Al-Qaeda chief vows attacks on Jews

Al-Qaeda's second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri called the United Nations an enemy to Islam and vowed attacks on Jews inside and outside Israel in a statement posted on the Internet Wednesday. "The United Nations is an enemy of Islam and Muslims," he said. "We promise our Muslim brothers that we will do our utmost to strike Jews in Israel and abroad with help and guidance from God," Israel News online reported Wednesday.

Al-Zawahri said Al-Qaeda does not kill innocents in an audio response to questions submitted on extremist Web sites. The audio message, accompanied by a 46-page English transcript, was the first installment to the more than 900 questions submitted by supporters, critics and journalists in December.

'We haven't killed the innocents, not in Baghdad nor in Morocco, nor in Algeria, nor anywhere else,' he said according to the English transcript. 'If there is any innocent who was killed in the Mujahideen's operations, then it was either an unintentional error or out of necessity,' he said. He added their opponents killed innocents and also "takes up positions in the midst of the Muslims for them to be human shields for him."

Analysts said the semi-interactive forum allows Zawahri to appear accessible to followers even though he and other al-Qaeda leaders are believed to be holed up in remote Pakistan.