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Syrians Sustaining and Replenishing Hardest Core of Iraq Insurgency

(Washington Post/Guardian-UK) Ghaith Abdul-Ahad - A stream of fighters from Syria - most of them Syrians, but lately many of them Saudis - has sustained and replenished the hardest core of the Iraq insurgency, and supplied many of its suicide bombers. Nurtured by a militant interpretation of Islam, they insist they are fighting for their vision of their faith. Syrian smuggler Abu Ibrahim, who worked in Saudi Arabia for seven years, calls 9/11 "a great day. America was defeated." In Saudi Arabia, Abu Ibrahim heard about Abu Qaqaa, a charismatic Syrian religious sheikh who preached a radical version of Islam in Aleppo. "We were Wahhabis. Abu Qaqaa was preaching what we believed in." Returning to Aleppo, he became Abu Qaqaa's right-hand man. Two weeks after the attacks in New York and at the Pentagon, his group celebrated in public with a "festival," featuring video of hand-to-hand combat and training montages of guerrillas leaping from high walls. They called it "the Festival of America the Wounded Wolf." By 2002 the anti-American festivals were running twice weekly. Jihad was being allowed into the open. Abu Ibrahim said Syrian security officials and presidential advisers attended festivals, one of which was called "The People of Sham [an ancient name for the region] Will Now Defeat the Jews and Kill Them All." Money poured in from Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries. Abu Ibrahim credited Abu Musab Zarqawi with revitalizing the insurgency, especially since October, when he pledged fealty to Osama bin Laden. "Six months ago, Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden were different," he said. "Osama did not consider the killing of Shiites as legitimate. Zarqawi did that. Anyone - Christian, Jew, Sunni, Shiites - whoever cooperates with the Americans can be killed. It's a holy war." Recently, he said, his contacts in Iraq have said they were not in need of fighters, but money. He said he personally carried cash, provided by sympathetic Saudis, between Saudi Arabia and Syria. "Our brothers in Iraq are asking for Saudis," he said. "The Saudis go with enough money to support themselves and their Iraqi brothers."
2005-06-08 00:00:00
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