Daniel Byman: Iran's Ties to al-Qaeda Go Back Years
Daniel Byman is a professor in the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service and research director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution. His latest book is A High Price: The Triumphs and Failures of Israeli Counterterrorism.
The U.S. Treasury Department's designation last week of Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) as a terrorist supporter is only the latest ratcheting up of pressure against Tehran, and it seems like background noise compared with all the talk of oil boycotts and military strikes. But the designation also highlights one of the most important -- and one of the most mysterious -- partnerships of our time: Iran's relationship with al Qaeda.
It is easy to caricature Tehran's ties to Ayman al-Zawahiri's organization. Believers in the relationship point out that they are natural friends because both endorse an extreme anti-U.S. agenda and seek to spread radical Islam. Skeptics contend that Iran's Shiite regime is anathema for Sunni jihadists, making cooperation prohibitive. Both sides have a point: Shared enemies drive Iran and al Qaeda together, but mutual suspicion keeps the partnership tactical and gives both sides reasons to play it down.
Unclassified data on Iran's relationship with al Qaeda are scarce, but enough can be gleaned or inferred from open-source material to get a sense of the scope of and reasons for the relationship. Last week's designation accuses the MOIS of "facilitat[ing] the movement of al Qa'ida operatives in Iran and provid[ing] them with documents, identification cards, and passports." It continues: "MOIS also provided money and weapons to al Qa'ida in Iraq (AQI), a terrorist group designated under E.O. 13224, and negotiated prisoner releases of AQI operatives." Earlier designations have highlighted specific tactical links between al Qaeda and Iran, but the connection goes back years...