Al-Quaida announced yesterday on an Islamic website that Ayman al-Zawahri has assumed leadership of the organization now that Osama bin-Laden has been killed. The
San Francisco Chronicle reports that al-Zawahari, an Egyptian doctor, is believed to be hiding in Pakistan.
McClatchy Newspapers has published a full translation of the group's statement, which is filled with Islamic religious references. The statement reads in part:
Jihad will continue until Judgment Day, and ... has become an obligation in this era against the invading infidels, the occupiers of Muslim homes, and against the backsliding leaders who've changed Islamic law agreed upon by Muslim scholars....
... Al-Qaeda Jihad Organization seeks the implementation of Allah’s book and the Sunna and calls for all Muslims to follow the ways of the Prophet Mohammad and those of his noble companions and his successors, may Allah accept them all. We call for the pursuit of the ways agreed to by the followers of the prophet and their followers ... such as the four Imams and the Imams of Jurisprudence and Hadith.... We abide by what they set out and we do not disobey their commandments. We seek, with Allah's help, to be followers, not fabricators, learners and never creators.
