Zarqawi formalizes his declaration of war against Shia

Reuters:

Iraq's al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi on Wednesday declared a war on Shi'ite Muslims in Iraq in response to a U.S.-Iraqi offensive on the rebel town of Tal Afar, according to an Internet audio tape.

"Al Qaeda Organization in Iraq ... has declared war against Shi'ites in all of Iraq," said the voice which could not be immediately verified but sounded like previous recordings attributed to Zarqawi.

"As for the government, servants of the crusaders headed by (Iraqi Prime Minister) Ibrahim Jaafari, they have declared a war on Sunnis in Tal Afar. You have begun and started the attacks and you won't see mercy from us," it added.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Sunni-Muslim al Qaeda said in an Internet posting it was waging a nationwide suicide bombing campaign to avenge the military offensive against Sunni rebels in Tal Afar, in which more than 200 insurgents have been killed and several hundreds captured.


Of course he has been at war with them ever since Saddam fell. His stated objective was to entice the Shia into a civil war with the Sunnis in hopes that other Sunnis would come to the aid of the minority Sunni in Iraq. The Shia have not taken the bait, and A-man is showing his frustration.

The operation in Tal Afer must really be hurting him also because his reaction to it has been extreme rhetoric in order to mask his impotence on the ground. The murder of noncombatants in Baghdad is more of the impotent rage and is also an attempt to punish the Shia for defying him. Along with his losses in Tal Afar, apparently intelligence there led to a raid on an al Qaeda compound in Haditha with another one of his top men taken down.

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