History Through the Eyes of Al-Qaeda's Ideologue: An Analysis of Ayman Al-Zawahiri's Knights Under the Prophet's Banner

Author: Sophia Ibrahim

"Ayman al-Zawahiri is now the most wanted man in the United States. It is easy to categorize him, as the main ideologue and mastermind behind al-Qaeda - in addition to the fact that he is the newly appointed head of the organization - as a man whose ideas and motivations are extreme and inflexible; the viewpoint that the western, and, moreover global media have taken. One may find that, after having read both editions of Knights Under Prophet's Banner, al-Zawahiri's strategies are indeed clear, concise and he justifies his religious, political and ideological stances in a number of ways. He does so by providing a complex, well-articulated history of the contemporary "Islamic world" that could potentially rival works by established historians. This paper examines the ways in which Ayman al-Zawahiri uses history in conjunction with religious ideas in order to justify his actions and beliefs regarding a number of topics.”