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A powerful bomb explosion rocked the Norwegian capital Oslo, damaging several government buildings and killing at least seven people. Shortly after the bombing, a gunman dressed in police uniform killed nine others at a youth political conference near the capital. Norwegian authorities say the events are related.

There have been conflicting reports on who was behind the attacks. The New York Times reports that Ansar al-Jihad al-Alami, or the Helpers of the Global Jihad, has claimed responsibility, saying it was revenge for Norway’s involvement in Afghanistan and insults to Islam. Several other al Qaeda-linked jihadists have also claimed credit for the attacks. “Norway was targeted today to be a lesson and an example to the other countries of Europe,” wrote Abu Suleiman al Nasser, an al Qaeda-linked terrorist described by the SITE Intelligence Group as a “prominent jihadist.” It is not known yet if al Qaeda’s central leadership was directly involved, but there is a strong likelihood that one of its affiliates was involved.

There are several reasons al Qaeda would target Norway.

Al Qaeda and its affiliates have repeatedly threatened Norway with terrorist attacks because of the country’s involvement in Afghanistan. As a member of NATO, Norway’s Special Forces have helped the U.S.-led fight against the Taliban and al Qaeda for many years. Al Qaeda’s leader Ayman al-Zawahiri twice named Norway as a potential target in 2003 and 2007. Last December, two suicide bombings hit the capital of Sweden, Norway’s eastern neighbor, and one bomber had in a pre-taped video described Sweden’s role in Afghanistan as his motivation for the bombing. Norway is also part of NATO’s air campaign in Libya. On July 1, Libya’s leader Moammar Gaddafi threatened Europe with suicide bombings in retaliation for NATO’s air strikes. But it appears unlikely that today’s events were the handiwork of Gaddafi.

The attack could also be a revenge for the 2005 Danish cartoons of Prophet Muhammad. In 2006, several Norwegian embassies were attacked after the country’s newspapers reprinted the cartoons that angered Muslims around the world and became a propaganda tool for al Qaeda.

Another possibility is the controversial case of Mullah Krekar, the founder of Ansar al Islam, an Iraqi group with al Qaeda ties. Originally from Iraq’s Kurdistan, Krekar was declared a national security threat in Norway in 2005 but still lives in the country. Recently, Norwegian authorities indicted Krekar after he made threats against government officials if he was deported. But it would be difficult for his group to stage an attack of this magnitude without foreign assistance.

There are no known terrorist groups in Norway, but the attackers may be connected to terror networks abroad. Last year, three Norwegians of foreign origin were prosecuted for planning an attack in Oslo. The detentions were coordinated with the arrest of Najibullah Zazi, an Afghan-American who was plotting to bomb New York City’s subways. Al Qaeda’s central leadership in Pakistan was believed to have been behind the plots.

Al Qaeda may have chosen Norway not because it is a high priority target but because the Scandinavian country is an easier target. As I wrote in an earlier piece, al Qaeda’s new leader Zawahiri would attempt high-profile attacks in the U.S. or Europe to consolidate his position within al Qaeda and avenge the group’s recent losses. During his first visit to Afghanistan last Saturday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said al Qaeda’s defeat was “within reach,” and the group would soon be unable to strike the West. If the Oslo terror attack turns out to be the work of al Qaeda or its affiliates, it should alarm Washington that al Qaeda, despite losing its charismatic leader, is far from defeated and can plot attacks around the world.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s half-brother, the most powerful and controversial figure in southern Afghanistan, was assassinated by a senior associate this morning at his home in Kandahar City. The death of Ahmed Wali Karzai leaves a perilous power vacuum in the south at a critical time when the United States and NATO are trying to consolidate security gains of the past year, repel the Taliban’s summer offensive, transition security to the Afghan lead, and shift the fight against the Taliban from the south to eastern Afghanistan.

For the U.S. military, Wali Karzai was both an asset and a liability. He was the de facto governor of Kandahar, and his dominance over Kandahar’s security, political, and economic affairs was seen as a major setback to improving local governance and establishing an accountable and democratic leadership in the region. He had his own private militias and was accused of being the ringleader of regional drugs and criminal mafia.

Despite these flaws, he proved to be a staunch ally of the United States and NATO in the fight against the Taliban and al Qaeda. Both the CIA and the military relied on his influential network to maintain stability in the strategically important province. Unlike President Karzai, he wanted U.S. troops to stay in Kandahar, and, on several occasions, mobilized tribes to support anti-Taliban offensives by the coalition forces.

His death also means that President Karzai will now find it hard to have the same level of influence and control in Kandahar, as he had completely subordinated security and political affairs in the province to his half-brother. This will be a big challenge for the embattled president, who is readying his government for the transition process and is in an intense conflict with parliament that threatens to impeach him.

Wali Karzai’s death is the latest in a series of assassinations of senior Afghan officials over the past months, such as Kandahar’s police chief, the top police commander of northern Afghanistan, and the governor of Takhar province. The Taliban claimed responsibility for Karzai’s assassination immediately, but the killing appears to be more a result of personal or family feud than a Taliban plot. Mohammad Sardar, the assassin, was from Wali Karzai’s village and his trusted confidante for almost a decade.

Regardless of who was behind the plot, Wali Karzai’s assassination is a big propaganda and morale victory for the Taliban. The insurgents are now likely to step up targeted killings and suicide attacks in the south to shaken public confidence in the ability of the Afghan government and foreign troops to stabilize the country.

Kandahar is the strategic birthplace of both the Taliban and President Karzai. It is also the focus of the U.S. military surge that drove out the Taliban from their strongholds around Kandahar City. Ahmed Wali’s killing threatens to undo the security gains, as it will change the power structure in Kandahar and trigger a power struggle between members of Karzai’s family and leaders from competing influential tribes—which the Taliban will try to exploit. It remains to be seen what steps President Karzai will take to hold control over and maintain stability in the province.

A recent comment by Richard Holbrooke, the Obama administration’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, that “almost every Pashtun family has someone involved with the [Taliban] movement,” has caused an outcry in Afghanistan and strained the already tense relationship between Kabul and Washington. President Hamid Karzai had sought reconciliation with the Taliban because he is a Pashtun himself, adding that Washington did not back the negotiations.

Holbrooke’s remark drew little attention in the United States, but it enraged Afghanistan, especially Pashtun leaders who interpreted the remark as a U.S. ultimatum issued at their ethnic group. According to Tolo, a private Afghan television channel, members of the lower house of Afghanistan’s National Assembly accused Holbrooke of “inflaming ethnic and language conflict among Afghan people,” while the upper house criticized the remark as “detrimental to the unity and solidarity between ethnic groups living in Afghanistan.”

In an attempt ease the tension, Holbrooke issued a clarification published on the website of the U.S. embassy in Kabul: “When I noted that almost every Pashtun family has someone involved with the movement, I was reflecting President Karzai’s comment in Istanbul that ‘those Taliban who were not part of terrorist networks or Al-Qaeda are sons of the Afghan soil.’ I was not suggesting that all Pashtuns are part of the Taliban or all Taliban are Pashtuns.”

But the clarification failed to repair the damage and instead has served as a basis for new conspiracy theories. Haji Farid, a lawmaker from Kapisa Province, described the remark as a U.S. “warning that all Pashtuns must be eliminated.” Ghulam Jilani Zawak, head of the Research and Advisory Council of Afghanistan, said Holbrooke’s remarks indicated that the United States had aimed to “massacre Pashtuns” rather than to achieve “humanitarian goals.” Commentary in Taand, a Pashtu-language daily, said that “even the Russians during their ten years of occupation did not make such a rude and brazen comment about Pashtuns.” A meeting of Afghan political analysts and experts held at the Regional Studies Centre in Kabul on Monday strongly criticized Holbrooke’s statement and demanded an apology. Political analyst Abdul Rahman Hotaki said the comment was an attack on the rights of 40 million Pashtun people living on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border.

The relationship between Holbrooke and Karzai has been troubled from the start. The frequency of Holbrooke’s meetings with Karzai’s opponents led the Afghan president to believe President Obama wanted to oust him. The danger of the latest episode, however, is that Holbrooke has angered not only the government, but ordinary Afghans as well.

Pashtuns make up perhaps 40 percent of Afghanistan’s population. While it is true that the Taliban in Afghanistan come predominantly from the Pashtun ethnic group, the majority of the Pashtuns oppose the Taliban and are on the front lines to help the Afghan government and coalition forces defeat the insurgent group. Moreover, the Pakistani Taliban includes not only Pashtuns but also Punjabis, Sindhis, Arabs, Chechens, and Uzbeks. Equating the Pashtuns with the Taliban is not only inaccurate, it also helps serve the Taliban’s propaganda and complicates Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s “population-centric” efforts to defeat the Taliban.

Ahmad Majidyar is a research assistant at the American Enterprise Institute.