Freedom loving people everywhere will welcome the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, mastermind of the bloody campaign of suicide bombings, kidnappings and beheadings in Iraq.Al-Zarqawi and seven aides were killed in a U.S. air strike on a house 30 miles northeast of Baghdad, according to the new Iraqi government, which shortly afterwords announced the appointment of two new government ministers, as if to say:
Look world: We're making progress.Beyond the death itself, the best news (not yet confirmed at this writing) is that:
Locals sick and tired of al-Zarqawi's deadly antics turned him in, although there are (also unconfirmed) reports that Jordan provided the tip that led to the air strike.The Jordanian-born militant, who is believed to have personally beheaded at least two American hostages, had forged an alliance with Al Qaeda, and insurgents from the terrorist group had poured into Iraq in the months after the U.S.-led invasion. He had a $25 million bounty on his head, the same as Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
In the past year, al-Zarqawi moved his campaign beyond Iraq's borders. He claimed to have carried out a November 2005 triple suicide bombing against hotels in Amman, Jordan, that killed 60 people, as well as other attacks in Jordan and a rocket attack from Lebanon into northern Israel.
Al-Zarqawi was a loathed figure even among some Islamic militants. There was, for example, no love loss between he and Hezzbollah, as the peripatetic Michael Totten reports in a timely dispatch at his Middle East Journal.
U.S. forces and their allies came close to capturing al-Zarqawi several times since his campaign began in mid-2003.
Inevitably, al-Zarqawi's death will trigger a round of retaliatory violence. In fact, there were two bomb blasts in eastern Baghdad that took out several Iraqi police officers shortly after his death was announced. The retaliation is regretable, of course, but at least Iraq and the world finally will be rid of a very bad man.
Reaction to the news came fast and furious.
From PoliPundit:
It is very clear that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi represented the Center of Gravity for al-Qaida in Iraq. This is a major victory for the United States, Coalition Forces and the People of Iraq. This will be seen as a very significant moment in the fight against the insurgency.From Counterterrorism Blog:
Reacting to the killing . . . ,pro-Jihadi commentators on al Jazeera rushed to assert that the "death of Zarqawi won't weaken al Qaida but will actually unify the organization." Abdelbari Atwan, the editor of al Quds al Arabi accused Jordanian and U.S. intelligence of penetrating the inner circles of Zarqawi and were successful in getting to him." He added that the killing of Zarqawi was coordinated with the appointment of the ministers of defense and interior in Baghdad.Ivo Daalder at TPM Cafe:
A truly evil man is dead. That's a very good thing. But Zarqawi's death is no more likely to be turning point in Iraq than was Saddam Hussein's capture in December 2003. Because while Zarqawi and his terrorist henchmen were responsible for a lot of horrific violence, the present state of anarchy is the result of very different causes.From Juan Cole at Informed Comment:
There is no evidence of operational links between [Zarqawi's] Salafi Jihadis in Iraq and the real al-Qaeda; it was just a sort of branding that suited everyone, including the US. Official US spokesmen have all along over-estimated his importance. Leaders are significant and not always easily replaced. But Zarqawi has in my view has been less important than local Iraqi leaders and groups. I don't expect the guerrilla war to subside any time soon.
Mary Anne Weaver.
This link is temporary and provided by the magazine as a press preview for the article, which will appear in the July-August issue. I highly recommend the piece but have no idea how long it will be available online.
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