Posted on 04/26/2006 6:54:10 PM PDT by Alouette
CAIRO, Egypt - Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's new video marks a shift by the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq toward a less radical image, one that might appeal to the Iraqi insurgency more than the beheadings for which he's become notorious, analysts said Wednesday.
The video released Tuesday, the first by al-Zarqawi that shows his face, features scenes of the black-garbed terrorist firing a gun and hunkered over a map plotting strategy. The Sunni Muslim extremist, 39, looks youthful and healthy in the springtime desert.
"It's a departure from the past. There's no strident anti-Shiite rhetoric and no beheadings," said Joost Hiltermann, Middle East project director at the International Crisis Group, based in Amman, Jordan.
"He wants to be a `good' insurgent in a more moderate sense — an Iraqi sense — to appeal to Iraqis," Hiltermann said.
Iraqi government officials, however, condemned the Jordanian-born al-Zarqawi as a foreigner determined to destroy Iraq. They said his promise to launch more attacks may have been in response to the appointment of a new prime minister, a major step toward a unity government including Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds.
"I believe that al-Zarqawi was caught off guard by the new government taking shape because it will be very strong one representing all Iraqis," said Sheik Khalid al-Attiyah, the Iraqi parliament's new first deputy speaker. He added that al-Zarqawi is determined "to inflame a civil war."
"He feels very worried that he's losing popularity inside Iraq," Maysoon al-Damluji, a member of the Iraqi parliament, told CNN. "This is a change of strategy. He feels that he needs to make himself visible more in order to get support."
The video comes at a time when Arabs have voiced distaste for Islamic extremists' tactics such as beheadings and bombings, including deadly hotel attacks in Jordan that caused widespread protests.
"He is often seen as more extreme than even (Osama) bin Laden," said Jeremy Binnie, an analyst with Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Center in London. "In reality their ideology isn't that different."
Binnie said the video shows a "softer image" of al-Zarqawi. It suggests he "isn't just the leader of a fanatical band, but a more general-like figure, and also an action man himself."
Al-Zarqawi has done audiotapes, including one in January. But he has kept a relatively low profile since then, when his group merged with five other Iraqi insurgent groups to form the Mujahedeen Shura Council.
The new video was stamped with the logo of the Mujahedeen Shura Council as well as the black flag logo of al-Zarqawi's al-Qaida in Iraq.
Al-Zarqawi has claimed responsibility for some of the bloodiest suicide bombings in Iraq since the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein and for the beheadings and killings of at least 10 foreign hostages, including three Americans and a Briton.
The last time al-Zarqawi made a video was the 2004 beheading of American Nick Berg. In that one, al-Zarqawi's face was masked.
"He appeared to have a sense of mystique by never showing his face. In choosing to come out of the shadows, he may be changing tack," said London-based security consultant Charles Shoebridge.
Shoebridge, a former counterterrorism officer with London's Metropolitan police and a former British army officer, said the tape suggests al-Zarqawi is working to shore up his position within the insurgency.
Added Hiltermann: "Osama bin Laden is sitting somewhere in a cave, but al-Zarqawi is showing he is carrying out jihad in front of the world."
The tape was posted on the Internet two days after an audiotape of bin Laden appeared on Arab television. However, the al-Zarqawi tape is dated Friday, meaning it was made before bin Laden's was released.
In one scene in the tape, al-Zarqawi is pictured in a flat desert of dried, cracked mud with sprouts of vegetation similar to that in Iraq's western Anbar province. Although his whereabouts can't be definitively discerned, Binnie called it "extremely likely" al-Zarqawi was in Anbar or someplace close to it.
The United States has put a $25 million bounty on his head.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
A kinder, gentler insurgency? Did Zarqawi hire the same PR chick that taught Algore how to get women voters to like him?
Sprintime for Al-Zarqawi and Al Qeada....
ON THE NET...
Will he be skipping down the lane? Oh wait, he only has one leg, must be doing the pirate dance.
We'll see how healthy he looks with a .30 third eye in the middle of his forehead.His days are numbered.
"It's a departure from the past. There's no strident anti-Shiite rhetoric and no beheadings"
That's untrue. Their is anti-Shiite statements, several.
#9
Maybe not in the video, but in the written statement that accompanies it.
Here is the text.
http://www.centcom.mil/sites/uscentcom1/Shared%20Documents/Extremist%20Page/What%20Extremists%20Say.aspx?PageView=Shared
Really dumb move. Thanks for updating our photos of you, Zarqawi.
P.S. Some day Zarqawi's indiscriminant murdering of anybody near his bombings is going to kill the wrong person and their family will turn him in for the bounty.
Yeah, the whole "bullet through the head" look is SO 1970s. He won't be able to pick up any chicks if he goes for that look.
May Allah in his mercy not let you suffer the indignity of getting a month older!
May your remains be compact enough to fit in a pigs stomach so they may be carried by your mother in disgrace.
Howzat?
It's springtime for Al-Zarqawi and Al-Qaida...
Looks like it's springtime for hitler and Germany.
Ok, you scooped me by 3 minutes. lol
"He wants to be a `good' insurgent in a more moderate sense — an Iraqi sense — to appeal to Iraqis," Hiltermann said.
I guess the democrats have been supplying him with Clinton style image consultants.
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