Way to go Zarqawi
Marc “Abu Aardvark” Lynch reports that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s latest tactics in Iraq haven’t gone down well in the Maghreb states: Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has taken another step to alienate mainstream Arab public opinion: kidnapping and threatening to execute two Moroccan embassy workers. Just as the murder of an Egyptian diplomat infuriated Egyptian opinion, and ...
Marc "Abu Aardvark" Lynch reports that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's latest tactics in Iraq haven't gone down well in the Maghreb states:
Marc “Abu Aardvark” Lynch reports that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s latest tactics in Iraq haven’t gone down well in the Maghreb states:
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has taken another step to alienate mainstream Arab public opinion: kidnapping and threatening to execute two Moroccan embassy workers. Just as the murder of an Egyptian diplomat infuriated Egyptian opinion, and the murder of Algerian diplomats enraged Algerian opinion, the threats to kill the two Moroccans have set off a national protest…. Zarqawi’s strategy aims at driving representatives of Arab states out of Iraq to prevent any Arab intervention on behalf of the struggling Iraqi government. The cost is the alienation of mainstream Arabs – tactical gain for strategic loss, or at least so it appears on the surface.
Read the whole thing — the idea that Zarqawi is playing a tw-level game is an interesting one.
Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast. Twitter: @dandrezner
More from Foreign Policy

What Putin Got Right
The Russian president got many things wrong about invading Ukraine—but not everything.

Russia Has Already Lost in the Long Run
Even if Moscow holds onto territory, the war has wrecked its future.

China’s Belt and Road to Nowhere
Xi Jinping’s signature foreign policy is a “shadow of its former self.”

The U.S. Overreacted to the Chinese Spy Balloon. That Scares Me.
So unused to being challenged, the United States has become so filled with anxiety over China that sober responses are becoming nearly impossible.