Zawahiri issues new video praising slain commander in Afghanistan

Al-Qaida’s deputy leader has issued a new video message praising one of the terrorist organization’s slain commanders in Afghanistan.

Al-Qaida’s deputy leader has issued a new video message praising one of the terrorist organization’s slain commanders in Afghanistan.

Ayman al-Zawahri also said in the video, posted on the Web on Wednesday, that he was issuing a book, entitled “The Exoneration,” that he said aimed to counteract an image of the Islamic world as “helpless, submissive, fearful” — the way he said America and the West want Islam to be.

In most of the nine-minute, 59-second tape, al-Zawahri pays tribute to Abu Laith al-Libi, who was viewed as a top al-Qaida strategist in Afghanistan and was killed in late January by a missile from a US Predator drone that struck his safehouse in Pakistan.

Pakistani intelligence considered him the operational commander of al-Qaida in the border region and one of the militant group’s most high-profile figures after its leader, Osama bin Laden, and al-Zawahri.

In the English-subtitled message, al-Zawahri described al-Libi as a “knight” of al-Qaida’s holy war. He was “a mountain of Jihad and a lion”. In tribute to al-Libi, he recited verses from the 10th century Muslim poet Abu Tayeb al-Mutannabi and the early 20th century Egyptian poet Ahmed Shawqi.

The authenticity of the video, posted on Islamic militant websites by al-Sahab, the group’s media branch, could not be immediately verified, but SITE and the IntelCenter, two US groups that monitor militant messages, also reported it. The al-Qaida No. 2 implicitly threatened the US and its allies, saying new leaders would replace al-Libi to continue the fight.

“Every time a martyr falls, another martyr grabs the banner from him, and every time a chief goes down in blood, another chief completes the march after him,” he said.