Leith Shubeilat, an Islamic activist imprisoned with Zarqawi in the 1990s, described him to the BBC as "a leader; he is strong, straight to the point, with a very strong personality."
After he was released from prison, Zarqawi left Jordan but was convicted in absentia of plotting attacks on Jordanian tourist sites frequented by Israelis and Americans. He went to Europe and apparently set up a German cell with Jordanian and Syrian exiles who saw his organization as a rival to al Qaeda. In 2001, he established a training camp in Afghanistan and later went to Iraq, where he received medical treatment and established a presence.
Abu Musab Zarqawi has pledged his loyalty to al Qaeda, but experts doubt he wants a subordinate role.
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In 2002, Bush administration officials said, Zarqawi went to Baghdad to have one leg amputated after having been wounded by a U.S. bombing attack. That account has turned out to be wrong, according to U.S. intelligence officials who have interrogated Zarqawi associates.
"It was for another ailment, but not his leg," one intelligence official said yesterday. "We are still learning about him," this official added.
After Laurence M. Foley, a U.S. official with the Agency for International Development, was assassinated in October 2002 in Amman, Jordanian authorities attributed the crime to Zarqawi and his network.
Zarqawi has become a "semi-mythic figure built up by the U.S., which has associated him with everything bad," Cordesman said.
"He has the discipline to push buttons that get him media and public attention in the Arab and Islamic world," Cordesman said.
"Jihad has become central in Iraq," the counterterrorist official said, "and Zarqawi is now central to that."
