Bekkay Harrach video of September 2009

It's on YouTube, among other places.

حراش البكاي
Harrach al-Bekai

أبي طلحة الألماني
Abu Talha al-Almani

Bekkay Harrach alias Abu Talha the German grew up in Bonn, the capital of West Germany before the reunification of the country.

Although German forces played a part in the highly publicized air strike of 4 September which killed about 60 armed Taliban and 30 unarmed collaborators, Harrach does not mention that incident. Thus the video seems to have been made earlier than that date.

In 2007 a Lebanese gem merchant "Aleem N" was sentenced in Germany to 8 years imprisonment for his actions in support of al-Qa'ida. Aleem N was the guy who introduced Bekkay Harrach to the Islamic Jihad Union, a Turkish-European franchise of al-Qa'ida, in Pakistan. Aleem was convicted largely on the testimony against him by his son, who is a member of the German armed forces. This may be part of the reason why the German army is on Harrach's mind, assuming that the contents of the new video were up to Harrach at all.

IJU is not mentioned in this video. Instead there is a rather self-conscious introduction "al-Qa'ida presents" and a "promise from al-Qa'ida". The logo of Fajr (not as-Sahab) is attached. Fajr has been in conflict with the GIMF propaganda computer people lately, claiming that some GIMF personnel have been captured in Egypt and their stuff is no longer to be trusted.

It would be nice to know why Harrach goes out of his way to say that the city of Kiel will not be attacked. The only theory that I have is that he wants the security of that city to be relaxed.

In this video, the original background has been digitally removed and replaced with a still photograph.

Update: There is now an audio from Harrach as well, as-Sahab rather than al-Fajr this time, mocked up as a video with an old photo of a masked Harrach. It is more religious in nature than his other material or than terrorist propaganda in general. There is no indication that it is recent, and its release was presumably timed merely to try to influence the upcoming German election.

Update 2009.09.25: Another piece of the same (IMO insignificant) kind of material appeared today. YouTube will soon have a dozen copies of it, I'm sure.

A Turk in Stuttgart has been arrested after he uploaded the second of Harrach's recent pieces:

CNN in English.
Der Spiegel in German.

A new al-Qa'ida face, German, Bekkay Harrach

NEFA identifies him as Bekkay Harrach.

The German-language video, with Arabic subtitles, can be seen here.

Some worthwhile commentary here from Associated Press.

Update 29 January 2009. Two more good press reports:
Spiegel
Bild
both in English.

Harrach seems to part of the same network in Waziristan as Abu Yahya al-Libi and Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, but not IJU and their German star Eric Breininger, as far as I can tell.

Eric Breininger

Member of the Islamic Jihad Union. Wanted in Germany.

CCC backgrounder on IJU, mentioning Breininger.

The following material is from a Turkish-language IJU website hosted in Turkey.

Photo

Photo

Photo, Breininger at left

Photo, Breininger in the middle

Wanted: Eric Breininger & Houssain al-Malla

Wanted in Germany. Thought to be part of the Islamic Jihad Union. Reported to have been to tribal Pakistan this summer.


Eric Breininger German hotsheet on Breininger


Hussain Al-Malla German hotsheet on Al-Malla


Breininger at left.

A Turkish-language IJU website.