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Mission accomplished.
Again, I guess.
He was killed in a bombing raid in Bagdad.
more to come.....
Mission accomplished.
Again, I guess.
I have zero credibility in the political forum, so I may as well ruin my anonymity by saying- how convenient that he is dead as the mid-term election races heat up and the president needs a good boost in the polls.
I think he is dead.
Who gets the $25 million?
the bomb
Credibility is not a requirement for posting here Melmart.
I would hope an event that should be viewed as a blow to terrorism woudn't set off partisan political conspiracy rhetoric.
Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi Killed in Air Raid
Jun 8, 6:26 AM (ET)
By PATRICK QUINN
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida's leader in Iraq who led a bloody campaign of suicide bombings and kidnappings, has been killed in an air strike, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Thursday, adding that his iden y was confirmed by fingerprints and a look at his face. It was a major victory in the U.S.-led war in Iraq and the broader war on terror.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said al-Zarqawi was killed along with seven aides Wednesday evening in a remote area 30 miles northeast of Baghdad in the volatile province of Diyala, just east of the provincial capital of Baqouba, al-Maliki said.
Loud applause broke out among the reporters and soldiers as al-Maliki, flanked by U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and U.S. Gen. George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, told a news conference that "al-Zarqawi was eliminated."
But any hopes the Jordanian-born terror leader's death would help stem the violence in Iraq were dimmed hours later when a car bomb exploded in a Baghdad market, killing 12 and wounding 65.
The announcement about al-Zarqawi's death came six days after he issued an audiotape on the Internet, railing against Shiites in Iraq and saying militias were raping women and killing Sunnis and the community must fight back.
Al-Maliki said the airstrike was the result of intelligence reports provided to Iraqi security forces by residents in the area, and U.S. forces acted on the information. Casey said the hunt for al-Zarqawi began two weeks ago, and his body was identified by fingerprints and facial recognition.
A Jordanian official said Jordan also provided the U.S. military with information that helped in tracking al-Zarqawi down. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was addressing intelligence issues, would not elaborate, but Jordan is known to have intelligence agents operating in Iraq to hunt down Islamic militants.
Some of the information came from Jordan's sources inside Iraq and led the U.S. military to the area of Baqouba, the official said.
Baqouba has in recent weeks seen a e in sectarian violence, including the discovery of 17 severed heads in fruit boxes. It was also near the site of a sectarian atrocity last week in which masked gunmen killed 21 Shiites, including a dozen students, after separating out four Sunni Arabs.
"Those who disrupt the course of life, like al-Zarqawi, will have a tragic end," al-Maliki said. He also warned those who would follow the militant's lead that "whenever there is a new al-Zarqawi, we will kill him."
"This is a message for all those who embrace violence, killing and destruction to stop and to (retreat) before it's too late," he said. "It is an open battle with all those who incite sectarianism."
In London, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said al-Zarqawi's death "was very good news because a blow against al-Qaida in Iraq was a blow against al-Qaida everywhere." Khalilzad added that "the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is a huge success for Iraq and the international war on terror." He also gave a thumbs up and said it was a good day for America.
Since his emergence following the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Al-Zarqawi had become Iraq's most wanted militant - as notorious as Osama bin Laden, to whom he swore allegiance in 2004. The United States put a $25 million bounty on al-Zarqawi, the same as bin Laden.
His fighters led a wave of kidnappings of foreigners, killing at least a dozen, including Arab diplomats and three Americans. Al-Zarqawi himself is believed to have wielded the knife in the beheadings of two of the Americans - Nicholas Berg and Eugene Armstrong - and earned himself the le of "the slaughtering sheik" among his supporters.
He has also been a master Internet propagandist, spreading the call for Islamic extremists to join the "jihad" or holy war in Iraq. His group posted gruesome images of beheadings, speeches by al-Zarqawi and recruitment videos depicting the planning and execution of its most daring attacks.
While leaders said the killing was a major victory, Iraqi citizens had mixed reactions.
Thamir Abdulhussein, a college student in Baghdad, said he hopes the killing of al-Zarqawi will promote reconciliation between Iraq's fractured ethnic and sectarian groups.
"If it's true al-Zarqawi was killed, that will be a big happiness for all the Iraqis," he said. "He was behind all the killings of Sunni and Shiites. Iraqis should now move toward reconciliation. They should stop the violence."
Amir Muhammed Ali, a 45-year-old stock broker in Baghdad, was skeptical that al-Zarqawi's death would end the unrelenting violence in the country, saying he was a foreigner but the Iraqi resistance to U.S.-led forces would likely continue.
"He didn't represent the resistance, someone will replace him and the operations will go on," he said.
In the past year, he moved his campaign beyond Iraq's borders, claiming to have carried out a Nov. 9, 2005, triple suicide bombing against hotels in Amman, Jordan, that killed 60 people, as well as other attacks in Jordan and even a rocket attack from Lebanon into northern Israel.
U.S. forces and their allies came close to capturing al-Zarqawi several times since his campaign began in mid-2003.
His closest brush may have come in late 2004. Deputy Interior Ministry Maj. Gen. Hussein Kamal said Iraqi security forces caught al-Zarqawi near the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah but then released him because they didn't realize who he was.
In May 2005, Web statements by his group said al-Zarqawi had been wounded in fighting with Americans and was being treated in a hospital abroad - raising speculation over a successor among his lieutenants. But days later, a statement said al-Zarqawi was fine and had returned to Iraq. There was never any independent confirmation of the reports of his wounding.
U.S. forces believe they just missed capturing al-Zarqawi in a Feb. 20, 2005 raid in which troops closed in on his vehicle west of Baghdad near the Euphrates River. His driver and another associate were captured and al-Zarqawi's computer was seized along with pistols and ammunition.
U.S. troops twice launched massive invasions of Fallujah, the stronghold used by al-Qaida in Iraq fighters and other insurgents west of Baghdad. An April 2004 offensive left the city still in insurgent hands, but the October 2004 assault wrested it from them. However, al-Zarqawi - if he was in the city - escaped.
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060608/D8I3VN5G0.html
thank God that guy's finally dead
Great news for the fight on terrorism!
This news could not come at a better time for the President, the Military and for the general feeling about how things are progressing in Iraq.
Maybe even bring our men and women home earlier.
Now can we finally get Osama?
Considering he was one of the top 3-4 terrorists in the world, anyone who discounts this killing is a clown.
Some of his propaganda that he spread was that God was on his side because as hard as we were trying, we couldn't kill him. Hope the jihadis are paying attention.
Bush's fault???
Seriously this is great news. Not for Bush, any other politician, or CNN (who will actually have people tune in for a few hours today), but for the U.S. forces in that hole that need this as a morale boost. Oh, and because he was kind of responsible for numerous attacks and beheadings. You know, little things like that.
This is great, except that Al-Zarqawi has been dead for years.
Great news.
Will it make any measurable difference in the level of sectarian violence? Probably not.
He targeted US/UK forces, Kurds, the Iraqi police and army, and Shias. We'll see in the next few month if the level of violence keeps increasing or starts decreasing.
Just because the W.H. has finally decided Al-Zarqawi should be dead, won't make a bit of difference in the level of violence in Iraq - it will keep increasing. However, it might make a difference in a 'limited' withdrawal scenario the Republicans will soon probably announce. Just wait, it's coming.
this is why I keep coming back to ST.com
I know the death of Al-Zarqawi makes this a sad day for the liberals
Al-Zarqawi Lives!! (AGAIN!!)
CNNOne official says the Pentagon is not sure of how the death was confirmed and that there might need to be "additional forensics" done before they can be fully confident the terrorist leader is dead.
In other news, Ahmed Chilabi is still alive..
If there is every a villian that should be 'zombi-ized' by Mouse it's Al-Zarqawi. This website do ents some of Zarqawi's acheivements...
CONJURLet’s see…
Lost a leg in 2002 (but US later changed their tune)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FJ15Ak02.html
Killed in March 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...-2004Mar4.html
Came back to life to personally behead Nick Berg (post-Abu Ghraib photo release)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1136076/posts
(interesting as no one in that video appeared to be handicapped - Zarqawi had one leg amputated)
http://wais.stanford.edu/Individuals/nickberg.htm
Killed again in Oct. 2004
http://www.indiadaily.com/editorial/10-17a-04.asp
Seriously injured or killed in May 2005
http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/archives/10500
http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.ph...65740392&par=0
Zarqawi shot in chest/lung in May 2005
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4579885.stm
Killed and body in Falluja cemetery in June 2005
http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.ph...73437230&par=0
And now killed again in Nov. 2005
Baghdad imam says Zarqawi killed at beginning of US invasion
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exer...80950DF180.htm
Backed up by this March 2004 article
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4446084/
Here’s his latest picture (he’s on the right)
Zarqawi
Well since I helped develop the crew systems for the F16... YOU... on behalf of the USAF..
Some of you haters ing disgust me.... move to Canada please you loosers.
A new level of bull , even for Rummy standards...
Rumsfeld - Zarqawi death is win against global terror
BRUSSELS, June 8 (Reuters)Alertnet- U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld hailed on Thursday the death of al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in a U.S. air raid in Iraq as a "significant victory" in the battle against terrorism.
Rumsfeld told a news briefing after a meeting of NATO defence ministers in Brussels Zarqawi's death in a U.S. air strike near Baghdad on Wednesday had hurt his network and would slow down its operations.
He called Zarqawi "an integral part of the global war on terror".
"Let there be no doubt the fact that he is dead is a significant victory in the battle against terrorism in that country and I would say worldwide, because he had interests well outside Iraq," he said.
"No single person on this planet has had the blood of more innocent men, women and children on his hands than has Zarqawi."
I guess Rummy doesn't look in the mirror much these days?
Yeah, you loosers.
Tighten it up.
I heard al-Zarqawi was adopted by a gay married couple early on in life.
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