Down But Not Out

Al Qaeda in Iraq threatens to spoil many of the gains made during the past two years. Here's why the organization stills poses a threat -- and what Washington and Baghdad can do about it.

BY MYRIAM BENRAAD | DECEMBER 2, 2009

Al Qaeda in Iraq may be down, but it is not out. Last month, jihadists likely linked to the group posing as Iraqi Army soldiers executed 13 members of a U.S.-allied Sunni tribe near Abu Ghraib. In August and October, al Qaeda suicide bombers targeted government buildings in Baghdad, killing hundreds in the deadliest attacks against the Iraqi government since the U.S. invasion. With Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki basing much of his campaign for the January elections on his government's promise to provide security, further al Qaeda attacks could act as a spoiler, in addition to posing a significant challenge to Iraq's long-term security.

Although al Qaeda in Iraq has experienced significant setbacks since the 2007 U.S. surge, the group has never fully disappeared. Its influence in Iraq waned due to the July 2006 death of its charismatic leader, Jordanian jihadist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and because its extreme disregard for civilian life has alienated large segments of the Iraqi population. To adapt to these setbacks, the group has undergone a major organizational and ideological transformation over the last two years.

Since Zarqawi's death, al Qaeda's composition, formerly dominated by foreign jihadists, started to "Iraqify" through the recruitment of local fighters. This shift was born greatly out of necessity: Al Qaeda's force was dramatically diminished by the arrests or deaths of many foreign combatants or their relocation to new jihadi battlefields, particularly in the Maghreb and Afghanistan. Al Qaeda's leadership also recognized that it must provide a greater role for Iraqis to ensure its long-term survival: Zarqawi himself called for Iraqis to take more prominent positions within the organization.

This process of "Iraqification" was further corroborated by al Qaeda's proclamation of an "Islamic State of Iraq" in October 2006 and by jihadists' increasing focus on attacking Iraqi institutions. Police and security forces, Iraqi military personnel, federal ministries, and officials are today depicted in al Qaeda propaganda as the new "apostate occupiers" of Iraq, the "sacred land of the caliphate." This rhetoric retains potential appeal among disenfranchised Iraqi Sunnis, who are still not reconciled to the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government.

The June withdrawal of U.S. combat forces from Iraqi cities has also provided al Qaeda with new opportunities to carry out high-profile attacks. Several communiqués released in the aftermath of al Qaeda's August attacks and endorsed by Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State in Iraq, described the U.S. withdrawal as the acknowledgment of the American Army's "bitter defeat" and ridiculed Maliki's government for failing to maintain security in urban centers.

AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP/Getty Images

 SUBJECTS: IRAQ, AL QAEDA, MIDDLE EAST
 

Myriam Benraad is research scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and fellow at the Center for International Studies and Research at Sciences Po in Paris.

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ASGOLD25

10:54 AM ET

December 3, 2009

What, exactly, are your recommendations?

While I agree with Ms. Benraad that al Qaeda in Iraq still poses a significant threat, she's compartmentalized her recommendations for solving this problem into a paragraph of vague generalities. Let's take, for example, the following quote:

"However, keeping Al Qaeda's ideology on the margins of Iraqi political life also requires legitimate and accountable Iraqi authorities fulfilling their functions, delivering effective public services, and implementing critically needed economic reforms..."

These blanket statements sure sound nice and are more or less on the ball. But they can also be applied to pretty much every country that is plagued by some measure of corruption or instability. The question is not so much what needs to be done, but how to do it.