Columbia International Affairs Online: Policy Briefs

CIAO DATE: 02/2010

Al-Qaeda in the West Bank and Gaza

Matthew Levitt, Bruce Riedel

January 2010

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy

Abstract

Palestinian terrorist groups have long operated out of the West Bank and Gaza. What is new is that some radicalized Palestinians are choosing to engage in violence not through established domestic groups such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, or the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, but rather through groups that aspire to be part of al-Qaeda's global jihad.