Here are a couple of maggots we no longer have to worry about.
A U.S. military helicopter fired a guided missile to kill a wanted al-Qaida in Iraq leader from Saudi Arabia who was responsible for the bombing deaths of five American soldiers, a spokesman said Sunday.Noted foreign policy expert Barry Obama was unavailable for comment.
U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Gregory Smith said Jar Allah, also known as Abu Yasir al-Saudi, and another Saudi known only as Hamdan, were both killed Wednesday in Mosul.
According to the military, al-Saudi conducted numerous attacks against Iraqi and U.S. forces, including a Jan. 28 bomb attack that killed the five U.S. soldiers.
In that attack, insurgents blasted a U.S. patrol with a roadside bomb and showered survivors with gunfire from a mosque. The soldiers died in the explosion, the deadliest on American forces since six soldiers perished Jan. 9 in a booby-trapped house north of Baghdad.
Intelligence gathered in the Mosul area led the U.S. military to al-Saudi, who was in a car with Hamdan. A precision helicopter strike killed both and destroyed their vehicle. U.S. forces then confirmed the men's identities.
Smith said their deaths brought to 142 the number of al-Qaida insurgents killed or captured in Mosul since the beginning of the year.
Al-Saudi was the man who headed up the al-Qaida network in southeast Mosul, an insurgent hotbed where U.S. forces wage daily battles against the group.
"Mosul is the center of al-Qaida's terrorist activities today. Mosul is a critical crossroads for al-Qaida in Iraq. Baghdad has always been al-Qaida's operational center of gravity, but Mosul remains their strategic center of gravity as it provides access to the flow of foreign fighters," Smith said.
According to the military, al-Saudi planned and conducted numerous attacks against Iraqi and U.S. forces, including a reported attempt with a 5,000-lb vehicle bomb that would have killed hundreds of people if it had exploded.Bill Roggio has more.
Al-Saudi was a close associate of al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Ayyub al-Masri and arrived in Mosul with a group of foreign fighters last August after spending time fighting in Afghanistan.
"After fighting and training in Afghanistan, he was brought to Iraq by Abu Ayyub al-Masri in November 2007, one of four Saudi Arabians appointed to supervise al-Qaida activities in Mosul. He was quickly moved up to run all of the terror network's operations in southeast Mosul, becoming the most visible and active al-Qaida operative in the area," Smith said.
The Saudis, in the meantime, are busy comparing Israel with Nazis.
Meanwhile, there's another bug in Iraq that needs to be squashed.
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