Oops! Senate Turns Blind Eye to Al Qaeda Leader's Long Iraq Stint

The Senate Intelligence Committee released a report from 2005, on Friday:

The report discloses for the first time an October 2005 CIA assessment that before the war, Saddam’s government “did not have a relationship, harbor or turn a blind eye toward” al-Qaida operative Abu Musab al-Zarqawi or his associates.

More at the New York Times
Talk about turning a blind eye…

You would think the senators would remember this…
The current Al Qaeda leader in Iraq, Abu Ayyub Al-Masri, who after the fall of the Taliban, escaped to Iraq and set up terror camps with the Jordanian-born Zarqawi.

Hey Senators!… Remember this guy?… Al Qaeda #1 in Iraq… Who has been operating in Iraq since the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan?

Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Ayyub Al-Masri took charge of operations in southern Iraq after the Allied invasion of Afghanistan.

Al-Masri just released an audiotope this week threatening US and Iraqi soldiers.

Abu al Masri organized Al Qaeda terror camps in southern Iraq after he fled Afghanistan when the Taliban government fell in 2001:

Al-Masri – which means “the Egyptian” – is another foreign fighter who trained in Afghanistan like Zarqawi, coalition officials said. No one knows his real name.

The terrorist is said to be about 38 years old and got his beginning in Egypt, where he joined the Islamic Brotherhood. He fled from Egypt and moved to Afghanistan, where he trained in explosives at the al-Faruq Al Qaeda camp. There he met Zarqawi, officials said.

After the fall of the Taliban, Masri escaped to Iraq and set up with the Jordanian-born Zarqawi. The Egyptian specialized in vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices. He helped establish the Baghdad cell of Al Qaeda in early 2003, officials said.

Later he worked the “rat line” down the Euphrates River Valley supplying suicide bombers via Syria. Officials said he probably directed that operation from Fallujah.

ABC also reported links between Al Qaeda and Iraq in a story on March 26, 2005, titled “Osama bin Laden Contact With Iraq”

Flopping Aces has a huge roundup of Al Qaeda-Iraqi links.
Hat Tip Larwyn

A. Jacksonian has much, much more on the translated Saddam documents…

Saddam Dossier
Powerline Forward
Broad Advances
Joint Forces
The Vanguard Moves Forward
Rolling OutGearing Up
The Gathering
Calling All Translators

Jason Smith has more on the Monday Morning Hypocrites

The RNC has a posting on how the democrats conviently forgot what they said only months ago.

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Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

You can email Jim Hoft here, and read more of Jim Hoft's articles here.

 

Thanks for sharing!