I've been trying to post this all morning but blogger has been down (undoubtedly as a side-effect of everyone trying to comment on this good news). Here's the story from Reuters:
U.S. warplanes killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al Qaeda leader in Iraq blamed for bombings, beheadings and assassinations, in a strike which President George W. Bush said on Thursday had delivered justice.
In one of the most significant developments in Iraq since the capture of Saddam Hussein in 2003, Jordanian-born Zarqawi was killed on Wednesday in a joint U-S.-Iraqi operation helped by tip-offs from Iraqis and Jordanian intelligence.
Here is the video of the bombing (not terribly interesting, IMHO).
Of course, the caveats have already begun:
Zarqawi leaves gap but insurgency will outlive himZarqawi's death a relief, but not cure, for BushFine. Look, no one expects this to end the insurgency over night. But, to those who are already trying to minimize the effect of this victory I have only one thing to say: you took a shower this morning, knowing full well that more dirt would accumulate in the coming day. Killing Zarqawi is like taking a long, hot shower after a several days of heavy work. We have more work to do, but for the moment lets enjoy the smell of the soap and the feeling of being temporarily clean.
NOTE: Vinnie at the
Jawa Report links to this
CNN story, noting that Zarqawi was betrayed by members of his own al Qaeda group. Encouraging.
UPDATE: I guess Blogger went down for
unrelated reasons. (Via:
Althouse)
