New global terror group kingpin from gilded upper-class Egyptian background

THE NEW al-Qaeda leader was born in 1951 into an upper class Egyptian family.

Ayman al-Zawahiri’s grandfather was grand imam of al-Azhar, a seat of Muslim learning for more than 1,000 years. His father was pharmacology professor at Cairo University and his mother was from a wealthy, politically-active family.

As a devout teenager, Zawahiri became a disciple of Sayyid Qutb, the spiritual father of militant Sunni revivalist movements, and joined the Muslim Brotherhood. He formed a secret cell with the aim of overthrowing the government and transforming Egypt into an Islamic state. His cell joined with others to become the Egyptian Islamic Jihad.

Zawahiri graduated from the medical faculty of Cairo University in 1974 and served for three years as a surgeon in the Egyptian army. He earned a master’s degree in surgery and established a clinic near his parents’ home in the exclusive Maadi suburb of Cairo.

In 1981, he and other radicals were detained after the assassination of Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, condemned for signing a peace treaty with Israel. Cleared of involvement in the plot, Zawahiri served three years for weapons possession. On release, he went to Saudi Arabia and opened a clinic, but soon relocated to Afghanistan, where he met bin Laden. Following the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, Zawahiri assumed leadership of Islamic Jihad, which carried out numerous attacks on Egyptian public figures and eventually merged with al-Qaeda.

He is believed to have helped organise the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Africa, the 2000 boat bombing of a US naval ship in Aden harbour and the 2001 New York and Washington attacks.

His hatred of the US deepened when his wife and two of their six children were killed in a US air strike after Washington launched its war on Afghanistan in 2001. In an essay written that year he called for “as many casualties as possible” on US citizens.

The CIA has tried to assassinate him on three occasions.