Yusef al-Ayeri

Yusuf al-Ayeri or Yusuf bin Salih bin Fahd al-'Uyayri (1974 – 2003; known by a number of aliases, including al-Battar—the Arabic name of one of the swords of Muhammad—conventionally rendered "Swift Sword" in English) was a Saudi Arabian member of Al-Qaeda, and the first-ever leader of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia.

Biography Born on 24 April 1974 in Dammam, Saudi Arabia to an upper-middle-class family, Ayeri was known for taking part in illegal street racing, before dropping out of secondary school at age 18 and travelling to Afghanistan, where he received paramilitary training in the Al Farouq training camp, eventually becoming a trainer at the camp. Ayeri briefly served as a bodyguard of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, with whom he traveled to Sudan.

After the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, Ayeri was arrested by Saudi authorities and tortured. After two years he was released and was tasked by Bin Laden with organizing Al Qaeda's branch within Saudi Arabia.

Al-Ayeri was killed in 2003 in a gun-battle with Saudi security forces as part of the crackdown on Islamic insurgency in Saudi Arabia. He was 29 years old at the time of his death.

Personal life He was married to the sister of the wife of Shaykh Sulayman al-Ulwan, himself considered a radical cleric and put in jail by the Saudi authorities for this reason, with whom he had three daughters.

The famous journalist Abdel Bari Atwan said of him that he was "al-Qa'ida's first webmaster and an influential ideologue who wrote thirty books."