Suchergebnisse

Following in the footsteps of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia and Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, Muammar Gaddafi of Libya is the third dictator to be swept away in the democratic revolts of the Arab Spring. His fall, which only just preceded the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, brings symbolic closure to a decade marked by the shadow of Al Qaeda and the "global war on terror". Astonishingly, Gaddafi had managed to turn the international situation to his advantage. After the toppling of Saddam Hussein, he quickly dismantled his non-conventional arms in exchange for guarantees for the safeguard of his regime. Such opportunism allowed, for a time, a rapprochement with the West. But a stubborn (if heterogeneous) domestic resistance finally exploded in the winter of 2010-2011, and succeeded in ousting the "Guide of the Revolution" after months of bloody combat. The new Libya is a major player in the emancipation process that has only just begun in the southern Mediterranean.

Faced with difficulties in its "sanctuaries" in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Al-Qaeda is attempting to open up a new front in its self-declared war on the West. Its aim is for the Sahara to become the scene of an international jihad against the new "crusaders", singling out France -the region's former colonial power -as enemy number one. In January 2007, the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), an offshoot of the Algerian Armed Islamic Group (GIA), declared its allegiance to Osama Bin Laden's organization, subsequently renaming itself "Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQIM). The terrorist group has since waged a series of attacks in Algeria, Mali and Niger in an attempt to push France to send in troops. A growing number of kidnapped hostages have been killed, several of them French civilians. The French government must not give in to this provocation and must refrain from deploying armed forces in the region as this is precisely what Bin Laden and his henchmen want. Adapted from the source document.

Following in the footsteps of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia and Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, Muammar Gaddafi of Libya is the third dictator to be swept away in the democratic revolts of the Arab Spring. His fall, which only just preceded the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, brings symbolic closure to a decade marked by the shadow of Al Qaeda and the "global war on terror". Astonishingly, Gaddafi had managed to turn the international situation to his advantage. After the toppling of Saddam Hussein, he quickly dismantled his non-conventional arms in exchange for guarantees for the safeguard of his regime. Such opportunism allowed, for a time, a rapprochement with the West. But a stubborn (if heterogeneous) domestic resistance finally exploded in the winter of 2010-2011, and succeeded in ousting the "Guide of the Revolution" after months of bloody combat. The new Libya is a major player in the emancipation process that has only just begun in the southern Mediterranean. Adapted from the source document.

Faced with difficulties in its "sanctuaries" in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Al-Qaeda is attempting to open up a new front in its self-declared war on the West. Its aim is for the Sahara to become the scene of an international jihad against the new "crusaders", singling out France -the region's former colonial power -as enemy number one. In January 2007, the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), an offshoot of the Algerian Armed Islamic Group (GIA), declared its allegiance to Osama Bin Laden's organization, subsequently renaming itself "Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQIM). The terrorist group has since waged a series of attacks in Algeria, Mali and Niger in an attempt to push France to send in troops. A growing number of kidnapped hostages have been killed, several of them French civilians. The French government must not give in to this provocation and must refrain from deploying armed forces in the region as this is precisely what Bin Laden and his henchmen want.

The phenomenon of Al-Qaeda raises serious problems of understanding and interpretation. This makes it necessary to clarify its definition and calls for the long-term trajectory of Islam to be put into historical and ideological perspective with the assistance of a comparative approach. Al-Qaeda is at once an expression of contemporary Salafism (in its jihadist form) and at odds with it (by virtue of its unprecedented advocacy of global jihad). This divergence is worth underscoring for it feeds recurrent conflicts between Al-Qaeda and other (especially nationalist) groups engaged in armed jihad. While social movement theory feeds lively debate in the United States concerning the nature and evolution of this organization, it only partly answers the questions raised by the study of Al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda's dependence on the internet illustrates its originality as the foremost international terrorist organization as well as the elitist and avant-gardist manner in which it operates, with little effort made to encourage a mass movement. These reflections raise questions as to the reproducible and/or durable character of the organization. Adapted from the source document.

Los sitios yihadistas de internet constituyen hoy en día el principal vector de reclutamiento y de radicalización en las sociedades occidentales, suponiendo una amenaza contra el orden público que debe tenerse plenamente en cuenta. Al-Qaeda vive actualmente uno de los momentos más difíciles de sus veintiún años de existencia. En efecto, se encuentra sumida en una crisis profunda en el conjunto del mundo árabe, especialmente por motivo de la pérdida de las bases territoriales de su rama iraquí. Bin Laden y sus dirigentes, refugiados en las zonas tribales paquistaníes que vieron nacer la organización en agosto de 1988, han decidido jugárselo todo a la carta de la ofensiva revolucionaria de sus aliados yihadistas contra el régimen de Islamabad. La provocacion terrorista de Navidad en Detroit intentaba distraer a Estados Unidos con Yemen, para aliviar la presion sobre "al-Qaeda-central". Al tiempo que moviliza la mayor parte de sus recursos materiales en el escenario paquistaní, al-Qaeda realiza una desmesurada inversión en el espacio virtual de internet, donde sigue disfrutando de una considerable libertad de movimiento. Los sitios yihadistas de internet constituyen hoy en día el principal vector de reclutamiento y de radicalización en las sociedades occidentales, suponiendo una amenaza contra el orden público que debe tenerse plenamente en cuenta.