Global Security Newswire

Though al-Qaeda continues to pose a meaningful danger to the United States, that threat has been hampered by funding shortfalls, difficulties in planning strikes outside of South Asia and issues related to training recruits, a senior U.S. counterterrorism official said last week (see GSN, Dec. 7).

The terrorist organization's long-running goal of toppling Arab governments through terrorist attacks has not met success, said Daniel Benjamin, U.S. coordinator for counterterrorism.

Attacks on random Muslim civilians in Iraq and Pakistan have isolated al-Qaeda from many former supporters of the group, which has aimed to set up Islamic emirates in the Middle East, Benjamin said, according to a U.S. State Department report.

“The result has been both popular disaffection and a backlash from clerics in Muslim countries who have issued fatwas (religious edicts) against the killing of other Muslims, notably in Iraq,” he said in the release.

Still, the terrorist organization responsible for masterminding the Sept. 11 attacks has shown resilience, particularly when it is acting in poorly governed parts of the globe where there is tribal fighting, Benjamin said.

Washington is supporting local efforts in some poorly governed parts of the Afghanistan-Pakistan region aimed at eliminating safe havens for al-Qaeda, Benjamin said. Work also continues within the global financial community to limit funding sources for the organization and its compatriots.

As a result of reduced funding, organizations allied with al-Qaeda have resorted to relying on ransom raised from kidnapping operations, he said. This has led Washington to urge foreign governments to enact policies that prohibit awarding concessions to terrorists, he said.

More still needs to be done, the counterterrorism official said.

"The threat is global and our enemies latch onto grievances on behalf of the entire Muslim world, so we must work to resolve the longstanding problems that fuel those grievances," especially the Arab-Israeli conflict, Benjamin said (U.S. State Department release, Dec. 11).