CAIRO, 3 April 2003 — US President George W. Bush sees the invasion of Iraq as an extension of his “war on terror”, but many in the Middle East believe Osama Bin Laden will be one of the unintended winners.

The fugitive militant has been silent since the US-led assault to overthrow President Saddam Hussein began two weeks ago, fueling an outpouring of public anger in Arab and Muslim states against the United States. His image has been largely absent from anti-war protests in the Arab world.

But many politicians and analysts say Bin Laden’s cause can only gain from this confrontation between mighty Western armies and a Muslim underdog, especially if the war drags on.

“This war is a major recruiting sergeant garnering foot soldiers for Bin Laden,” said Magnus Ranstorp, director of the Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at St Andrews University in Scotland.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a key US regional ally who has cracked down hard on militants, voiced the concern of governments in the region this week when he said the war could fuel “a vicious cycle of terrorism”.

“Terrorism will be aggravated. Terrorist organizations will be united. Instead of one Bin Laden there will be 100 Bin Ladens. Everything will be insecure,” he said.

Some Western leaders have expressed similar fears. French President Jacques Chirac, an outspoken opponent of the war, has said attacking Iraq will weaken the coalition to fight terrorism created after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and draw new recruits for violence.

The United States says its special forces and their Iraqi Kurdish allies have smashed a militant group, Ansar Al-Islam, in Kurdish-held northern Iraq which it accused of links to both Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network and Saddam.

Bush said one reason for the war was to prevent Saddam sharing alleged weapons of mass destruction with such groups.

Yet experts say the combination of Western military action on Arab, Muslim soil, economies depressed by the fallout of war, and autocratic governments that permit little space for opposition provides a fertile breeding ground for terrorism.

The flow of Arab volunteers to fight in Iraq has been swelling. Iraq says some 4,000 have arrived so far and young men are volunteering from Algeria and Tunisia to Lebanon and Syria.

Some of those fighters may return to join militant groups at home, as Arab volunteers who fought the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s did in countries such as Algeria, Yemen.

Mohamed, 30, a volunteer interviewed by Reuters in Algiers, said he was itching to die in a “jihad” (holy struggle) operation against Americans.

“I’m convinced that the Americans are fighting Islam.

They declared that they are engaged in a crusade against Islam. Going to fight them in Iraq is my opportunity to avenge Muslims,” he said as he waited for his visa at the Iraqi Embassy.

Western experts say the duration of the war may be crucial to whether this militant mood turns into actual violence. “Obviously, this situation radicalizes individuals, but whether they will be deployed in action is a different question,” Ranstorp told Reuters in a telephone interview.