International Herald Tribune Qaeda claims to be winning in Iraq
The Associated Press Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia claimed in a new audiotape Friday to be winning the war faster than expected in Iraq and said that it had mobilized 12,000 fighters who had "vowed to die for God's sake." The U.S. military, meanwhile, reported that three U.S. soldiers and a Marine were killed Thursday in Iraq, bringing the number of Americans who have died in the country so far this month to 25. At least 105 U.S. soldiers died in October, the fourth highest monthly toll of the war. In the audiotape, made available on militant Web sites, the Qaeda spokesman welcomed the Republican electoral defeat that led to the departure of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. He said the group's fighters would not rest until they had blown up the White House. "The Al Qaeda army has 12,000 fighters in Iraq, and they have vowed to die for God's sake," said a man who identified himself as Abu Hamza al-Muhajir. Muhajir, also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri, also urged the United States to stay in Iraq so that his group would have more opportunities to kill U.S. troops. "We haven't had enough of your blood yet," he said. Muhajir became the leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia after Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in a U.S. airstrike in June. The tape could not be independently verified. Describing President George W. Bush as "the most stupid president" in U.S. history, Masri reached out to the Muslim world and said his group was winning the war in Iraq faster than expected as a result of U.S. policies. Since the war started in March 2003, 2,845 members of the U.S. military have died, according to an Associated Press count. The Iraqi Army also said it had captured the Egyptian leader of a Qaeda cell in the restive Anbar Province. Acting on a tip, Iraqi soldiers descended on a building in the city of Rawah, 280 kilometers, or 175 miles, northwest of Baghdad, where they arrested a local Qaeda commander, Abu Muhayyam al- Masri, whose name, like that of the group's leader, is a pseudonym meaning "the Egyptian," a Defense Ministry official said. Two aides, Abu Issam al-Libi, or "the Libyan," and Abu Zaid al-Suri, "the Syrian," also were arrested, along with nine other members of the cell, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media. The pseudonyms appeared to mark the men as foreign fighters, thousands of whom are said by Iraq's government to have crossed the porous border with Syria about 88 kilometers west of Rawah to join the insurgency. Their nationalities were not confirmed. The official said that Suri confessed to organizing at least one suicide bombing in Baghdad. He said the raid also netted a large quantity of weapons. Rawah lies deep in Anbar Province, where Sunni Arab insurgents routinely launch deadly attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces that show no sign of diminishing in numbers or intensity, more than three years after the U.S. invasion. At least 11 of the American deaths in November have been in Anbar, including the Marine who died Thursday. A roadside bomb also killed two U.S. soldiers and wounded a third Thursday in western Baghdad, the U.S. command said. Another soldier was killed and one wounded by a roadside bomb that struck their truck Thursday during a combat logistics patrol west of Haditha, 225 kilometers northwest of the capital. In other violence, six Iraqi soldiers were killed when a suicide bomber drove his explosives-rigged car into an army checkpoint in the northern city of Tal Afar, the military said. The new deaths came a day after the Iraqi health minister, Ali al-Shemari, estimated that 150,000 civilians had been killed in the war - about three times previously accepted estimates. In comments during a visit to Austria, Shemari said that he based his figure on an estimate of 100 bodies per day brought to morgues and hospitals - although such a calculation would come out closer to 130,000 in total. "It is an estimate," Shemari said. http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/11/10/news/iraq.php
