{"id":2191,"date":"2021-09-07T14:21:24","date_gmt":"2021-09-07T14:21:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?p=2191"},"modified":"2021-09-07T14:39:39","modified_gmt":"2021-09-07T14:39:39","slug":"afghanistan-the-pledge-binding-al-qaeda-to-the-taliban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?p=2191","title":{"rendered":"Afghanistan: The pledge binding al-Qaeda to the Taliban?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"<\/a>A key question arising from the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan is their relationship with their long-time ally, al-Qaeda.<\/b><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Al-Qaeda is bound to the Taliban by a pledge of allegiance – or “bay’ah” – which was first offered in the 1990s by Osama Bin Laden to his Taliban counterpart Mullah Omar.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The pledge has been renewed several times since, although it has not always been publicly acknowledged by the Taliban.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Under the 2020 peace deal with the US, the Taliban agreed not to allow al-Qaeda or any other extremist group to operate in areas under their control. They reiterated this vow days after the takeover of Kabul on 15 August.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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But they do not appear to have publicly rejected al-Qaeda either.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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And al-Qaeda has certainly not softened its rhetoric towards the US.<\/p>\n

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Significance of the pledge<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n
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The Arabic word bay’ah is a term meaning a pledge of loyalty to a Muslim leader and is the foundation of fealty between many jihadist groups and their affiliates.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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It entails obligations for both parties, including obedience by the one offering bay’ah to a leader. Reneging on the pledge is considered a serious offence in Islam.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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In al-Qaeda’s case, it effectively subordinates it to the Taliban, by bestowing the honorific title of “commander of the faithful” upon the Taliban leader and his successors.<\/p>\n

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t was probably a factor in Mullah Omar’s refusal to hand Bin Laden over to the Americans after the 9\/11 attacks, leading to the US-led invasion in 2001.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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One famous example of the flouting of bay’ah came when al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Iraq refused to adhere to its pledge to central command, leading it to break away and later re-emerge as the Islamic State group (IS).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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IS and al-Qaeda remain fierce rivals.<\/p>\n

Source: BBC<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A key question arising from the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan is their relationship…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2193,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[41,4,42],"tags":[64],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic.jpg",976,549,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic-300x169.jpg",300,169,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic-768x432.jpg",640,360,true],"large":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic.jpg",640,360,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic.jpg",976,549,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic.jpg",976,549,false],"enternews-featured":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic.jpg",976,549,false],"enternews-medium":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic-720x475.jpg",720,475,true],"enternews-thumbnail":["https:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/120421468_aqtalibangraphic-480x315.jpg",480,315,true]},"author_info":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?author=1"},"category_info":"Politics<\/a> Stories<\/a> World<\/a>","tag_info":"World","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2191"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2198,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191\/revisions\/2198"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}