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Over the past few months a number of stories related to the former Iraqi regime's links to terrorism have developed. Recently, former top aide of Saddam Hussein, Izzat al Douri, was said to have renounced his alliance with al Qaeda. What isn't being asked is how can Al Douri, who once told TIME of cooperating with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, be "breaking" from al Qaeda if Baathists would not be willing to work with al Qaeda to begin with? In a related story, former Iraqi PM (and former Baath party member) Iyad Allawi's connections to information about members of the former...

Examining Saddam Hussein's last words (دراسة صدام حسين الكلمات الاخيرة In the months and weeks before his death Saddam Hussein (Uruknet photo on left) produced a number of communications to the world beyond his cell through speeches, letters and interviews. Some of these communications have been made public and reveal additional insights into the former Iraqi leader's personal beliefs and motives, particularly Hussein's views on jihad and the use of terrorism. In his July 7, 2006 letter to the American people, Hussein (via Uruknet) referred to the insurgency in Iraq as "heroic Mujahideen, in glorious, virtuous, militant, jihadist Iraq. So...

CAIRO, Egypt - The new leader of al-Qaida in Iraq said in an audio message posted on a Web site Thursday that more than 4,000 foreign insurgent fighters have been killed in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. It was believed to be the first major statement from insurgents in Iraq about their losses. "The blood has been spilled in Iraq of more than 4,000 foreigners who came to fight," said the man, who identified himself as Abu Hamza al-Muhajir - also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri - the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq. The voice could not be...

The recent arrest and confessions of Hamed Jumaa Farid al-Saeedi shines an uncomfortable light (uncomfortable for those who warned such cooperation wasn't possible due to ideological differences) on what many observers of the Iraq war warned wasn't possible: Cooperation between Iraqi Baathists loyal to secular Saddam Hussein and religiously fanatic al-Qaeda. al-Saeedi, also known as Abu Humam or Abu Rana, told his captors that he has been "'responsible for more attacks than he can remember' and has been involved in the insurgency almost from its beginning three years ago," according to officials. al-Saeedi admitted that "Al Qaeda in Iraq was...

Abu Abbas, head of the Palestine Liberation Front, was captured in Iraq shortly after the fall of Baghdad and died of natural causes in U.S. custody the following year. Notorious for the 1985 hijacking of the Achille Lauro, Abbas's most deadly terrorist attack actually occurred in 1974, when a PLF assault in northern Israel killed 36 people. Abbas was also behind a foiled attack on a Tel Aviv beach in May 1990, when the U.S. was first trying to establish a dialogue with the PLO. Abbas's assault interfered with those efforts, and Iraq's invasion of Kuwait two months later halted...