Hamza, 29, is widely seen as a possible successor to Ayman al-Zawahiri, the Egyptian ideologue who took over Al-Qaeda after US special forces killed Osama Bin Laden in a 2011 raid in Pakistan.
“We thought everyone was over this,” said Hamza’s uncle Hassan Bin Laden in an interview with the Guardian, referring to Osama bin Laden.Osama bin Laden’s mother, Alia Ghanem, insisted that the Saudi-born terrorist behind the 2001 World Trade Centre and Pentagon attacks had been a good man until he was “brainwashed” in university by ideologues.
“Then the next thing I knew, Hamza was saying ‘I’m going to avenge my father’… If Hamza was in front of me now I would tell him ‘God guide you. Think twice about what you are doing. Don’t retake the steps of your father. You are entering horrible parts of your soul.”
“He was a very good child until he met some people who pretty much brainwashed him in his early 20s. You can call it a cult,” she said.Al-Qaeda had never completely recovered from the death of Osama Bin Laden. His successor, Zawahiri, was seen as less charismatic, and over the past few years many jihadists abandoned the group to join Isil.
Yahoo news
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