According to reports, the terrorist godfather said – quote – “The Americans, Russians, Iranians, Alawites, and Hezbollah are coordinating their war against us — are we not capable of stopping the fighting amongst ourselves so we can direct all our efforts against them?”
Given the context of global rivalry between Al Qaeda and ISIL, it was widely understood as though he was offering an olive branch to his fellow terrorists-in-arms in order to unite against the rest of the world. But, at the same time, the surprise announcement also brought Al Qaeda back into the headlines that it’s largely been absent from ever since ISIL started brutally rising to power around 18 months ago.
With anti-terrorist experts once more being reminded that Al Qaeda does in fact still exist, and might actually be hatching an evil plan to unite with ISIL, Ayman al-Zawahiri is the man in the news this week.
To discuss in more detail we are joined by Vladimir Sotnikov, Director at the East-West strategic studies center, Moscow-based think-tank (studio guest); Andrew Hammond, Mideast policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations and Author — "The Illusion of Reform in Saudi Arabia"; Tayyab Baloch, Islamabad-based journalist, founder of The Silk Post, and reporter at Abb Takk TV and Manish Chand, CEO & Editor-in-Chief, India Writes Network.
