[Stratfor on the editorship of the Iranian newspaper that made the report that the government denied]
Iranian newspaper Hayat-e No reported Feb. 17 that security forces arrested senior al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri several days ago and are holding him in Tehran's notorious Evin jail, which frequently houses political prisoners. However, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi denied the report.
Zawahiri, the founder of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, is Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant and is wanted by Washington for involvement in the August 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. If Iran has detained him, it would be a major coup in the war against al Qaeda, but it would present an equally mammoth dilemma for Iran over what to do with the Egyptian militant. The claims and counterclaims of Zawahiri's arrest highlight the impact that Washington's war on al Qaeda is having on the already heated political struggle in Tehran.
It is important to note from the outset that STRATFOR has been unable to confirm or refute the allegation of Zawahiri's arrest. But it is likely that Hayat-e No believes its report is true and well grounded. The Farsi-language daily is run by Hojatoleslam Hadi Khamenei, a leading legislator and the younger brother of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Hadi Khamenei is in a position to know if the report is true: He represents Tehran in the Majlis, where he also heads the committee on Afghanistan. Moreover, he has no reason to issue such a report if he knew it to be false. Unlike his brother, Hadi Khamenei is a dedicated and active member of the reform movement. Whatever the divisions within the Iranian reform movement, issuing false claims of Zawahiri's arrest would gain it nothing and in fact risk exacerbating tensions with the United States.