Abu al-Layth Ali Ammar Ashur al-Libi (Arabic : أبو الليث على عمار عاشور الليبي, romanized: ʾAbū al-Layth ʿAlī ʿAmmār ʿĀshūr al-Lībī; 1 January 1967 – 29 January 2008) was a Libyan militant who was a leader of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan who appeared in several al-Qaeda videos. He was believed to have been active in the tribal regions of Waziristan. [1] [2] He also served as an al Qaeda spokesman. According to the Defense Intelligence Agency, he was an "expert in guerilla warfare." [3]
The Defense Intelligence Agency says he was born in 1967. [3] [4] In the 1980s he was one of the Afghan Arabs who came to Afghanistan to fight the Soviet Union during the Soviet–Afghan War. [5] He returned to Libya in 1994 and took part in a failed attempt to oust Muammar Gaddafi. [6] In the wake of this attempt al-Libi escaped to Saudi Arabia, where he was imprisoned in Riyadh following the Khobar Towers bombing. Sometime thereafter he was either released or managed to escape, and came to Afghanistan to collaborate with al-Qaeda and the Taliban. [5] In 1997, a dispute between the two oldest brothers of the Canadian Khadr family, Abdullah and Abdurahman, was mediated by al-Libi, who earned their confidence and respect telling them about Dubai and Ferraris, and they later referred to him as a "really cool" person. [7] In 2002, he approached the father Ahmed Khadr about letting the 15-year-old Omar serve as a translator for some Arab "visitors" in the region. When a gun-battle resulted in the young translator being sent to Guantanamo Bay detention camp, al-Libi tried to placate the family with gifts and apologies, but Khadr remained furious and refused to associate with al-Libi, whom he blamed for not taking care of his son. [7]
In May 2005 when Abu Faraj al-Libbi was captured in Pakistan, his identity was confused in many reports with Abu al-Layth al-Libi. [8]
Al-Libi was seen in two online videos in 2007, the first of which called for the kidnapping of Westerners. The second claimed preparations were being made for war against Israel and the subsequent imposition of Islam in the world. [6] In February of that year he is said to have been involved in the Bagram Air Base bombing, which al-Qaeda claimed was an attempted assassination of U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney. In November 2007 he reported the merger of Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a Libyan group waging jihad against Gaddafi, with al-Qaeda; this would be his last public appearance before his death. [6]
On January 31, 2008, al-Libi was reported to have been killed by a targeted killing drone attack from an unmanned CIA Predator drone, either late Monday, January 28, or early Tuesday, January 29, 2008. [6] [9] [10] CNN attributed reports of his death to a "knowledgeable western official", and an "unnamed military source".[ citation needed ]
MSNBC reported that some intelligence sources describe him as the number three leader of al Qaeda. [11]
On January 31, 2008, it was reported by the SITE Intelligence Group that he had been killed after a message appeared on Ekhlaas.org, an Islamist website. [5] [12]
[Libi] was martyred with a group of his brothers in the land of Muslim Pakistan ... Though we are sad for his loss, he left a legacy that will inflame the enemy nation and religion.
— Ekhlaas.org, [13]
Other members of al Qaeda's cadre of leaders have been reported to have been killed by the airstrike that killed al Libi. [14] [15]
The Italian news source Adnkronos reported three other al Qaeda leaders were killed. [14] They were Abu Obeida Tawari al-Obeidi, Abu Adel al-Kuwaiti and Abdel Ghaffar al-Darnawi.
The Kuwaiti news source Arab Times also reported Abu Adel al-Kuwaiti was killed in the airstrike, but it asserted he was a Saudi, in spite of his name. [15] It reported the death in the airstrike of a second Saudi, named Tawari Rakhis Al-Mutairi, who had also lived in Kuwait for a long period of time. [16]
Michael McConnell, the USA's Director of National Intelligence, told members of the Senate Intelligence Committee [17]
The death last week of Abu Layth al-Libi, al Qaeda's charismatic senior military commander and a key link between al Qaeda and its affiliates in North Africa, is the most serious blow to the group's top leadership since the December 2005 death of then-external operations chief Hamza Rabia.
Turkistanis were among ten Al-Qaeda allies who were killed alongside Abu Sahil al-Libi and Abu al-Layth al-Libi. [18]
Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi was a Libyan national captured in Afghanistan in November 2001 after the fall of the Taliban; he was interrogated by American and Egyptian forces. The information he gave under torture to Egyptian authorities was cited by the George W. Bush administration in the months preceding its 2003 invasion of Iraq as evidence of a connection between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda. That information was frequently repeated by members of the Bush administration, although reports from both the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) strongly questioned its credibility, suggesting that al-Libi was "intentionally misleading" interrogators.
Ayman Mohammed Rabie al-Zawahiri was an Egyptian-born pan-Islamist militant and physician who served as the second general emir of al-Qaeda from June 2011 until his death in July 2022. He is best known for being one of the main orchestrators of the September 11 attacks.
The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), also known as Al-Jama'a al-Islamiyyah al-Muqatilah bi-Libya, was an armed Islamist group. Militants participated in the 2011 Libyan Civil War as the Libyan Islamic Movement, and are involved in the Libyan Civil War as members of the Libya Shield Force. Alleged militants include alleged Al Qaeda organizer Abd al-Muhsin Al-Libi who now holds a key command position in the Libya Shield Force.
Mohamed Salah al-Din al-Halim Zaidan, commonly known by his nom de guerreSaif al-Adel, is a former Egyptian Army officer and explosives expert who is the de facto leader of al-Qaeda. Al-Adel fought the Soviets as an Afghan Arab before becoming a founding member of the al-Qaeda organization. He is a member of Al-Qaeda's Majlis al-Shura and has headed the organization's military committee since the death of Muhammad Atef in 2001. He is currently known to live in Iran along with several other senior members of the group.
Nazih Abdul-Hamed Nabih al-Ruqai'i, known by the alias Abu Anas al-Libi, was a Libyan under indictment in the United States for his part in the 1998 United States embassy bombings. He worked as a computer specialist for al-Qaeda. He was an ethnic Libyan, born in Tripoli.
Ahmed Saïd Khadr was an Egyptian-Canadian with alleged ties to al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan. His activity in Afghanistan began in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and he has been described as having had ties to a number of militants within the Afghan mujahideen, including Saudi militant Osama bin Laden. Khadr was accused by Canada and the United States of being a "senior associate" and financier of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.
Abu Faraj al-Libi is an assumed name or nom de guerre of a Libyan alleged to be a senior member of the al-Qaeda terrorist organization. His real name is Mustafa Faraj Muhammad Muhammad Masud al-Jadid al-Uzaybi. He was arrested by Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) on May 2, 2005, in Mardan. Finding al-Libi was a joint effort of the Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) Special Activities Division and Pakistan's Special Forces.
The Khalden training camp was one of the oldest and best-known military training camps in Afghanistan. It was located in the mountains of eastern Paktia Province, near Tora Bora.
On 13 January 2006 the Central Intelligence Agency fired missiles into the Pakistani village of Damadola in the Bajaur tribal area, near the Afghan border, killing at least 18 people. United States officials later admitted that no al-Qaeda leaders perished in the strike and that only local villagers were killed. The attack purportedly targeted Ayman al-Zawahiri, second-in-command of al-Qaeda after Osama bin Laden, who was thought to be in the village.
During the 2001 Invasion of Afghanistan, many Taliban, al-Qaeda and militant fighters were captured and held at military bases in the region. On several occasions, there were instances of mass escapes.
There have been several video and audio recordings featuring former Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri between 2003 until his death in 2022.
Mir Ali or Mirali is a town in North Waziristan District, in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Mirali is located in the Tochi Valley, about 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) east of Miramshah, 40 kilometres (25 mi) west of Bannu, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and 70 kilometres (43 mi) southeast of the city of Khost, Afghanistan. Mirali is at an altitude of 674 metres (2,211 ft).
Al Liby, or variations, is a surname, alias or nom-de-guerre used by several individuals from Libya. Variations include al Libi, al-Libi, al-Liby and al-Libby. People with the name include:
Abu Yahya al-Libi, born Mohamed Hassan Qaid, was a terrorist and leading high-ranking official within al-Qaeda, and an alleged member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.
In late January 2008 the CIA launched missiles from unmanned aerial vehicles at a house in North Waziristan where they believed a militant summit was taking place.
Abu Hamza Rabia was an Egyptian member of al-Qaeda, described in news accounts as a high-ranking leader within the organization's hierarchy. His death in a surprise CIA drone attack was widely reported by media outlets around the world.
Abdullah Said al-Libi was described as being an al Qaeda operational leader in Pakistan. He is reported to have previously served in the Libyan military. He led an al-Qaeda paramilitary force. Said al-Libi was killed in a drone strike on 17 December 2009 in North Waziristan. In April 2009 he had released a statement where he identified himself as the leader of al Qaeda's efforts to take control of Khorasan - an ancient Islamic province that included Afghanistan, Pakistan, and some neighboring areas.
Since the late 1990s, several members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group had decided to leave the band, most of them joining other armed organizations.
Abu-Zaid al Kuwaiti was a high-ranking member of Al-Qaeda, and was considered a potential successor to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the head of the Salafist jihad group. Abu-Zaid was killed in a drone strike in Pakistan.
Abu Omar al-Turkistani was a high-ranking commander for several al-Qaeda-affiliated groups, such as the Islamic Jihad Union (IJU), the Al-Nusra Front and the Turkistan Islamic Party in Syria (TIP). Active as a militant since at least 2001, al-Turkistani fought in both the War in Afghanistan and the Syrian Civil War. By late 2016, he was considered to be "one of top ten leading 'jihadists' in Syria" and one of the "four most prominent leaders" of TIP. Shortly before his death, al-Turkistani helped to facilitate the merger of many Islamist rebel groups into Tahrir al-Sham. He was eventually killed by an American drone strike on 1 January 2017.
Al Qaeda operational leader Abu Layth Al Libi also has claimed that "the preparations we [Al Qaeda] make and all the fighting in the cause of God we carry out in the east and west is preparation and training for fighting the Jews in the Al Aqsa Mosque [in Jerusalem]."
Today's report of the capture of a top Al Qaeda operative, Abu Farraj al-Libbi, represents a critical victory in the war on terror. Now al-Libbi was a top general for bin Laden. He was a major facilitator and chief planner for the Al Qaeda network. His arrest removed a dangerous enemy who was a direct threat to America.
A jihadi Web site today carried a banner congratulating the Muslim worldwide community for the 'martyrdom of Sheikh Abu Al-Laith Al-Libi.'