Zarqawi Is Dead

Smithereens!

WorldNetDaily's article today has before and after pictures, and I have to say he looks so much better dead. So peaceful. May he burn in hell.

Iraqi officials said Zarqawi was killed in a precision strike about five miles north of Baquba.

"We have eliminated Zarqawi," Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki told a news conference in Baghdad.

Maliki said the airstrike – two 500-pound bombs dropped by F-16s – was based on intelligence reports provided to Iraqi security forces by area residents.

Efforts to find Zarqawi were stepped up after the terrorist leader appeared in a videotape in late April, according to Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari.

The tape helped "pinpoint" Zarqawi's location, he said, without further explanation.

Here is the text of President Bush's statement.

Omar at Iraq the Model is thrilled. He adds this about the intelligence the military received:

In the first official confirmation, PM al-Maliki said that Jordan has provided intelligence that was used in the raid on Zaraqwi's hiding place but he also stressed that tips from locals were the primary lead to Zarqawi's exact location and these were the information according to which the missiles were guided.

Al-Maliki said that among the 7 killed with Zarqawi were two women who were responsible for collecting intelligence for the al-Qaeda HQ cell.

Naturally, to the MSM, this is bad news. Even though, for at least the past two years, they've been criticizing President Bush because Zarqawi was still alive and leading "the insurgency," now that he's dead, they're downplaying its significance as much as possible.

I listened to Laura Ingraham this morning on my way to work, and she played a clip from a press conference with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. One of the reporters wanted to know if Rumsfeld had been concerned about "collateral damage" if they went through with the air strike on Zarqawi's safe house. Rumsfeld said simply, "No."

Of course not! The other people killed with Zarqawi were the people who provided him safe haven and a base from which to carry out his attacks--attacks aimed not just at Americans but at innocent Iraqi civilians as well. These people were with him in life, and now they're with him in death. But to the MSM, these other deaths are on America's (read: Bush's) head.

To add insult to MSM injury, CNN interviewed Michael Berg, the father of Nick Berg, the reporter personally beheaded by Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi. Keep in mind that CNN has had Michael Berg on before, so they know where he stands on the war in Iraq and as a member of International ANSWER. Here's what Berg had to say about Zarqawi's death:

Well, my reaction is I'm sorry whenever any human being dies. Zarqawi is a human being. He has a family who are reacting just as my family reacted when Nick was killed, and I feel bad for that.

As long as people use violence to combat violence, we will always have violence.

Berg may be sorry when any human being dies, but he apparently has no ability to be grateful for the human beings who won't die in the future now that Zarqawi is dead.

Reuters has a similar report on Michael Berg today, and they have the headline "Father of beheaded man blames Bush, not Zarqawi." Typical of the Left: Bush is responsible for the actions of the killers, but the killers aren't responsible for their own actions. No matter what happens, it's Bush's fault. I'm sick of it.

Zarqawi is dead. Hallelujah!

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Update:

In more bad news for the Left, oil prices dropped after news came out about Zarqawi's death. Today's Yahoo News has the report.