US forces arrest top Kurdish Al-Qaeda ‘bomb-maker’

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.khaleejtimes.ae/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/focusoniraq/2006/August/focusoniraq_August155.xml§ion=focusoniraq&col=

BAGHDAD - An alleged Al-Qaeda militant suspected of bombing the office of President Jalal Talabani’s party in northern Iraq has been arrested near the oil hub of Kirkuk, the US military said.

US military spokesman Major General William Caldwell said the militant, an Iraqi Kurd, was arrested on August 19 and is a ‘bombmaker suspected of orchestrating some of the most horrific bomb attacks’ in Iraq.

Caldwell said he is considered an ‘explosive expert producing suicide vests, improvised-explosive-devices and detonation devices and is known to have facilitated the movement of high level leaders of Al-Qaeda in Iraq.’

He said the captured individual was also close to the Abu Ayyub al-Masri, who allegedly took charged of Al-Qaeda’s Iraqi subsididary following the June 7 death of Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.


http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/38619/

Zarqawi's successor in prison for 7 years

Fearing a fear-vaccuum, the Bush administration quickly named Abu Ayyub al-Masri the bogeyman successor to Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi after the Al Qaeda-Iraq leader's death last month. They put a $5 million price on his head.

In a potentially embarrassing turn of events, however, Zarqawi's successor may already be in an Egyptian prison. For the past seven years.

From Aljazeera:

Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, the purported successor of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, is in an Egyptian prison and not Iraq, a lawyer has claimed.


...


"Sharif Hazaa {al-Muhajir} is in Tura prison, and I met him two days ago while I was visiting some of my clients," Ismail, a lawyer known for defending Islamist groups, told the newspaper.

[BushOut06]

1. Heil Bush, our Lord and Savior

Thank you Bush, our mighty Fuhrer, for keeping us safe with your war on tarrah. Thank you for locking up all the scary brown men from those Muslim countries. Thank you for going after those who dare to fight your occupation of Iraq.

[FloridaPat]

2. But the Kurds are our friends! Same as the Saudis! Does that mean

Turkey is our enemy???

[nealhughes]

3. al Qaeda is an ARAB organization -- not a Kurdish one. The guy was trying

to bomb a Kurdish office. The Kurds are pretty moderate Muslims and definitely not al Qaeda types! Pretty secular, in fact. Al Qaeda, as we all know is most definitely an Arab, Wahhabi (ultra strict fundy orthodox Sunni) Islamic sect that is the state religion of Saudi Arabia.
The bomb money flows straight from the palaces in Saudi Arabia to Tora Bora or wherever Old Sammy and the boys are hiding Emmanuel Goldstein these days.

[NNN0LHI]

5. Maybe al-Qaeda is selling franchises?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2149499.stm

Wednesday, 24 July, 2002, 22:04 GMT 23:04 UK

'Al-Qaeda' influence grows in Iraq

A pocket of militant Islamic extremists, believed to be linked to Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda movement, is causing havoc in the Kurdish area of northern Iraq.

The presence of the violently anti-American group, known as the Ansar al-Islam (Partisans of Islam), is likely to attract increasing attention as US moves to overthrow Saddam Hussein's Iraqi regime gather pace. snip

The Ansar are largely made up of Iraqi Kurds belonging to several radical Islamic groups which merged late last year.

They control a string of villages in the plains and mountains between the town of Halabja and the mountain ridge which marks Iraq's border with Iran.

But many of the Ansar's Kurdish members are believed to have returned from Afghanistan, where they had gone for training and to wage jihad (Holy War) alongside al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

[Ignacio Upton]

6. The Taliban were not Arabs

And neither are the Pakistanis hiding Bin Laden in the mountains. Al Qaeda is a Sunni/Wahabbist terrorist group, not just one for Arabs. If they were for Arabs alone, then they would not have attacked Shiite Arabs in Iraq.

[htuttle]

4. Kurdish? Al Queda?

They keep using that word, "Al Queda". I do not think it means what they think it means...