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Jewish World Review Oct. 17, 2005 / 14 Tishrei, 5766 Prez's claim that Iraq is the central front in the War on Terror confirmed by al Qaida big By Jack Kelly
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
On July 9th, Ayman al Zawahiri, the number 2 man in al Qaida, wrote a 6,000
word letter to Abu Musab al Zarqawi, the al Qaida chieftain in Iraq. The
letter was captured by U.S. forces, translated, and posted on government Web
sites.
Democrats and journalists scoff at President Bush's claim that Iraq is the
central front in the War on Terror. Zawahiri agrees with Bush:
"I want to be the first to congratulate you for...fighting battle in the
heart of the Islamic world, which was formerly the field for major battles
in Islam's history, and which is now the place for the greatest battle of
Islam in this era," he told Zarqawi.
Zawahiri outlined a four part incremental strategy.
The first stage is to expel the Americans from Iraq.
The second stage is to establish a caliphate — a Taliban-style dictatorship
— within Iraq.
The third stage is to expand the caliphate to Iraq's neighbors.
The fourth stage is to destroy Israel, and to expand the Islamist
dictatorship to Egypt and Lebanon.
If Zarqawi could have a telephone conversation with Zawahiri without the NSA
listening in and a cruise missile interrupting it, he'd probably say that
expelling the Americans is easier said than done.
Zawahiri tacitly acknowledges this, but holds out hope we'll cut and run of
our own accord:
"Things may develop faster than we imagine. The aftermath of the collapse
of American power in Vietnam — and how they ran and left their agents — is
noteworthy. Because of that, we must be ready starting now, before events
overtake us."
Even if the Americans left tomorrow, al Qaida isn't powerful or popular
enough to take over, Zawahiri concedes. So there should be a coalition
government that al Qaida could later subvert.
Which leads to the point of Zawahiri's letter. He gently admonishes Zarqawi
for using tactics that alienate the Iraqi populace.
"Among the things which the feelings of the Muslim populace who love and
support you will never find palatable are the scenes of slaughtering the
hostages."
Ever the humanitarian, Zawahiri suggested Zarqawi just shoot them instead:
"We can kill the captives by bullet. That would achieve that which is
sought after without exposing ourselves to the questions and answering to
doubts. We don't need this."
Zawahiri agrees the Shia are heretics who must be dealt with:
"The collision between any state based on the model of prophecy with the
Shia is a matter that will happen sooner or later."
But dealing with the Shia should wait until al Qaida is stronger, because
attacks on Shia civilians are alienating even Sunni Muslims:
"Many of your Muslim admirers amongst the common folk are wondering about
your attacks on the Shia. The sharpness of this questioning increases when
the attacks are on one of their mosques...My opinion is that this matter
won't be acceptable to the Muslim populace however much you have tried to
explain it."
The attacks are impractical:
"Can the mujahedeen kill all of the Shia in Iraq? Has any Islamic state in
history ever tried that?"
Zawahiri reminds Zarqawi that 100 al Qaida leaders are in Iran.
"Even if we attack the Shia out of necessity, then why do you announce this
matter and make it public, which compels the Iranians to take counter
measures? And do the brothers forget that both we and the Iranians need to
refrain from harming each other at this time in which the Americans are
targeting us?"
If after Zarqawi crawls out from under the rubble left by the cruise missile
strike and re-establishes the telephone conversation hypothesized above, he
might tell Zawahiri that he attacks Shia civilians primarily because those
are the only people he can get at. Attacks on U.S. and Iraqi soldiers have
been sending his fighters to Allah rather faster than they've wanted to go.
I suspect Zawahiri intuits this. His letter — which he ends with a plea
for money — is an astonishing confession of weakness.
Yet this is how Douglas Jehl described it in the New York Times:
"Mr. Zawahiri told Mr. Zarqawi that the American occupation of Iraq has
provided Islamic militants with a historic opportunity to win popular
support."
Al Qaida is getting creamed militarily and politically in Iraq. But as
Zawahiri reminded Zarqawi: "more than half this battle is taking place in
the battlefield of the media."
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© 2005, Jack Kelly |
Mitch Albom | |||||||||||
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