THE group of al-Qaeda's frontman in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, claimed today to have executed an American hostage, in a statement on the Internet accompanied by pictures of his driving licence. "Your brothers in al-Qaeda in the Land of Two Rivers got their hands on a US pilot who turned out to have bombarded several mosques and the Sheraton hotel in Baghdad during the invasion of Iraq, as well as several civilian homes," according to the statement. It said that "after questioning this infidel, the divine verdict was applied to him". The statement, whose authenticity could not be verified, did...