CAIRO - Al-Qaeda's No. 2 has slammed France's push to ban the Islamic full-face veil and urged Muslim women in a new audio message on the Internet to defend their headdress in a holy war against the "secular Western crusade." Ayman al-Zawahri says the drive by France and some other European nations is a discrimination against Muslim women. In the 47-minute recording released on militant websites on Wednesday, al-Qaeda's deputy leader also eulogised reputed No. 3 official, who was killed with his family in a US strike in Pakistan in May. Al-Zawahri praises Mustafa al-Yazid's sacrifice and goes on to claim that although killed al-Qaeda militants in Iraq outnumber US soldiers 100-to-1, the US will still withdraw from Iraq in defeat.