The US State Department said on February 15 that Saif al-Adel, an Egyptian living in Iran, has become the de facto new leader of the notorious terrorist network al-Qaeda, following the death of the terrorist leader. Ayman al-Zawahiri’s father in July 2022.
“Our assessment is consistent with the United Nations’ assessment that the de facto new leader of al-Qaeda, Saif al-Adel, is hiding in Iran,” a State Department spokesman said. good.
Earlier, a United Nations report published on February 14 said that the majority of member states identified Adel as the leader of al-Qaeda.
But the terrorist network has not officially announced him as its new leader because it is sensitive to the concerns of the Taliban government in Afghanistan, who are reluctant to admit that Zawahiri was destroyed by US missiles in a house. houses in Kabul last year, according to a United Nations report.
In addition, the UN report also said that al-Qaeda – a Sunni Muslim organization – was very sensitive to Adel’s hiding in Iran, a country with a majority Shiite Muslim population.
According to the American Project Against Extremism, Adel, 62, is a former lieutenant colonel in the Egyptian special forces. He is also a senior member of al-Qaeda’s leadership, having helped build the group’s operational capabilities and trained some of the hijackers involved in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. in America.
Ali Soufan, a former counter-terrorism investigator with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), said that Adel had been in Iran since 2002 or 2003, at first under house arrest but later gained enough freedom to make trips to Pakistan.
The FBI has offered a $10 million reward for information leading to the capture or death of Saif al-Adel, who is wanted by the FBI for the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. , killing 224 people and injuring thousands more.