On 9/11 anniversary, al-Qaeda rebounding as threat — experts
NEW YORK (AFP) — AlQaeda is on the rise again in the shadow of the Islamic State (IS) group in Syria, 16 years after the jihadists shocked the United States in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, experts said on Monday.
They said that Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Sunni group that last month seized control of the northern Syrian city of Idlib, is simply a “rebranding” of al-Qaeda that is positioning itself as more moderate than the IS in hopes of a resurgence.
“IS may be today’s preeminent terrorist threat, but al-qaeda in Syria is worrisome. It is al-Qaeda’s largest global affiliate at this point,” said former White House counterterrorism director Joshua Geltzer.
Speaking on the current terror threat against the United States at the New America think tank, Geltzer and other experts said they expect HTS to take center stage among jihadists as the IS group loses ground on the battlefield in Syria and Iraq.
HTS is simply a cosmetic name-change for al-Qaeda, they said.
In consolidating control of much of Idlib province, it has eliminated or absorbed rival groups, and is modernizing its propaganda on the web-savvy model of the IS.
“The organization itself seems to have more lives than a cat,” said Daveed GartensteinRoss, co-author with Geltzer of a New America report on the current jihadist threat.