Al-Qaida Deputy Calls For Violence Against Coalition Forces
Posted June 22, 2006 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Sitting next to an automatic rifle, Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida deputy called for violence against coalition forces in Afghanistan in a videotaped message.
Ayman al-Zawahri’s missive was posted to an Islamic website and came as four U.S. soldiers were killed trying to block enemy forces movement.
“I am calling upon the Muslims in Kabul in particular and in all Afghanistan in general and for the sake of God to stand up in an honest stand in the face of the infidel forces that are invading Muslim lands,” said al-Zawahri.
The message from al-Qaida’s number two man provoked Afghan President Hamid Karzai to denounce him as “the enemy of the Afghan people.”
Coalition military spokespersons warned Wednesday that “significant violence” might be on the horizon in the southern part of the country, where thousands of multinational troops are trying to root out Taliban insurgents and restore law and order.
Karzai expressed concern about the ongoing war on terror and the approach taken so far, saying the deaths of hundreds of Afghans – Taliban or not – was a tragedy.
“It is not acceptable for us that in all this fighting, Afghans are dying. In the last three to four weeks, 500 to 600 Afghans were killed. (Even) if they are Taliban, they are sons of this land,” he said.
More than 600 people, most of them insurgents, have been killed in recent weeks as coalition forces launched Operation Mountain Thrust – the biggest strike since the Taliban was ousted in 2001.
Al-Zawahri and bin Laden are believed to be hiding out somewhere along the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
