The killing of Al-Qaeda’s senior leader and propagandist in Afghanistan has been described as a huge blow to the Al-Qaeda operations not only in Afghanistan but in the broader Middle East.
On Saturday, Oct. 24, 2020, Afghanistan announced that its forces had killed a senior Al-Qaeda leader and propagandist Abu Muhsin al-Masri (a.k.a. Husam Abd al-Rauf). Al-Masri, an Egyptian, was killed during an operation in Ghazni province.
The death of al-Masri will be a major setback to Al-Qaeda terrorist organization that is consistently experiencing strategic losses in Afghanistan. The Afghan security forces led and executed this raid against al-Masri leading to his death has been seen as a good sign that the Afghan security forces are improving.
Al-Qaeda after al-Masri in Afghanistan specifically will suffer some setbacks. Killing of a propagandist for any terrorist organization is usually a huge blow to individual organizations and filling up their positions is not easy citing the critical roles they play.
Terrorist propagandists are interrelated in driving the terror organizations agendas, amplify of terror activities via their media besides pushing their ideology in a bid to attract more recruits within their ranks.
For Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan now without a key leader and propagandist means that the ideology of the terrorist group has a direct relationship to the ability to recruit new members. If that ideology does not demonstrate some improvement for would-be recruits, the group will ultimately fail, with or without outside interference.
The loss of a propagandist like al-Masri will greatly affect group’s operations. For instance, it is challenging to maintain a viable ideology that motivates, especially when there are other terrorist groups leveraging the same ideology, like ISIS, for example. Al-Qaeda will with no doubt be faced by a difficult time convincing it followers/fighters that they are still a relevant organization fighting for the ideology of Jihadi Salafism.
The death of al-Masri affects Al Qaeda’s ability to remain relevant. It is important that now the counterterrorism actors to focus their efforts on who is likely to replace al-Masri within Al-Qaeda’s ranks and make sure he is eliminated forthwith.
