In Zarqawi's wake

James Robbins:

While the international community has been celebrating Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s transition from terrorist to t-shirt, the terrorist reaction to Zarqawi’s timely demise has been the usual mishmash of contradictions and bluster. On the one hand they celebrate Zarqawi’s “martyrdom,” saying he went to a better place. Yet, they threaten they will take revenge for our evil deed. They caution us not to be too celebratory — the big attacks are coming. How many times have they made this threat? Even Zarqawi said the big one was coming, and sure enough it came, much to his surprise. Is a major hit on us more likely now, with al Qaeda’s command structure in tatters, with 200 follow-on raids in the week since Zarqawi was taken down, with the entire organization trying to figure out who the mole was who sold out their leader? Are those the essential preconditions for mounting a large operation? Oh, don’t bother them with details.

Anyway, according to a statement from the Mujahedin Shura Council, we cannot claim any credit at all for Zarqawi’s death. We only hit him by accident while conducting routine random house bombings in the neighborhood. It was God’s will that Zarqawi happened to be there, they said. It was predestination. (So why did God will the death of his faithful servant who was doing such a good job in his service? Maybe God is on the other side? Hey, shut up!) Plus, Zarqawi was so tough the bombs didn’t even kill him, we had to beat him to death while he was strapped down to a gurney. I’m still waiting for the “he’s not really dead” story line; the “he was no longer useful to the Americans so they got rid of him” fantasy is already out there, but only on American blogs. Terrorists would never believe something that silly.

Al Qaeda rushed out a statement naming a successor, Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, about whom little is known. “Abu Hamza” is a common nom de guerre in bad-guy circles, and “al-Muhajer” is as well — referring to the muhajiroun (emigrants) who followed Mohammed from Mecca to Medina. One report said he was an Egyptian, with experience in Afghanistan, and a follower of Abdullah Azzam, Osama bin Laden’s spiritual mentor who coined the term “al Qaeda.” Other reports speculate he may be a Saudi. Abu Hamza’s first statement as emir of AQ in Iraq, published in the Mujahedin News on June 13, promised that “what will happen in the coming days is something that will turn your children's hair white _ battles that will reveal the falsehood of your might, the weakness of your soldiers and your lies.” Is that supposed to scare us? Can you imagine a Pentagon press briefing with threats of this type? “Soon the terrorists will feel the wrath of our mighty armies, their bones will shake in fear, their beards will fall out, and their lying tongues will choke them in the perfidy of their falsehoods. O.K, we have time for a few questions.”

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There is more. What is really weird about these boasts and threats is that they act like they have not been making a maximum effort to do all those things to begin with. I think part of it is in the Arab cullture of threats and insults. Even the new Iraqi Prime Minister threatens to comedown on the bad guys with an iron fist. I think he probably has a better chance of living up to his rhetoric. Raids on al Qaeda houses are now up to 200 since Zarkawi's demise.