[quote]Al Qaeda's senior leadership has disowned the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham (ISIS) in a statement released online. ISIS and its leader, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, have repeatedly refused to obey orders issued by Ayman al Zawahiri and his subordinates. As a result, al Qaeda's general command -- commonly referred to as al Qaeda's senior leadership (AQSL) in the West -- has cut off the group. Al Qaeda's senior leaders now say they have "no connection" with ISIS, which is "not an affiliate with the al Qaeda group and has no organizational relation with it." Furthermore, al Qaeda's general command is "not responsible" for ISIS's actions. "The branches of al Qaeda are the ones that the General Command of the group announces and recognizes," the statement reads, according to a translation obtained by The Long War Journal. "We emphasize our loyalty, love, and support for every mujahid. We are keen on the fellowship among Muslims and mujahideen."[/quote] I recently made a thread outlining several different scenarios that could play out in the wake of rebel infighting currently going on within Syria. While I didn't predict kicking them out of the network, I did predict a face-saving move by al-Qaeda in order to save their image and to retain some levels of their gains inside Syria. I said [url=http://www.bungie.net/7_My-Analysis-on-Syria/en/Groups/Post?id=63423733&groupId=16959]here[/url]: [quote]They have been losing influence within the opposition and see the need to tone down ISIS and try to save face against this US/Qatari/Saudi-backed coalition of other opposition groups. With Zawahiri again intervening...this shows he understands the importance of stopping this coalition from gaining too much ground on their successes in Syria...this also shows that the senior leadership is incredibly worried about losing what they have gained inside Syria.[/quote] This move is most certainly a face-saving strategy by the senior leadership. Cutting them off from funds and fighters allocated from elsewhere comes as a punishment for ISIS disobeying al-Zawahiri. What this does for the dynamics on the ground in Syria, or even Iraq, remains to be seen. Like The Long War Journal says, I doubt that ISIS will stop what they're doing anytime soon. They will probably try to regain connections to the senior leadership, but to what extent I dunno. What this does for the fighting inside Iraq also remains to be seen. We can potentially see a breakaway faction of ISIS retaining those senior leadership connections; we can also see another group entirely (like Ansar al-Islam) becoming AQ's go-to-group for operations inside Iraq. Or we can see something different all together. TL;DR: Al-Qaeda senior leadership says ISIS is no longer connected to them and they are not responsible for their actions in a face saving move for their gains inside Syria and Iraq. What this does for the dynamics on the ground in either country is yet to be seen, however. Regardless, this is big news for the conflicts in both countries. Your thoughts on anything covered in this thread? Your thoughts on how this will affect the opposition inside Syria?