The leader of al-Qaida’s Yemen branch has actually threatened both U.S. President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip in his very first video message considering that taking control of the group in 2015.
The half-hour video message by Saad bin Atef al-Awlaki, which spread out online early Saturday by means of advocates of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, likewise consisted of require lone-wolf militants to assassinate leaders in Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf Arab mentions over the war, which has actually annihilated Gaza.
The video of al-Awlaki’s speech revealed pictures of Trump and Musk, in addition to U.S. Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of State Pete Hegseth. It likewise consisted of pictures of logo designs of Musk’s services, consisting of the electrical carmaker Tesla.
” There are no red lines after what occurred and is occurring to our individuals in Gaza,” al-Awlaki stated. “Reciprocity is genuine.”
Yemen’s al-Qaida branch long believed to be most unsafe
Though thought to be compromised recently due to infighting and thought U.S. drone strikes eliminating its leaders, the group understood by the acronym AQAP had actually been thought about the most unsafe branch of al-Qaida still running after the 2011 killing by U.S. Navy SEALs of creator Osama bin Laden, who masterminded the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
In 2022, a U.S. drone strike in Afghanistan eliminated bin Laden’s follower, Ayman al-Zawahri, who likewise assisted plot 9/11. The Sept. 11 attacks then started years of war by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Iraq, and fomented the increase of the Islamic State group.
Al-Awlaki currently has a $6 million U.S. bounty on his head, as Washington states al-Awlaki “has actually openly required attacks versus the United States and its allies.” He changed AQAP leader Khalid al-Batarfi, whose death was revealed by the group in 2024.
Israel-Hamas war a focus of the Houthis too
AQAP taking onto the Israel-Hamas war follows the efforts of Yemen’s Houthi rebels to do the exact same. The Iranian-backed group has actually released rocket attacks on Israel and targeted business vessels moving through the Red Sea passage, in addition to American warships. The U.S. Navy has actually explained their project versus the Houthis as the most extreme battle it has actually dealt with considering that The second world war.
The Trump administration likewise released its own extreme project of strikes on the Houthis, which just ended before the president’s current journey to the Middle East.
The Houthis’ worldwide profile increased as the group stays stuck in Yemen’s long-stalemated war. Al-Awlaki might be banking on the exact same for his group, which U.N. professionals have actually approximated has in between 3,000 and 4,000 active fighters and passive members. The group raises cash by robbing banks and cash exchange stores, in addition to smuggling weapons, counterfeiting currencies and ransom operations, according to the U.N
. The Shiite Zaydi Houthis have actually formerly rejected dealing with AQAP, a Sunni extremist group. Nevertheless, AQAP targeting of the Houthis has actually dropped in current years, while the militants keep assaulting Saudi-led union forces who have actually fought the Houthis.
” As the Houthis gain appeal as leaders of the ‘Arab and Muslim world’s resistance’ versus Israel, al-Awlaki looks for to challenge their supremacy by providing himself as similarly worried about the scenario in Gaza,” stated Mohammed al-Basha, a Yemen specialist of the Basha Report threat advisory company.
” For a nationwide security and diplomacy neighborhood significantly disengaged from Yemen, this video is a clear suggestion: Yemen still matters.”