Beatriz Yubero: "Al-Qaeda will have a successor and there will also be a response"

In the latest edition of Onda Madrid's "De cara al mundo", we had the participation of Beatriz Yubero, international analyst and expert on the Middle East and counter-terrorism, who analysed the current situation of Al-Qaeda after the United States eliminated the leader of the terrorist organisation, Ayman al-Zawahiri, in Kabul.

Beatriz, we have read with great attention in Atalayar your article on what the disappearance of Al-Qaeda's leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, the person who succeeded Osama bin Laden, means. We wonder what will happen now?

Several fronts are now open. Firstly, this has been a success for Joe Biden's administration, which was going through a rather questionable period and which has come out ahead, not only thanks to a series of implementations and changes it has implemented in the United States, such as the environmental plan or the challenge to China, but also because it needed a blow to the outside world, and this blow has undoubtedly been the elimination of Ayman al-Zawahiri, one of the most wanted terrorists at the moment.

On the other hand, another important gap has opened up with the Taliban. As we know, in 2020 they reached an agreement with the United States precisely to prevent Al-Qaeda from operating in the country, in Afghanistan, and yet we have seen that Ayman al-Zawahiri was at home in Kabul and that it has been months of work in which the terrorist has adopted a series of routines. All members of his family were also identified; he was with his children, his wife and grandchildren, and it was a clean attack. Nevertheless, it was a breach of that pact with the Taliban.

However, even if we now think that the organisation is now headless, in reality, what you have to think about is that it is an organisation that has already been headless under Osama bin Laden, previously under al-Zarqawaii and now under Ayman al-Zawahiri. Undoubtedly, they will have a successor, who is currently being sought and discussed, and there will also be a response, we do not know if it will be joint, with the Daesh, or if it will be the Taliban who will somehow manage to repress that response, at least in their territory.

Daesh and Al-Qaeda are two terrorist organisations that have many differences, but in these moments of certain weakness, can they think of some kind of joint action?

They have many differences, but we should not forget that the Islamic State is a splinter of Al-Qaeda. At a time when Al-Qaeda was looking for that resurgence and that encouragement again for other terrorist organisations, and was even reinforcing propaganda and encouraging other organisations like the Islamic State, which is at its lowest period at the moment, it is possible to think that, of course, they could do some kind of joint organisation. Everything will depend on who succeeds Ayman al-Zawahiri.

We should not deceive ourselves, the terrorist threat is still constant. We have seen how people with knives have carried out various attacks in several European countries, a much lower profile, fortunately, than at other times, but, the terrorist threat remains.

The terrorist threat remains and will always be there. These types of terrorist organisations do not end, they evolve. We have seen it with Al-Qaeda, we have seen it with the Islamic State, but we have seen it with other terrorist organisations and even with the Sahel, with Boko Haram. I believe that the threat remains and will remain, because it has a strong ideological and political component, which is the purpose of any terrorist organisation, unlike any other organised crime group. 

Therefore, we cannot let our guard down, especially now, at a time when we are looking for a successor, and the two names that resonate the most are two of Al-Qaeda's most wanted leaders. There is the name of Saif al-Adel, who is a young man who could be in contention to succeed al-Zawahiri, although he is still in doubt because of his business connection to Iran. And then there is the name Abderrahmane al-Maghrebi, better known as Mohamed Abattatay, the son-in-law of Ayman al-Zawahiri, who was a long-time media arm of Al-Qaeda.

Is the threat from Iran through the militias that they finance in various countries a concern?

The regional threat is always there. It is a regional actor that disputes control, along with other countries, of the region. Indeed, Iran supports militias like Hezbollah in Lebanon and, of course, Iran's aim is always going to be to destabilise as much as possible Europe, the West and its opponents in the region. Of course, it will go to the financing of terrorist militias in different countries.