The end of the so-called head of Al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was indeed a blow to the ‘foreign’ insurgents operating in Iraq. Though Western commentators are now saying that Zarqawi was not such a big figure in the shadowy world of Al Qaeda, during his lifetime he was considered sufficiently important by the US to announce a $25 million bounty on his head. The killing of such a prominent figure of Iraqi insurgency might have demoralised the guest insurgents from Arab countries that Zarqawi had lured into Iraq, but not enough to paralyse them.
The Iraqi administration thinks that the end of Zarqawi will facilitate the difficult job of reaching out to the minority Sunnis who have had a long innings of supremacy of power, especially during Saddam Hussein’s hey days. The Americans are drawing solace from the fact that after capturing Saddam Hussein from his secret underground bunker, Zarqawi has been their biggest catch in Iraq. They hope that it will pave the way for rounding up or killing of other key elements of the Iraqi insurgency so that they can plan an early exit from the troubled country.
Iraqi authorities, obviously, emboldened by the success of eliminating Zarqawi, have resorted to a sort of show of force, sending 40000 security personnel on the streets of Baghdad as part of an overall stepping up of security measures. Simultaneously, they also imposed a ban on personal weapons, extended night time curfew hours and issued special uniforms and badges for security personnel. The number of check points has been increased to stop and search vehicles. If the authorities think that these measures will make the streets safer, they may be in for a disappointment. Insurgency will not disappear as long as it enjoys local support to a significant degree.
According to Iraq’s national security adviser, Mowaffaq al-Rubaie, the insurgents are on the run. That sounds a bit too optimistic when on an average between 20 and 30 Iraqis are being killed daily in suicide and grenade attacks. Even President George Bush, who made a surprise visit to Baghdad to shore up his popularity at home, does not foresee an early end to violence in Iraq. Zarqawi’s successor, Abu Hamza al-Mujahid has vowed to continue to attack the ‘crusaders’ and the Shias.
It may not be an empty boast because by now it has become clear that the disease of sectarian hatred has spread far and wide in Iraq. The Americans have been unable to show that getting rid of Saddam Hussein was a blessing for Iraq. Besides, Al Qaeda cannot be targeted as it is an amorphous body. It is not a unified military taking instructions from the headquarters. Al Qaeda is the name of a movement primarily targeting the US and its interests and many who vow allegiance to Al Qaeda are freelance operatives.
After the death of Zarqawi it was announced that a virtual ‘treasure trove’ of useful information about the Al Qaeda was discovered—a computer hard disk, laptops and documents bearing names and addresses of militants. It is quite likely that this kind of disclosure would have alerted the listed and unlisted militants and they would have certainly and quickly moved to new hideouts.
Zarqawi, a one time petty Jordanian criminal whose real name was Ahmad Fadil al-Khalayleh, did a stint in Afghanistan when it was under Soviet occupation but had not made a name as a big ‘Afghan Arab’ fighter. His more important achievement in Afghanistan was starting a camp to train guerrillas for Jordan to grab power from the King in Jordan. He was able to set shop in Iraq because of wide resentment against the presence of foreign forces, especially American. The Iraqi anger was no doubt compounded when they discovered that life after their ‘liberation’ had become more unbearable with drastic cuts in electricity and water supplies and with an all round sense of insecurity. In short, the Iraqi insurgency grew for reasons other than the presence of Zarqawi.
Where Zarqawi opened a new front in Iraq was in generating Shia-Sunni hatred, hoping that it will lead to a civil strife that will ultimately help achieve his goal of establishing a Sunni order of his liking in embattled Iraq. Belonging to a hard-line Sunni sect, Zarqawi had a pathological hatred for the Shias, which he translated into action by ordering his group to target the Shias. With the emergence of some militant Shia groups, clashes between the majority Shias and minority Sunnis were bound to become more intense. But Zarqawi’s brutalities and excesses invited revulsion even from many ordinary Iraqis. That may well have proved to be his undoing with even many Sunnis strongly disapproving the un-Islamic acts of Zarqawi like beheading his victims and then dispatching videotapes of the gruesome act.
The Iraqi and American intelligence attribute their success in operation eliminate Zarqawi to a moll they had successfully planted inside his network. If this indeed is so, it bodes ill for all other insurgent groups in the area. It has also been reported that a ‘spiritual leader’ of Zarqawi, Sheikh Abdal Rehman, was trailed by intelligence agencies for a long time. The exercise to track Zarqawi required patience and was painstakingly taken up with the additional help of electronic spying gadgets. Some days before Zarqawi was killed, one of his ‘aides’ named Kassim al-Ani was arrested. It was a signal that the intelligence agencies were closing in on Zarqawi.
Zarqawi had many enemies in Baquba, north of Baghdad and the town where he was hiding, because the people there thought his presence meant trouble for them with no chance of peace. Finally, many in Jordan too have heaved a sigh of relief at the killing of Zarqawi who had reportedly masterminded one of the worst militant attacks on civilians in Jordan when his men killed nearly 60 civilians in a hat trick of suicide bombings in Amman.
In fact, Zarqawi, who had once served a seven-year prison sentence in Jordan, was sentenced to death in absentia after he was tried for trying to overthrow the monarchy and establish a caliphate. Well, the execution orders against Zarqawi have now been carried out, though not by the Jordanians. It remains doubtful if even Jordan can smell freedom from Islamic militancy in the near future, any how not before it has first been cleansed from Iraq.
Courtesy : Syndicate Features
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