History of Al Qaeda - 2002 - Present
Group - Alexis Irlbeck and Megan Andersen
Many of us have heard of a terrorist group called “Al Qaeda” but know very little about the actual group or its history. Al Qaeda is a radical Islamic group formed in 1988 by Osama bin Laden to begin and participate in terrorist activities and is against Western foreign policy, specifically America’s. This terrorist group is worldwide, but is predominantly known as being composed of Middle Eastern countries or Muslims. Many famous attacks have been carried out by or blamed on Al Qaeda, including the 9/11 tragedy, the 1998 US Embassy Bombings, and the 2002 Bali Bombings, which have led to extreme Islamophobia in many parts of the world. With a basic background of Al Qaeda covered, we are going to move on and look at the history and major events of Al Qaeda from 2002 until the present.
Osama bin Laden, founder of Al Qaeda
As was stated earlier, Al Qaeda was founded in 1988 by Osama bin Laden with the intention to drive all traces of Americans or American culture out of Muslim countries, destroy Israel, and get rid of Middle Eastern dictatorships that followed Western ideology and culture. By 2002, that was still the goal set forth. The previous year, Al Qaeda had succeeded in hijacking four planes, crashing two of them into the Twin Towers and thus shocking the nation. This was by far their most successful attack, and in 2002, they carried out several other attacks in Tunisia, Bali, Saudi Arabia, on the Limburg, and many other places. During this year, the United States ended “Operation Anaconda” as an attempt to destroy Al Qaeda and the Taliban without any success.
2002 Bali Bombings
On March 20, 2003, the United States once again became involved and attacked Iraq, only to later formally declare “Major Combat” in May of the same year, although Osama bin Laden had declared Jihad on “the Americans Occupying the Country of the Two Sacred Places” several years before. The next year was the year of Al Qaeda suicide attacks, as they were accused of carrying many of them out in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Spain, and Morocco. There was also a beheading of an American hostage, Nick Berg, instigated by this group and later criticism of the Saudi Arabian government for becoming “too close” with America.
Throughout the next four years, there were several men put on trial due to accusations of planning the 9/11 attacks. Many of Al Qaeda’s high ranking members were either killed or arrested during this time, causing bin Laden to speak out towards the American people, recommending that they read the book The Rogue State to find their path to peace. He then later released a video on the sixth anniversary of 9/11 of one of the suicide hijackers speaking his last words into a camera as a personal attack on Americans. Later in 2007, bin Laden told Europeans to stop supporting America in the war in Afghanistan.
Up through 2010, several key events in Al Qaeda history took place. Events such as bin Laden’s son, Saad, being killed by an American missile, an Al Qaeda supporter attempting to blow up a plane in Detroit, and then former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf not definitively stating that he’d hand over Osama bin Laden if he was found in Pakistan took precedence as the most important points in Al Qaeda history in this time period. However, 2011 would be one huge year in itself, almost as important as the 9/11 attacks of 2001.
Beginning in late April, the United States found a series of nine Islamic prayer houses, along with a formal mosque, all of which were believed to be where Al Qaeda members were recruited and trained. The same week, a famous commander in Afghanistan that controlled and regulated suicide bombings and funding for Al Qaeda, Abdul Ghani, was killed in an airstrike. Most importantly, though, was the death of the original founder of Al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden. This took place on May 1, 2011 and was carried out by the American CIA and Navy SEAL that discovered and killed bin Laden in his hiding place in Pakistan.
Since the death of Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda has been relatively quiet. A new leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri has taken power over the terrorist group. One important attack in which terrorists linked with this group took over 800 people hostage and killed a total of nearly 70 people near Amenas, Algeria was one of the largest attacks Al Qaeda had to date.
Currently, Al Qaeda has taken somewhat of a backseat with the ISIS drama taking place. A huge myth is that ISIS and Al Qaeda are allies, and even that they’re part of one larger radical Islamic group, when in fact, ISIS used to be the Iraqi Al Qaeda until February of 2014 when they refused to listen to orders from Al Qaeda headquarters instructing them to reduce violence against civilians. This is when they split, leading to two competing jihadist groups: ISIS and Al Qaeda. Overall, Al Qaeda had been the major, front-running terrorist group up until the time ISIS recently took the news, but Al Qaeda is still a more well-known household name that is responsible for many violent terrorist attacks.
If I've learned anything from researching the history, specifically key events in Al Qaeda's history, it's that this is far more of a violent group than I was aware of. School has never taught us about any of the acts Al Qaeda has carried out other than 9/11, and it lead me to wondering why we have been kept in the dark so long about this, and what else we haven't been told about other religious extremist or political groups. Anyways, I've come to the definitive conclusion that Al Qaeda is an awful group that hopefully can be taken down someday, just not by America attempting to engage in a war.
Sources
Al Qaeda General Information #1
Comments
Excellent job Alexis! Well written! I will say from now on, add the pictures directly inside the blog entry instead of linking them. Also, you didn't mention that they started in Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion.
As far as why you haven't been taught about these groups is that I am guessing this is the first and only class dedicated to current events. Since all of these topics are more current, history classes simply run out of time at the end of the year.
Radical religious/political groups are definitely the Nazi Germany of today, that is, the major enemy that we need to be aware of.