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EXPLAINER: What was, and is, al-Qaida?

FILE - In this April 22, 2014 file photo, a group of suspected al-Qaida militants accused in the killing of an army general in a suicide bombing, stand trial at a state security court in Sanaa, Yemen. Over the past decade, even as it used Yemen as a base for international attacks, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula has often clashed with the military and security forces, carrying out attacks and withstanding crackdowns even as it sought to weave itself into Yemeni society. (AP Photo/Hani Mohammed, File) FILE - In this July 16, 1997 file photo, police handcuff Lionel Dumont of France after his trial in central Bosnian town of Zenica for a series of robberies in Bosnia. Dumont, a senior al-Qaida member, was based in Japan for more than a year, and investigators suspect he was trying to establish a terror cell, Japanese media said Tuesday, May 18, 2004. (AP Photo/Hidajet Delic, File) FILE - In this Dec. 27, 1979 file photo, rebel Muslim fighters inspect a Soviet tank captured in fighting with the Kabul government forces on September near Asmar, Afghanistan. Al-Qaida, or “the Base” in Arabic, organized as the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan. Hoping to capitalize on the support the mujahedeen, or the “holy warriors,” received during their war against Moscow, Osama bin Laden formed al-Qaida and became its leader. (AP Photo/Steve McCurry, File) FILE - In this Oct. 15, 2000 file photo, experts in a speed boat examine the damaged hull of the USS Cole at the Yemeni port of Aden after an al-Qaida attack that killed 17 sailors. (AP Photo/Dimitri Messinis, File) FILE - In this 1998 file photo, Ayman al-Zawahri, center left, and Osama bin Laden, center, hold a news conference in Afghanistan. Born out of the 1980s war against the Soviet Union's occupation of Afghanistan, the terror group al-Qaida under bin Laden grew into a generational threat to America that culminated in its Sept. 11, 2001, attack that brought down the World Trade Center in New York. (AP Photo/File) FILE - In this Sept. 11, 2001, file photo, the south tower of the World Trade Center, left, begins to collapse after a terrorist attack on the landmark buildings in New York. (AP Photo/Gulnara Samoilova, File) FILE - In this Friday, Aug. 7, 1998 file photo, rescue workers carry Susan Francisca Murianki, a U.S. embassy office worker, over the rubble of a collapsed building next to the embassy, in Nairobi, Kenya. In 1996, Osama bin Laden issued a formal declaration of war. But it wasn't until trucks loaded with explosives detonated outside of U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, killing more than 200 people on Aug. 7, 1998, that the threat became real. (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi, File) FILE - In this Aug. 15, 1998 file photo, a U.S. Marine talks with an FBI investigator in front of the damaged U.S. embassy in the capital Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. In 1996, Osama bin Laden issued a formal declaration of war. But it wasn't until trucks loaded with explosives detonated outside of U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, killing more than 200 people on Aug. 7, 1998, that the threat became real. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, File)