The tone was celebratory and the words filled with heavy symbolism, but who exactly was judging whom was not immediately clear to everyone: "You cannot lose hope, people of Iraq, because you have seen the evil one disappear. You, people of Iraq, whom the evil one was obligated to protect and whom he tortured and murdered instead. You, people of Iraq, whom the evil one was supposed to feed and whom he allowed to starve instead."

To mark the beginning of the month of fasting known as Ramadan, Paul Bremer, Washington's governor in the land of two rivers, was trying his hand at the flowery speech of the Middle East. And the "evil one," whose name the American was trying so hard to avoid, as if naming him would conjure up the devil himself, was of course the region's true great braggart: Saddam Hussein, deposed dictator, international pariah and dark shadow behind the bloody terror that is increasingly shaking America's rule between the Tigris and the Euphrates.

By the end of last week, no one could continue to deny that a guerilla war is raging in Iraq, a war in which the occupying troops finds itself powerless against the "insurgents," as the US Army is now calling its opponents. "We are still at war," says Colonel William Darley, spokesman for the invasion forces. He says this with astonishing openness. "We have entered a new phase in the conflict," he continues.

The new phase began on a pastel-colored Sunday morning with a rocket attack on the Hotel Rashid, where Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, one of the key apostles of a hegemonic new order in the Middle East, was staying. One US soldier was killed and eight were wounded. A few days later, at least 35 people were killed and 230 wounded in four coordinated attacks on the Red Cross and three police stations within 45 minutes, a sequence similar to that of the hijacked jets crashing into their targets in New York and Washington on September 11, 2001.

Both the occupying army and the White House interpreted this bloody Monday as a sign that Islamic terrorists have taken the initiative in the guerilla war. "This reminds us," said Wolfowitz, who was not injured in the attack, "just how few perpetrators it takes to kill a lot of people." In the preceding week, US soldiers were also killed every day in attacks or by land mines in the Sunni Triangle, which extends from Baghdad's ghettos to Faludja and Tikrit. By the weekend 118 people had died, more than in the war itself, the war President George W. Bush had declared ended on May 1.

Targeted assassinations of government officials installed by the Americans have also continued unabated. Baghdad deputy mayor Faris Rassak Assam was the most recent victim. In addition, the international force under Polish command was recently ambushed south of Baghdad. Seven Ukrainian soldiers were wounded, some severely.

The guerilla war is expanding. Although the British and Americans have 140,000 troops stationed in Iraq, this number does not appear to be sufficient to ensure security and stability. Only in the Shiite south and the Kurdish north are conditions relatively normal. However, the country's future is decided in the capital and the Sunni Triangle, where supporters of the deposed regime have managed to gain a foothold. The outlawed Baath Party even called for a day of resistance last weekend - a test of strength that suggests that the numbers of its sympathizers is not insignificant.

Meanwhile, President Bush, in one of his rare press conferences, openly conceded for the first time that "dangerous resistance" against the occupying forces is raging in Iraq. He repeated eleven times that "Iraq is a dangerous country," but also vowed that "we will not withdraw from Iraq."

Bush seemed distracted and often at a loss for words. He has become a victim of the events in Iraq, which are causing him to lose his popularity and reducing his chances of being reelected in 2004. There are many indications that it will not be the economy, which is showing initial signs of a robust recovery, that will play the decisive role next year, but the war between the Tigris and the Euphrates. A hasty withdrawal of troops in disgrace would be tantamount to declaring bankruptcy. The publicist William Kristol, mouthpiece of the neo-conservatives, is already warning against the "quagmire in Iraq," which could spell Bush' downfall.

It is not surprising that the President attempted to attribute the devastating situation to extenuating circumstances last week. In doing so, however, he triggered a furious response by uttering an oddly dialectic sentence. In reality, argued Bush with his index finger raised, the serial attacks were a sign of progress, because the attackers were motivated by their dismay over things taking a turn for the better. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd derisively commented that " With eyes wide shut, Bush sees a recovering Iraq."

Senator John McCain, a stoic supporter of the Baghdad regime change, is drawing parallels to the Vietnam War, saying that the President is painting a picture that is in crass contrast with reality. It is veterans like McCain and Democratic Senator John Kerry who are reminded of the absurd glossing over of a miserable situation in the light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel rhetoric of Presidents Johnson and Nixon.

Of all people, Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense and powerful apologist for the war, delivered a blunt summary of the situation on October 16. In an internal memorandum, he writes that the fight against Osama Bin Laden's Al Qaeda has only produced "mixed results" and that against the Taliban only "slow progress." He also described America's war on terrorism as a "long, hard slog."

Washington's pep talks seem illogical when compared to these gloomy words. Reports by overtaxed US intelligence services in Iraq are now making reference to an "amorphous threat." After each attack, the experts correct the profiles of the attackers and possible victims, but even after hundreds of attacks they still have no hot leads.

Paul Bremer, Bush' governor in Baghdad, is tirelessly searching for those behind the wave of terror. It is said that a few hundred Al Qaeda terrorists from Syria, Yemen and Iran have joined forces with Ansar al-Islam, a terrorist organization based in Iraq.

The Iraqi Governing Council installed by the Americans presumes that Islamic terrorists are cooperating with Saddam loyalists. A possible point of connection between these groups, once ideological enemies, could be Saddam's former vice president Issat Ibrahim al-Duri, whom US intelligence services have now named as a key organizer of the resistance, together with Saddam.

Duri, a former interior minister and general, was principally responsible for suppression of the Shiite revolt in 1991 and for thousands of deaths, and has long been viewed as the pious face of the Iraqi leadership. It is said that the Saddam regime's growing use of Islamic symbols following the 1991 Gulf War and increased construction of mosques is also attributable to his influence, as is the addition of the phrase "Allahu akbar" ("God is great") to the Iraqi national flag.

Security experts such as Bruska Shawais, advisor to Kurd leader Massud Barsani, doubt that Duri is still powerful enough to organize acts of terror against the American occupiers. For weeks Kurdish intelligence agents have been following his trail in the northern Iraqi city of Mossul, where they already arrested Saddam's other deputy, Taha Jassin Ramadan, in mid-August. The 61-year-old Duri, who apparently suffers from leukemia, has barely escaped capture on several occasions.

Whoever is behind the attacks, he presents a "tremendous problem" to the occupying forces and the Iraqi Governing Council, complains Bremer, particularly because the terrorist are now using more "refined methods." The US military currently estimates that 35 attacks occur each day. Washington quickly rejected the idea of transforming Baghdad into a fortress to prevent suicide attackers from gaining access to the United Nations, the Red Cross or the new Iraqi civil institutions.

This would only serve to further widen the growing rift between the occupiers and the local population, which is bitterly complaining about the lack of security and order after Saddam.

It is also unlikely that additional soldiers will be deployed to Iraq in the foreseeable future. The multinational force United States had requested from the United Nations will be a long time coming, if it ever materializes. The UN and humanitarian organizations such as the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders are already taking action and recalling many of their foreign employees from the crisis region.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell said that he regrets the withdrawal of the aid organizations, saying that their work is needed: "If they are driven out, then the terrorists win."

For want of alternatives, the Bush administration is now attempting to move forward with Iraqization. The President issued orders to the Pentagon to speed up its training of local security forces, including the police, the military, border guards and security guards to protect embassies, power plants and oil pipelines. A few weeks of training will have to suffice. According to the plan, quickly trained militias will assume responsibility for maintaining law and order in the Sunni Triangle.