Brother of Al-Qaeda leader Al-Zawahiri justifies 9/11 attacks, says group would strike at Israel if it could

(Times of Israel) Ahead of Tuesday’s eleventh anniversary of the September 11 terror assault on the United States, Egyptian Salafist and al-Qaeda operative Muhammad Al-Zawahiri, the younger brother of Osama bin-Laden’s successor as al-Qaeda Leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri, justified the attacks in an interview on Al-Jazeera. [...]

The interviewer went on to ask Zawahiri why al-Qaeda chose to target the US and not Arab regimes it considers infidel or Israel.

“We consider anyone hostile towards the Muslims to be an enemy, but all in good time. At present, America is attacking our countries,” said Zawahiri. He then said that al-Qaeda had launched attacks against Israel, mentioning the 2002 attempted shooting down of an El Al plane in Kenya and an attack the same year on a synagogue in Djerba, Tunisia.

“If al-Qaeda could reach… If the regimes of the Arab countries bordering Israel did not prevent it… Al-Qaeda wants to carry out attacks against Israel,” concluded Zawahiri.