The Law of Unintended Consequences
Mood:  a-ok
Now Playing: "Teenager in Love" by Dion and The Belmonts
I can't help but to think that this would be related to the idea going around that Zarqawi is dead. Richard Miniter writes in Human Events Online (emphases mine):

Dead men tell no tales, but luckily for intelligence analysts, live women do.

Sajida Mubarak Atrous al-Rishawi was not able to detonate her bomb at the wedding party and fled with the guests as her husband exploded himself. Now, she is in the custody of the GID, Jordan’s intelligence agency. By all accounts, the interrogation is going slowly. Still, enough information is emerging for us to draw some lessons for the triple bombings in Amman, Jordan, on November 9.

Mrs. al-Rishawi’s family history reveals just how effective the U.S. military has proven to be in eliminating insurgents. Jordanian intelligence has learned that three of her brothers were killed by coalition forces in Iraq. Her brother, Thamir al-Rashawi, a member al-Zarqawi’s inner circle, was killed in April 2004 in Fallujah, when a missile fired from a U.S. aircraft struck his pick-up truck. Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister Marwan al-Mu’ashir described her brother, Thamir, as “the emir [commander] of the Al-Anbar region [of the Iraqi insurgency] in the Al-Qa’idah of Jihad Organization in the Land of Two Rivers. He was the right hand of Abu-Mus’ab al-Zarqawi.”

So why isn't Big Media reporting on these triumphs against the Zarqawiites? Would it ruin their storyline that the torture-happy American military are the real enemy and that their presence in Iraq is only creating more terrorists?

Another sign of desperation: Consider who Zarqawi sent to run the Amman operation, Mrs. Al-Rishawi’s husband. He also a member of Zarqawi’s inner circle. He is now dead. Why did Zarqawi send a top officer to die? He has already lost so many. It suggests that either he’s running short of suicide bombers (typically Saudi recruits) or he’s running short of people he trusts. Either way, it’s a sign of desperation.

Meanwhile, Mrs. al-Rishawi is alive and apparently talking. She can certainly tell her interrogators the location of the other insurgents and perhaps Zarqawi’s hiding place.

I am very pleased to hear that things might be wrapping up against Zarqawi. I know that this won't end our obligations in Iraq, but it will deal those murderous animals a serious blow. And done in by a woman? That just makes the irony more delicious!

I hope by the time I fall asleep tonight, I'll know that that piece of shit is dead.