Abu-Zaid al Kuwaiti (born Khalid Bin Abdul Rehman Al-Hussainan ( ar, خالد بن عبد الرحمن الحسينان); – December 6, 2012) was a high-ranking member of Al-Qaeda, and was considered a potential successor to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the head of the

Salafist The Salafi movement or Salafism () is a reform branch movement within Sunni Islam that originated during the nineteenth century. The name refers to advocacy of a return to the traditions of the "pious predecessors" (), the first three generati ...

jihad group. Abu-Zaid was killed in a

drone strike Drone warfare is a form of aerial warfare using unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAV) or weaponized commercial unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). The United States, United Kingdom, Israel, China, South Korea, Iran, Italy, France, India, Pakist ...

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 243 million people, and has the world's second-lar ...

Biography

Abu-Zaid al Kuwaiti was born in

Kuwait Kuwait (; ar, الكويت ', or ), officially the State of Kuwait ( ar, دولة الكويت '), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated in the northern edge of Eastern Arabia at the tip of the Persian Gulf, bordering Iraq to the nort ...

in either 1965 or 1966. At one point, he was an imam in the

Kuwait Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs Kuwait Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs is a cabinet department of the Cabinet of Kuwait, executive branch of the government of Kuwait dedicated to spreading tolerant Islamic culture. Specifically, it seeks to spread awareness and expand the i ...

. He became affiliated with the Al-Qaeda jihadist group and a member of their Islamic study committee, eventually joining the top tier of leaders. Since the death of Abu Yahya al Libi earlier in 2012, Abu-Zaid was regarded as Al Qaeda's top religious scholar, appearing in many videos teaching Islam. Abu Zaid was considered a potential heir to the organization, and accordingly became a high-value target for the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

and

i government. He was killed in a drone attack while eating breakfast ( Suhur) near Mir Ali in

, and the Al-Qaeda organization acknowledged his death three months later. He was 46 years old when he was killed.

NBC News NBC News is the news division of the American broadcast television network NBC. The division operates under NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, a division of NBCUniversal, which is, in turn, a subsidiary of Comcast. The news division's var ...

journalist and

United States Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United Stat ...

consultant Evan Kohlmann commented on his death in an interview with NBC. “That's a big gap in the leadership. He was the last senior Al-Qaida leader in the Afghanistan-Pakistan area who was, one, from the Arabian Peninsula and, two, who had serious clerical credentials. Now there is no obvious publicly recognizable candidate left to succeed Zawahiri.” Abu Zaid has been honored as

martyr A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an externa ...

by al Qaeda, Ansar al-Sharia in Tunisia, and Seifallah Ben Hassine.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kuwaiti, Abu-Zaid 1960s births 2012 deaths Kuwaiti al-Qaeda members Assassinated al-Qaeda leaders 20th-century criminals 21st-century criminals Deaths by United States drone strikes in Pakistan Kuwaiti expatriates in Pakistan