Al Qaeda’s No. 2 Leader Solicits Questions From Journalists Online

Al Qaeda has invited journalists to send questions to its No. 2 figure, Ayman al-Zawahri, in the first such interview offer by the increasingly media-savvy terror network since the 9/11 attacks.

The invitation is a new twist in Al Qaeda’s campaign to reach a broader audience, and represents an attempt by al-Zawahri to present himself as a sophisticated leader rather than a mass murderer.

I think their media capability is sophisticated as ever,” said Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert and professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. “It shows how this group with 7th-Century ideology is exploiting 21st-Century media capabilities.”

The advertisement, issued by the group’s Al-Sahab media arm on an Islamic militant Web site, invites “individuals, agencies and all media” to submit written questions for al-Zawahri by sending them to the Web forums where Al-Sahab posts its messages.

Al-Sahab asked the forums to send it the questions “with no changes or substitutions, no matter whether they agree or disagree.”

It said it would take questions until Jan. 16, after which al-Zawahri would answer them at “the soonest possible occasion.” It did not say whether his answers would come in writing, video or audiotape.

Osama bin Laden and al-Zawahri have given a few interviews to Western and Arabic news media since they first rose to prominence in the 1990s. But neither has been interviewed since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the subsequent U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, which toppled Al Qaeda’s patrons, the Taliban, and sent Al Qaeda’s leaders into hiding.

They are believed to be in the lawless regions along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

Since then, al-Zawahri has emerged as Al Qaeda’s most prominent spokesman. He has appeared in at least 16 videos and audiotapes this year, compared to four for bin Laden.

Hoffman said al-Zawahri is also trying to boost his own image to look more like a true leader as opposed to a “homicidal thug.” Opening himself up to questioning — in a fashion similar to that of U.S. political campaigns — makes him look more sophisticated, he said.

–By Anna Johnson

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