Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, initially depicted as a terrorist leader, may have been instrumentalized by American interests to justify the Iraq invasion and sow internal discord, shaping the region's volatile dynamics.

The most notorious professed opponent of the United States during the so-called War on Terror was the Jordanian jihadist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who founded Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), ranked second only to Osama bin Laden.

However, a more thorough analysis of Zarqawi's biography ...