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handle is hein.crs/govegak0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congre s&onaI Resedrch Sern anfrming Ih Ieg ilaive dIebate sin o 1914 0 Updated May 6, 2022 Al Qaeda: Background, Current Status, and U.S. Policy Al Qaeda (AQ) is a transnational Sunni Islamist terrorist organization and network of affiliates that the U.S. intelligence community described as of early 2022 as one of the groups that probably pose the greatest threat to U.S. persons and interests abroad and a potential source of inspiration to domestic violent extremists. Sustained counterterrorism (CT) pressure has weakened the group since it perpetrated the September 11, 2001 (9/11) attacks. In its March 2022 annual public threat assessment, the U.S. intelligence community stated that Al Qaeda is constrained in its efforts to lead a unified global movement but will try to capitalize on permissive operating environments. U.S. officials characterize the AQ threat as stemming mainly from its affiliates, which have generally focused on local issues in their respective areas of operation, where they threaten local U.S. personnel, interests, and partners. Background In 1988, Osama bin Laden established Al Qaeda from a network of Arab and other foreign veterans of the Afghan insurgency against the Soviet Union, with the aim of supporting Islamist causes in conflicts around the world. After the 1991 Gulf War, citing opposition to the decision by Saudi Arabia to host U.S. troops, the group made the United States its primary target. Bin Laden left his native Saudi Arabia that year and relocated to Sudan, until the Taliban took power in Afghanistan in 1996 and offered refuge to AQ members and other armed Islamists. Al Qaeda conducted a series of terrorist attacks against U.S. and allied targets prior to 9/11, including the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania (after which the United States launched airstrikes against targets in Afghanistan and Sudan) and the 2000 attack on the USS Cole in Yemen. The United States designated Al Qaeda as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) in 1999. After the 9/11 attacks, the United States launched military operations to topple the Taliban government in Afghanistan and expanded its CT efforts worldwide. Some AQ leaders fled to Pakistan, where U.S. forces killed Bin Laden in 2011. AQ attacks against U.S. and Western targets worldwide continued in the years after 9/11, but the group has not successfully carried out a major attack inside the United States since then. Leadership AQ's leader, or emir, is Ayman al Zawahiri, an Egyptian who succeeded Bin Laden. Some attribute purported AQ struggles (including its failure to strike inside the United States) to what they describe as Zawahiri's understated leadership, as compared to Bin Laden's charisma. Others argue that Zawahiri's more restrained approach is an asset that has created space for AQ affiliates to pursue regionally tailored strategies and make inroads into local communities. Widespread reports that Zawahiri (70) has been ill have raised questions about the group's future leadership. Zawahiri's former deputy, Abu Khayr al Masri, was killed by a U.S. drone strike in Syria in 2017; Al Mash's successor was killed in Iran in August 2020, reportedly by Israeli agents. Their deaths, and that of Bin Laden's son Hamza (whose killing in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region was announced by President Trump in 2019), leave Saif al Adl as Zawahiri's likely successor. Al Adl is reported to reside in Iran, which has allowed some AQ figures to operate in its territory despite historic enmity between Sunni Al Qaeda and Iran's Shia Islamic Republic government. AQ leaders may view Iran as relatively safe from U.S. counterterrorism pressure, while Iran may view AQ's presence as leverage against the United States, as well as an opportunity to support another U.S. adversary. Structure Al Qaeda once had a hierarchical organization, a relatively small and geographically contained membership, and claimed to be the vanguard and global leader of Islamist terrorism. The attenuation of AQ core leadership, the growth of regional affiliates, and the rise of the Islamic State have changed Al Qaeda greatly. For years, analysts have debated how to characterize the shifting ties between AQ leaders and groups that have pledged allegiance to Al Qaeda, and among these self- described affiliates. Some contend that Al Qaeda remains essentially a centrally governed organization, with the group's leaders providing marching orders to its various affiliates; others describe a hub and spoke model in which leaders provide inspiration, strategic vision, and some financial support but little in the way of direct tactical supervision. In 2022, the analytical consensus appears to view AQ as having devolved operational responsibility to regional affiliates as it has shifted away from centrally directed plotting, per the 2022 annual threat assessment. Al Qaeda may persist as a group that inspires ideologically motivated terrorism against U.S. interests around the world and opportunistically enters (or secures the allegiance of participants in) local conflicts. Changes in the relative balance of these elements of the group's identity and structure may in turn spur changes in the focus of U.S. counterterrorism efforts over time. Status in Afghanistan The Taliban's August 2021 return to power in Afghanistan gave Al Qaeda a significant boost, per United Nations sanctions monitors, and traditional AQ allies (such as figures linked to the Haqqani Network) have prominent roles in the Taliban government. Since congratulating the Taliban in August 2021, AQ has maintained a strategic silence, likely an effort not to compromise Taliban efforts to gain international recognition and legitimacy, in light of

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