Afghanistan mystery: Why was Al Qaeda’s leader in Kabul?
Announcing the death of Ayman al-Zawahri – killed by a CIA drone strike on the balcony of a villa in downtown Kabul early Sunday – President Joe Biden said it demonstrated a U.S. capability to fight terrorism in Afghanistan today, even without thousands of soldiers on the ground.
Yet a year after the jihadist Taliban swept back to power in Kabul, the brazen presence in the capital of the Egyptian-born Al Qaeda leader – a key architect of the 9/11 attacks and earlier high-profile strikes on American targets – appears on its face to have brought Afghanistan full circle: back to the incendiary circumstances that led to 9/11.
Indeed, U.S. officials say that by harboring Al Qaeda leaders, the Taliban have breached the Doha agreement negotiated by then-President Donald Trump in 2020 and accepted by Mr. Biden. The U.S.-Taliban deal included a
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