increasingly important role in the Syrian conflict and stoked the enmity of other groups fighting to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad. The animosity between the group, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, and other rebel groups has fueled the deadliest infighting yet between the foes of President Bashar al-Assad and sapped their campaign to depose him.
While the authenticity of the statement could not be confirmed, the SITE Intelligence Group, an organization that tracks jihadist communications on the Internet, posted a summary of the statement on its website, suggesting it was credible. Though the isolation of the group could lead to greater unity among other rebel forces, it is unlikely to assuage fears in the United States and elsewhere about the increasing power of extremists in Syria.
The motivation for severing the relationship appeared to reflect the Qaeda leadership’s own effort to assert more influence over the jihadist elements of the Syrian insurgency and not side with one faction or another. The statement said Al Qaeda disapproved of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and had “ordered it to stop” acting in Al Qaeda’s name. The break between Al Qaeda and ISIS, announced late Sunday on jihadist websites, actually served both sides, according to William McCants, a scholar of militant Islam at the Brookings Institution. Al Qaeda cut ties with a group that was besmirching the Al Qaeda name among other militants, while ISIS boosted its image as a force to reckon with.
According to a translation of the statement quoted by The Associated Press, Al Qaeda condemned the rebel infighting in Syria. “We distance ourselves from the sedition taking place among the mujahedeen factions and of the forbidden blood shed by any faction,” the statement was quoted as saying. “ISIS is now officially the biggest and baddest global jihadi group on the planet,” Mr. McCants said. “Nothing says ‘hard-core’ like being cast out by Al Qaeda.”
Angered by what they called the arrogant behavior of fighters loyal to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and the organization’s tendency to commandeer resources, other Syrian groups began to violently clash with it starting in late 2013. Many of the clashes were deadly, and most were confined to the northern and eastern parts of Syria, where the rebellion against Mr. Assad is most pronounced. The rise of the group has largely reflected what many analysts see as the diminished clout of the original Al Qaeda organization and the rise of affiliates and other militant groups that share its ideology but run their own affairs.
While the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria shares the common insurgent goal of deposing Mr. Assad and his followers, it wants to replace the government with a strict Islamic state. Rifts between Al Qaeda and ISIS emerged last year, when the Qaeda leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, ordered it to withdraw from Syria and leave the insurgency there to be run by the official Al Qaeda affiliate, the Nusra Front. ISIS refused.
In early January, another Qaeda-linked group in Syria, the Nusra Front, proposed a cease-fire in the rebel infighting and the establishment of a special Islamic court to resolve any disputes, but that solution apparently never advanced. Its haste to seize resources like oil fields and border crossings brought it into conflict with other rebels, and widespread clashes between the sides in recent weeks have left thousands dead across northern and eastern Syria, according to partisan activist groups. That violence has led to harsh criticisms of ISIS from other rebel leaders who consider the group just as dangerous as Mr. Assad.
The nearly three-year-old Syrian conflict has left an estimated 130,000 people dead and millions displaced, with no sign of resolution. Last week, the first face-to-face peace talks took place between the Assad government and an opposition coalition group, which ended in acrimony, although Lakhdar Brahimi, the special United Nations envoy for Syria, said further talks could take place later this month. On Monday, an ISIS bomber detonated himself at a rebel base in northern Syria, killing 16 fighters and wounding 20, activists said.
In what appeared to be a concession by Mr. Brahimi to the Syrian government aimed at ensuring its participation in another round of talks, the United Nations announced on Monday that Mr. Brahimi’s deputy, Nasser al-Kidwa, was resigning, effective this week. Such attacks have led an influential Saudi cleric who is based in Syria and was once close to the group to disown it and call on its fighters to defect.
Syrian officials had objected to Mr. Kidwa, a former foreign minister of the Palestinian Authority, which is negotiating with Israel over a future Palestinian state. Mr. Kidwa also is a nephew of Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader who died in 2004 and who was said to have been despised by Mr. Assad’s father, Hafez, a former president of Syria. In a video posted online on Sunday, the cleric, Abdullah al-Muheiseni, said that one of the group’s suicide attacks had killed a 12-year-old boy. Another destroyed a water facility and killed a civilian man.
A statement by the office of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, posted on the United Nations website, gave no reason for Mr. Kidwa’s departure, but said he had indicated to Mr. Ban “his willingness to serve the United Nations in other capacities, should the secretary general wish.” “That brother who blew himself up, what is his destiny now before the Almighty God?” Sheikh Muheiseni said.
In a written statement posted on jihadist forums, Al Qaeda accused ISIS of not working with other groups, naming its own leaders and trying to impose authority on the wider community.
The statement called on all groups in Syria to work together to spare the blood of Muslims and to remain loyal to the teachings of Osama bin Laden.
American intelligence and counterterrorism analysts said that the group’s increasing economic independence — largely through revenue from commandeered oil fields, border tolls, extortion and granary sales — has allowed it to thrive without links to Qaeda leaders in Pakistan.
“Although the Al Qaeda brand still carries weight among jihadists worldwide, ISIS has never been dependent on the Al Qaeda core for resources or direction, so the tangible impact of the decision may not be that significant,” a counterterrorism official said.
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak about intelligence reports, said that Al Qaeda’s official Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front, is now likely to try to benefit from its exclusive Qaeda credentials.
Inside Syria, however, those credentials appeared to be less significant than Nusra’s efforts to maintain good relations with other rebel groups.
“We have no problems with Nusra and we fight with them sometimes in the same trench,” a rebel fighter, Nader Ramandan, said in a Skype conversation from northern Idlib Province. While he disagreed with Nusra’s ideology, he said, he did not consider the group a threat and hoped it would help get rid of ISIS.
Nearly three years of civil war in Syria have left more than 130,000 people dead and destabilized neighboring countries. On Monday, a suicide bomber blew himself up in a bus south of the Lebanese capital, Beirut, killing himself and wounding other passengers. The bombing was the latest in a series of attacks that have targeted civilian areas across Lebanon.
Also on Monday, at least 30 people, including 13 children and three women, were killed in aerial bombardments by the Syrian government in the northern city of Aleppo, according to the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Similar attacks have killed scores of people in the city in recent days.
International efforts have so far failed to stop the war, and a first round of international peace talks concluded in Geneva last week with no concrete progress.
In what appeared to be a concession to the Syrian government, the United Nations announced on Monday that the deputy to Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations special envoy for Syria, was resigning, effective this week.
The deputy, Nasser al-Kidwa, a former foreign minister of the Palestinian Authority, is also the nephew of Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader who died in 2004. Mr. Assad’s father and predecessor, Hafez al-Assad, was said to have despised Mr. Arafat, and Syrian officials objected to Mr. Kidwa’s role in the talks.
A statement by the office of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, posted on the United Nations website, gave no reason for Mr. Kidwa’s departure.