Al-Qaeda rejects Abbas' referendum
Al-Qaeda's number 2 al-Zawahri call on Palestinians to reject Abbas's referendum on two-state solution
Al-Jazeera satellite channel broadcast Friday excerpts of a video tape by deputy leader of al-Qaida, Ayman al-Zawahri, that criticized a possible referendum over a proposal calling for the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.
"I call on Muslims to reject any referendum on Palestine, because Palestine is part of the Islamic world and not subject to any compromise."
"I call upon Muslims everywhere to support the brothers in Palestine," He said mentioning armed Islamist militants, prisoners and their families.
But he did not mention the Palestinian Islamic movement Hamas by name as he did in an earlier tape when he criticized it for participating in elections.
Al-Zawahri praised al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a US air strike on Thursday, but does not mention his death, suggesting it was made earlier.
Al-Zawahri focussed on political developments in the Palestinian territories, Sudan and Egypt.
An Al-Jazeera announcer said that the tape was made before the announcement of al-Zarqawi's death Thursday, because al-Zawahri praised the al-Qaida in Iraq leader's efforts to
confront U.S.-led forces in Iraq.
"God bless the prophet of Islam in Iraq, the persistent hero of Islam, the Holy Warrior Abu Musab al-Zarqawi," Al-Zawahri said.
He also sent greetings to the Shura Council of Mujahedeen in Iraq and insurgents, "who are confronting crusaders and their apostate aids and the merchants of religion."
Wearing a white turban and tunic al-Zawahri appeared against a black background. He repeatedly waved his right hand and pointed his finger in a gesture of admonishment.
The channel did not give the date the tape was made or say how it received it.
On developments in Sudan, he concentrated on the situation in Darfur, criticizing the visit by U.N. Security Council security experts to Sudan as being "to prepare to occupy
and divide it."
"I call upon every Muslim and everyone who has faith in Sudan, and every fervent Muslim in Darfur to confront the Zionist Crusader plot to occupy the lands of Islam."
Weighing in on the campaign by a group of Egyptian judges for full independence of the judiciary, al-Zawahri urged judges to apply Islamic law.
"Oh judges you won't obtain independence unless your country is liberated first, and our home will not be liberated unless Islamic Sharia (law) is implemented," Al-Zawahri, who is Egyptian, said.
Addressing the judges, he said, "the regime won't give you your independence because to do so would be to kill itself."
But he also blamed the judges, "I have to be frank with you. You are part of the problem. You agreed on the constitution and the secular laws imposed on the nation by arms and suppression and torture and rigged elections."
