Al-Qaeda (Arabic: القاعدة - al-Qā‘idah, “the foundation” or “the base”) is the name given to an international alliance of militant Islamist organizations. Originally built from the cadre of Saudi-funded Arab fighters who flocked to join the mujahideen resistance movement against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, it seeks to establish, via military and terrorist tactics, a radical form of Islamist ideology to supplant both current regimes in the Middle East and eventually Western society as a whole.
These are their activities:
- Al-Qaeda gained worldwide notoriety after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.
- Besides the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., al-Qaeda has also taken responsibility for the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar-Es-Salaam, Tanzania, and the attack on the USS Cole, as well as many attacks on people in and of other nations around the world.
- In 1996, Osama bin Laden was expelled from Sudan after possible participation in the 1994 attempted assassination of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak while his motorcade was in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
- On February 23, 1998, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri of Egyptian Islamic Jihad issued a fatwa under the banner of the World Islamic Front for Jihad Against the Jews and Crusaders saying that “to kill Americans and their allies, civilians, and military is an individual duty of every Muslim who is able.”
- In 1999, Egyptian Islamic Jihad officially merged with al-Qaeda, and al-Zawahiri became bin Laden’s right-hand man.
- Following the September 11, 2001 attacks by al-Qaeda, the United States began to build up military forces in preparation for an attack on Afghanistan (whose government harbored bin Laden’s organization) in response.
- Battles between the United States and the Taliban and al-Qaeda forces continue as of 2005. As a result of this invasion, the al-Qaeda training camps were destroyed, and much of the existing operating structure of al-Qaeda was disrupted.
- During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, al-Qaeda took more formal interest in the region and is known to have been responsible for actively organising and aiding local resistance to the occupying coalition forces.
- During Iraq’s historic elections in January 2005 al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for nine suicide blasts in the Iraqi capital Baghdad.
- The first militant attack that al-Qaeda allegedly carried out consisted of three bombings which were targeted at U.S. troops in Aden, Yemen, in December 1992. A Yemeni and an Austrian tourist died in the bombing.
- Ramzi Yousef, who was involved in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing (though probably not an al-Qaeda member at the time), and Khalid Sheik Mohammed planned Operation Bojinka, a plot to destroy airplanes in mid-Pacific flight using explosives.
- Al-Qaida is believed to be responsible for a bombing at a U.S. military facility in Riyadh in November 1995, which killed two people from India and five Americans. Al-Qaeda is also thought by some to be responsible for the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing which killed American military personnel in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia; this attack and the previous one are usually ascribed to Hizbullah.
- Al-Qaeda is believed to have conducted the bombings in August 1998 of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, killing more than 200 people and injuring more than 5,000 others
- In December 1999 and into 2000, al-Qaeda planned attacks against U.S. and Israeli tourists visiting Jordan for millennial celebrations; however, the Jordanian authorities thwarted the planned attacks and put 28 suspects on trial. Al-Qaeda also attempted the bombing of the Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles, California during the millennium holiday, although the bomber Ahmed Ressam was caught at the US-Canadian border with bombs in the trunk of his car.
- Also, al-Qaeda planned to attack the USS The Sullivans on January 3, 2000, but that effort failed due to too much weight being put on the small boat meant to bomb the ship.
- They are also thought to be responsible for the October 2000 USS Cole bombing. German police foiled a plot to destroy a cathedral in Strasbourg, France in December 2000. Al-Qaeda is thought to be responsible.
- The most destructive act ascribed to al-Qaeda was the series of attacks in the USA on September 11th, 2001.
- Several attacks and attempted attacks since September 11, 2001 have been attributed to al-Qaeda. The first of which was the Paris embassy attack plot, which was foiled. The second of which involved the attempted shoe bomber Richard Reid, who proclaimed himself a follower of Osama bin Laden, and got close to destroying American Airlines Flight 63).
- More subsequent plots included the El Ghriba synagogue bombing in Djerba, Tunisia and attempted attacks in Jordan, Indonesia, Morocco, and Singapore.
- The network has also been implicated in the Limburg tanker bombing, of complicity in the kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and in numerous bombings in Pakistan.
- Al-Qaeda is responsible for the terrorist car bombing in Mombasa in November 2002, the Riyadh Compound Bombings, and the Istanbul Bombings in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2003.
- Al-Qaeda has strong alliances with a number of other Islamic militant organizations including the Indonesian Islamic extremist group Jemaah Islamiyah. That group was responsible for the October 2002 Bali bombing.
- Although there have been no identified al-Qaeda attacks within the territory of the United States since the September 11, 2001 attacks, numerous al-Qaeda attacks in the Middle East, Far East, Africa and Europe have caused extensive casualties and turmoil
- It is also believed that al-Qaeda was involved in the 7 July 2005 London bombings, which was a series of explosions that was set off by four bombs that struck London’s public transport system during the morning rush hour. At 08:50, three bombs exploded within one minute on three London Underground trains, and at 09:47 a fourth bomb exploded on a bus. Fifty-two people are confirmed dead, with 700 injured.
WHAT DID YOU ALL GET FROM ALL OF THIS, HAH?!?!?
X-(
