Al-Qaeda’s second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has urged followers to carry out attacks against Israel and its US backers to avenge the Israeli offensives against Lebanon and the Gaza
Strip.
In a videotape aired by Arabic television channel Al-Jazeera, Osama bin Laden’s right hand man also called for an alliance of Sunni and Shiite Muslim fighters.
Zawahiri called on Muslims to transcend sectarian animosities and extending from Afghanistan to the Palestinian territories in order to liberate "the whole of Palestine".
Zawahiri’s unity call threatens to widen the Middle East conflict and take it to a new level.
"We cannot watch these rockets raining down fire on our brothers in Gaza and Lebanon and remain inactive and submissive," Zawahiri said, describing the offensivesdas "crusader-Zionist aggression".
It was the first reaction by Al-Qaeda to the onslaughts which started in late June in Gaza and on July 12 in Lebanon.
The Israeli offensive in Gaza and Lebanon were triggered by the capture of Israeli soldiers by Palestinian militants and Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah movement.
"The rockets and missiles tearing apart the bodies of Muslims in Gaza and Lebanon are not purely Israeli. They come from and are funded by all the countries of the crusader alliance," Zawahiri said in a reference to the US and its allies.
"Hence, everyone who took part in the crime must pay the price ... The whole world is an open field for us. Like they attack us everywhere, we too attack them everywhere."
Prophets invoked
Zawahiri's comments invoked revered Shiite figures like Prophet Mohammed's grandson, Imam Hussein, as well as figures revered by Sunnis.
They indicated that Al-Qaeda, which is made up of Sunni Islamist extremists, was prepared to help Hezbollah despite differences with the Shiite sect.
"The war with Israel ... is a jihad (holy war) for the sake of God ... a jihad that seeks to liberate Palestine, the whole of Palestine, and to liberate every land which (once belonged to) Islam, from Andalus to Iraq," Zawahiri said.
"These events (in Lebanon and Gaza) show the importance of the jihadi fronts in Afghanistan and Iraq. All Muslims must assist them so that America's forces get out of them crippled ... and pay the price of its aggression against Muslims and its support for Israel," he said.
Apparently referring to Washington's Shiite allies in Iraq, Zawahiri said the "crusader-Zionist aggression" might perhaps prompt "the traitors in Iraq to retreat from their shame and treason and stop justifying and backing the US-crusader presence" in the country.
Zawahiri also called for "the oppressed and downtrodden" throughout the world to close ranks with Muslims in "confronting injustice."
He slammed the "impotence and complicity" of Arab and Muslim governments and expressed outrage at world condemnation of the capture of Israeli soldiers whereas no one lifted a finger to free 10,000 Arabs held in Israeli prisons.
Authenticity not confirmed
US President George W Bush said he was "not surprised" that Zawahiri "feels like he needs to lend his voice to terrorist activities that are trying to prevent democracies from moving forward."
"The United States of America stands strong against Mister Zawahiri and his type," he said.
White House spokesman Tony Snow said that Zawahiri's stated concerns about Muslims were hypocritical.
"Many of the things that he has done have led to the murder of Muslims around the world by his own jidahists," Snow said.
He said US officials had yet to positively confirm the authenticity of the recording but added that "it certainly looked like him."
Zawahiri had last appeared in a video also aired on Qatar-based Al-Jazeera on June 23 to vow that Al-Qaeda would avenge the death of its Iraq frontman, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a US air raid June 7.