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CHAPTER XIII
Providing a Face to the Enemy: Who is
Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi?
The “war on terrorism” requires a humanitarian mandate. It is
presented as a “Just War” to be fought on moral grounds “to redress
a wrong suffered”.
The Just War theory defines “good” and “evil”. It concretely
portrays and personifies the terrorist leaders as “evil
individuals”.
Several prominent American intellectuals and antiwar activists, who
stand firmly opposed to the Bush administration, are nonetheless
supporters of the Just War theory: “We are against war in all its
forms but we support the campaign against international terrorism.”
To reach its foreign policy objectives, the images of terrorism must
remain vivid in the minds of the citizens, who are constantly
reminded of the terrorist threat.
The propaganda campaign presents the portraits of the leaders behind
the terror network. In other words, at the level of what constitutes
an “advertising” campaign, “it gives a face to terror”.
The “war on terrorism” rests on the creation of one or more evil
bogeymen, the terror leaders, Osama bin Laden, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi,
et al., whose names and photos are presented ad nauseam in daily
news reports.
Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi: New Terrorist
Mastermind
Since the war on Iraq, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi has been presented to
World public opinion as the new terrorist mastermind, overshadowing
“Enemy Number One”, Osama bin Laden.
The US State Department has increased the reward for his arrest from
$10 million to $25 million, which puts his “market value” at par
with that of Osama. Ironically, Al-Zarqawi is not on the FBI most
wanted fugitives’ list.1
Al-Zarqawi is often described in official government statements as
well as in media reports as an “Osama associate”, allegedly
responsible for numerous terrorist attacks in several countries. In
other reports, often emanating from the same sources, he is said to
have no links to Al Qaeda and to operate quite independently. He is
often presented as an individual who is challenging the leadership
of bin Laden.
Osama belongs to the powerful bin Laden family, which has business
ties to the Bushes and prominent members of the Texas oil
establishment. Osama bin Laden was recruited by the CIA during the
Soviet-Afghan war and fought as a Mujahideen. In other words, there
is a longstanding documented history of bin Laden-CIA and bin
Laden-Bush family links, which are an obvious source of
embarrassment to the US Government. (See Chapter II)
In contrast to bin Laden, Al-Zarqawi has no family history. He comes
from an impoverished Palestinian family in Jordan. His parents are
dead. He emerges out of the blue.
“Lone Wolf”
Al-Zarqawi is described by CNN as “a lone wolf” who is said to act
quite independently of the Al Qaeda network. Yet surprisingly, this
“lone wolf” is present in several countries, in Iraq, which is now
his base, but also in Western Europe. He is also suspected of
preparing a terrorist attack on American soil.
The media reports suggest that he is in several places at the same
time. He is described as “the chief US enemy”,“a master of disguise
and bogus identification papers”. We are led to believe that this
“lone wolf” manages to outwit the most astute US intelligence
operatives.
According to the Weekly Standard—which is known to have a close
relationship to the Neocons in the Bush administration:
Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi is hot right
now. He masterminded not only [Nicholas] Berg’s murder [in 2004]
but also the Madrid carnage on March 11 [2004], the bombardment
of Shia worshippers in Iraq the same month, and the April 24
[2004] suicide attack on the port of Basra. But he is far from a
newcomer to slaughter. Well before 9/11, he had already
concocted a plot to kill Israeli and American tourists in
Jordan. His label is on terrorist groups and attacks on four
continents.2
Al-Zarqawi’s profile “is mounting a
challenge to bin Laden’s leadership of the global jihad.”
In Iraq, according to press reports, he is preparing to “ignite a
civil war between Sunnis and Shiites”. But is that not precisely
what US intelligence is aiming at (“divide and rule”) as confirmed
by several analysts of the US led war? Pitting one group against the
other with a view to weakening the resistance movement.3
The CIA, with its $40 billion plus budget, pleads ignorance: they
say they know nothing about him, they have a photograph, but,
according to the Weekly Standard, they apparently do not know his
weight or height.
The aura of mystery surrounding this individual is part of the
propaganda ploy. Zarqawi is described as “so secretive even some
operatives who work with him do not know his identity.”4
Consistent Media Pattern
What is the role of this new terrorist mastermind in the Pentagon’s
disinformation campaign?
In previous war propaganda ploys, the CIA hired Public Relations
firms to organize core disinformation campaigns. In 1990, the
British PR firm Hill and Knowlton launched the 1990 Kuwaiti
incubator media scam, where Kuwaiti babies were allegedly removed
from incubators in a totally fabricated news story, which was then
used to get Congressional approval for the 1991 Gulf War.
Almost immediately in the wake of a terrorist event or warning, US
network television announces (in substance) that, they think this
mysterious individual Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi is possibly behind it,
invariably without presenting supporting evidence, and prior to the
conduct of an investigation by the relevant police and intelligence
authorities.
In some cases, upon the immediate occurrence of the terrorist event,
there is an initial report which mentions Al-Zarqawi as the possible
mastermind. The report will often say (in substance) that they think
he did it, but it is not yet confirmed and there is some doubt on
the identity of those behind the attack. One or two days later, the
reports will be confirmed, at which time CNN may come up with a more
definitive statement, quoting official police, military and/or
intelligence sources.
Often the CNN report is based on information published on an Islamic
website, or a mysterious video or audio tape. The authenticity of
the website and/or the tapes is not the object of discussion or
detailed investigation.
The news reports never mention that Al-Zarqawi was recruited by the
CIA to fight in the Soviet-Afghan war, as acknowledged by Secretary
Colin Powell in his presentation to the UN Security Council on 5
February 2003. (See Chapter XI.) Moreover, the press usually
presents the terrorist warnings emanating from the CIA as genuine,
without acknowledging the fact that US intelligence has provided
covert support to the Islamic militant network consistently for more
than 20 years. (See Chapters I and III.)
History of Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi
Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi’s name was first mentioned in relation to the
thwarted attack on the Radisson SAS Hotel in Amman, Jordan, during
the December 1999 millennium celebrations. According to press
reports, he had previously gone under another name: Ahmed Fadil Al-Khalayleh,
among several other aliases.
An Al-Zarqawi legend was in the making. According to The New York
Times, Al-Zarqawi is said to have fled Afghanistan to Iran in late
2001, following the entry of US troops. According to news reports,
he had been “collaborating with hard-liners” in the Iranian military
and intelligence apparatus:
United States intelligence officials
say they are increasingly concerned by the mounting evidence of
Tehran’s renewed interest in terrorism [and support to Al-Zarqawi],
including covert surveillance by Iranian agents of possible
American targets abroad. American officials said Iran appeared
to view terrorism as [a] deterrent against [a] possible attack
by the United States.
Since the surprise election of reformer Mohammad Khatami as
president of Iran in 1997 and his wide public support,
Washington has been counting on a new moderate political
majority to emerge. But the hard-line faction has maintained its
grip on Iran’s security apparatus, frustrating American efforts
to ease tensions with Tehran.
Now, Iranian actions to destabilize the new interim government
in Afghanistan, its willingness to assist Al Qaeda members and
its fuelling of the Palestinian uprising are prompting a
reassessment in Washington, officials say.5
Presenting the Tehran government as
having links to Al Qaeda was part of an evolving disinformation
campaign, consisting in portraying Iran as a sponsor of the “Islamic
terror network”.
Turning Point in the Disinformation
Campaign
In the months leading up to the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Al-Zarqawi’s
name reemerges, this time almost on a daily basis, with reports
focusing on his “sinister relationship to Saddam Hussein”.
A major turning point in the propaganda campaign occurs on February
5, 2003 at the United Nations Security Council, following Colin
Powell’s historic address to the UN body.
Focussing on the central role of Al-Zarqawi, Secretary Colin Powell
presented detailed “documentation” on the ties between Saddam
Hussein and Al Qaeda, and linked this “sinister nexus” to Iraq’s
alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction:
Our concern is not just about these
illicit weapons; it’s the way that these illicit weapons can be
connected to terrorists and terrorist organizations.…
But what I want to bring to your
attention today is the potentially much more sinister nexus
between Iraq and the Al Qaeda terrorist network, a nexus that
combines classic terrorist organizations and modern methods of
murder. Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network, headed by
Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi, an associate and collaborator of Osama
bin Laden and his Al Qaeda lieutenants.
Zarqawi, a Palestinian born in Jordan, fought in the Afghan War
more than a decade ago [as a Mujahideen recruited by the CIA].
Returning to Afghanistan in 2000, he oversaw a terrorist
training camp. One of his specialities and one of the
specialities of this camp is poisons. …
We know these affiliates are connected to Zarqawi because they
remain, even today, in regular contact with his direct
subordinates, including the poison cell plotters. And they are
involved in moving more than money and materiel. Last year, two
suspected Al Qaeda operatives were arrested crossing from Iraq
into Saudi Arabia. They were linked to associates of the Baghdad
cell, and one of them received training in Afghanistan on how to
use cyanide.
From his terrorist network in Iraq, Zarqawi can direct his
network in the Middle East and beyond. [Al-Zarqawi is presented
here as being active in several countries at the same time.] …
According to detainees, Abu Atiya, who graduated from Zarqawi’s
terrorist camp in Afghanistan, tasked at least nine North
African extremists in 2001 to travel to Europe to conduct poison
and explosive attacks. Since last year, members of this network
have been apprehended in France, Britain, Spain and Italy. By
our last count, 116 operatives connected to this global web have
been arrested. The chart you are seeing shows the network in
Europe.
We know about this European network, and we know about its links
to Zarqawi, because the detainee who provided the information
about the targets also provided the names of members of the
network. …
We also know that Zarqawi’s colleagues have been active in the
Pankisi Gorge, Georgia, and in Chechnya, Russia. The plotting to
which they are linked is not mere chatter. Members of Zarqawi’s
network say their goal was to kill Russians with toxins.
We are not surprised that Iraq is harboring Zarqawi and his
subordinates. This understanding builds on decades-long
experience with respect to ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. …
As I said at the outset, none of this should come as a surprise
to any of us. Terrorism has been a tool used by Saddam for
decades. Saddam was a supporter of terrorism long before these
terrorist networks had a name, and this support continues. The
nexus of poisons and terror is new; the nexus of Iraq and terror
is old. The combination is lethal.
With this track record, Iraqi denials of supporting terrorism
take their place alongside the other Iraqi denials of weapons of
mass destruction. It is all a web of lies. When we confront a
regime that harbors ambitions for regional domination, hides
weapons of mass destruction, and provides haven and active
support for terrorists, we are not confronting the past, we are
confronting the present. And unless we act, we are confronting
an even more frightening future.6
Following Powell’s February 2003 UN
Security Council presentation, Al-Zarqawi immediately gained in
public notoriety as a terrorist mastermind involved in planning
chemical and biological weapons attacks.
The Ansar Al-Islam Connection
Based on fake intelligence, Secretary Powell’s presentation to the
UN Security Council consisted in linking the secular Baathist regime
to the “Islamic terror network”, with a view to justifying the
invasion and occupation of Iraq.
According to Powell, Al-Zarqawi had been working hand in glove with
Ansar Al-Islam, an obscure Islamist group, based in Northern Iraq.
In the wake of 9/11, Ansar had allegedly been responsible for
plotting terror attacks in a number of countries including France,
Britain, and Germany. US officials had also pointed to the sinister
role of Iraq’s embassy in Islamabad, which was allegedly used as a
liaison between Ansar Al-Islam operatives and representatives of the
Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein.
Ironically, Ansar was allowed to develop in a region which had been
under US military control since the 1991 Gulf War, namely Kurdish
held Northern Iraq. This region—which was in “the no fly zone”—was
not under the control of the Saddam government. It became a de facto
US protectorate in the wake of the 1991 Gulf War.
There was no evidence of Saddam Hussein’s support to Ansar Al-Islam.
In fact, quite the opposite. The US military authorities stationed
in the region had turned a blind eye to the presence of alleged
Islamic terrorists. With virtually no interference from the US
military,
“Al Qaida affiliates [had] been
operating freely in the [regional] capital, … coordinating the
movement of people, money and supplies for Ansar al-Islam”.7
The spiritual founder of Ansar Al-Islam,
Mullah Krekar confirmed that “like most militant Islamists, [he]
hates Saddam.” At the time of the US invasion of Iraq, Mullah Krekar
was living in Norway, where he had refugee status.
“The US has not requested his
arrest. If Iraq is guilty of occasional meetings with
second-level Al Qaeda operatives, then what is the Norwegian
government guilty of?”8
Ansar Al-Islam was largely involved in
terrorist attacks directed against the secular institutions of the
Kurdish regional governments. It was also involved in assassinations
of members of the Kurdish Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).
In fact in the days following Colin Powell’s February 5, 2003
presentation to the United Nations Security Council, a senior
military leader of PUK forces General Shawkat Haj Mushir was
assassinated allegedly by Ansar Al-Islam.9 Surrounded in mystery,
the assassination of Shawkat was barely mentioned in the US press.
In the days following Colin Powell’s February 5, 2003 UN address,
the Iraqi foreign ministry clarified in an official statement that:
the Iraqi government [of Saddam
Hussein] helped the [PUK] Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani against
the Ansar al-Islam group. He [the spokesman] accused Ansar
al-Islam of carrying out acts of sabotage inside Iraq … [and]
that the United States had turned down an Iraqi offer to
cooperate on the issue of terrorism.10
While accusing Baghdad of links to the
terror network, the presence and activities of Islamic
fundamentalist groups in Northern Iraq was largely serving US
interests.
These groups were committed to the establishment of a Muslim
theocracy. They had contributed to triggering political instability
while at the same time weakening the institutions of the two
dominant secular Kurdish parties, both of which had been on occasion
been involved in negotiations with the government of Saddam Hussein.
Quoting a “top secret British document”, the BBC revealed on the
very same day Colin Powell made his presentation to the UN Security
Council (5 February 2003):
“that there is nothing but enmity
between Iraq and Al Qaeda. The BBC said the leak came from
[British] intelligence officials upset that their work was being
used to justify war.”11
Moreover, the powerful Council on
Foreign Relations (CFR) which plays a behind the scenes role in US
military planning also refuted the substance of Colin Powell’s
statement to the UN Security Council concerning the links between
the Iraqi government and the Islamic terror network. (This
refutation is all the more serious, in view of the fact that these
alleged links were used as a justification for the invasion of
Iraq.):
The question of Iraqi links to Al
Qaeda remains murky, although senior Bush administration
officials insist such ties exist. … [M]any experts and State
Department officials note that any Al Qaeda presence in Iraq
probably lies in northern regions beyond Saddam’s control. Many
experts say there is scant evidence of ties between Al Qaeda and
Iraq, noting that Al Qaeda’s loathing for “impious”Arab
governments makes it an unlikely bedfellow for Saddam’s secular
regime.12
Mysterious Chemical-Biological Weapons Plant
in Northern Iraq
The substance of Powell’s UN statement with regard to Al-Zarqawi
rested on the existence of an Ansar al-Islam chemical-biological
weapons plant in Northern Iraq which was producing ricin, sarin and
other biological weapons, to be used in terror attacks on the US and
Western Europe:
When our coalition ousted the
Taliban, the Zarqawi network helped establish another poison and
explosive training center camp, and this camp is located in
North-Eastern Iraq.
The network is teaching its operative
how to produce ricin and other poisons. Let me remind you how ricin
works. Less than a pinch—imagine a pinch of salt—less than a pinch
of ricin, eating just this amount in your food would cause shock,
followed by circulatory failure. Death comes within 72 hours and
there is no antidote. There is no cure. It is fatal.
Those helping to run this camp are Zarqawi lieutenants operating in
northern Kurdish areas outside Saddam Hussein’s controlled Iraq, but
Baghdad has an agent in the most senior levels of the radical
organization Ansar al-Islam, that controls this corner of Iraq. In
2000, this agent offered Al Qaeda safe haven in the region. After we
swept Al Qaeda from Afghanistan, some of its members accepted this
safe haven. They remain there today.
The above statement by Colin Powell, concerning the North Iraqi
facility where the ricin was being produced, was refuted by several
media reports, prior to the US-led invasion:
There is no sign of chemical weapons
anywhere—only the smell of paraffin and vegetable butter used
for cooking. In the kitchen, I discovered some chopped up
tomatoes but not much else. The cook had left his Kalashnikov
propped neatly against the wall. Ansar al-Islam—the Islamic
group that uses the compound identified as a military HQ by
Powell—yesterday invited me and several other foreign
journalists into their territory for the first time. “We are
just a group of Muslims trying to do our duty,” Mohammad Hasan,
spokesman for Ansar al-Islam, explained. “We don’t have any
drugs for our fighters. We don’t even have any aspirin. How can
we produce any chemicals or weapons of mass destruction?”13
The intelligence contained in Colin
Powell’s UN statement had been fabricated. At the height of the
military invasion of Iraq, a few weeks later, US Special Forces,
together with their “embedded” journalists, entered the alleged
chemical-biological weapons facility in Northern Iraq. Their report
also refutes Colin Powell’s statements to the UN body:
What they [US Special Forces] found
was a camp devastated by cruise missile strikes during the first
days of the war. A specialized biochemical team scoured the
rubble for samples. They wore protective masks as they entered a
building they suspected was a weapons lab. Inside they found
mortar shells, medical supplies, and grim prison cells, but no
immediate proof of chemical or biological agents. For this unit,
such evidence would have been a so-called smoking gun, proof
that it has banned weapons. But instead, this was a
disappointing day for these troops on the front line of the hunt
for weapons of mass destruction here. Jim Sciutto, ABC News,
with US Special Forces in Northern Iraq.14
The Alleged Ricin Threat in the US
On February 8, 2003, three days after Colin Powell’s UN speech, the
ricin threat reemerged, this time in the US. Al-Zarqawi was said to
be responsible for “the suspicious white powder found in a letter
sent to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist which contained the [same]
deadly poison ricin.”15
In a CIA report which was supposedly “leaked” to Newsweek, a group
of CIA analysts predicted authoritatively that:
“[There was] a 59 percent
probability that an attack on the US homeland involving WMD
would occur before 31 March 2003.” … It all seems so precise and
frightening: a better than 90 percent chance that Saddam will
succeed in hitting America with a weapon spewing radiation,
germs or poison. But it is important to remember that the odds
are determined by averaging a bunch of guesses, informed
perhaps, but from experts whose careers can only be ruined by
underestimating the threat.16
The picture of “terrorist
mastermind”Al-Zarqawi was featured prominently in Newsweek’s cover
story article.
In the National Review (February 18, 2003), one month before the
onslaught of the invasion of Iraq, Al-Zarqawi was described as Al
Qaeda’s “chief biochemical engineer”:
It is widely known that Zarqawi, Al
Qaeda’s chief biochemical engineer, was at the safe house in
Afghanistan where traces of ricin and other poisons were
originally found. What is not widely known-but was briefly
alluded to in Sec. Powell’s UN address-is that starting in the
mid-1990s, Iraq’s embassy in Islamabad routinely played host to
Saddam’s biochemical scientists, some of whom interacted with al
Qaeda operatives, including Zarqawi and his lab technicians,
under the diplomatic cover of the Taliban embassy nearby to
teach them the art of mixing poisons from home grown and readily
available raw materials.17
Radioactive Dirty Bombs
In the immediate aftermath of Powell’s speech, there was a code
orange alert. Reality had been turned upside down. The US was not
attacking Iraq. Iraq was preparing to attack America with the
support of “Islamic terrorists”. Official statements also pointed to
the dangers of a dirty radioactive bomb attack in the US. Again Al-Zarqawi
was identified as the number one suspect.18
Meanwhile, Al-Zarqawi had been identified as the terror mastermind
behind the (thwarted) ricin attacks in several European countries
including Britain and Spain, in the months leading up to the
invasion of Iraq.
Britain’s Ricin Threat
In January 2003, there was a ricin terror alert, which supposedly
had also been ordered by Al-Zarqawi. The ricin had allegedly been
discovered in a London apartment. It was to be used in a terror
attack in the London subway. British press reports, quoting official
statements claimed that the terrorists had learnt to produce the
ricin at the Ansar al-Islam camp in Northern Iraq.
Two years later, the police investigation revealed that the ricin
threats in Britain had been fabricated, and Britain’s system of
justice had been “tailored to a time of terror”:
There was no ricin and no Al Qaeda
recipe, only a formula apparently confected by a white American
Christian survivalist and downloaded from the Internet. Even if
Bourgass, a nasty and deluded loner, had managed to create his
poison and smear it on car-door handles, it would not have
worked. Had Bourgass the poisoner devoted himself to creating
the perfect Nigella chickpea couscous, he could hardly have been
a less likely mass exterminator …
In the absence of chemical poison, a
war against Iraq, a fake link between Al Qaeda and Saddam and a
double helping of contempt of court were brewed up on Kamel
Bourgass’s hob. Tony Blair, David Blunkett, Colin Powell and
senior police officers all used the arrests to illustrate the
existence of a new breed of Islamist super-terrorist. A criminal
prosecution was exploited to fit a political agenda. A war was
justified and civil liberties imperiled by the ricin stash that
never was.
Lawyers for the eight cleared men are outraged at the way their
clients have been portrayed by the media and politicians, and
there is so little acknowledgment of a just result, from the
Home Office and elsewhere, that one wonders if dodgy convictions
would have left some politicians more satisfied. Meanwhile, a
new terror law, more draconian than expected, is in the Labour
manifesto, pushing criminal trials for those who “glorify or
condone acts of terror”.
The affair of the sham ricin casts a long shadow over the
police, the Crown Prosecution Service, the credulous
sensationalists of the media and, most of all, over politicians.
…
Eight innocent men were presumed guilty. Ten others held for two
years without charge reportedly had non-existent links to the
ricin plot cited on their government control orders.19
It is worth mentioning that
“authoritative” news stories on the ricin threat as well as the
(nonexistent) chemical weapons plants in Northern Iraq, continued to
be churned out in the wake of the invasion, despite the fact that
official reports confirmed that they did not exist. In a June 2004
report in the Washington Times:
Zarqawi stands as stark evidence of a link between Saddam Hussein’s
autocratic regime and bin Laden’s al Qaeda terror network.
Zarqawi, 38, operated a terrorist camp
in northern Iraq that specialized in developing poisons and chemical
weapons.
The Spanish Connection
In the months leading up to the invasion of Iraq, fabricated threats
of chemical weapons attacks had emerged in several countries at the
same time. Was the disinformation campaign being coordinated by
intelligence officials in several countries?
In Spain, in the months prior to the March 2003 invasion, Bush’s
indefectible coalition partner, Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar had
initiated his own disinformation campaign, no doubt in liaison with
the office of the US Secretary of State.
The timing seemed perfect: on the very same day Colin Powell was
presenting the Al-Zarqawi dossier to the UN (focussing on the
sinister chemical weapons facility in Northern Iraq), Prime Minister
Jose Maria Aznar was busy briefing the Spanish parliament on an
alleged chemical terror attack in Spain, in which Al-Zarqawi was
supposedly also involved.
According to Prime Minister Aznar, Al-Zarqawi had established links
to a number of European Islamic “collaborators” including Merouane
Ben Ahmed, “an expert in chemistry and explosives who visited
Barcelona”.20
Prime Minister Aznar confirmed in his
speech to the Chamber of Deputies (Camera de diputados) on the 5th
of February 2001 that the sixteen Al Qaeda suspects, allegedly in
possession of explosives and lethal chemicals, had been working hand
in glove with “terrorist mastermind” Al-Zarqawi.
Prime Minister Aznar’s statements concerning these “lethal chemical
weapons in the hands of terrorists” was also based on fabricated
intelligence. An official report of the Spanish Ministry of Defense
confirmed that “the tests on chemicals seized from 16 suspected Al
Qaeda men in Spain … have revealed that they are harmless and some
were household detergent.”21
A defense ministry lab outside Madrid tested the substances—a bag
containing more than half a pound of powder and several bottles or
containers with liquids or residues—for the easy-to-make biological
poison ricin …. The Spanish defense ministry, which carried out the
tests, and the lab itself declined to comment.22
3/11: The Madrid 11 March 2004 Train
Bombing
In the wake of the US led invasion of Iraq, Al-Zarqawi’s name was
being routinely associated, without supporting evidence, with
numerous terror threats and incidents in Western Europe and the US.
While the press reports regarding the March 11, 2004 Madrid train
bombing did not generally point to Al-Zarqawi’s involvement, they
nonetheless hinted that the Moroccan group which allegedly
“supervised the bombings in Madrid, [was] acting [according to the
CIA] as a link between Al-Zarqawi and a cell of mostly Moroccan Al
Qaeda members.”23
This type of reporting, which broadly replicates the sinister
relationship described by Prime Minister Aznar in his February 5,
2003 statement to the Spanish Parliament, provides a face to the
outside enemy.
Two days after the 3/11 Madrid bombing, CNN reported, quoting US
intelligence sources, that Al-Zarqawi, described as “a lone wolf”,
might be planning attacks on “soft targets” in Western Europe:
LISOVICZ: And Jonathan,
specifically, Abu Musaab Al-Zarqawi is someone you have
described as Al Qaeda 2.0, which is pretty scary.
SCHANZER: Yes. Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi
is the man we caught; we intercepted his memo last month. US
intelligence officials found this memo. It indicated that he was
trying to continue to carry out attacks against the United
States.
CAFFERTY: Where do we stand in your
opinion on this war on terrorism? We have got this terrible
situation in Madrid. We’ve got this fellow, Zarqawi, you are
talking about, the lone Wolf that is active, some think inside
Iraq. We have got terrorist attacks happening there. There is
discussion all over Western Europe of fear of terrorism,
possibly being about to increase there. Are we winning this war
or are we losing it? What is your read?
SCHANZER: I think we’re winning it.
We’ve certainly—I mean counterterrorism at its core is just
restricting the terrorist environment. So we’ve cut down on the
amount of finances moving around in the terrorist world. We have
arrested a number of key figures. So we are doing a good job.24
“Are we winning or loosing” the war on
terrorism. “We are doing a good job.” These catch phrases are part
of the disinformation campaign. While they acknowledge “weaknesses”
in US counterterrorism, their function is to justify enhanced
military-intelligence operations against this illusive individual,
who is confronting US military might, all over the World.
The April 2004 Osama Tape
Meanwhile, another mysterious Osama tape (April 2004) had emerged in
which bin Laden acknowledged his responsibility for the 9/11 attacks
on the World Trade Center and the 3/11 train bombing in Madrid in
March 2004:
“I [Osama] am offering a truce to
European countries, and its core is our commitment to cease
operations against any country which does not carry out an
onslaught against Muslims or interfere in their affairs as part
of the big American conspiracy against the Islamic world. … The
truce will begin when the last soldier leaves our countries. …
Whoever wants reconciliation and the right (way), then we are
the ones who initiated it, so stop spilling our blood so we can
stop spilling your blood. … What happened on September 11 and
March 11 was your goods delivered back to you.25
In other words, Osama bin Laden offers
“a truce” if the various European countries involved in Iraq accept
to withdraw their troops. In return, Al Qaeda will declare a
moratorium on terrorist attacks in Europe.
Without further investigation, the Western media described the
controversial April 2004 Osama tape as an attempt by “Enemy Number
One” to create a rift between America and its European allies.
The tape in all likelihood was a hoax of US intelligence. The
propaganda ploy consists not only in upholding the US-led occupation
of Iraq as part of the broader “war on terrorism”, it also provides
a pretext to European governments, pressured by citizens movements,
to turn a blind eye to the US-UK sponsored war crimes in Iraq. In
the words of France’s President Jacques Chirac, “nothing can justify
terrorism and, on that basis, nothing can allow any discussion with
terrorists.”
Underlying the Osama tape is the presumption that the “extremists”
in Iraq are the same people responsible for the 9/11 and 3/11
terrorist attacks. It follows, according to one US press report,
that the “anti-war zealots”, by opposing the US led occupation, are
in fact providing ammunition to Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda:
Bin Laden’s deranged fantasies are
frighteningly similar to those many anti-war zealots harbor both
here and abroad. … He also apparently tries to justify the
attacks of 9/11 as retaliation for US support for Jews in
Palestine, and US invasions in the Gulf War and Somalia. “Our
actions are reactions to your actions,” he said.
This is gibberish, but it is typical of a megalomaniacal mind.
Even Hitler, after all, insisted his attack on Poland was in
self-defense. Evil often comes cloaked in the counterfeit robes
of virtue.
But it’s also easy to see how such arguments can gain traction
among impoverished Arabs who long have been repressed by their
own governments and are searching for answers.
The United States should be grateful for this latest tape. It
puts a lot of things in perspective. Europe and the United
States are at war together, and the enemy is someone of flesh
and blood who can be frightened—enough so that he feels it
necessary to propose a truce.26
Al-Zarqawi and the Abu Ghraib Prison
Scandal
The Abu Ghraib torture scandal, including the release of the
photographs of tortured POWs, reached its climax with the broadcast
of CBS’s “60 Minutes” hosted by Dan Rather on the 28th of April
2004.27
Within days of an impending scandal involving the upper echelons of
the Pentagon, which directly implicated Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld, Al-Zarqawi was reported to be planning simultaneous large
scale terrorist attacks in several countries, including a major
terrorist operation in Jordan.
With Al-Zarqawi featured prominently on network television, these
reports served to usefully distract public attention from the Abu
Ghraib torture scandal.
A mysterious videotape was released, describing in minute detail how
“terrorist mastermind” Al-Zarqawi was planning to wage a major
attack inside Jordan. The alleged attack consisted in using “a
combination of 71 lethal chemicals, including blistering agents to
cause third-degree burns, nerve gas and choking agents, which would
have formed a lethal toxic cloud over a square mile of the capital,
Amman”.28
According to the news reports, “the alleged terrorist plot was just
days away from execution”. The targets were the Jordanian
intelligence headquarters, the prime minister’s office and the US
Embassy. According to CNN, which broadcast excerpts of the
mysterious videotape, “the Jordanian government fears the death toll
could have run into the thousands, more deadly even than 9/11” . 29
[In CNN’s coverage], Jordanian
special forces [are] raiding an apartment house in Amman in the
hunt for an al Qaeda cell. Some of the suspects are killed,
others arrested, ending what Jordanian intelligence says was a
bold plan to use chemical weapons and truck bombs in their
capital. … The Jordanian government fears the death toll could
have run into the thousands, more deadly even than 9/11.
For the first time the alleged plotters were interviewed on
videotape, aired on Jordanian TV. CNN obtained copies of the
tapes from the Jordanians. This man revealing his orders came
from a man named Azme Jayoussi, the cell’s alleged ringleader.
HUSSEIN SHARIF (through translator): The aim of this operation
was to strike Jordan and the Hashemite royal family, a war
against the crusaders and infidels. Azme told me that this would
be the first chemical suicide attack that al Qaeda would
execute.
VAUSE: Also appearing on the tape, Azme Jayoussi, who says his
orders came from this man, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the same man
the US says is behind many of the violent attacks in Iraq.
AZME JAYOUSSI,ACCUSED PLOTTER (through translator): I took
advanced explosives course, poisons, high level, then I pledged
allegiance to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, to obey him without any
questioning, to be on his side. After this Afghanistan fell. I
met Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Iraq.30
Al-Zarqawi ‘s “Attack on America”
Two days later on the 29 April 2004, immediately following the
reports on the terrorist threat in Jordan, the State Department
announced that Al-Zarqawi was now planning a similar chemical
weapons attack on America.31
The “ freelancer” and “lone wolf, … acting alone in the name of Al
Qaeda” had been crossing international borders unnoticed. One day,
he’s in Jordan, the next day in the US, and back again a few days
later in Iraq.
According to the US State Department Annual Report on Terrorism,
quoted by CNN:
[T]he number of terrorist attacks
around the world declined last year, but the government’s annual
report on terrorism includes a chilling warning about the year
ahead. … The State Department says terrorists are planning an
attack on US soil. High on their anxiety list, terrorist Abu
Musab Al-Zarqawi.
[According to the State Department’s Coordinator for
Counter-terrorism, Cofer Black] “He [Al-Zarqawi] is
representative of a very real and credible threat. His
operatives are planning and attempting now to attack American
targets, and we are after them with a vengeance.32
The State Department report was released
on the same day as the CBS’s “60 Minutes” program on the Abu Ghraib
prison scandal.
The Nicholas Berg Execution
Barely a couple of weeks later, Al-Zarqawi is named as the
mastermind behind the execution in Iraq of Nicholas Berg on May 11,
2004. Media coverage of Berg’s terrible death was based on a
mysterious report (and video) on an Islamic website, which according
to CNN provided evidence that Al-Zarqawi might be involved:
ENSOR: The Web site claims that the
killing was done by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian terrorist
whose al Qaeda affiliated group is held responsible by US
intelligence for a string of bombings in Iraq and for the
killing of an American diplomat in Amman. CNN Arab linguists
say, however, that the voice on the tape has the wrong accent.
They do not believe it is Zarqawi. US officials said the killers
tried to take advantage of the prison abuse controversy to gain
attention. …
BROWN: So, the administration said
today we’ll track these people down.We will get them beyond, I
guess, this belief that Zarqawi somehow was involved. Are there
any clues out there that we heard about?
ENSOR: This is going to be very,
very difficult. They’ve been looking for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
for several years now. There’s a large price on his head. He’s
been blowing up a lot of things in Iraq according to him and
according to US intelligence. They don’t know where he is, so
it’s—I don’t think they have any clues right now, at least none
that I know of—Aaron.33 While initially expressing doubts on the
identity of the masked individual, a subsequent and more
definitive report, based on “authoritative intelligence”, was
aired two days later by CNN on 13 May 2004: The CIA confirms
that Nicholas Berg’s killer was Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi; The CIA
acknowledges sticking to strict rules in tough interrogations of
top al Qaeda prisoners.
BLITZER: Because originally our own
linguists here at CNN suspected that—they listened to this
audiotape and they didn’t think that it sounded like Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi. But now definitively, the experts at the CIA say it
almost certainly is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi?
ENSOR: They say it almost certainly
is. There’s just a disagreement between the CNN linguists and
the CIA linguists. The US Government now believes that the
person speaking on that tape and killing Nick Berg on that tape
is the actual man, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.34
The report on the Nicholas Berg
assassination, coincided with calls by US senators for the
resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld over the Abu Ghraib
prison scandal. It occurred a few days after President Bush’s
“apology” for the Abu Ghraib prison “abuses”. It served once again
to distract public attention from the war crimes ordered by key
members of the Bush Administration.
Authenticity of the Video
The video footage published on the website was called “Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi
shows killing of an American”.
While CIA experts released a statement saying that Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi
“was the man in the mask who beheaded the US citizen Nick Berg in
front of a camera,” several reports question the authenticity of the
video.35
Al-Zarqawi is Jordanian. Yet the man in the video “posing as
Jordanian native Zarqawi does not speak the Jordanian dialect.
Zarqawi has an artificial leg, but none of these murderers did. The
man presented as Zarqawi had a yellow ring, presumably a golden one,
which Muslim men are banned from wearing, especially so-called
fundamentalists.”36
When the issue of his artificial leg was mentioned in relation to
the video, US officials immediately revised their story, stating
they were not quite sure whether he had actually lost a leg: “US
intelligence officials, who used to believe that Zarqawi had lost a
leg in Afghanistan, recently revised that assessment, concluding
that he still has both legs.”37
Nicholas Berg was assassinated. The identity of the killers was not
firmly established. Moreover, there were a number of other aspects
pertaining to the video, which suggested that it was a fake.
Another report stated that Zarqawi was dead.
The audio was not in synchrony with the video, indicating that the
video footage might have been manipulated.
The Iraqi Resistance Movement
In the wake of the invasion of Iraq, the disinformation campaign
consisted in presenting the Iraqi resistance movement as
“terrorists”.
The image of “terrorists” fighting US peacekeepers is presented on
television screens across the globe.
Portrayed as an evil enemy, Al-Zarqawi was used profusely in Bush’s
press conferences and speeches, in an obvious public relations ploy:
Yo u know, I hate to predict
violence, but I just understand the nature of the killers. This
guy, Zarqawi, an al Qaeda associate—who was in Baghdad, by the
way, prior to the removal of Saddam Hussein—is still at large in
Iraq. And as you might remember, part of his operational plan
was to sow violence and discord amongst the various groups in
Iraq by cold-blooded killing. And we need to help find Zarqawi
so that the people of Iraq can have a more bright—bright
future.38
The portrait of terror mastermind Al-Zarqawi
was used to personify the Iraqi resistance.
In an almost routine and repetitive fashion, his name is linked to
the numerous “terrorist attacks” in Iraq against the US
led-occupation.
While the Western media highlights these various occurrences
including the kidnappings of paid mercenaries, on contract to
Western security firms, there is a deafening silence on the massacre
of more than one hundred thousand Iraqi civilians by coalition
forces, since the beginning of the US-led occupation in April
2003.39
The 2004-2005 operation in Fallujah, which resulted in several
thousand civilian deaths, was casually described by the Bush
administration as “a crackdown” against extremists working under the
leadership of Al-Zarqawi. According to official statements, Al Qaeda
mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was in Fallujah, which had become a
so-called “hotbed for foreign fighters”. In the words of Newsweek:
“Saddam may not have had direct ties to Al Qaeda, but the Jihadists
are eager to fill his shoes.”40
In other words, the Bush administration needs Al-Zarqawi and the
“war on terrorism” as a justification for the killing of civilians
in Iraq, which it continues to describe as “collateral damage”.
Consistently, a barrage of media reports had surfaced on Al Qaeda
links to the Iraqi resistance movement. The insurgents are described
as Islamic extremists and fundamentalists: “hard-line Sunnis,
foreign extremists, and, now, Sadr and his disenfranchised Shiite
followers”.41
The secular character of the resistance movement is denied. In a
completely twisted logic, Al Qaeda is said to constitute a
significant force behind the Iraqi insurgents.
The disinformation campaign ultimately consists in convincing the US
public that the “Defense of the Homeland” and the occupation of Iraq
are part of the same process and involving the same enemy. In the
words of former CIA Director James Woolsey in a CNN interview:
Iraqi intelligence, trained al Qaeda
in poison gases and conventional explosives. And had
senior-level contacts going back a decade. And the Islamists
from the Sunni side, from the al Qaeda, work with people like
Hezbollah. They’re perfectly happy to work together against us.
It’s sort of like three Mafia families, but they insult each
other, but can still cooperate …. I think it’s Islamist
totalitarians masquerading as part of a religion. Certainly if
anybody in the intelligence community is surprised by this, the
really surprising thing would be that they are really surprised.
Some of them have had an idea fix
for a long time, that al Qaeda would never work with the
Ba’athist and the Shiite Islamist would never work with the
Sunni. It’s just nuts. They work together on important things.
It’s not that one necessarily controls the other. It’s not sort
of like state sponsorship, but cooperation, support here and
there against us, sure, they’ve been doing it for years and
years and years.42
New Propaganda Ploy
As the resistance movement in Iraq unfolds and challenges the US
military occupation, Al-Zarqawi is increasingly portrayed by the
media as the main obstacle to the holding of “free and fair
elections” in Iraq.
Barely a week prior to the January 2005 Iraqi elections sponsored
and organized by the Bush administration, with the support of the
“international community,” another mysterious Al-Zarqawi audiotape
surfaced on the Internet.
While the news reports initially stated that “the authenticity of
the tape could not be determined”, they later confirmed, quoting
“authoritative intelligence” that “the voice in the tape appeared to
be that of Al-Zarqawi”. In his own words, Al-Zarqawi had now
declared “a fierce war on this evil principle of democracy and those
who follow this wrong ideology”.43
The Al-Zarqawi pre-election audiotape usefully served the
disinformation campaign, by underscoring the evil and insidious
links between Al-Zarqawi and former Saddam regime loyalists.
Secular Sunni Baathists and jihadists are said to have joined hands.
In the Zarqawi audiotape, the Shiite majority is presented as
“evil”, serving to create divisions within Iraqi society:
The leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu
Musab al-Zarqawi, whose “young lions” are attacking polling
stations and killing candidates, has described Shias as “the
most evil of mankind … the lurking snakes and the crafty
scorpions, the spying enemy and the penetrating venom”.
Understanding that elections favor the majority, he said that
the US had engineered the poll to get a Shia government into
power.44
Again, reality is turned upside down.
The existence of an Iraqi resistance movement to the US-led
occupation is denied. The “insurgents” are “terrorists” opposed to
democracy. Al-Zarqawi is pinpointed as attempting to sabotage what
both the American and European media have described in chorus as
“the first democratic elections in half a century”. Meanwhile, the
US-UK military mandate in Iraq is upheld by the “international
community” and Washington’s European allies.
“Clash of Civilizations”
With Iraq under continued US military occupation, the propaganda
ploy now consists in focussing on the “clash of civilizations”: the
great divide between the societies of the Islamic Middle East and
the Judeo-Christian West. Whereas the latter is recognized as “a
moral system” closely associated with modern forms of Western
democracy, the former is said to be entrenched in theocratic and
authoritarian forms of government, dominated directly or indirectly
by the tenets of Islamic fundamentalism.
It is on the premises of this “clash of civilizations” that America
has formulated its messianic mission “to spread liberty in the
world”. In the words of President George W. Bush, there is “no
neutral ground in the fight between civilization and terror”
“The clash of civilizations,” as described by Samuel Huntington, had
become an integral part of the propaganda campaign.
Islam is not only heralded as being broadly “un-democratic” and
incompatible with a (Western) system of representative government,
the jihadists—including bin Laden and Al-Zarqawi are ushered in as
the sole spokesmen for an Iraqi “insurgency” described in press
reports and on network television, as being composed of “terrorists”
and “criminal gangs”:
The questions Zarqawi raises go way
beyond the elections in Iraq to the whole issue of modernization
of the Arab world. Is democracy un-Islamic? Is there a
fundamental clash between the principles of representative
government and the principles of Islam?45
Meanwhile, the illegality of the US
occupation under international law and the Nuremberg charter goes
unmentioned.
Under the disguise of “peace-keeping”, the United Nations is
actively collaborating with the occupying forces. The deaths of
thousands of civilians, the torture chambers and the concentration
camps, the destruction of an entire country’s infrastructure—not to
mention the issue of the missing “weapons of mass destruction”— have
been overshadowed by the fabricated image of an American commitment
to democracy and post-war reconstruction.
Notes
1. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),“FBI
Most Wanted” at
http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/topten/fugitives/fugitives.htm
2. Weekly Standard, 24 May 2004.
3. See Michel Collon, “Washington has Found the Solution ‘Let’s
Divide Iraq as We Did in Yugoslavia!’”, Centre for Research on
Globalization, 23 December 2003,
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/COL312A.html. See also
Vladimir Radyuhin, “From Kosovo to Iraq”, The Hindu, 18 August
2003,
4. Washington Times, 8 June 2004.
5. New York Times, 24 March 2002.
6. US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s address to the UN
Security Council, 5 February 2003.
7 Midland Independent, 6 February 2003.
8. Glen Rangwala, “Claims in Secretary of State Colin Powell’s
UN Presentation concerning Iraq, 5th February 2003”,
http://www.traprockpeace.org/firstresponse.html On
Mullah Krekar, see Daily News, New York, 6 February 2003.
9. The Australian, 11 February 2003.
10. News Conference by Lieutenant-General Amir al-Sa’di, adviser
at the Iraqi Presidency; Dr Sa’id al-Musawi, head of the
Organizations’ Department at the Iraqi Foreign Ministry; and
Major-General Husam Muhammad Amin, head of the Iraqi National
Monitoring Directorate, BBC Monitoring Service, 6 February 2003.
11. Quoted in Daily News, New York, 6 February 2003.
12. Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) website at
http://www.cfrterrorism.org/groups/alqaeda3.html
13. The Observer, London, 9 February 2003.
14. ABC News, 29 March 2003.
15. Pittsburgh Post Gazette, 8 February 2004.
16. Newsweek, 24 February 2003.
17. National Review, 18 February 2003.
18. ABC News, 13 February 2003.
19. Mary Riddell, "With poison in their souls: The demonisation
of the ricin suspects by politicians and the media smacks of
Salem”, The Observer, 17 April 2005
20. Reported in El País, Madrid, 6 February 2003.
21. Europe Intelligence Wire, 27 February 2003.
22. Irish News, 27 February 2003.
23. The Australian, 27 May 2004.
24. CNN, 13 March 2004, emphasis added, For details on the
Madrid bombing see, “Madrid ‘blueprint’: a dodgy document” by
Brendan O’Neill, Centre for Research on Globalization, 1 April
2004,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/ONE404A.html
Ibid., See also the report by Al Jazeera, Centre for Research on
Globalization, 17 April 2004,
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/ALJ404A.html
26. Deseret Morning News, Salt Lake City, 15 April 2004.
27. Torture of Iraqi POWs in Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib Prison, CBS
Transcript: “60 Minutes”, 28 April 2004.
28. Charleston Post Courier, 28 April 2004.
29. CNN, 27 April 2004, emphasis added.
30. Ibid, emphasis added.
31. CNN, 29 April 2003.
32. Ibid.
33. CNN, 11 May 2004.
34. CNN, 13 May 2004.
35. Sirajin Sattayev, “Was Nick Berg killed by US
intelligence?”, Centre for Research on Globalization, 23 May
2004,
http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/SAT405A.html
36. Ibid.
37. US News and World Report, 24 May 2004.
38. President George W. Bush, Press Conference, 1 June 2004,
emphasis added.
39. See Les Roberts, Riyadh Lafta, Richard Garfield, Jamal
Khudhairi, Gilbert Burnham, “Mortality before and after the 2003
invasion of Iraq”, Lancet, 29 October 2004.
40. Newsweek, 19 April 2004.
41. US News and World Report, 19 April 2004.
42. Quoted from CNN, Lou Dobbs, Tonight, 15 April 2004.
43. Associated Press Report, 23 January 2005.
44. Quoted in The New Statesman, 31 January 2005.
45. The Washington Post, 30 January 2004.
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