Disharmony Among Jihadis

This has been a real bad week for jihadis the world over. Zarqawi is now Satan's bitch in hell (but not before knowing that it was the US that killed him), a Hamas leader and jihadis firing rockets are dead after Israeli airstrikes, and al Qaeda bigwig Zawahiri is slamming the Palestinian Authority's planned referrendum on moving towards a two-state solution (accepting the existence of Israel).

Wearing a white turban and tunic al-Zawahri appeared against a black background. He repeatedly waved his right hand and pointed his finger in a gesture of admonishment.

The al-Qaida deputy leader criticized a possible referendum in the Palestinian territories.

"I call on Muslims to reject any referendum on Palestine, because Palestine is a house of Islam and not subject to any compromise."

On developments in Sudan, he concentrated on the situation in Darfur, criticizing the visit by UN Security Council security experts to Sudan as being "to prepare to occupy and separate it."

"I call upon every Muslim and everyone who has faith in Sudan, and every fervent Muslim in Darfur to confront the Zionist Crusader plot to occupy the lands of Islam."

Once again, we're seeing that Zawahiri and al Qaeda are being forced to react to events around the world, instead of pushing their own agenda. However, it is troubling and disconcerting that the world refused to recognize the threat posed by failed states like Sudan and Somolia where al Qaeda has operated with impunity before and seeks refuge to regroup and rebuild their jihadi aspirations after being forced from the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan in a thorough pasting.

Hamas and al Qaeda see eye to eye on the Fatah proposed referrendum. They think it violates their foundation principles of never accepting a Jewish state on land that once belonged to Muslims. They will never recognize the state of Israel. Period. For to do so would violate their key teachings.

And to make matters worse, Iraqis know a good thing when they see it. It might behoove someone to run through the Iraqi bloggers for their reactions. It's quite enlightening and shows just how much folks over there are happy that this mass murdering SOB has found a new home - in hell. Among those with takes on Zarqawi's elimination: Alaa at Messoptamian, Hammorabi, Iraq Pundit, and Baghdad Treasures.

UPDATE:
Intel gleaned from Wednesday's 17 raids have turned into 39 raids on insurgent an al Qaeda targets around Iraq between Thursday and Friday.

Hours after al-Zarqawi's death, U.S. troops carried out 17 simultaneous raids Wednesday around the location of his safe house near Baqouba, the capital of Diyala province. The region is in the heartland of the Sunni Arab-led insurgency and has seen a recent rise in sectarian violence. Baqouba is 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.

Those raids provided the information leading to the searches overnight Thursday.

In the 39 raids, troops "picked up things like memory sticks, some hard drives" that would allow American forces to begin dismantling al-Zarqawi's al-Qaida in Iraq, Caldwell told the British Broadcasting Corp.

He said the latest information was helping U.S. forces unravel the source of al-Qaida's weapons and financing.

In announcing al-Zarqawi's death, Caldwell said the 17 raids "produced a tremendous amount of information," which he described as a "treasure trove." He also said they waited to kill al-Zarqawi before carrying out the other raids, in an apparent effort not to spook the Jordanian-born terrorist.

"We had identified other targets that we obviously did not go after to allow us to focus on al-Zarqawi. Now that we got him, we will go after them," Caldwell told the BBC.

As Iraqi and U.S. leaders cautioned that al-Zarqawi's death was not likely to end the bloodshed in Iraq, Caldwell said another foreign-born militant was already poised to take over the terror network's operations.

He said Egyptian-born Abu al-Masri would likely take the reins of al-Qaida in Iraq. He said al-Masri trained in Afghanistan and arrived in Iraq in 2002 to establish an al-Qaida cell.

The U.S. military did not further identify al-Masri and his real identity could not immediately be determined. But the Central Command has listed an Abu Ayyub al-Masri as among its most wanted al-Zarqawi associates and placed a $50,000 bounty on his head.

Masri arrived in Iraq in 2002 to establish an al Qaeda cell? That would be before the US invasion of Iraq in March 2003, so it would seem that al Qaeda was busy preparing for a conflict with the US in Iraq well before the invasion.