September 21, 2007

Is Al Qaeda Iraq a Threat to Sweden?

By Walid Phares
The leader of al Qaeda in Iraq recently offered a bounty encouraging the assassination of a Swedish cartoonist and his editor for having published drawings deemed insulting to the religion of Islam. Omar al Baghdadi, in an audio statement said Lars Vilks, who "dared insult the Prophet", should be killed for a reward of $100,000 and, if "slaughtered like a lamb", the killer will receive another $50,000.  In addition, he offered a Jihadi financial reward of $50,000 for the murder of Ulf Johansson, the editor of Nerikes Allehanda, the Swedish paper that printed Vilks' cartoon on August 19. In the context of Global Jihadism, this second cartoon drama -- after last year's Danish cartoon crisis - displays a dimension very relevant to the ongoing War on Terror. Indeed, the identity of the threat issuer is important, because it is al Qaeda in Iraq. This development should send a significant message into the American and international debates about that conflict,...(Read Full Article)