Killing of Bin Laden Marks a New Season for the Region

IRD: A few days ago, most of the news media focused on the death of Bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaida, in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Other news indicated that some of his family members were also killed in the attack. President Obama announced that American forces were able to kill Bin Laden and transfer his corpse to US custody without any casualties on their side. After this news came out, many Americans in Washington, D.C., gathered to express their happiness.

The fact that Obama announced that this successful operation was performed under his command indicates that he is planning to preside over the US presidency while benefiting from this raid. This event can be considered a very important matter in the internal affairs of the US. Former presidents- such as George Bush- have also expressed their happiness over this news and we can conclude that the killing of Bin Laden will have a major impact on the domestic affairs of the US.

It was widely believed in the Middle East that the leadership of Al-Qaeda had an important role in the region. However, after it became evident that Al-Qaeda had no role in the developments in North African and Arab countries- despite the fact that they tried to influence Arab countries but weren’t able to have a serious impact- they are now  considered a politically dead group.

We should remember that recent developments in North Africa and the Arab countries were not influenced by extremist groups such as Al-Qaeda. However, the important fact is that despite the ten-year search for Bin Laden by US intelligence forces, he seems to have lived in Pakistan for many of these years. Therefore, the question is whether the US intelligence services are so weak that it took it ten years to find Osama, or was this process an agreed upon interaction?

This issue could be of great importance to Iran. Iran can dissect this incident and understand what is really going on in its neighboring countries. 

It seems unrealistic that a person like Osama Bin Laden could hide in a small city like Abbottabad. Are US intelligence services this weak?

This incident could be of great importance for the people of the region, since they have been the targets of Al-Qaeda’s violent and extremist attacks on a daily basis in countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan, or in the eastern parts of Iran. Therefore, it is very important that the corpse of the leader of this group was in US custody before he was buried at sea.

The death of Bin Laden could weaken the position and conduct of this group in the region. However, we’ll have to wait and see if his supporters will react in the short run. This extremist trend could react in the medium term- they have shown no reaction yet, but they might show a violent reaction soon. As we know they announced that they would start a new wave of operations in Afghanistan.

This incident could have many lessons for the countries of the region, including Iran. In Pakistan, the custodian of affairs should be accountable for this incident. Afghanistan, southern Asia and Arab countries will experience a different influence. However, all the countries and societies that have been affected or damaged by this group could have their own reading of the incident.

But what is certain is that the Americans have controlled the events up until now, and they’ve indicated President Obama’s careful management of international affairs. Hopefully, other countries- including Iran- will have their own accurate assessment of this incident and use the situation to their own benefit.