Analysts: Al-Qaida still offers olive branch to IS

Al-Qaeda is using US airstrikes in Syria as a reason to extend olive branches to the renegade Islamic State group, saying the two should stop feuding and join forces to attack Western targets a reunification that intelligence analysts say would allow al-Qaeda to capitalise on the younger group's ruthless advance across the region.
Analysts are closely watching al-Qaeda's repeated overtures, and while a full reconciliation is not expected soon if ever there is evidence the two groups have curtailed their infighting and are cooperating on the Syrian battlefield, according to activists on the ground, US officials and experts who monitor jihadi messages.

Al-Qaeda is saying, "Let's just have a truce in Syria," said Tom Joscelyn, who tracks terror groups for the Long War Journal. "That is what's underway now. ... What we have seen is that local commanders are entering into local truces. There are definitely areas where the two groups are not fighting."
The Islamic State group has seized about a third of Iraq and Syrian territory and is terrorising civilians to impose a strict interpretation of Islamic law. Their advances led to airstrikes by the United States and a coalition of Western and Gulf nations in both Iraq and Syria.

IS was kicked out of al-Qaeda in May after disobeying its leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri. So far, IS has not publicly responded to al-Qaida's calls to reunite the most recent on October 17 from al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the Yemen-based offshoot that denounced the airstrikes and called on rival militant groups to stop their infighting and together train their sights on the West.
Reconciling with al-Qaeda senior leadership would let IS benefit from al-Qaeda's broad, international network but would also leave it restrained in carrying out its own attacks. For its part, al-Qaeda would get a boost from the Islamic State group's newfound popularity in jihadi circles, which has provided an influx of new recruits and money. The US Treasury Department said last week that IS has earned about USD 1 million a day from selling oil on the black market.

One school of thought is that if the two groups continue to spend time and resources fighting each other, it diminishes the terror threat to the West. Experts tracking terrorist networks say, however, that continued infighting also could incite a competition over who would be the first to launch a new attack against the West.
Jihadi groups across the world recently have rushed to proclaim a new allegiance to IS, either out of fear or because they want to be with the winning team. But Joseclyn notes that they are all "B-listers," not mainline al-Qaeda affiliates. "The Islamic State is the strongest jihadist group in Iraq and Syria, but the evidence thus far says that al-Qaeda is much stronger everywhere else," he said.