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WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush will try to rally Americans behind his new Iraq plan today in a State of the Union speech.
It will be the first time Bush will give his annual address before a United States Congress controlled by Democrats. He goes into it at the weakest political moment of his six years in the White House. A Washington-Post/ABC News poll yesterday gave him a job approval rating of 33 per cent. It said 65 per cent of Americans oppose his plan to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq.
Bush said he will talk about his Iraq strategy, which has been met with scorn on Capitol Hill, where politicians are preparing nonbinding resolutions against it.
Yesterday al Qaeda's deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri mocked Bush's plan in a video which the Washington-based Site Institute said it had intercepted. "I ask him, why send 20,000 [troops] only - why not send 50 or 100 thousand? Aren't you aware that the dogs of Iraq are pining for your troops' dead bodies?
"So send your entire army to be annihilated at the hands of the mujahideen to free the world from your evil because Iraq, land of the Caliphate and Jihad, is able to bury 10 armies like yours, with Allah's help and power."
Violence continued in Iraq with two car bombs ripping through a busy market in Baghdad, killing 88. The military said that US and Iraqi forces had captured 16 Shiite militia leaders and 33 key Sunni insurgents in the past 45 days.
A survey showed that Bush is facing mounting disapproval of his policies abroad. A BBC World Service poll of 26,000 people in 25 countries showed just 29 per cent now feel the United States exerts a mainly positive influence on the world, compared with 36 per cent a year ago and 40 per cent two years ago. Forty-nine per cent now believe it plays a mainly negative role internationally.
- REUTERS
