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Iran is Al-Qaeda’s New Home Base
“Al-Qaeda has a new home base: It is the Islamic Republic of Iran,” announced U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday.
On Tuesday, current U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo publicly charged Iran’s government with aiding and abetting al Qaeda, and allowing the terrorist organization to establish a “home base” in Iran.
“Since 2015, Iran has also given al Qaeda leaders greater freedom of movement inside of Iran under their supervision,” Pompeo said in a speech at the National Press Club.
“As a result of this assistance, al Qaeda has centralized its leadership inside of Iran. Ayman al-Zawahiri’s deputies are there today, and frankly, they’re living a normal al Qaeda life,” he said.
Pompeo also told the news conference he was announcing publicly for the first time that al Qaeda’s Abu Muhammmad al-Masri, accused of helping mastermind the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa, died on August 7, 2020.
“Al-Masri’s presence inside Iran points to the reason that we’re here today,” Pompeo said. “Al-Qaeda has a new home base: it is the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
The New York Times reported in November that al-Masri was killed by Israeli secret service operatives in Iran, but Iran has denied the report, saying there were no al Qaeda “terrorists” on its soil.