Free Republic

DUBAI (Reuters) - Arabic television al Jazeera on Friday aired an audio tape purportedly from al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri, saying the United States was defeated in Afghanistan (news - web sites) and his group was chasing Americans everywhere, including the United States. "America has been defeated (by) our fighters despite all its military might, its weaponry...With Gods [sic] help we are still chasing Americans and their allies everywhere, including their homeland," said the speaker who sounded like Zawahri, al Qaeda's second in command.

THE RAT TRAPPart 1: How Saddam may still nail BushBy Pepe Escobar BAKU - The Christmas blockbuster from the Pentagon studios was a dream. This was the new Roman Empire at its peak - better than Ridleys Scott's Gladiator: a real, captive barbarian emperor, paraded on the Circus Maximus of world television. The barbarian was not a valiant warrior - but a bum. He was not hiding in a nuclear-proof bunker armed to his teeth - he was caught like "a rat" in a "spider hole". He was nothing but a pathetic ghost taking a medical for the world to...

Contrary to American claims, the resistance will grow now that Saddam has been found, writes Sami Ramadani. The joy was deep, but the pain, too, was overwhelming as I remembered relatives and friends who lost their lives opposing Saddam Hussein's tyranny or in his wars. I remember my dearest friend, Hazim, whom I hugged goodbye in 1969 at the canteen of the college of medicine in Baghdad. I never saw him again. Although only 15, Hazim had the courage to distribute anti-Baathist leaflets at our school in Baghdad within months of the 1963 CIA-backed coup that brought the Baathists to...