Al-Qaeda number two Ayman Zawahiri has ridiculed US president-elect Barack Obama as a "house negro" and warned him against sending more troops to Afghanistan, in an internet audio message.
Zawahiri insulted Obama and other black Americans who have held high office in the US administration with the term used by the late Muslim black militant leader Malcolm X for slaves serving their white masters.
"It is true about you and people like you... what Malcolm X said about the house negroes," he said in a message released on Wednesday, naming former secretary of state Colin Powell and the current secretary, Condoleezza Rice.
An English transcript of the speech in Arabic purportedly by the al-Qaeda number two was provided by al-Qaeda's media arm As-Sahab.
The tape features an old speech by Malcolm X in which he used the two terms, referring to house slaves who were considered more docile and on better terms with their masters than the slaves out in the field.
Obama's transition team declined to comment on the tape, in which Zawahiri accuses the president-elect of siding with Israel.
But US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the insult exposed the anti-democratic values of al-Qaeda.
"It's just, you know, more despicable comments from a terrorist," McCormack told reporters.
"And if anybody needed... more of a contrast between what... the West and the United States stand for, in terms of democracy and what these terrorists stand for, I don't think you need to go any further than those comments."
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino described Zawahiri's verbal broadside against Obama as "pathetic comments by al-Qaeda terrorists."
"They attack everything and anything that is American. And so they just look for targets of opportunity, both verbally and physically, and that's why we have to stop them," Perino said.
On the political front, Zawahiri said: "What you have announced before... that you will withdraw (US) troops from Iraq (and send them) to Afghanistan is a policy that is doomed to failure ...
"If you still want to be stubborn about America's failure in Afghanistan, then remember the fate of (President George W) Bush and (Pakistan's ex-president) Pervez Musharraf, and the fate of the Soviets and British before them."
In the message made available by SITE Intelligence Group in the United States, Zawahiri warned Obama of a "heavy legacy of failure" awaiting him in office.
"Beware that the (stray) dogs of Afghanistan have savoured the taste of your soldiers' flesh, so do send them in thousands," said the closest aide to al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.
In a major interview aired on Sunday, Obama vowed no retreat from his campaign promise to begin pulling troops out of Iraq and switch the military focus to Afghanistan.
A US counter-terrorism official in Washington said Zawahiri's new message "holds few, if any, surprises".
"It shows how out of touch al-Qaeda is with so much of the rest of the world. But make no mistake: this is still a group that can do serious damage," the official said.
The November 4 election of Obama as the first black president-elect of the United States was widely applauded around the world.
In his message, Zawahiri said Bush had succeeded only in "passing the misfortune and embroilments of America to his successor," and that the American people had elected the leader who will rid them of the Iraq burden.
"By voting in (Barack) Obama, the American people have proclaimed their fear of the fate that they could be led into by the policies of the like of Bush," he said.
"They have decided to support the one who calls for withdrawal from Iraq," Zawahiri said.
The message was aired in a videotape showing a portrait of Zawahiri wearing a white turban, next to Obama's picture with a kippa praying at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem during a pre-election visit to Israel.
The backdrop also shows a picture of African American Muslim leader Malcolm X, who was assassinated in 1965.
"You represent the opposite to honourable black Americans like... Malcolm X," Zawahiri said, while old footage of Malcolm X's speeches on human rights and equality was played.
He scolded Obama for "choosing to be an enemy of Islam and Muslims," saying that the Muslim "nation had bitterly received" Obama's pledge of support to Israel.
"You have chosen to stand in the ranks of the enemies of Muslims and pray the prayer of the Jews, although you claim that your mother is Christian," Zawahiri added.
