jan 3, 1988 - BUILDING AL-QAIDA

Description:

bin Laden created a new group, called al-Qaida (“the base”) that would focus on symbolic acts of terrorism instead of military campaigns. After the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia to step up fundraising for this new and more complicated mission. However, the comparatively pro-Western Saudi royal family feared that bin Laden’s fiery pan-Islamist rhetoric might cause trouble in the kingdom, and so they tried to keep him as quiet as they could.

Added to timeline:

Date: