Posted on 11/22/2005 8:27:37 AM PST by West Coast Conservative
The United States is using "technical means" to verify if Al-Qaeda frontman in Iraq Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in battle, US coordinator for Iraq James Jeffrey said.
"We are using technical means to try to verify that," Jeffrey told reporters in Jordan during a videoconference from Washington.
"We are looking into the incident in Mosul but we have no indication at this time that any of the dead were Mr Zarqawi," said Jeffrey, who served as deputy chief of mission in Baghdad from June 2004 to March 2005.
"I don't have any more information for you on that," Jeffrey added.
Media reports have said Jordanian-born Zarqawi, the Al-Qaeda frontman, might have been among a group of insurgents killed in battle in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Saturday.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told Jordan's state-run news agency Monday that the Baghdad authorities were carrying out DNA tests on the bodies of insurgents killed in the battle to check if Zarqawi was among them.
US military commanders have said they were continuing the hunt for Zarqawi, who has a 25-million-dollar US bounty on his head.
"We have no indication that Zarqawi was killed and we will continue operations to search for him," a US military spokesman told AFP in Baghdad on Monday.
I think the really tough "tech" problem
in analyzing the tissue/blood remains of
these blast suicides is in finding CLEAN
samplings to test.
Imagine the contamination involved with a
whole room/vehicle/street full of blood
splattering over everything within the site.
Add to that the cross contamination created
by "mourners" whose religious tenets insist
upon their mopping up as much of the blood
as possible after each incident.
I've often wondered exactly what they DO
with the bloody rags they accumulate. Sorry
for the morbid image, but I've never seen
the mourners placing the collected "remains"
in plastic bags for preservation.
Don't give up on this yet. Get the sweets and candy ready.
The situation has changed... but don't get snippy about it (GORE 2000)
On Fox this AM a military expert said that if these were run-of-the-mill terrorists the military would have dropped a bomb on them. Instead, he said it looks like they sent in the Delta Force to capture the terrorists. Finally, Zarqawi was supposedly wearing a bomb belt.
I think the most interesting thing is that we haven't heard a word from Zarqawi since the initial reports came out. I always thought he chimes in anytime there's a report of his demise.
Its not yet verified that none of the bodies are zarcowards.
Reminds me of the old tv show where they would bring out 3 people and each one stated that indeed they were the actual person and then the panel asked questions until they guessed at the end of the show if it was: #1, #2, or #3. My guess is Zarquowi is #1 - real dead and hopefully the president will announce on Thanksgiving after proof has been shown positive!
He's dead, Jim.
Cordially,
I'm slightly ashamed to admit that I did a happy little dance when the pictures of their corpses surfaced.
Wouldnt that be great?
Of all the dead Z rumors this one seems different.
And confirmation or lack thereof is taking longer than usual it seems. Maybe we got lucky and he was there.
Why even bother putting out such an ambiguous statement?
Don't be ashamed. It is never wrong to see evil crushed.
Al Qaida chief of operations in Iraq, Abu Musab al Zarqawi, wears a suicide bomb belt so he can kill himself if capture appears imminent - a practice that apparently drove U.S. forces to suspect that he was one of three terrorists who blew themselves up after they surrounded a safehouse in Mosul on Saturday.
"He has sworn never to be taken alive by the U.S.," ABC newsman Brian Ross reported Monday, adding: "He actually travels with his own suicide explosive belt."
While U.S. officials remain publicly skeptical that Zarqawi was among those killed, DNA tests are continuing in a bid to determine the identities of the three terrorists who committed suicide using explosive devices.
Joint forces backed by U.S. military helicopters surrounded the house after receiving a tip that Zarqawi might be inside, the governor of Nineveh province, Duraid Kashmoula, told the Washington Post.
http://newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/11/21/124030.shtml
IIRC, those suicide vests usually leave the head intact. Zarqawi has a very average face so it would probably take fingerprints or DNA to confirm if a given body part was really his.
If he's not dead, let's kill him again.
Probably showing a fingernail to relatives. "Does this look like him?"
So did I. I could've sworn I heard Fox news report yesterday morning that AZ wasn't present at the house...and they did it in a rather matter-of-fact tone.
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