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Hizballah and Al-Qaeda: Friends or Foes?

(Beirut Daily Star) Haytham Mouzahem - The final report of the Sept. 11 Commission in the U.S. argued that al-Qaeda had ties with Iran and Hizballah, but it also concluded there was no collaboration between Iraq and al-Qaeda. The report noted that "the relationship between al-Qaeda and Iran demonstrated that Sunni-Shiite divisions did not necessarily pose an insurmountable barrier to cooperation in terrorist operations." It is true that Sunni-Shiite differences are in no way obstacles to cooperation between Islamist groups such as the Shiite Hizballah and Palestinian Islamist movements such as Hamas or Islamic Jihad. But the Sept. 11 Commission did not observe that al-Qaeda was a very different Sunni group than the Palestinian ones; it is an extremist Wahhabi movement that considers Shiites nonbelievers. The relation between the Iraq's Baath regime and al-Qaeda began in 1998, when Saddam Hussein allowed the group to establish training camps in Iraq. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was reportedly the broker of this connection. The alliance may have resurfaced after the U.S. invasion through the unexpected cooperation between the two parties in attacking coalition forces, Iraqi policemen and civilians, and Shiite leaders and holy shrines. The tight organization and apparent logistical network behind the al-Qaeda suicide operations suggest there may have been preparation for those attacks with the Baath regime, which provided al-Qaeda with organizational and intelligence assistance as well as money and maybe combatants. It was bizarre indeed that al-Qaeda and Saddam's followers should have focused their attacks so strongly against Shiite religious and political leaders, killing thousands of civilians, instead of focusing on targeting the occupation forces. That strongly implied both a deep hatred for the Shiites and a desire to prevent them from playing any major role in post-war Iraq.
2004-08-20 00:00:00
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