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For many, the whereabouts and machinations of al-Qaida founder Osama bin Laden following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks until his death remain shrouded in mystery.

The terror mastermind had been on the run, trying to evade U.S. forces, while al-Qaida itself was in a period of disarray.

Yet even as U.S. Navy SEALs burst into bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in May 2011 and killed him, things already had begun to change with the help of officials in Iran and Pakistan.

"It's a very, very crucial period that always has been overlooked and misunderstood," said Catherine Scott-Clark, co-author of the new book The Exile: The Stunning Inside Story of Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaida in Flight.

There have been some prior insights into bin Laden and al-Qaida during his years on the run, including the release by U.S. intelligence of three tranches of documents recovered from the Abbottabad complex. But many more remain classified.

Those documents, according to U.S. officials, give insights into a paranoid jihadist, hoping to prevent al-Qaida from falling apart.

"The movement is nothing like unified. It disagrees with itself all the time," a senior U.S. intelligence official said of the second set of declassified documents, most of which date from 2009 to 2011. "You got to see the mess it was behind the scenes."

But Scott-Clark and co-author Adrian Levy tell a more nuanced story of bin Laden's exploits, relying on testimony from his family, his deputies, his spiritual adviser, and others with links to the al-Qaida network.

"He was active and ambitious and happy that al-Qaida was on the up and coming back, and money was flowing through and the affiliates were kind of getting under control and doing what he wanted them to do," Scott-Clark told VOA following a discussion Monday at the Brookings Institution. "Things were continuing. It was business as usual."

Scott-Clark attributes much of that success to alliances bin Laden had forged with some current and former officials in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, although she emphasized that key officials were kept in the dark.

Pakistani authorities have denied that any officials had any knowledge of bin Laden's whereabouts. Scott-Clark said that the information was closely held.

"Not everyone has the same level of knowledge and people did not share information," she said. "If you look at the fallout after the killing [of bin Laden] and the way that the army and the ISI reacted by just shutting everything down, they were as shocked as everybody else."

Perhaps more important, bin Laden and al-Qaida got a boost from Iran an unlikely ally that kept several family members, including some of his wives and his son, Hamza, as well as key members of al-Qaida's Shura, or ruling council, held at a Quds force training compound in Tehran.

After an offer was reportedly rebuffed to hand over the family and al-Qaida leaders to the U.S. or other Western nations in exchange for an easing of sanctions, Tehran took a more proactive approach and "negotiated with al-Qaida to mutual benefit."

"It was a fraught relationship, from the people who were in Iran from al-Qaida that I interviewed," Scott-Clark said. "It went up and down all the time, and there was complete mutual distrust on both sides for the whole time that they were there."

But both sides, she said, were able to get some of what they wanted. Iran was able to use al-Qaida and al-Qaida in Iraq the forerunner of Islamic State to create problems for U.S. forces in Iraq. And bin Laden and al-Qaida were able to reinvigorate the group's networks, setting up a comeback that has yet to abate.

"They were able to re-establish a funding pipeline through Iran which still exists today," Scott-Clark said. "These days, the money comes from Kuwait and Qatar and goes to Syria and Iraq. A lot of it used to go to Pakistan."

Yet divisions with al-Qaida remained.

Bin Laden, enamored by the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, wanted "to fight a physical war. He wanted the bigger bangs," according to Scott-Clark.

That vision seems to have died with bin Laden, Scott-Clark says, and was replaced by that of his former deputy and current leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, who sees al-Qaida as a means for inspiration.

"I don't think al-Qaida Central is going to carry out a sort of coordinated home-based mass attack. I think those days are gone," she said. "It's all about PR [public relations]."

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Iran, Pakistan Crucial to al-Qaida's Long-term Success - Voice of America

The Iran sanctions bill was crafted as a response to Tehran's human rights abuses and its backing of terrorist-designated groups. | AP Photo

By Elana Schor

06/05/2017 07:46 PM EDT

Updated 06/05/2017 09:09 PM EDT

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Monday night teed up a vote this week to take up a bipartisan Iran sanctions bill, which also sets up potential battles over sanctioning Russia and blocking some of President Donald Trump's proposed weapons sales to Saudi Arabia.

The Iran sanctions bill was crafted as a response to Tehran's human rights abuses and its backing of terrorist-designated groups.

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Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and the committee's top Democrat, Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin, have agreed to pursue legislation punishing Russia for its meddling in the 2016 election without the use of sanctions, but senators in both parties have vowed to push a debate on sanctioning Moscow regardless particularly given Thursday's hotly anticipated testimony from former FBI Director James Comey about Trump's efforts to shut down the bureau's Russia investigation.

In addition, Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) may yet use the Iran bill as a vehicle to force a vote on their resolution blocking about $500 million in Trump-blessed weapons sales to Saudi Arabia.

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Paul and Murphy are targeting their efforts toward a small group of offensive arms sales, citing humanitarian concerns that the weapons would be used to fuel the violent civil war in Yemen.

The Trump administration on Friday walked back a previous suggestion that it might revisit existing sanctions against Russia. But White House Director of Legislative Affairs Marc Short told reporters Monday night that he is not yet not prepared to outline the president's position on sanctions against Moscow or Tehran, adding that more information is expected this week.

Matthew Nussbaum contributed to this report.

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McConnell calls up Iran bill as possible Russia and Saudi votes loom - Politico

LONDON Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei lashed out on Sunday against U.S. President Donald Trump and Saudi Arabia's leaders for their new regional alliance against Tehran, saying it would bear no fruit.

Trump singled out Iran as a key source of funding and support for militant groups during his visit to Saudi Arabia in late May, two days after the Iranian election in which pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani won a second term.

During Trump's visit to Riyadh, the U.S. sealed a $110 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia, Iran's regional arch-rival.

Khamenei called the visit a display of brazenness.

"The U.S. president stands alongside the leaders of a tribal and backward system and does the sword dance, but criticizes an Iranian election with 40 million votes," the supreme leader said in a speech broadcast live on state TV.

"Even with a multi-billion dollar bribe to America, the Saudis cannot achieve their goals in the region," he said.

Khamenei accused Washington of double standards, saying it turned a blind eye to the "killing of Yemeni people in mosques, streets and their homes," while claiming to promote human rights around the world.

Saudi Arabia is leading a Sunni Arab coalition fighting the Iran-allied Houthis in Yemen, part of the same regional power struggle that is fuelling the war in Syria.

The Iranian president championed a nuclear deal with the United States and five other major powers in 2015 that led to the lifting of most sanctions against Iran, in return for curbs on its nuclear program.

The landmark deal, however, has not led to normalization of ties between the two countries that Tehran hoped for.

Trump has frequently called the agreement "one of the worst deals ever signed" and said Washington would review it.

European countries, Russia and China have expressed concern that the Trump administration might withdraw from the deal.

"European leaders are now saying the Americans are not trustworthy. Imam Khomeini said the same thing more than 30 years ago," Khamenei said at the mausoleum of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, marking the 1989 death of the founder of the Islamic Republic.

Relations with Washington were broken after Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution and enmity to the United States has long been a rallying point for hardline supporters of Khamenei in Iran.

Khamenei hailed the high turnout in the election, saying that it showed the majority of Iranians still supported the Islamic revolution and its uncompromising values.

(Reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin; Editing by Tom Heneghan)

SYDNEY Australian police on Monday shot dead a gunman in the city of Melbourne who had been holding a woman hostage, police said, a confrontation for which the militant group Islamic State claimed responsibility.

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Iran's leader lashes out at Trump, Saudis for anti-Tehran alliance - Reuters

Iran sending Shi'ite militias to create stronghold on Iraq-Syria border through which the Islamic Republic can send forces, weapons and supplies to Assad regime and Hezbollah in Lebanon

The most important strategic development in the Middle East these days isnt the Trump administrations decision, which was foreseen, not to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Intelligence services in Israel and the region are now following events along the Syria-Iraq border.

In both countries, Shiite militias, backed by Iran, are moving toward the border. If they can come together on both sides of the frontier and create a band of control, a longtime Iranian aspiration will be fulfilled: to establish a land corridor through which the Iranians can freely move forces, weapons and supplies from Tehran through Iraq to the Assad regime in Syria, and even west of there to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The creation of this contiguity would follow an achievement chalked up by the Iran-led axis in the region thanks to Russian intervention for the Assad regime in the Syrian civil war. Since the final surrender of the rebel forces in Aleppo in northern Syria last December, the regime and its supporters have slowly expanded their hold on various parts of Syria.

At the same time, the Iranians, through local Shiite militias, are helping the United States and Iraqi government fight the Islamic State around the Iraqi city of Mosul. Moving ISIS away from the border lets the Tehran-backed militias take strategic territory in the desert area west of Mosul near the Syrian border.

About a week ago, Shitite militias took over a number of villages around the town of Baaj on the Iraqi side of the border, pushing out Islamic fighters. The militias are accompanied by Iranian advisers and instructors. Reuters reported that the conquest of the villages will let the Iranians and their supporters reopen a good portion of the main road connecting Baghdad to the areas under Assads control in Syria. For complete territorial contiguity, Assads forces must still advance on the Syrian side in the area where the Kurdish militias are operating, supported by the United States.

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The Syria-Iraq border is at the moment the most important place in the region. Thats where the regional picture will be determined, Chagai Tzuriel, director general of the Intelligence Affairs Ministry, told Haaretz over the weekend. Tzuriel, a former head of research in the Mossad, added that the creation of territorial contiguity under Iranian influence changes the strategic balance in the Middle East. According to Tzuriel, Iran, with the assistance of the Shiite militias and the cooperation of other forces, continues to take steps whose goal is strengthening its hold in Syria.

Tzuriel said that alongside their operations on the Iraqi-Syrian border, the Iranians have been in contact with the Assad regime to lease a port in northwestern Syria. This would give Iran a foothold on the Mediterranean coast something Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned about on his visit to Moscow in March.

The stabilizing of the Assad regime thanks to Russian military support, along with the daily circus around U.S. President Donald Trump, have reduced media coverage of events in Syria. But Syria is the main arena of conflict, where the struggles between the superpowers are being waged and temporary or long-term alliances are being formed.

In Trumps visit to Riyadh last month, where he signed a huge deal to sell American weapons to the Saudis, he expressed support for the Gulf states and warned against Irans intentions. But actually it seems Iran is advancing step by step toward its strategic goals.

For now, its not clear whether the new administration in Washington plans to take steps beyond rhetoric to halt Irans influence. Most of the U.S. militarys moves in the region are directed against the Islamic State, and in Trumps speeches, he often focuses on the Iranian dangers, especially in the context of the recent terror attacks by Islamic extremists in Britain in Manchester and before that in London.

On May 18, in an unusual move, the U.S. Air Force attacked militias identified with the Assad regime when they approached a base near Tanf on the Syria-Jordan border. U.S. special forces are operating in the area, alongside Syrian rebel forces that maintain a relationship with the Americans. The bombing seems to have been an isolated event that does not reflect a greater degree of commitment by Washington or a willingness to operate methodically in this region.

Israels statements on Syria mainly involve events closer to home a lack of stability near the Jordanian-Syrian-Israeli border and what seems to be the Syrian regimes attempts to gradually restore control along its border with Israel in the Golan Heights. Israel has already stated its opposition to the arrival of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and Hezbollah fighters to the Golan if Syria is successful in its efforts.

Most of the Israeli attention is on an area that now has its own Hebrew acronym that translates as R.S.S. (region of southern Syria). But it seems that east of there, on the Syria-Iraq border, in an area that could also affect Jordan, a new reality is coming into being with implications that could affect the region in the coming years. At the moment at least, its the Iranians who are dictating this reality, while the other parties are watching from afar and still trying to draw conclusions.

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Iran Striving for Land Corridor From Tehran to Beirut - Haaretz

Qatargas, the world's largest exporter of liquefied natural gas, reassures Japan, the world's largest importer, that Gulf state rift will not effect supply

Japan's JERA Co, the world's biggest buyer of liquefied naturalgas, said on Monday it has been informed byQatargasthat there will be no impact on LNG supplies after several Middle East countries cut ties withQatar.

There would be "no conceivable impact on LNG supplies" from the rift, JERA said in a statement, adding "this is also a geopolitical issue in the Middle East and there is a possibility that this could be closely related to the energy market, so we will continue to keep watch on the movements."

>>Hacks, Money and Qatari Crisis: How Gulf States Entangled D.C. Think Tanks in Their Fight for Influence>>Qatar Crisis Explained: What Just Happened and Why It Messes Up Trump's Iran and ISIS Plans (And there's an Israeli connection)>> Palestinians confirm: Top Hamas officials have left Qatar at country's request

Qataris the world's biggest exporter of liquefied natural gas, while Japan is the largest importer, taking in about one-third of global shipments.

Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain severed their ties withQataron Monday, accusing it of supporting terrorism, opening up the worst rift in years among some of the most powerful states in the Arab world.

Qatar-Iran cooperation

In April 2017, Qatar lifted a self-imposed ban on developing the world's biggest natural gas in an attempt to stave off an expected rise in competition.

Iranian official blasts Gulf states over Qatar: Cutting ties 'not a way to resolve crisis'|Gulf states' break with Qatar won't affect fight against ISIS, says Tillerson<<

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At the time the LNG market was undergoing huge changes as the biggest ever flood of new supply hit the market, with volumes coming mainly from the United States and Australia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin also was aiming to become the world's largest LNG producer.

Qatar had declared a moratorium in 2005 on the development of the North Field, which it shares with Iran, to give Doha time to study the impact on the reservoir from a rapid rise in output.

The flurry of liquified natural gas production has resulted in global installed LNG capacity of over 300 million tons a year, while only around 268 million tons of LNG were traded in 2016, Thomson Reuters data shows.

Iran's top priority

Iran, which suffers severe domestic gas shortages, has made a rapid increase in production from South Pars a top priority and signed a preliminary deal with France's Total in November 2016 to develop its South Pars II project.

Iran's oil minister also vowed this March to ramp up production of its part of the shared field.

"Iran's gas production in South Pars can exceed Qatar's before the end of new Iranian year [ending March 20, 2018]," Zanganeh was quoted as saying by Tasnim news agency.

Total was the first Western energy company to sign a major deal with Tehran since the lifting of international sanctions.

Qatar Petroleum's Chief Executive Saad al-Kaabisaid the decision to lift the moratorium was not prompted by Iran's plan to develop its part of the shared field.

"What we are doing today is something completely new and we will in future of course ... share information on this with them [Iran]."

The economy of Qatar, a future World Cup host with a population of 2.6 million, has been pressured by the global oil slump and in 2015 QP dismissed thousands of workers and has earmarked a number of assets for divestment.

QP is merging two LNG divisions, Qatargas and RasGas, to save hundreds of millions of dollars.

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The Qatar-Iran Gas Field Behind the Diplomatic War in the Middle East - Haaretz