Al-Zawahri Sends a Message to Democrats

He was for the Democrats before he was against them.
Updating a story that appeared earlier this week, in a portion of the tape from al Qaeda No. 2 man, Ayman al Zawahri, made available only today, Zawahri says he has two messages for American Democrats, according to ABC News.

"The first is that [the Democrats] aren't the ones who won the midterm elections, nor are the Republicans the ones who lost. Rather, the Mujahideen -- the Muslim Ummah's vanguard in Afghanistan and Iraq -- are the ones who won, and the American forces and their Crusader allies are the ones who lost," Zawahri said, according to a full transcript obtained by ABC News.

The deputy leader of al-Qaida named Democrats in new criticism of U.S. policy. Al-Zawahri said the United States was negotiating with the wrong people in Iraq, implying in a video broadcast Wednesday on Al-Jazeera that Washington should be talking to his group, reports AP.

"I want to tell the Republicans and the Democrats together ... you are trying to negotiate with some parties to secure your withdrawal, but these parties won't find you an exit (from Iraq) and your attempts will yield nothing but failure," Ayman al-Zawahri said on the video.

The warning comes as elation in the Middle East wanes for the newly won Democrat control of Congress.

Al-Jazeera reports al-Zawahiri called for the occupied Palestinian territories will be liberated through jihad, not elections, according to a senior al-Qaeda leader.

In the video, al-Zawahiri said: "Any road other than jihad will only lead to loss."

He also said: "Those trying to liberate the land of Islam through elections based on secular constitutions or on decisions to surrender Palestine to the Jews will not liberate a grain of sand of Palestine."

Al-Zawahri criticized Iran and Shiites abroad who supported the U.S.-backed governments in Iraq and Afghanistan while they also backed the anti-Israeli forces in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

In a previous video, marking the fifth anniversary of the attacks on the US of September 11, 2001, al-Zawahiri said that the Gulf and Israel would be al-Qaeda's next targets.

Egyptian-born al-Zawahiri carries a $25m US bounty for information leading to his arrest or death.

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