Al Qaeda Policy

QandO has an analysis of Al Qaeda rhetoric. Long story short, here are the conclusions:

One year ago, Al Qaeda believed the Caliphate could best be established by detente with the House of Saud, and War against the United States.

Today, Al Qaeda seeks detente with the US, and war against the House of Saud.

What changed? And why now?

My guess is that the US and our coalition have been hitting them hard on all fronts. The Saudis have been hurting them in the Kingdom. We have been inflicting asymmetric casualties on them in Iraq and we show no signs of stopping. So their answer is to ask for a cease fire from the US while they rebuild their operations in the Kingdom. We have them on the run. The conspicuous lack of rhetoric surrounding the reestablishment of the Global Caliphate is the key. What we are seeing is an attempt at strategic withdrawl so they can regroup and rebuild.