In 2014, American and Iraqi intelligence analysts said that al-Baghdadi has a doctorate for Islamic studies in Quranic studies from
Saddam University in Baghdad.
[46][47] According to a biography that circulated on extremist internet forums in July 2013, he obtained a
BA,
MA, and
PhD in
Islamic studies from the Islamic University of Baghdad.
[41][48][49] Another report says that he earned a doctorate in education from the University of Baghdad.
[50]
Bin Laden was raised as a devout
Sunni Muslim.
[38] From 1968 to 1976, he attended the élite secular
Al-Thager Model School.
[34][39] He studied
economics and
business administration[40] at
King Abdulaziz University. Some reports suggest he earned a degree in
civil engineering in 1979,
[41] or a degree in
public administration in 1981.
[42] bin Laden was an attendant at an English-language course in
Oxford, England during 1971.
[43] One source described him as "hard working";
[44] another said he left university during his third year without completing a college degree.
[45] At university, bin Laden's main interest was religion, where he was involved in both "interpreting the
Quran and
jihad" and charitable work.
[46] Other interests included writing poetry;
[47] reading, with the works of
Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery and
Charles de Gaulle said to be among his favorites; black
stallions; and
association football, in which he enjoyed playing at
centre forward and followed the English club
Arsenal.
[48]
Ayman al-Zawahiri worked in the medical field as a surgeon. In 1985, al-Zawahiri went to Saudi Arabia on
Hajj and stayed to practice medicine in
Jeddah for a year.
[34] As a reportedly qualified surgeon, when his organization merged with
bin Laden's al-Qaeda, he became bin Laden's personal advisor and physician. He had first met bin Laden in Jeddah in 1986.
[35] In 1981, Ayman al-Zawahiri traveled to
Peshawar,
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,
Pakistan, where he worked in a
Red Crescent hospital treating wounded refugees. There he became friends with
Ahmed Khadr, and the two shared a number of conversations about the need for Islamic government and the needs of the Afghan people.
[36][37] In 1993, al-Zawahiri traveled to the United States, where he addressed several
California mosques under his
Abdul Mu'iz pseudonym, relying on his credentials from the Kuwaiti
Red Crescent to raise money for Afghan children who had been injured by Soviet
land mines—he only raised $2000.
[38]
Considering majority of our population isn't a graduate, It seems many highly educated people are terrorists. It's a shame media has tainted Madrassas.
.
