The BBC is reporting that:

A message claiming to come from a group led by the Islamic militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has called for the release of charity worker Margaret Hassan.

What does this mean? I suspect it means that arranging the killing of Margaret Hassan followed by an earlier attack on Fallujah was one of the options which the Bush regime was considering if they found themselves too far behind in the polls before the election. Now they don't need to do this. As it was, opinion polls were close, and it was possible to plausibly win the election just by fixing voting machines in a few areas.

If you think this is is far fetched, consider the detailed story of Nick Berg's death.

See also:
http://disruptive.org.uk/2004/06/11/terrorist_mastermind.html

http://disruptive.org.uk/2004/10/28/margaret_hassan_2.html
http://disruptive.org.uk/2004/10/21/margaret_hassan.html
http://disruptive.org.uk/2004/05/17/the_killing_of_nick_berg.html
http://disruptive.org.uk/2004/05/18/nick_berg_video-_update.html