Yesterday, he broke as a world exclusive on www.arabnews.com the news that Shiite scholar Abdul Majid Al-Khoei had been killed in Najaf’s Ali Mosque, after taking eye witness accounts from Iraqis who had just witnessed the scene.

In contrast to American briefings, which put the incident down to “Shiite sectarianism,” Essam told the truth: That Al-Khoei had been butchered — literally cut to pieces with knives and swords — by Iraqis who accused him of being “an American stooge.”

The previous night, Essam had tried to set off for Baghdad after hearing that US Marines had finally occupied the city. He got halfway there, but was ambushed in his jeep by bandits, shot at from close range, and then robbed of almost all his belongings. After escaping, he returned to Najaf.

Undeterred, he set off once again yesterday morning for Baghdad, without a dollar in his pocket.

Half an hour later he at last arrived in downtown Baghdad, a human bomber detonated explosives around the corner from where he parked his jeep, and Essam found himself once again in the thick of things.

Characteristically, despite not having slept for 48 hours, he was on the scene in minutes.

Essam was the first Saudi journalist to enter Iraq after war broke out, and he now goes down in history as the first Saudi journalist to have made it to wartorn Baghdad.