The Connection, Take 55
Last night, Scott highlighted Steve Hayes' preview analysis of the Pentagon's recently released 59-page report on Iraq and terrorism. Contrary to the way the report was portrayed by the MSM following leaks about its contents, the report actually demonstrates multiple ties between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.
Tom Joscelyn, who like Hayes has covered this issue for years, provides further analysis at the Weekly Standard's blog. Tom tells us that "the report ties Saddam’s regime to at least five different al Qaeda associated groups, including two groups that formed the core of al Qaeda." Specifically:
The Iraqi Intelligence documents discussed in the report link Saddam’s regime to: the Egyptian Islamic Jihad (the “EIJ” is al Qaeda number-two Ayman al Zawahiri's group), the Islamic Group or “IG” (once headed by a key al Qaeda ideologue, Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman), the Army of Mohammed (al Qaeda's affiliate in Bahrain), the Islamic Movement of Kurdistan (a forerunner to Ansar al-Islam, al Qaeda's affiliate in Iraq), and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar (a long-time ally of Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan), among other terrorist groups. Documents cited by the report, but not discussed at length in the publicly available version (they may be in a redacted portion of the report), also detail Saddam’s ties to a sixth al Qaeda affiliate: the Abu Sayyaf group, an al Qaeda affiliate in the Philippines.Both the EIJ and the IG were early and important core allies for Osama bin Laden as he forged the al Qaeda terror network, which comprises a number of affiliates around the world.
