End of the Isis old guard signals dangers ahead
谁杀死了阿德纳尼？
广州阿拉伯语翻译公司：在中东，很多事件都会因为阴谋论而变得迷雾重重，最近ISIS宣传部门头目阿德纳尼的失踪也是如此。
Who killed Abu Muhammad al-Adnani? For most people, the credit for the elimination of a top Isis leader goes to the Obama administration, which has the most impressive record of hunting down terrorists.
谁杀死了阿布•穆罕默德•阿德纳尼(Abu Muhammad al-Adnani)？对大多数人来说，消灭“伊拉克和黎凡特伊斯兰国”(ISIS)这个高层头目应该归功于奥巴马政府——奥巴马政府在追缴恐怖分子方面的记录最令人印象深刻。广州阿拉伯语翻译公司。
But maybe it was Russia? Or perhaps Adnani was assassinated by a rival within Isis?
但也或许是俄罗斯干的？抑或阿德纳尼被ISIS内部的竞争对手暗杀？
And what if his death is a myth deliberately disseminated by Isis?
如果他的死亡只是ISIS故意散播的传言，情况又会如何？
In the Middle East, every event, good or bad, is often accompanied by a conspiracy theory that sprinkles enough doubt to muddy the most obvious conclusions. And so it is with last week’s disappearance of Adnani, known as the spokesman for Isis, its chief propagandist and head of external operations.
在中东，每个事件，无论好与坏，往往伴随着阴谋论，让事件蒙上重重迷雾，搅浑最明显的结论。最近ISIS发言人、负责对外行动和宣传部门的头目阿德纳尼的失踪也是如此。广州阿拉伯语翻译公司。
News of his demise has brought widespread relief in many corners of the world where Isis has sought to extend its reach, by planning or simply inspiring attacks. But it has also raised questions about the state of the organisation and the disarray in the international effort to drive it out of Syria and Iraq.
阿德纳尼死亡的消息让世界许多角落的人们普遍感到如释重负——在这些地方，ISIS寻求通过策划或者只是煽动恐怖袭击来延伸其触角。但它也引发了有关该组织的状态以及国际社会将ISIS逐出叙利亚和伊拉克的混乱努力的问题。
There are admittedly uncommon twists in the Adnani story. Not only was his death announced rapidly by Isis last week but the US and Russia stepped forward to claim credit for it. The US administration’s statement about a precision strike was straightforward and convincing. More curious was that from Russia, which has until now deployed its military machine primarily to rid the Damascus regime of rebels who are fighting Isis. Moscow insisted it was one of its bombers that had struck Adnani and dozens of his companions, an assertion dismissed by the US as an undeserving brag.
应该承认，阿德纳尼的死亡存在古怪之处。不仅ISIS在上周迅速宣布了他死亡的消息，而且美国和俄罗斯都站出来领功。奥巴马政府发布了有关一次精确空袭的直截了当的声明，令人信服。较为古怪的声明来自俄罗斯，后者迄今部署的军事力量主要是在帮助大马士革政权打击正与ISIS作战的叛军。莫斯科方面坚称，是俄军一架轰炸机轰炸了阿德纳尼及其数十名随行人员，美国对此予以否认，称其是不够格的吹嘘。广州阿拉伯语翻译公司。
While world powers competed for credit, on the jihadi online rumour mill, an altogether different theory was making the rounds: Adnani’s murder was an inside job in an intensifying struggle over succession.
在世界大国争功劳的同时，圣战组织的网上谣言机器散布了完全不同的说法：阿德纳尼是在日益加剧的继承权争斗中被自己人杀死的。
The man most likely responsible, went the theory, was Abu Luqman, an Isis operative who fancies himself as the successor to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the Isis leader.
按照这种说法，最可能的元凶是阿布•鲁克曼(Abu Luqman)。鲁克曼是ISIS的特工人员，向往成为该组织领导人阿布•巴克尔-巴格达迪(Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi)的继任者。
Luqman himself is something of a mystery. Some reports from Raqqa, the Isis stronghold in Syria, suggest that he had changed his name to Abu Ayyub last year after Isis deliberately circulated rumours that he had been killed.
鲁克曼自己也有些神秘。来自拉卡(Raqqa)——ISIS在叙利亚的据点——的一些报道似乎表明，他在去年更名为阿布•阿尤博夫(Abu Ayyub)，此前ISIS有意散播他被杀死的传言。广州阿拉伯语翻译公司。
And that leads us to the other Adnani conspiracy theory: that he too might still be alive, his death nothing but a ruse staged by Isis to keep his movements safe for a while.
这把我们带到另一个关于阿德纳尼的阴谋论：他也可能仍然活着，死亡消息只不过是ISIS为了暂时隐匿他的踪迹而施展的诡计。
Bellingcat.com, a blog that uses open source material to investigate conflicts and has done good work on Syria, put the claims and the conspiracy theory to test but came up empty-handed.
Bellingcat.com是一家使用开源材料调查冲突事件的博客网站，对叙利亚冲突作了一些不错的研究。该网站深入分析了美俄两国的声明以及上述阴谋论，但最终也拿不出定论。
After parsing maps, social media accounts, footage and timelines, it concluded that the “inside Isis job” theory should be treated with suspicion — but the statements made by the US and Russia also remained ambiguous.
在分析了地图、社交媒体账户、影像资料和时间轴之后，该网站得出结论称，“ISIS自己人干的”这一说法值得怀疑，但美国和俄罗斯的声明同样含糊。广州阿拉伯语翻译公司。
So for now, it’s still safe to assume that Adnani is dead and, if he’s not, then he will have changed his name and we will never hear it again. The extent to which he was involved in planning terrorist attacks abroad is uncertain but he was undoubtedly the organisation’s leading voice, so his disappearance strikes a harsh blow to Isis. Whether it undermines it strategically, however, is less clear.
因此，就目前来说，我们仍然有理由假定，阿德纳尼已经死了，如果他没有死，那么他会更名，我们永远听不到这个名字了。目前仍不确定他在多大程度上参与策划国外的恐怖袭击，但他无疑是ISIS的头面人物，因此他的失踪对该组织是一个沉重打击。然而，这起事件是否在战略上削弱了ISIS还不甚明朗。
The mystery around his killing has exposed two glaring failings in the fight against Isis. One is the absence of the international unity needed to eradicate Isis, the other is the gaps in understanding of the structure and functioning of the Isis.
阿德纳尼死亡谜团暴露出打击ISIS的两个引人注目的失败。一个是缺乏剿灭ISIS所需的国际团结，另一个是对ISIS架构和运作机制的理解空白。
Barack Obama, the US president, has invested heavily in diplomacy with Russia in pursuit of an elusive consensus to end the war in Syria and focus on demolishing Isis.
美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)投入极大精力对俄罗斯展开外交活动，力求就结束叙利亚战争和聚焦于摧毁ISIS凝聚共识，但这并不容易。广州阿拉伯语翻译公司。
With a few months left for the Obama administration, there is no reason to expect that Washington and Moscow will reach an agreement. As the chaos persists, Isis buys time to rejuvenate its ranks.
随着奥巴马还有几个月就会离职，没有理由预计华盛顿和莫斯科将会达成协议。随着混乱持续，ISIS争取到了更替头目的时间。
Hassan Hassan, an expert on Isis, said according to the BBC website that the transition from the old guard to the second and third tiers of leaders within Isis is well under way and, when one is eliminated, others emerge that are possibly more dogmatic and resilient. More important than who killed Baghdadi is to identify the potentially more brutal, new breed.
据英国广播公司(BBC)网站报道，ISIS问题研究专家哈桑•哈桑(Hassan Hassan)表示，ISIS内部正在推进从元老向二线和三线领导人交棒的过程，当一个人被清除后，其他人就会涌现出来，他们可能更加教条更加死硬。比谁杀死阿德纳尼更重要的任务是识别潜在更加野蛮的新一代ISIS头目。
