Top al-Qaeda militant killed
2005-06-23 23:05
Dubai - Iraq's most wanted man, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, said in a purported statement on Thursday that a top al-Qaeda militant on Saudi Arabia's most-wanted list had been killed in a United States air strike on the Iraq-Syria border.
Al-Qaeda's Iraq chief on an Islamic website said: "Let the Islamic nation rejoice with the martyrdom of Abdullah al-Rashud."
The statement, whose authenticity could not be verified, said Rashud was killed in action during battles in al-Qaim, a restive city near the border with Syria, where US forces had been fighting insurgents.
No date was given for his death.
Zarqawi said: "The mujahedeen Islamic fighters killed Crusaders (US soldiers) who were forced to flee" the battle zone in al-Qaim."
Oil-rich Muslim conservative kingdom
He said: "And when the Crusaders failed to re-enter the zone, they resorted to strike mujahedeen positions with warplanes, and our sheikh met his wish (death)."
Rashud, 37, was one of the last three Saudi fugitives at large out of a list of 26 senior al-Qaeda militants wanted by Riyadh for a wave of deadly attacks in the oil-rich Muslim conservative kingdom.
The Zarqawi statement said Rashud had gone to Iraq about six weeks ago.
It said: "He waged battles and was killed... He came from the Arab penninsula... for the holy war... in the land of the two rivers, where he died on this land."
Qaim was the site of frequent clashes between US-Iraqi forces and insurgents, some of whom were foreign Islamic fighters suspected of regularly crossing into Iraq from neighbouring Syria.
Arrest of several aides
Jordanian-born Zarqawi, who had a $25m US bounty on his head, was blamed for some of the deadliest attacks in Iraq.
Iraqi and US officials had announced in recent weeks the arrest of several of his aides.
Saudi security forces had been battling a wave of attacks by Islamist militants - mainly the Saudi branch of al-Qaeda, which called itself "al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula" - since May 2003.
After the killing of Rashud, only two militants from the most-wanted list remained at large, the al-Qaeda chief in Saudi Arabia, Saleh al-Oufi and Taleb al-Taleb.
Militant 'still alive and wanted'
Oufi was reported killed in gunbattles with Saudi security forces in April, but an interior ministry spokesperson later said the militant was "still alive and wanted".
Rashud, considered one of the chiefs of young jihadi scholars in Saudi Arabia, had issued several religious edicts, or fatwas, declaring the al-Saud ruling family "apostate".
In several statements published by al-Qaeda's publication in Saudi Arabia, Sawt al-Jihad, Rashud had called for directly attacks on the Saud family, chiefly Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdelaziz who had been leading the counter-terrorism war.
Born in the Saudi holy city of Medina, Rashud completed Sharia Islamic studies at the prestigious al-Imam university in Riyadh before becoming Sharia professor there.