Monday, August 20, 2007
The enemy despairs
In the category of small but good news, The Daily Star is reporting that al Qaeda's North Africa franchise is losing soldiers to hearth and home:
Dozens of foreigners who joined Al-Qaeda's Algeria-based North Africa wing have been leaving because they are disillusioned, a recent deserter from the group said in remarks published on Wednesday. Benmessaoud Abdelkader gave himself up last month after disagreements with other leaders of the Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, which claimed responsibility for a triple suicide bombing that killed 33 people in Algiers on April 11. El Watan newspaper quoted Benmessaoud as saying about 50 foreign recruits had joined the group, but many had either left already or now sought to leave. "Most of those who operated in the Sahara have gone back home after discovering that the situation they had hoped for was just a delusion," El Watan said.
Doves will claim credit for this one -- one of the reasons given for the low morale of the North African branch is that recruits do not want to participate in suicide bombings and racketeering in the absence of a foreign occupation against which to struggle. No doubt that is true, up to a point.
3 Comments:
By 
, at
Tue Aug 21, 01:14:00 AM:
Perhapes their deciding theres more important things to do that blow themselves up for a bunch of fanatics LIKE TAKE CARE OF THEIR FAMILIES
By , at
Wed Aug 22, 03:42:00 PM:
More news on this subject: Former terrorists deprogrammed with art therapy.
Andrew
By 
Dawnfire82, at
Fri Aug 24, 07:14:00 PM:
Doves will be wrong.
The simple occurrence of an ideological or other schism in a group there isn't that big of a deal. Terrorist groups split and recombine all the time over trifling details that don't matter a bit to the rest of us, and only a fraction of these happenings become public knowledge.
There has been an Islamist insurgency running against the Algerian government for what, like 15 years now? In the complete absence of overt foreign intervention of any kind.
It's a struggle between Islamists and non-Islamists in Algeria. We have very little to do with it.
