(Newsweek) Robert Baer - Ten days ago, in Damascus, I sat down with a Syrian official I've known for years and asked: What's with the jihadists crossing Syria's border into Iraq? There is no way anyone can control a long border like that, he said, sounding the official line. Then he dropped a bombshell. Of 1,200 suspected suicide bombers arrested by Syrian authorities since the beginning of the war in 2003, 85% have been Saudis. During the last few months, the Iraqi resistance has been firing at Saudi and Kuwaiti border posts. So far it's nothing serious - but it could be a harbinger of Iraq's chaos spilling into the kingdom. Iran is no less a problem. Two months ago, in Qum, I spoke with Grand Ayatollah Saanei about the phenomenon of suicide bombings. I expected the usual diatribe against the U.S., but instead his real anger was directed at the "Wahhabi" suicide bombers, almost all of them Saudis, killing Iraqi Shia. "They are wolves without pity," he said. "Sooner rather than later, Iran will have to put them down." The writer is a former veteran CIA officer.
2005-08-08 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive