BAGHDAD, Iraq – A new recording Friday attributed to the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq mocked President Bush as a coward whose conduct of the war was rejected at the polls, challenging him to keep U.S. troops in the country to face more bloodshed.
“We haven’t had enough of your blood yet,” taunted terror chieftain Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, identified as the speaker on the tape.
He gloated over Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s resignation, claimed to have 12,000 fighters under his command who “have vowed to die for God’s sake,” and said his fighters will not rest until they blow up the White House and occupy Jerusalem.
It was impossible to verify the authenticity of the 20-minute recording, posted on a Web site used by Islamic militants. The CIA said technical analysis was being conducted on the tape.
Al-Muhajir, an Egyptian also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri, boasted that al-Qaida in Iraq is moving toward victory faster than expected because of Bush’s mistakes.
Al-Muhajir praised the American people for handing victory to the Democrats, saying: “They voted for something reasonable in the last elections.”
He also said Bush was “the most stupid president” in U.S. history.
“We will not rest from our jihad (holy war) until we are under the olive trees of Rumieh and we have blown up the filthiest house – which is called the White House,” al-Muhajir said.
The “olive trees of Rumieh” appeared to be a reference to the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, or to Christendom as a continuation of the Roman empire.
The tape and its often far-fetched claims came as the U.S. military announced the deaths of five more service members in the 44-month-old conflict, which has grown increasingly unpopular at home. Twenty-six American service members have been killed in Iraq so far this month.
At least 59 Iraqi civilians were killed or found dead Friday as the violence threatens to spiral into all-out civil war. In one of the day’s bloodiest incidents, a suicide bomber in an explosives-rigged car killed six Iraqi soldiers he had lured from behind a checkpoint.
Just hours earlier, Iraq’s army said it captured the Egyptian leader of an al-Qaida cell in Anbar province, an insurgent stronghold.
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