One extremist is dead. One leader eliminated. One name deleted from the list of enemies of the United States.  Two hundred million plus Americans need no longer be afraid of Abu Musab al Zarqawi.  Too many have been affected by the life and work of this one man. A rough estimate of his killing spree is @ 754 plus three beheadings. Collateral lives interrupted must be guessed at. Just the existence of the second most powerful leader of al Queda was cause for fear throughout the world.  His elimination will not change the world-wide agreement of Muslims about this Jihad’s chief objective - bringing down liberal, Jewish and American democracy.

Times have changed since the West relied on Crusaders leaving their homes to retake the “Holy” land from its conquerors, the military arm of the new religion that rapidly spread throughout the same world claimed by Christianity.  This is a fifteen hundred year obsession of religions and peoples who have shed each other’s blood and changed the course of history many times.

The chief effect of Abu Musab al Zarqawi’s existence here on earth was to give a name and face to monstrous deeds blessed by the authority of Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah.  I don’t think that Mr. Zarqawi’s convictions, a mirror of Osama bin Laden’s work, deeds and philosophy, are those of the majority of Islamic peoples throughout the world – the largest religion by numbers in the world. The fear that Zarqawi and bin Laden whipped up is shared by both Islamic peoples and Christians while the small number of Jews left in the world wait for acceptance in the land claimed by the Ancient Hebrews as given them by God.

A terrorist is gone but terror remains for there is no lack of leadership in this cause.  Sustaining the Zarqawi effect will be like the world under the crust of this earth we live on.  Volcano eruptions, hot springs, earthquakes and unstable fault lines are continual natural events and the appearance of terrorists is just the same.  There will be no dearth of replacements.  The first and foremost of Jihadist terrorists, Mr. bin Laden, lost his preeminence to Zarqawi and there will be a third and fourth and on and on.

There is no way to predict what plans have been made and will be enacted. This is the fear that has so many dealing with shadows and superstitions about the power of underground forces that plan the destruction of all that we hold sacred.

If it weren’t so ridiculous, a comparison of cells of Islamic think tanks planning to take over the world with the Protocols of the Elders of Zion could be made. Sustaining the Zarqawi effect supplies real reasons to fear for the future. Anti-Semitism will continue and be exacerbated while excuses are made for Jihad.