Will Al Zarqawi’s killing bring political gains to Bush?

After three years of lies and deception from the Bush administration can we really believe today's news that the U.S. occupying forces killed "the most-wanted Iraq terrorist"; Abu Mus'ab Al Zarqawi?

In the wake of today's breaking news that the U.S. number one enemy in Iraq was finally killed as American warplanes dropped 500-pound bombs on his isolated safe house in Iraq, analysts raise questions regarding the significance of the timing of the killing of a man the U.S. had been allegedly chasing over the past three years.

The U.S. had long benefited from Al-Zarqawi's reputation as Iraq's number one terrorist and Al Qaeda man in a country where brutal killings and inhuman massacres have become routine.

Blaming deadly attacks which claimed far more Iraqi civilians than foreign troops on Al Zarqawi, specially at a time where ethnic tensions between Iraq's Sunnis and Shias spiraled into fierce battles, used to make a hero out of the U.S.' invading troops and the very few of its remaining allies.

But now President Bush, who hailed al-Zarqawi's killing as an opportunity for Iraq to fight "insurgency" that had wreaked havoc in the country, seems to have realised that he needs a far more effective strategy to save his declining approval ratings before his mid-term elections, especially after news broke out that Italy would begin reducing the number of its troops deployed in Iraq this month.

Bush' job approval rating has fallen to all time low among California voters, as Republicans, once loyal to the commander-in-chief, start abandoning him for the extended and unjustified U.S. military presence in Iraq and failure to handle the war, according to a Field Poll.

The poll showed that only 28 percent of Californians now approve of the job Bush is doing, while 65 percent disapprove.

"We're in uncharted waters," said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll.

"The question is, can a president who has reached those depths reconnect with voters and turn those ratings around? I've never seen it done before because we've never had it happen before."

Historically Bush's approval ratings are the worst-ever given to a U.S. president by California voters.

President Richard Nixon's approval rating reached 24 percent in August 1974 shortly before he resigned.

Despite celebrating Al Zarqawi's death, the U.S. President stated that "the difficult and necessary mission in Iraq" will continue, which implies that even killing Al Zarqawi doesn't mean that the U.S. will withdraw from Iraq soon.

"We can expect the terrorists and insurgents to carry on without him," Bush claimed. "We can expect the sectarian violence to continue," he added, urging Americans to continue to be patient.

By the time Al Zarqawi was killed, the alleged Al Qaeda leader was more powerful as a myth than as a man. He was the ghost the U.S. chased wherever it deemed an attack was necessary.

But the timing of his killing was carefully chosen to have the maximum psychological effect on the American public; gradually losing hope and trust in their President.