Despite his lengthy military background, the Egyptian President Abdul Fattah Al Sissi who rose to the rank of Field Marshall before removing his uniform has proved to be an accomplished diplomat and statesman, like reported by gulfnews.com.

Since he assumed office in June 2014 his prime focus has been on developing the economy, providing jobs, increasing tourism and overhauling his nation’s infrastructure.

He is a leader who has sought good relations with all major powers and works to find peaceful solutions to brewing conflicts.

Put simply, he is no warmonger and neither does he seek to use force in order to acquire territory or steal the natural resources of neighbouring states. Softly spoken, charismatic and known for his patience, it appears when it comes to a looming existential threat to Egypt posed by Libya, his patience is almost exhausted.

On Saturday, for the first time he put his cards on the table clearly delineating his red lines.

While stressing his preference for a ceasefire to be followed by a diplomatic solution to the conflict, he warned that any efforts on the part of foreign militias to capture the port town of Sirte, a gateway for the export of oil, or the Al Jufra airbase, currently home to Khalifa Haftar’s forces, would invite Cairo to launch a military intervention.

“Any military intervention by Egypt will be according to the principles of international law,” he said while pledging never to violate Libya’s sovereignty or threaten the Libyan people.

Mediation efforts
President Al Sissi’s recent thrust to mediate between the unelected Government of National Accord (GNA) and the Libyan National Army (LNA) involving the dismantling of militias, the removal of foreign mercenaries and the handover of all illegal weapons was praised by the US, the EU, Russia and most Arab states.

Unfortunately, the Islamist-weighted GNA led by Fayez Al Sarraj appears more concerned with holding on to the limited power it currently enjoys than the well being of citizens.

Al Sarraj has thrown a damp squib into the proceedings, vetoing an Arab League meeting to discuss the way forward after shamefully placing his nation under the protection of Turkey that has wormed its way into areas of Iraq, Syria, Somalia and its ideological twin Qatar.

Al Sarraj has placed his people’s fate in the hands of the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who gets oil and gas exploration rights within Libya’s maritime borders for his trouble.

Brotherhood regime
And as an additional bonus his insertion into Libya of 15,000 or more hard line Syrian militias, now free to terrorise the population unchecked, succeeds in rattling his nemesis President Al Sisi who brought down Turkey’s former ally the destructive Brotherhood regime.

Moreover, just in case the GNA was seriously considering the Egyptian proposal, Turkey dispatched a delegation bearing a multimillion trade deal to Tripoli which could be construed as a timely bribe.

On this occasion Erdogan may have underestimated the resolve of the Egyptian leader to protect Egypt’s long and porous western border from terrorist incursions.

Turkish intervention
Turkey’s intervention was a blow to the ambitions of LNA chief General Khalifa Haftar whose forces were beaten back by Turkish drones just as they were closing in on the capital.

Haftar subsequently accepted the need for negotiations but such talks require two to tango and so far the other side insists on dancing to Turkey’s tune.

Cairo has now gained a new ally within Libya besides Haftar. On Saturday, Sheikh Mohamed Al Mesbahi who heads the Supreme Council of Libyan Tribes urged Egypt to expel or “exterminate” militias in the pay of Turkey.

He confirmed that Libya’s tribes would resist the Turkish occupation and he slammed Erdogan for pretending to be a liberator even as he arms and funds terrorist groups.

From a purely moral perspective, Egypt is on the side of right and deserves the backing of the Arab League as well as the international community at large.

The United Nations should withdraw legitimacy from the GNA which has turned its back on conflict cessation leading to free and fair elections and both the United States and Russia should quit sitting on the fence, instead issuing Turkey’s wannabe neo-Sultan with an ultimatum.

The French president is supportive of Egypt’s endeavours but now is the time for him to put his money where his mouth is especially when it was former president Nicolas Sarkozy who persuaded David Cameron and Barack Obama to tip the balance in Libya in the favour of rebels which ultimately sealed its destruction.

At this time when a crippling pandemic is robbing lives and setting back economic growth, no one with the possible exception of the Turkish president wants to be engaged in wars.

Al Sarraj could easily put an end to the heightened tensions by accepting talks in good faith unless he is scared of enraging his puppet master across the Mediterranean.

Alternatively Russian President Vladimir Putin could decide to sever relations with Turkey and throw his backing behind his Egyptian counterpart.

Until now, the world has played footsie with Erdogan. Turkey’s Nato membership, strategic airbase and its containment of millions of refugees ready to hotfoot it to Europe given the chance has allowed him to punch above his weight.

In the event that Al Sissi’s red lines are breached it is my hope that whatever the outcome, Egypt’s allies will grow a backbone and not leave Cairo to fight alone.

Ever since the signing of the U.S.-Taliban agreement in Doha on February 29, there has been much speculation around the question of whether the Taliban will break ties with al-Qaeda to honor the terms of the agreement. The agreement mentions that the Taliban will not allow any individual or group, including al-Qaeda, to threaten the United States and its allies from Afghanistan, like reported by thediplomat.com.

While the agreement states that there are unspecified “enforcement mechanisms” to validate the conditions of the deal, there seem to be no visible changes in the relationship between al-Qaeda and the Taliban as of now. Al-Qaeda’s relationship with the Taliban has not always been steady and while the two groups have had their differences, their relationship has remained intact for more than two decades now. Recent developments in Afghanistan have shown that the Taliban is unlikely to abandon al-Qaeda and may even permit the latter’s activities as long as they benefit the Taliban operationally and are not traceable back to them.

Evolution of the al-Qaeda-Taliban nexus

Al-Qaeda and the Taliban got along due to a similar understanding of a fundamentalist form of Islam known as Wahhabism that they twisted to suit their own beliefs. The Taliban mixed the pre-Islamic Pashtun tribal code, Pashtunwali, with Wahhabism, but lacked credible Islamic scholars who could give credibility to their ultra-strict version of Islam as most Taliban had come from the most backward tribes of eastern Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda, however, mixes Salafi and takfiri concepts with Wahhabism and its members usually came from educated backgrounds and provided the guidance that the Taliban required.

Al-Qaeda leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri pledged allegiance to Taliban leader Mullah Omar and accepted Omar as Amir al-Mu’minin (Commander of the Faithful) of all Sunni Muslims. Al-Zawahiri would later re-affirm this pledge to Omar’s successors, though they were not accepted publicly. Afterwards al-Qaeda gained considerable freedom to operate in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan, and were even allowed use of national resources for their activities. In return, al-Qaeda doled out money to the Taliban.

However, there were some tensions when al-Qaeda was becoming blatant in its attacks and statements, after which Omar shifted bin Laden to Kandahar to keep him under observation. In 1998, Omar even went as far as to promise the chief of the Saudi intelligence agency that the Taliban would not shelter bin Laden after al-Qaeda threatened the Saudi royal family (one of the three governments that recognized the Taliban). Al-Qaeda’s presence was a source of internal tension within the Taliban. Some Taliban elements were particularly frustrated by bin Laden’s declarations of war and al-Qaeda’s acts of terrorism against the United States in the years prior to 2001. However, U.S. missile strikes on al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan after the 1998 East African embassy bombings renewed Taliban support for the group. Bin Laden had lied to Omar in July 2001, when he promised that al-Qaeda would launch no more overseas attacks (while secretly plotting the 9/11 attacks). Regardless, the Taliban did not give up bin Laden and al-Qaeda after 9/11 to the United States, even at the risk of being bombed out of power.

The Taliban-al-Qaeda alliance has since then survived almost 19 years of a U.S.-led Global War on Terror and despite the prospective benefits for the Taliban in breaking ties with al-Qaeda. The Taliban remains solely focused on Afghanistan and has never accepted al-Qaeda’s global jihadist ambitions. Their mutual interest in expelling U.S. forces and retaking Afghanistan has kept them together. Also the emergence of a common rival since 2014 – the Islamic State (IS) – has given them more incentive to cooperate.

Recent Developments in al-Qaeda-Taliban ties

In April 2020, on the seventh anniversary of Omar’s death, the Taliban praised his defense of al-Qaeda and bin Laden after 9/11 in a eulogy. The Taliban had put out a similar statement in October 2019 and in July 2019 the Taliban in a video justified the 9/11 attacks. Even after the U.S.-Taliban agreement, the Taliban have not denounced al-Qaeda and rather have done the opposite.

In the present day al-Qaeda appears to be operating clandestinely both alongside and independent of the Taliban. A United Nations report claimed that al-Qaeda and the Taliban had at least six meetings over the last one year at the top level with regard to operations, training, and sanctuary for al-Qaeda by the Taliban in the event of a U.S. withdrawal. The most interesting of these meetings occurred during spring 2019 in Helmand province, in which top veteran Taliban officials reportedly met with Hamza bin Laden (announced dead in July 2019 by the United States) to reassure him personally that there would be no change to the Taliban-al-Qaeda relationship at any cost. However, according to TIME Magazine, Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen categorically denied these reports.

In May 2019, al-Zawahiri gave a video eulogy for the deceased Jalaluddin Haqqani of the Taliban’s Haqqani network. Jalaluddin’s son Sirajuddin became the deputy leader of the Taliban after his death. Al-Zawahiri met with Hafiz and Yahya Haqqani to discuss the Afghan peace process in February 2020. Yahya Haqqani has been the primary Haqqani Network liaison with al-Qaeda since 2009 and the Haqqani Network has been historically close to al-Qaeda.

In September 2019, as negotiations were ongoing between the United States and the Taliban in Qatar, a joint U.S.-Afghan raid on a suspected Taliban-al-Qaeda compound in Helmand killed the leader of al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), Asim Umar, along with multiple foreign nationals, including the group’s deputy, its “courier” to al-Zawahiri, multiple foreign females, and several Taliban fighters. This is a strong indication of continued patronage of high-level al-Qaeda members by the Taliban. Prior to his death Umar had praised current Taliban Emir Haibatullah Akhundzada’s leadership in an Eid al-Fitr address.

AQIS changed the name of its Urdu language magazine Nawa-e-Afghan Jihad to Nawa-e-Ghazwa-e-Hind (NGH) in March 2020 after the U.S.-Taliban deal. This name change may have been done to give the impression that the Indian subcontinent would be the priority theater for AQIS after its apparently successful jihad against U.S. forces in Afghanistan alongside the Taliban. This could be an attempt to create artificial distance between the Taliban and al-Qaeda after the U.S.-Taliban agreement. In the April issue of NGH, AQIS for the first time mentions its role in the fight against the Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP) under the command of the Taliban. They helped them specifically in preparing improvised explosive devices and conducting special night-time operations to capture ISKP strongholds in Nangarhar province from August-October 2019.

Conclusion

After al-Zawahiri pledged allegiance to Taliban Emir Akhundzada in 2016 the latter did not publicly acknowledge the pledge, but at the same time there is no indication that it was rejected. Al-Qaeda’s regional affiliates are, in theory, loyal to the Taliban’s emir by virtue of their allegiance to al-Zawahiri. Therefore, al-Qaeda’s members around the globe are now, technically, bound by an oath to Akhundzada as well. Ever since the emergence of IS, al-Qaeda has sought to discredit the IS “Caliph” by promoting the Taliban’s emir as the more theologically correct leader of Muslims. Akhundzada not reciprocating al-Zawahiri’s pledge can be seen as an indication of the Taliban cutting ties with al-Qaeda (as pointed out by Shaheen) but it could also be seen as the relationship becoming more clandestine. To demonstrate that the Taliban is actually breaking ties with al-Qaeda, it has to publicly reject al-Zawahiri’s pledge.

Al-Qaeda today has more to gain from the Taliban by continuing to be relevant by playing a supplementary role in the latter’s jihad as well as gaining a prospective safe haven. At present the Taliban have an available fighting force of 55,000-85,000 fighters and contests 50-60 percent of Afghan territory with 21 districts under full Taliban control, so an additional 400-600 al-Qaeda members will not make a significant difference.

The Taliban-al-Qaeda alliance has survived the deaths of bin Laden and two Taliban emirs, which is indicative of something much deeper than personal relationships at the top level. The relationship is based on more complex conditions of legitimacy and identity. The Taliban cannot abandon al-Qaeda without also abandoning their current identity as an organization based on the Pashtunwali code and fundamentalist Islam. Their legitimacy depends not only on their governance, popular support, or territory, but on their adherence to their version of Islam. Ideological concerns aside, if the Taliban severs its ties with al-Qaeda it could lead to a domino effect where other regional groups in Afghanistan come out from the Taliban’s influence due to them sharing ties with al-Qaeda at the foundational level. Furthermore, those outfits could also align themselves with the Taliban’s rivals such as ISKP and rebel Taliban factions like the Hizb-e-Vilayat-e-Islami and continue fighting.