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One of the last times al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri was on center stage was roughly 40 years back, when the international press captured his rants from a cage at the back of an Egyptian courtroom.

The cameras found him shouting about the torture he and other prisoners endured as a result of Egyptian jailers. He started the group chanting: "We are Muslims. We are Muslims."

Zawahiri's prison time in Egypt not only set him against the regime there, but also marked the beginning of his lifelong hatred of the U.S.

When he joined forces with Osama bin Laden eventually, he passed that enmity along, on Weekend local time in Afghanistan after an unmanned U but it ended for al-Zawahiri.S drone fired two hellfire missiles at a safe house in Kabul, killing him.

President Biden noted Monday that al-Zawahiri was Osama bin Laden's deputy during 9/11 and that he was "deeply involved in the planning."

"For decades he was the mastermind behind attacks against Americans," Biden added, noting the 2000 USS Cole attack and the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Biden also detailed al-Zawahiri's role leading al-Qaida since bin Laden was killed by U.S. forces in 2011, including contacting followers in recent weeks to attack the U.S. and allies.

Bruce Hoffman, director of the Center for Security and Peacefulness Studies at Georgetown University, said in 2011 that while al-Zawahiri had a reputation for being prickly and dogmatic, he might emerge as an more robust leader than bin Laden even.

"Unlike bin Laden, he previously the road cred at having been a dyed-in-the-wool terrorist from the right time he was an adolescent," Hoffman said. "OK, he's not as telegenic as bin Laden. He lacks bin Laden's charisma. He doesn't have bin Laden's mellifluous voice, but he is an extremely powerful figure within the movement still."

Bin Laden had talked about building a base for a broader Islamist movement as though it were a mantra. He wanted a business that didn't need him to survive. And al-Zawahiri has kept it going in the decade since bin Laden's death.
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