PARIS, Nov 24 ― The new leader of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) is a well-known veteran among the jihadist insurgencies wreaking havoc in North Africa but experts say it's unclear what path he will chart to assert his authority.
Abu Obaida Yusuf al-Annabi, an Algerian national born in 1969, replaced Abdelmalek Droukdel following his killing by French forces in Mali last June, according to the SITE terrorism monitoring group.
Annabi was already head of AQIM's Council of Dignitaries and “he was also one of its media chiefs,” said Laurence Bindner, co-founder of the JOS Project for analysing extremist propaganda online.
“He's the one who pledged allegiance in the group's name to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the main al-Qaeda chief, in 2011. And he's authored several of its main statements in recent years,” she told AFP.
The United States placed Annabi, who is thought to still be based in Algeria, on its terrorism watch list in 2015, a move followed by the United Nations the following year.
His group has claimed responsibility for several attacks on troops and civilians across the Sahel region, including a 2016 strike on a hotel and restaurant in Burkina Faso that killed 30 people, mainly Westerners.
But Annabi's legitimacy at the head of AQIM might not be clear-cut, particularly among more recent and younger recruits.
“Annabi is better known, to me at least, as a propagandist and pseudo-cleric than as an operational figure,” said Alex Thurston, a political scientist at the University of Cincinnati who focuses on Islam in northwest Africa.
“Tapping someone without the same operational background as Droukdel... would seem to me to be a sign of a weak bench,” he said, describing AQMI as “an organisation fighting for relevance and lacking in charismatic authority.”
Jihadist infighting
Analysts at the Counter Extremism Project say Annabi's relations with his predecessor may have been tense, another potential sign of strategic divisions in the ranks.
That in turn could complicate AQIM's relationships with Iyad Ag Ghaly, the Malian tuareg who leads the Group to Support Islam and Muslims, a nominal ally of the group.
While Ghaly has pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda, he has like other affiliates in the world significant autonomy ― and whether Annabi allows this to continue will determine how jihadist fighting evolves in the coming years.
“There have always been tensions between fighters on the ground in northern Mali, and an extremely isolated AQIM emir in Algeria,” said Elie Tenenbaum, a researcher at the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI).
He said Annabi's first moves would be key for determining how he wants to position his group, at a time when Qaeda affiliates are facing off against Islamic State fighters also jockeying for influence.
“Is he going to name new chiefs for the katibas (combat units)” south of the Algerian border, Tenenbaum asked.
“Will he be tempted to place his own people there? Will he modify the links with AQIM's local allies?”
It also remains to be seen how Annabi will approach the negotiations sought by Mali's government, which are fiercely opposed by France as it tries to help Sahel governments stave off the jihadist threats.
In a rare interview with France 24 television last year, Annabi made clear his wish to see jihadist prisoners freed as part of talks to liberate Sophie Petronin, a French hostage seized in Mali in 2016.
Petronin was freed in October, just as Mali's authorities released some 200 prisoners.
Tenenbaum said that for the Malian government, the GSIM “appears today as the group it can talk to”, a position that could strengthen Ghaly's hand in the fight against the Islamic State.
That means infighting among the jihadist groups is unlikely to abate anytime soon.
“The time of reconciliation has passed and no longer seems to be on the agenda,” Tenenbaum said. ― AFP
