THE AL QAEDA CONNECTION:

Bin Laden's followers have found refuge in northern Iraq (JONATHAN S. LANDAY, Feb. 03, 2003, Knight Ridder Newspapers)

Along with Baghdad and the oil fields of Kirkuk, a U.S.-led invasion of Iraq could sweep into the slopes and valleys off in the distance in front of Sarkawt Abdullah's hilltop mortar pit.

"Those people are from Tora Bora," said the Kurdish fighter, gesturing at bunkers on nearby ridges and recalling the mountain bastion in Afghanistan from which Osama bin Laden and many of his loyalists escaped a U.S.-led siege just over a year ago.

Kurdish officials say dozens of bin Laden's fugitive followers, most of them Arabs, have found a refuge with a militant group, Ansar al Islam ("Partisans of Islam"), after making their way to the Kurds' self-ruled enclave in northern Iraq.

The militants are challenging the authority of secular Kurdish leaders, enforcing strict Taliban-style Islamic rule in a remote sliver of rugged territory that sits hard against the snow-draped peaks of Iraq's border with Iran.

In their 10-square-mile stronghold, a hatred of America shared by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida intersects, Kurdish officials say.

It says much about how unseriously they still take us that al Qaeda remnants would hide out in Iraq. Thanks to the French, the Germans, and the Democrats, they probably figure they're safe there. Posted by Orrin Judd at February 3, 2003 10:05 PM