Zarqawi was born with a name similar to Fadil al-Khalaylah in the town of Zarqa, Jordan, around 1966. As a teenager, he took to drinking and other behaviors forbidden under Islam. In 1989, he decided to head to Afghanistan to join the jihad. As the Russians had left, he started writing for an Islamic newsletter.
In 1992, he joined an Islamic group Bayaat al-Imam. The following year, he was arrested and sentenced to jail. He was released in an amnesty in 1999. He traveled with his aging mother to Peshawar, Pakistan, where he lived until his visa expired in 2000.
Zarqawi first appeared in the American news on April 4, 2000.
AMMAN, Jordan (AP) - Jordanian authorities have named two more suspects linked to a terrorist conspiracy to stage attacks in the United States and Israel during millennium celebrations. An official close to the investigation said on condition of anonymity that both fugitives are accused of conspiracy to carry out attacks on U.S. and Israeli targets during New Year's celebrations in 1999. The attacks were foiled by Jordanian security agents. Six men have already been sentenced to death in the case. The official identified the suspects as a Jordanian, Ahmad Fadeel Al-Khalayleh, better known as Abu-Musaa'b al-Zarqawi and believed to be in Afghanistan, and a Syrian, Loa'i Ahmad, widely known as the doctor or Baa'laa, believed to be hiding in Turkey. Jordan has not requested their extradition, the official said. Another official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said the two were in close contact with others seen as key figures in the conspiracy, including Raed Mohammad Hijazi, 32, a Palestinian who holds U.S. and Jordanian citizenship.
This is related to attacks that were thwarted in Jordan for the millenium celebration. According to a Wikipedia entry, the targets were "a fully booked Radisson hotel in Amman, Jordan; the border between Jordan and Israel; Mount Nebo, a Christian holy site; and a site on the Jordan River where John the Baptist is said to have baptized Jesus Christ." However, it does not appear that Zarqawi was a major figure in this plot, and the New York Times biography suggests there was very little evidence for his participation in the scheme.
Regardless, Zarqawi entered Afghanistan in 2000. It is sometimes believed that Zarqawi lost a leg in the bombings of Afghanistan after 9/11, and that he had surgery in Iraq to amputate the leg and get a prosthetic leg. However, this is unknown.
Zarqawi is first identified as an al-Qaeda leader on March 23, 2002 in a New York Times article where he is described as being in Iran.
Abu Musaab Zarqawi, a senior Al Qaeda leader who fled the western Afghan city of Herat after the American military campaign began, has turned up in Tehran under the protection of Iranian security forces, according to senior Israeli and American officials.
Last month, Mr. Zarqawi dispatched three Afghan-trained operatives to attack Israel, Israeli officials said. The three, two Palestinians and a Jordanian, were arrested when they crossed from Iran into Turkey on Feb. 15.
Turkish authorities said the men had possessed fake documents, had diagrams for bombs and claimed that they intended to attack targets in Tel Aviv on orders from a leader known as Abu Musaab. Israeli intelligence said his full name was Abu Musaab Zarqawi, and American officials said he was believed to be the highest ranking Al Qaeda leader now in Iran.
The location of Zarqawi is hard to track here. He is referred to as a "senior Al Qaeda leader" here. I am unsure how "senior" Zarqawi would have been at this point in time.
Zarqawi next appears in the US News in December 2002. In a CNN story
A statement from the Jordanian government said the two men, identified as Salem Sa'ed Salem bin Suweid, a Libyan national, and Yasser Fathi Ibraheem, a Jordanian, confessed to their membership in al Qaeda and that they received their orders from a senior al Qaeda leader.
According to the statement, "bin Suweid and Ibraheem confessed that they are members of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda organization, and are affiliated with bin Laden's lieutenant, Ahmad Fadeel Nazal Al-Khalayleh, known as Abu Musa'ab Al-Zarqawi."
Zarqawi left Jordan in 1999 and has been convicted in absentia of a plot to bomb tourist hotels in Amman during the millennium celebrations.
Although the defense attorneys claimed that the confessions were under torture and that the men were innocent, it seems likely that Zarqawi by this point was
On February 5, 2003, Colin Powell gave a speech to the United Nations describing "links" between al-Qaeda and Iraq. Here are some excerpts from another CNN article:
After al Qaeda and the Taliban were ousted from Afghanistan, Zarqawi, a Jordanian national, established a camp in northeastern Iraq to train terrorists in using explosives and poisons, Powell said.
The camp is in the northern Kurdish area of the country, outside the control of the Iraqi regime, but Iraq has kept track of events there by infiltrating Ansar al-Islam, a radical Islamic group that controls the area, Powell said.
Intelligence services disagree whether the camp is actually linked to Saddam's regime.
Zarqawi also has been sighted in Baghdad, Powell said. He traveled to Baghdad for medical treatment last May, staying there for two months "while he recuperated to fight another day," Powell said.
Zarqawi is described as "skilled in chemical and biological weapons", and is tied to a host of such operations. However, I have found no evidence prior to this speech of Zarqawi having any particular experience with either of these weapons.
The first appearence of Zarqawi in a DailyKos Scoop-era diary was on November 2, 2003, in this diary by thorswitch. It links to an interview of Paul Wolfowitz in May 2003 where he refers to "this guy Zarqawi whom Powell spoke about in his UN presentation." Clearly, Paul Wolfowitz was not particularly informed about Zarqawi in May 2003.
On February 11, 2004, William Safire wrote about a "smoking gun" for the Osama-Saddam connection. It was supposedly authored by Zarqawi, referred to as "the man with the limp" by Safire.
On March 2, 2004, multiple attacks were carried out on Shiite mosques, killing 143.
U.S. officials and Iraqi leaders named an al-Qaida-linked Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as a ``prime suspect'' for the attacks, saying he seeks to spark a Sunni-Shiite civil war to wreck U.S. plans to hand over power to the Iraqis on June 30.
U.S. intelligence officials have long been concerned about the possibility of attacks during Ashoura. Last month, U.S. officials released what they said was a letter by al-Zarqawi outlining a strategy of spectacular attacks on Shiites, aimed at pitting Shiites against Sunnis in a bloody civil war.
The text of that letter can be found here. Considering that Zarqawi is generally believed to be barely literate, and that the contents are in general a glowing endorsement of US policies, the letter is considered by many to be a forgery. Columnest David Ignatius describes this in more depth in his February 20th column.
However, in a brilliant move of strategy, all of these questionable circumstances were ignored. Within the day, NBC News learned that Bush had several opportunities to eliminate Zarqawi. Suddenly, it was in the best interest of liberal pundits to agree that Zarqawi had done everything Bush claimed, because they could say "Bush didn't get him". And why Bush didn't get him?
Military officials insist their case for attacking Zarqawi?s operation was airtight, but the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.
This was seen as "political dynamite" for Democrats. Bush let the terrorist get away for his war in Iraq. It proves he's a war-mongering maniac.
However, having Zarqawi as a major figure would score major political points for Republicans later.
On March 11, 2004, attacks in Madrid just prior to elections killed 191 people. Initially, President Aznar tried to blame Basque Seperatists for this, and he subsequently lost re-election after this was shown to not be true. Soj has a wonderful rundown of the Spanish situation.
I NEVER trust statements like these by officials on the condition of "anonymity". When an official speaks to a news media on the condition of anonymity it means "I want you to report this but I won't stand behind it". In other words, it's pure spin.
Just as Aznar wished ETA had been responsible, Morocco would love for the Spanish bombers to be responsible for their bombing as well. It wraps things up nice and tight, it keeps their new best friends (America) quite happy, it links Iraq to terrorism to Spain to Morocco to Turkey and it has a nice PR spin. That's exactly why I don't believe it in the slightest.
Although it seems that the bombings were by Islamic groups, it does not appear that there was a significant connection to al-Qaeda and definitely not one to Zarqawi.
In May, Zarqawi was held responsible for the killing of Nick Berg in Iraq. There were many bizarre circumstances surrounding that killing as well. Once again, the Wikipedia entry for Nick Berg and a kuro5hin article about the killing may shed some insight.
Since then, attempting to track Zarqawi claims is as fruitless as tracking al-Qaeda claims. So my analysis for now will stop at this point in time.
What conclusions can we draw from this analysis? It appears that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi does exist, although our knowledge of him has been blurred by the sheer number of different situations he is claimed to have been in. I think it is unlikely he is responsible for all the acts claimed; some or many of them are probably done by others in his name, like "Kilroy was Here". He appears to have definitely risen to a position of power in the ranks of al-Qaeda. However, his direct role in many of the large terrorist attacks is questionable at best. The Madrid connection is very slim, the circumstances surrounding the Nick Berg slaying are questionable, and the March 2nd bombings also seem to have no definitive tie. It appears that indeed Zarqawi is as much myth as man. We have no personal knowledge of him in recent years; we do not even know for sure how many legs he has. It seems astounding that we could pinpoint him as the mastermind of all these attacks.
Why has nobody asked about who Zarqawi is? Because it has been in nobody's best interest to do so. I think it was a carefully planned leak to let NBC know that Bush let Zarqawi get away. By doing this, the left-wing pundits would legitimize Zarqawi, to magnify the problem of him being let go. However, Bush can still blame Zarqawi for masterminding any problems in Iraq, rather than fixing them.
It is ridiculous to claim that capturing one man will cure our problems in Iraq. Yet I'm sure many people feel that if we were to capture Zarqawi, our problems would disappear in Iraq. This is clearly not the case. In this sense, Zarqawi is a myth created to instill hope that if we could just catch Zarqawi, we would win. If we continue to focus on Zarqawi, we will continue to appear ever-closer to victory, but we will never get any closer.
Permalink | 7 comments