Naguib Mahfouz, RIP

Nobel prize-winning Arabic novelist and short story writer Naguib Mahfouz is dead at 94.

Do yourself a favor and read him. If you want a window on Arab culture, forget the posturing politicians (who mostly actually work in English and French), and the American pundits who interpret the Arab world to us without knowing Arabic or having lived in the Arab world (sort of as though Aljazeera's correspondent who reported on Washington, DC, government affairs did not know English and had never visited the United States; believe me, it would not happen.)

Read Mahfouz.

I suggest you start with Midaq Alley, set in a fast-changing lower middle class neighborhood of Cairo during the British occupation of World War II. If you ever wondered what the Egyptians were thinking as Montgomery duelled Rommel, here is the most painless way possible to find out. The characters alone, and they are characters, are worth the price of admission.
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Bush Maintains ending US Occupation of Iraq will Infuriate Terrorists

Bush says that ending the Iraq occupation will open America to a terrorist attack.

I can't imagine why he says that. If we weren't occupying Iraq, how would that infuriate al-Qaeda and the Muslim radical fringe?

Can you imagine the discussions in the cave in Waziristan?

"They got out of Iraq!"

"Damn them, this is unacceptable."

"How dare they leave a Muslim country alone?"

"They are imperialists,aren't they? Why don't they imperialize? I am confused."

"The Iraqis are rejoicing, saying that they are independent and can practice Islam freely."

"It is horrible, I tell you, horrible."

"It cries out for vengeance! It is not acceptable for them not to colonize us!"

"I say we hit them where it hurts."

For a peak at the real world, try here.

Or you could try here. Robert Pape is a social scientist and has crunched the numbers.

As for the argument that withdrawing from Iraq will encourage the terrorists and make them feel victorious, we can turn Cheney's argument around. What had we withdrawn from in the mid to late 1990s that precipitated 9/11? Bin Laden cited Beirut (two decades earlier!) and Yemen (where we just stopped refueling). This was a pitiful attempt on Bin Laden's part to convince himself that the US is a paper tiger, not a realistic accounting of strategy! Do Bush and Cheney really want to rely on al-Qaeda propaganda in making their own policies?
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Diwaniyah Ceasefire in Doubt
Spike in Death toll Continues, with over 50 dead

Dan Murphy of the CSM writes about the increasing fragmentation of Iraqi politics and militias at the local level. He argues that Muqtada al-Sadr and even the powerful Kurdish warlords are losing control to local militant groups that take the law in their own hands. His comparison of the PKK (Kurdish Workers' Party) in Kurdistan, which blows up things in Turkey, to the extremist Sadrists in Diwaniyah and Karbala who are beyond Muqtada al-Sadr's control strikes me as extremely perceptive.

A roadside bomb in the market of Shurjah in Baghdad killed 25 and wounded 25 others. In Hilla to the southwest of the capital, a bicycle bomb killed 12 and wounded 38 at a recruitment station. Altogether at least 50 were killed and 100 wounded, though that is a substantial undercount. Al-Hayat puts the death toll on Wednesday at 80.

Defense Minister Abdul Qadir Jasim Muhammad al-`Ubaidi visited Diwaniyah Wednesday, the scene of fighting between militias, and between a militia and local Iraqi tribal troops. He abruptly denounced the cease-fire that had been negotiated by the elected governor of Qadisiyah province with Muqtada al-Sadr, who roundly condemned the Mahdi Army militiamen that engaged in the firefight. Al-Hayat reports that the rural tribal youth that make up the Iraqi army in Diwaniyah are in the mood for revenge and want to start back up the fighting with the Mahdi Army. For its part, the Sadr Movement in Najaf complained that the governor of Qadisiyah Province had already broken the cease fire agreement, with government troops moving into Sadrist neighborhoods "as though they were Occupation forces," and firing indiscriminately, killing several persons. At the same time, an aide to Muqtada said the young nationalist cleric commanded his followers to stop fighting and to put away their weapons, and to avoid appearing armed in the streets, lest they give a pretext to forces that would like to move against the Sadr Movement and its leadership.

My guess? Prime Minister Maliki will try to rein in Gen. al-`Ubaidi and try to preserve the shakey the cease fire. The Diwaniyah crisis was settled in the Najaf way, with talking it out and face saved for everyone. The Defense Minister wants to settle it in the old Baathi way, with the non-government side crushed. This would be all very well if the government were a) actually strong enough to pull it off and b) not a composite that includes the Sadr Movement!

Al-Zaman says that an assistant secretary (Mudirah `Ammah) in the Ministry of Justice was assassinated on Wednesday.

Al-Zaman/ DPA allege that Marines on patrol in parts of West Baghdad where Sunni Arabs from al-Anbar province have taken refuge used megaphones to tell them that the US troops were leaving Iraq soon. In Ramadi to the west, Sunni Arab guerrillas clashed with US troops.

With Bush and Blair's Iraq War, much of the lying was done through silence or silencing others. In spring of 2004 the [oops of course should have been Australian] foreign minister Alexander Downer suppressed a message from a weapons inspector saying point blank that there was no WMD in Iraq. He was briefed by the scientist. And then a month later the foreign minister said at a news conference that the hunt for WMD was a work in progress and he could draw no conclusions. Over on this side of the Pacific, not only did Rummy, Bush and Cheney stonewall us on the empty well, but Pete Hoekstra and Rick Santorum are still effectively lying about it. People in a democracy get the representatives they deserve.
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Israeli War on Lebanese Civilians Continues

A top United Nations humanitarian official, Jan Egeland, said he was shocked on inspecting southern Lebanon to find it littered with deadly unexploded cluster bombs. These were for the most part dropped in the last three days of the conflict, when it was foreseen that there would be a resolution and a ceasefire. He said, “What’s shocking and I would say, to me, completely immoral is that 90 percent of the cluster bomb strikes occurred in the last 72 hours of the conflict, when we knew there would be a resolution."

Egeland was not just harshly condemning a UN member state, which is a breach of protocol. He was also accusing Israel of crimes against humanity. You see, if a rationale could be found at all for using cluster bombs, it would be against a massed, invading enemy infantry corps. But just to scatter them all around a civilian area as a cease fire is imminent is not a legitimate military action. It is a monstrous crime. It is a surefire death sentence on hundreds, perhaps thousands of innocent children, who will find the bomblets and think they are playthings. The government of Ehud Olmert committed this crime as part of its cynical attempt to ethnically cleanse the far south of Lebanon of its Shiite inhabitants. It was a way of discouraging them from returning, just as was the massive demolition of thousands of houses, with bulldozers and aerial bombing, which had no military value whatsoever.

The American people are complicit in these war crimes, insofar as they provided the cluster bombs and supported Olmert to the hilt in his dirty war, which was only occasionally about actually combating Hizbullah fighters (there weren't any, in a lot of the places that were bombed).

Israel continued its across the board blockade of Lebanese ports, which is depriving dialysis patients of needed medicines and continuing to harm the entire Lebanese economy. 40% of the Lebanese electorate is Christian, and they are suffering along with everyone else. Lebanese unemployment is surging to Depression-era levels.
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Rumsfeld Accuses Critics of Appeasement of Fascists

The LA Times reports that

' Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Tuesday compared critics of the Bush administration to those who sought to appease the Nazis before World War II, warning that the nation is confronting "a new type of fascism." '

(Click here for explanation of photo.)

The LA Times continued:

' He continued, "Can we truly afford to believe that, somehow or someway, vicious extremists could be appeased?" '

For an alternative view, see The Crock of Appeasement, an IC golden oldie:

'The Crock of Appeasement

The warmongers, imperialists, and just plain greedy who wish to use up US troops to gain their ill-gotten goods love to use the word "appeasement." Anyone who stands against their expansionist ambitions will be tagged with this term. In the lexicology of the Rabid Right, it evokes British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's attempt to negotiate with German Chancellor Adolph Hitler. It is certainly the case that Hitler was a genocidal maniac and not the sort of man with whom one could usefully negotiate. But not all negotiation is equally fruitless. Before that incident, by the way, "appeasement" had a positive connotation, of "seeking peace."

The rightwing use of the term appeasement, however, turns it on its head. Taken seriously, the doctrine of "no appeasement" on the right would mean we are stuck in perpectual war, always doomed to be on the offensive, always dedicated to gobbling up more of other people's territory and wealth even at the expense of living in constant dread of being blown up and being forced to give up the civil liberties which had made American civilization great.

It would never be possible to negotiate a truce with any enemy. That would be appeasement. It would never be possible to compromise. That would be appeasement. It would never be prudent to withdraw troops from a failed war. That would be appeasement. In other words, the rightwing doctrine of "no appeasement, ever" actually turns you into Hitler rather than into Churchill.

But we are anyway not stuck perpetually in the late 1930s, and it is not the only exemplary period in history to which we can resort for our metaphors and our courses of action.

The Iraq crisis, for instance, is clearly an odd sort of neocolonialism, which can only ultimately be resolved by decolonization. Decolonization in the 1950s and 1960s was also denounced as "appeasement," but it was the only right course.

The similarities between British decolonization in Kenya and the Bush administration "war on terror" were pointed out in The Nation last winter.

Britain gave up India (and Pakistan) in 1947. Was that "appeasement?" You may be assured that the British Right saw it that way.

Without this sort of realism, Britain would have tried to keep India and there would have been a bloodbath. Likewise, any attempt by Britain to hold on to Kenya past the early 1960s would have led to even more violence than the Mau Mau and British reprisals (20,000 imprisoned, many tortured) had. And with decolonization, the Mau Mau and violence subsided. Problems do have solutions, and war is not always the best solution. Sometimes the withdrawal of the imperial power itself solves the problem.

You will note that you never hear that Britain "appeased" the Stern Gang, Irgun, Haganah and other Zionist forces that sometimes engaged in terrorism in Palestine, when it departed that territory in 1948.

France "appeased" Lebanon and Syria by granting them independence in 1943. It "appeased" Morocco by giving it up in 1956. It "appeased" Algeria in 1962. Britain likewise "appeased" all of its former colonies. The political Right in each of these imperial countries fought decolonization tooth and nail (I do not admire Albert Camus as much as many Americans of my generation, because of his reactionary stance on Algeria).

Or let us take Cory Aquino's people power movement that challenged-US backed dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the 1980s. The first instinct of Reagan and the rightwingers around him was to help Marcos crush Cory and her movement. Anything else would have been "appeasement." But Senator Dick Lugar went to the Philippines, looked around, and wisely decided that the only feasible course of action for the US was to acquiesce in people power. Lugar managed to persuade Reagan, thus averting disaster. Were Lugar and Reagan guilty of "appeasement"?

All counter-insurgency struggles have to be waged at both the military and the political levels. The political side of the struggle requires that we attempt to understand what is driving the insurgents, that we negotiate with them and attempt to bring them into the system. That is not appeasement. It is counter-insurgency. Counter-insurgency by simple brute military force has never worked, except where its wielder has been willing to commit genocide or soemthing close to it.

Is negotiating with the leadership of the Baath guerrilla movement in Iraq appeasement? I favor it if it would save the lives of US troops. Would declaring an amnesty for Baath Party members who cannot be proved to have committed a crime be appeasement? I favor it. Would internationalizing Iraq and drawing down US troops be appeasement? I favor it.

Rightwingers who want to play Churchill and denounce "appeasement" should please go off to Iraq and put their own lives on the line instead of playing politics with the lives of our brave troops from the safety of Washington DC. What we want for those troops, as soon as humanly feasible, is to come out of Iraq and stay out.

And no, it is not so they can then be sent to die in the sands of Iran. '

For "cont'd" postings, click here.

Americans bombed Diwaniyah
26 Bodies found in Baghad

On Wednesday morning in Iraq, guerrillas set off a bomb outside a military recruiting center, killing 12 and wounding 38.

Two more US troops were announced dead, one from action in al-Anbar, and one from a humbee accident.

The initial story, conveyed in the press and by US officials and observers about the Diwaniyah clashes of Saturday-Monday is falling apart as new information comes out.

1. The US military represented itself as just a bystander, having sent helicopters to hover above. But Agence France Press reports today from Diwaniyah:

' During yesterday's fighting, an American F-16 jet dropped a 220kg satellite-guided bomb on an "enemy position" while flying in support of Iraqi and coalition troops, the US air force said. '

2. Some reports and observers represented the Iraqi army as having acquitted itself well. But AFP reports:

' Officials said 81 people died in Diwaniyah in yesterday's clashes between security forces and militiamen and that . . . a peace deal was reached . . . "We killed 50 gunmen in the clashes and this incident resulted in the deaths of 23 of our soldiers and injuries to 30 of them," Mr Maliki said. Mr Jaathi said eight civilians were also killed and 61 wounded bystanders were treated after yesterday's 12-hour gun battle. '

My own guess is that it took local Badr Corps (infiltrated into Diwaniyah police and security forces), Badr Corps Special Police Commandos, Iraqi army soldiers, and a US 500 pound bomb to produce an outcome where ragtag militiamen were fought to a standstill.

3. The impression was given of a clear win of the new Iraqi army over the Mahdi Army militia. But AFP reports that the battle was resolved through negotiations, not militarily, and the Iraqi army has been forced to back down on some points:

' The army has agreed not to enter residential areas for three days, while the Mahdi Army will withdraw its fighters and a militia commander who was arrested at the weekend will be brought to court within 24 hours, town councillor Sheikh Ghanim Abid said. '

4. It was implied in some quarters that Muqtada al-Sadr put the militiamen up to causing this trouble. In fact, the local Sadrist leadership in Diwaniyah has for months been far more militant than Muqtada would have liked, and he tried to rein them in. AFP confirms:

' but aides said the battle had been triggered by rogue elements. '

In my appearance on the Lehrer News Hour on Tuesday, I challenged the narrative that the brave new Iraqi army single-handedly took on a Shiite militia and put it in its place. I think the army sided with one militia (the Badr Corps a.k.a Diwaniyah police) over another (the Mahdi Army). And I see the faction-fighting in Diwaniyah, which follows similar such clashes in Karbala and Basra, as further sign that even the Shiite south has entered a new phase of profound instability. Instead of celebrating that the Iraqi army did not run away from this fight, we should be worried that such a fight was necessary in sleepy, Shiite Diwaniyah to begin with. Diwaniyah, with a provincial government run by the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, should have been a constituency for the Maliki government, not a challenge to it.

Some sort of deal appears to have been struck between the Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds about how petroleum revenues will be collected, federally and provincially, and how the federal government will share them back out. If this deal really is firm, it is a big achievement, since this is one of the issues that could blow Iraq apart down the road.

On the other hand, the deal appears intended to pave the way to the letting of some major Iraqi petroleum bids. I worry that with the country such a mess and the politicians so cash-strapped, they will be tempted to give away too much in bad contracts, just for an immediate infusion of money.

The Iraqi government will gain control of its own army in September.

You mean they didn't have control of their own army?

Of course, this "control" that the troops will obey the commands that they are given.

The Kurds are building a refugee camp for 6,000 Iraqis who have been displaced north by the violence and poor security and bad economy in Arab Iraq. They are said not to be able to afford housing in Sulaymaniyah. It is hard to tell from a distance whether this is philanthropy or a social control mechanism.

Reuters reports political violence on Tuesday. Major incidents included the discovery of 26 dead bodies in Baghdad; other violence:

KIRKUK - A policeman was killed and nine people were wounded when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in the tense city of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police and hospital sources said. . .

BAQUBA - Fifteen people were gunned down in several attacks in different areas of Baquba, police said. . .

BAQUBA - Gunmen attacked an office of the radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the religiously mixed city of Baquba on Tuesday, killing two guards and wounding five, police said. . .

NEAR BAQUBA - Four people were found shot dead, handcuffed and blindfolded in a village near Baquba, police said. . .

BAGHDAD - Four mortar rounds landed in two districts in northern Baghdad wounding five people, including two Iraqi soldiers, a source in the Interior Ministry said. . .

BAGHDAD - Clashes between a Sunni tribe and Shi'ite militias wounded 14 people late on Monday in southern Baghdad, the army and an Interior Ministry source said.

Read Leonard Pitts on the Bushies' mania to control information while it is still available. :-)

Mother Jones has a timeline of the lies that led to the last war.
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Over 100 Killed in Iraq, 100 Wounded
Mahdi Army Clashes in Diwaniyah
Bombings Rock Turkey

Two more US troops were announced dead on Monday, bringing the total dead among GIs for the weekend to 9.

Vice President Richard Bruce Cheney doesn't get it, as usual. The reason to draw down US ground troops in Iraq is that for the most part their presence in such numbers is counter-productive. Look at the fighting in Diwaniyah. All the US did was send helicopters to circle around. We don't need US or Coalition troops in Diwaniyah. And, why would we care who controls Diwaniyah, anyway? What Americans had even heard of it four years ago? It certainly is not a security threat to the United States.

As for this tag line that the the US was not in Iraq on Sept. 11, so Iraq cannot be generating terror, how stupid does he think we are? September 11 came indirectly out of the Reagan administration's use of Muslim fascists or mujahidin to fight socialism in Afghanistan. The lesson to draw is that unleashing large numbers of unconventional guerrilla forces and giving them billions of dollars and CIA training is a bad idea, and might well produce blowback. Afghanistan generated the last wave of terror. Now Iraq is generating a new generation of terror. Madrid and London came in response to it. Cheney's tag line is misleading and foolish.

The Independent estimates that over 100 Iraqis were killed on Monday in political violence. Dozens died in the fighting in Diwaniyah, along with the other violent deaths reported by Reuters, and the 14 dead bodies that showed up in Baghdad according to the LA Times. Al-Hayat estimated that 100 were wounded, as well.

Guerrillas also targeted the Ministry of the Interior with a car bomb, killing at least 16 and perhaps as many as 26 (-al-Hayat) and wounding dozens. The attack was likely an attempt to kill Interior Minister Jawad al-Bulani, who was to meet with provincial police chiefs on Monday.

Diwaniyah is run politically by the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and likely its police and security forces have been heavily infiltrated by the Iran-trained Badr Corps, the paramilitary of SCIRI (as the NYT also suggests.) So a lot of the struggle is probably actually best thought of as Mahdi Army on Badr Corps faction fighting. Although SCIRI and allies won the provincial elections of January, 2005, since then the Sadr movement has been gaining adherents and influence in this and other southern Shiite provinces. New provincial elections were scheduled but have never been held, in part for fear that the Sadrists would sweep to power in provincial statehouses.

The Associated Press explains how the fighting in Diwaniyah began on Saturday, with Shiite militia attacks on Polish troops in the area. AP says that the Mahdi Army controlled wide swathes of the city on Monday evening.

' The clashes in Diwaniyah began Saturday night after a rocket attack on a Polish-run base earlier in the day, and then resumed Sunday night, said Lt. Col. Dariusz Kacperczyk, a Polish military spokesman.

Sheikh Abdul-Razaq al-Nidawi, the manager of Sadr's office in Diwaniyah, told the Associated Press that trouble had been brewing since Saturday night when the army arrested an Sadr supporter from the Jumhouri neighborhood.

On Sunday, the army raided the same place and "a gunfight erupted between them and the Mahdi Army," Nidawi said.

Army Capt. Fatik Aied said gunbattles broke out at about 11 p.m. Sunday south of Diwaniyah, when Iraqi soldiers conducted raids in three neighborhoods to flush out militiamen and seize weapons.

Nidawi said "a big force of the army raided Jumhouri, Sadr and Askouri neighborhoods and clashes broke out (again) between the army and the Mahdi Army." He said the raids took place early Monday. '

Al-Zaman reports that for the past three days, Diwaniyah had turned into an arena for street battles. On Monday, 20 Iraqi soldiers were killed and 50 Mahdi Army militiamen (followers of Shiite nationalist cleric Muqtada al-Sadr), and 70 persons were wounded. The battles evolved quickly after Iraqi security forces imprisoned an official of the Sadr Movement. The government and the Mahdi Army have concluded an unofficial truce. An Iraqi government spokesman said that 20 Iraqi troops and 40 Mahdi Army militiamen were killed in clashes that began Sunday night in Diwaniyah.

A captain who asked to remain anonymous told al-Zaman, "The clashes broke out after the Coalition forces incarcerated a prominent leader of the Sadr movement, who had in his possession quanities of medium weapons and bombs, and was linked to Saturday's assassinations after an attack in the Jumhuri District [downtown Diwaniyah]." The captain said that on Sunday, negotiations took place between the Coalition forces and the Sadr Movement concerning the release of the Sadrist leader, but they failed. That is what led to the clashes between the Mahdi Army and Iraqi security forces." He added, that a number of Mahdi militiamen came to the province from neighboring ones, to participate in the battle.

[The "Coalition" forces were apparently the Poles.]

Sahib al-Amiri, the head of a Sadrist foundation in Najaf, denied that the Mahdi Army had been involved in the fighting, though he said that they played a role in ending it. He maintained that it was others, outside Sadr's circle, who were responsible for the violence. He accused American military forces of "supporting these sorts of actions, for the purpose of extending the period of their presence in Iraq."

Prime Minister Nuri al-Malki had pledged on Aug. 17 that Qadisiyah province, of which Diwaniyah is the capital, would soon witness a handover from Coalition to Iraqi troops such as has already happened in Muthanna.

The governor of Qadisiyah, Khalil Jalil Hamzah, left for Najaf to negotiate with Muqtada al-Sadr after talks with his representatives in Diwaniyah failed.

A security source in Diwaniyah told al-Zaman, "Large numbers of reinforcements from the Iraqi army arrived at the city, and they secured most of its districts aside from the districts of al-Nahdah and that of al-Wahdah, where the militia remains dominant."

An Iraqi government source alleged to al-Zaman that "The Mahdi Army executed a number of Iraqi troops after having captured them." He added that the militia controlled 7 of the city's districts,a nd that they were establishing barricades and checkpoints, and were setting roadside bombs.

Abdul Mun'im Abu Tabikh, a member of Qadisiyah's elected governing council, alleged, "What happened was an attempt by the government to finish off undisciplined elements that are attempting to undermine security in the city and to continue to carry arms openly, on the part of some disreputable members of the Sadr Movement who refused to acknowledge the commands of Sayyid Muqtada al-Sadr to turn their energies toward preaching and guidance alone." This behavior led the government, he said to send in the army against them, especially those that were openly carrying arms. He said that there is a curfew in the city, given that the clashes are continuing.

Eyewitnesses reported an exodus from the city of dozens of families, who took refuge in surrounding villages. Shops are closed througout Qadisiyah, and both water and electricity have been cut off since Sunday evening.

The explosion at a leaking oil pipeline near Diwaniyah that killed 16 persons who came to collect petroleum from it would have been bad news enough all on its own. Instead, a mere deadly accident flew under the news radar. The tragedy came because of the severe fuel crisis in Iraq, which drives people to try to collect oil in dangerous ways.

Meanwhile, bombings rocked Turkey on Monday. A radical Kurdish group claimed credit, indicating it was trying to sabotage one of Turkey's major industry's, tourism.

The bombings are encouraging Turkey to step up its shelling of northern Iraq, where US-backed Kurdish politicians are harboring the terrorist PKK or Kurdish Workers' Party.

Bombings stretched from Istanbul to southern Iraq on Monday, in a new arc of crisis. This isn't going very well.
For "cont'd" postings, click here.

Civil War Violence Explodes Throughout Iraq
At Least 80 Dead, Dozens Wounded
6 US Troops Killed

al-Zaman says that [Ar.] Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has been forced to make alterations in his cabinet only 100 days after its formation by two crises-- the lack of fuel and the lack of loyalty.

Sources told al-Zaman that Petroleum Minister Hussein Shahristani, a nuclear engineer with no petroleum experience, might have to go. He was appointed to keep the position out of the hands of the Fadhila or Virtue Party, which is strong in Basra and is said already to control much of Iraq's petroleum exports there. But as the fuel crisis has worsened this summer, Shahristani has been blamed. The Virtue Party is saying that it will not lead a movement to unseat Shahristani in parliament. (But that is probably because they won't need to.)

The LA Times reports that at least 80 Iraqis were killed in the country's low-intensity civil war on Sunday. This article says that killings are down substantially in Baghdad itself, what with thousands of US and Iraqi troops making security sweeps through the most dangerous neighborhoods. The first question is whether the decline in deaths in Baghdad (which is only relative) has been offset by violence in Mosul, Baqubah and elsewhere. The second question is whether the violence will remain lower when the sweeps end, as inevitably they will. Can the Iraqi troops take over at that point and continue to be effective against the guerrillas? My guess is, "no." In which case the US "Battle for Baghdad" is just a delaying tactic, putting off the day when the west of the capital falls altogether into the hands of the Sunni Arab guerrillas. If that happened, the Green Zone might not be far behind.

Prime Minister Maliki had the misfortune to come on US television noonish on Sunday and pronounce that violence is lessening in Iraq.

The LA Times reported 6 troops killed or announced dead on Sunday.

WaPo probably had an earlier deadline and only counted up to 69. But it largely spared us the recitation of how things are much better in Baghdad now.

Details on the smaller attacks are provided by Reuters

The most costly attacks with regard to loss of life occurred in Khalis northeast of Baghdad. A massive bombing in the morning was followed some 10 hours later by a massacre when a kidnapping almost went wrong and townspeople came to the aid of the victims, but were mown down by machine gun fire. 21 persons died in the two attacks, and 40 were injured. Khalis cannot be that big, so these were enormous events there.

Despite the security sweep of Baghdad by thousands of US and Iraqi troops, a minibus bombing in Shiite Karrada killed 9, the offices of al-Sabah newspaper were car bombed, killing 2 and wounding 18, and 20 bodies showed up in the streets, executed gangland style.

The range of violence was truly nationwide, with 7 killed in a bombing in the far south at Basra, but also 3 shot to death in Mosul.

Two bombings in Kirkuk underlined the collapse of security in that city. Al-Zaman says that the violence in Kirkuk every day during the past 3 days is unprecedented in its severity. Kurdish Peshmerga control the city, and the governing council is being boycotted by its own Arab and Turkoman members. A bombing of the takyah or Sufi center left 9 dead and 53 wounded. The Sufi center belonged to the family of Jalal Talabani, the president of Iraq. (I presume that this center is for the Naqshbandi Sufi order, which predominates among Kurds.) In a separate incident, the offices of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan were attacked. Al-Zaman is speaking of the "collapse" of security "in Kirkuk."
For "cont'd" postings, click here.

Collier: The "Shaped Charge" Bogey Man

Military historian and former Green Beret Tom Collier writes:

' We have read recently in the press about "sophisticated shaped-charge" mines destroying Coalition vehicles in Iraq. They are described as new, deadly, and coming from Iran.

The truth is the shaped-charge effect was discovered in the 19th Century and first saw combat in the warhead of the U.S. Army's bazooka rocket in 1942. It has been used since by many nations in assorted anti-vehicle weapons. Furthermore, shaped-charge mines are easily made from scratch with #10 cans, dinner plates, and plastic explosive.

U.S. Army Special Forces have routinely made them so since the 1950s. Last year, "Newsweek" ["Unholy Allies," Sept 26, 2005] described Iraqi insurgents showing Hamza Sangari, a visiting Taliban fighter, how to make and use them. Maybe Coalition forces in Iraq have come across some new and "sophisticated" anti-vehicle weapon made in Iran, but until they show it to us I would bet that Iraqis are still making and using improved versions of the old bazooka. '

Tom Collier

For "cont'd" postings, click here.

Achcar Guest Editorial: The Situation in Iraq

The Situation in Iraq

by Gilbert Achcar

[The following excerpt is from the Epilogue to Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy, by Noam Chomsky & Gilbert Achcar, edited with a Preface by Stephen R. Shalom, to be published by Paradigm Publishers September 15, 2006, Hardcover $22.95. To order the book at a 15% individual customer discount please click here.]

Q: The past few months in Iraq have seen widespread sectarian attacks. How do you assess the evolution of the situation? In particular, do you believe that a civil war is going on? Is the sectarian turmoil a reason to extend the stay of U.S. troops?

Gilbert Achcar: In the past six months, the situation in Iraq has deteriorated in a truly frightening manner, proceeding inexorably toward the actualization of the worst-case scenario -- the worst for Iraq, that is, which is not necessarily the worst for Washington, as I shall explain.

The outcome of the December 2005 parliamentary election was quite bad for U.S. plans in Iraq. The official results confirmed that the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) once again secured a major voting bloc in the parliament (128 seats out of 275), although they did not get the majority that they enjoyed in the previous assembly. That was foreseen, however, as the January 2005 election had been boycotted by most Arab Sunnis and its outcome was accordingly quite exceptional. Nevertheless, the loss of 12 seats by the UIA was rather less than the 22–seat loss by the Kurdish Alliance, while the coalition list headed by Washington's henchman, Iyad Allawi, suffered a very serious decline, falling to 25 seats from 40, which had already been a poor showing.

These results meant that, had any of the "Sunni" coalitions -- whether the Iraqi Accord Front (44 seats), which is a coalition between the Islamic Party (i.e., the Iraqi "moderate" branch of the Muslim Brotherhood [the Association of Muslim Scholars being the "hard-liners" originating in the same tradition]) and traditionalist Arab Sunni tribal forces; or the Iraqi National Dialogue Front alone (11 seats), a motley Arab nationalist coalition including present or former Baathists who disavow Saddam Hussein's leadership -- agreed to join an alliance with the UIA, they would have secured together an absolute majority in the parliament. For that, the UIA needed only 10 more votes, or even fewer if one takes into account the 2 seats won by a small Shiite grouping close to the Sadrists, which joined the UIA. Such an extended cross-sectarian bloc would thus have been able to counter political pressure exerted by Washington through its Kurdish allies and Allawi's group and whoever else might have joined with them.

Yet, both "Sunni" coalitions proved more interested in doing business with Washington, believing that getting U.S. support against the Shiite UIA would put them in a better overall position than allying with the latter. They were thus keener on playing a petty sectarian political game than on speeding national liberation from the occupation. On the other hand, many Arab Sunnis consider Iran's hegemony -- of which, they believe, the UIA is but a tool -- to be a greater threat than U.S. hegemony, thus justifying politically that kind of behavior.

The Arab Sunni parliamentary coalitions entered into an alliance with Allawi to dispute the electoral results. Last January, I commented that their objections to the election results were not sincere, but aimed only at exerting political blackmail on the UIA. What happened afterward proved this assessment correct: When they -- and U.S. proconsul Zalmay Khalilzad -- got what they wanted with regard to the government, they just ended all their clamoring about "rigged elections."

In the meantime, intensive tugs-of-war took place in Iraq between several forces. The main contest pitted, on one side, the UIA, backed by Iran, and on the other side, a broad coalition of the Kurdish Alliance, the "Sunni" electoral parties, and Allawi, backed by Khalilzad and by regular statements and high-ranking visitors from Washington insisting hypocritically on the need to give Arab Sunnis an important share of power. As after the January 2005 election, the Bush administration tried to dictate not only its own conditions on the UIA but also Allawi's participation in the government, despite Iran's and the UIA's red line. Washington finally conceded this last point, but only after they managed to get rid of the candidate designated by the UIA to head the first "regular" Iraqi government under the new constitution -- the same man who headed the provisional government based on the Constituent Assembly: Ibrahim al-Jaafari.

The other major contest took place within the UIA itself, pitting against one another the two major blocs: the SCIRI and the followers of Muqtada al-Sadr. The SCIRI wanted the premiership for their own man, Adel Abdel- Mahdi, an ex-Maoist turned fundamentalist in both Islamic and neoliberal religions. Despite the fact that the SCIRI is the closest of all Iraqi groups to Iran and despite its advocacy of a super-federal state in southern Iraq, an idea that is resented by the United States (and rejected by all other Arab Iraqi forces, including Muqtada al-Sadr's followers), Washington backed Abdel-Mahdi, hoping that he would help the United States lay its hands on Iraq's oil in the name of free marketeering. Khalilzad, chiefly obsessed with reducing Muqtada al-Sadr's clout, was also trying in this way to fan the dissension within the UIA. For his part, Sadr strongly backed his friend and leader of the Dawa Party, Jaafari, whom he deemed closer to his political stance (Jaafari had subscribed without reservation to the "Pact of Honor" that Sadr tried to get all major Iraqi forces independent of Washington to sign [1]) and more open to his pressure.

Tension might have arisen between the two factions, but Tehran -- which invited Muqtada al-Sadr for a visit after the December election -- was certainly instrumental in preventing the UIA from splitting and urging the SCIRI to consider the UIA's unity as a priority. The issue of the UIA's candidate for premiership was thus decided democratically by a vote within the alliance, which gave a narrow majority to Jaafari. Washington's "democracy promoters" did their best thereafter to prevent the constitutional mechanism from getting under way: Normally, the Assembly would have convened and elected among others a president who would have been required to designate the candidate put forward by the largest bloc in parliament -- Jaafari, in this case -- to try to form a government. This position would have enabled Jaafari to maneuver between the other blocs and try to win over enough Arab Sunni representatives to secure a parliamentary majority, thus forcing the Kurdish Alliance to join lest they be excluded from the government.

Obviously, such a scenario was out of the question for Washington: The result was a very tense and highly dangerous standoff, until a compromise was reached whereby Jaafari agreed to be replaced with his second-in-command in the Dawa Party, Nouri al-Maliki. The latter was presented as being less sympathetic to Iran and more flexible and amenable than Jaafari. As a matter of fact, Maliki seems more compliant than Jaafari in his relations with the United States. The difference between the two men, leaders of the same party, was nonetheless not such as to warrant Washington's and London's indecent self-congratulation after Maliki's designation, as if Allawi himself had been anointed again prime minister of Iraq.

The whole situation was clearly a setback for Sadr, however. As I mentioned earlier, he had tried hard to convince the Sunni Arab parliamentary and extra-parliamentary groups to join in an anti-occupation alliance. He failed totally in that respect: The Arab Sunni parliamentary groups rejected his advances, and stuck to their alliance with the Kurdish parties and Washington's proconsul. On the other hand, the Association of Muslim Scholars, which is very close to the Arab Sunni insurgency, disappointed Sadr bitterly: He couldn't get them to condemn Zarqawi and his al-Qaeda branch in strong terms (Sadr even wanted them to excommunicate Zarqawi's group), and his radical anti-Baathist attitude was equally a stumbling block in his relations with Sunni Arab nationalists. He has complained that of the Sunni groups he approached before the December election and asked to adhere to his "Pact of Honor," none have signed it.

The next major blow to Sadr's strategy of trying to build an anti-U.S. alliance with anti-occupation Arab Sunni forces was the single event that contributed most to fueling the sectarian tension between Arab Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq -- I mean, of course, the attack against the Al-Askari Mosque in Samarra on February 22, 2006. This sectarian attack unleashed reprisals on a large scale by Shiite militants infuriated by the unending series of murderous sectarian attacks to which their community had been subjected ever since the occupation started. In these reprisals, Sadr's ragtag "Mahdi Army" was apparently very much involved. Not that Sadr gave a green light for this -- on the contrary, like most other Shiite leaders, he tried his best to cool things down -- but since his militias are much less centralized than the quasi-military SCIRI Badr militia, Sadrist militiamen obeyed their impulses before considering any other option and before getting to listen to the voice of political rationality.

At any rate, these unfortunate events were hugely exploited by an odd array of forces -- including U.S. friends, pro-Zarqawi Sunni fundamentalists, and pro-Saddam Baathists -- in order to discredit Muqtada al-Sadr among Arab Sunnis and to destroy any appeal he might have had for both his uncompromising anti-occupation stance and his reputation for being very much independent of Iran. All that Sadr had achieved politically in the previous period, in terms of building his influence on a pan-Arab (Sunnis and Shiites) Iraqi basis, was thus shattered along with the dome of the Al-Askari Mosque. To be sure, he retains formidable clout among the Shiites -- above all, among the downtrodden layers of the Shiite community, a clout that very likely has been enhanced by the role of his "army" in embodying the armed wing of the community more than any other group. But the fact remains that he is further from imposing himself as a leader of both Arab nationalist Shiites and Sunnis than he has ever been since he clashed with occupation troops in 2004.

Despite these developments, Iraq has not yet reached a state of full-fledged civil war. Indeed, what I characterized a year ago as a "low-intensity civil war" [2] had not ceased increasing in intensity throughout 2005 and early 2006, even before the sudden and most serious flare-up provoked by the Samarra attack. Nevertheless, drawing on my own Lebanese experience, I would say that there are two elements that at this moment still stand between the present situation in Iraq and a full-scale civil war. The first is the persistence of a unified Iraqi government and the existence of still-unified Iraqi armed forces: In Lebanon, it was the split-up of the government in early 1976 and the disintegration of the Lebanese army that signaled the shift to a full-fledged civil war. The second element is the existence of foreign armed forces playing the role of deterrent and arbiter, like the role that the Syrian army used to play -- but only intermittently -- in Lebanon from 1976 onward.

To say this is to point to what I hinted at already, namely that the slide of Iraq toward the worst-case scenario for its population does not necessarily represent the worst-case scenario for Washington. Actually, most of what has happened in recent months in Iraq, except for the publicity surrounding U.S. troops' criminal behavior, has suited Washington's designs. The sharp increase in sectarian tensions as well as the defeat of Muqtada al-Sadr's project played blatantly into Washington's hands. Along with many others, I have warned for quite a long time that, when all is said and done, Washington's only trump card in Iraq is going to be the sectarian and ethnic divisions among Iraqis, which the Bush administration is exploiting in the most cynical way according to the most classical of all imperial recipes: "Divide and rule." This is what Washington's proconsuls in Baghdad, from L. Paul Bremer to Khalilzad, have tried their best to put in place and take advantage of.

Seen in this light, the present flare-up in sectarian tensions is a godsend for Washington, to the point that many Iraqis suspect that U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies stand behind the worst sectarian attacks. Note how the occupation seems now "legitimized" by the fact that many Arab Sunnis in mixed areas, who feel threatened, request the presence of foreign troops to guarantee their safety as they have no confidence in Iraqi armed forces. [3] What a paradox, when you think of the fact that Arab Sunnis were and are still the main constituency of the anti-occupation armed insurgency -- though surely not the only one: There has been a growing pattern of anti-occupation armed actions in southern Iraq that is hardly reported, if at all, in the Western media, or even in the Arab media for that matter.

However, Washington is playing with fire: The sectarian feud suits its designs, but only provided that it is kept within limits. It is not in the United States' interests for Iraq to be carved up into three separate parts, as has been advocated cynically in the U.S. media by self-proclaimed "experts" and as neocons and friends believe is the second-best outcome, short of safe U.S. control over a unified Iraq. Not only would that actually be a recipe for a protracted civil war, but it would make U.S. control over the bulk of Iraqi oil that is located in the Shiite-majority South even more uncertain. Washington's best interest is therefore to foster the sectarian feud at a controllable level that suits its "divide and rule" policy, without letting it get out of control and turn into a most perilous civil war. A federal Iraq, with a loose central government, could fit neatly with this design, provided it were accepted by all major Iraqi actors (which is quite difficult), but an Iraq torn apart could be a disaster -- all the more so that it could trigger a dangerous regional dynamic. (Think of the Shiite-populated eastern province of the Saudi kingdom where the bulk of oil reserves is concentrated.)

Now, if U.S. forces in Iraq are to be compared to a firefighting force, the truth of the matter is that they are led by highly dangerous arsonists! Ever since the occupation started, the situation in Iraq has steadily and relentlessly deteriorated: This is the undeniable truth, which only blatant liars like those in Washington can deny, insisting that the situation is improving in the face of glaring evidence to the contrary. Iraq is caught in a vicious circle: The occupation fuels the insurgency, which stirs up the sectarian tension that Washington's proconsul strives to fan by political means, which in turn is used to justify the continuing occupation. The latest major way in which U.S. occupation authorities are throwing oil on the Iraqi fire, according to Shiite sources, is by helping the Islamic Party -- the Iraqi Arab Sunni group closest to Washington and to the Saudis -- build an armed wing that is already taking part in the sectarian feud.

There is no way out of this burning circle but one: Only by announcing immediately the total and unconditional withdrawal of U.S. troops can a decisive step be taken toward putting out the fire. This would cool down the Sunni insurgency that the Association of Muslim Scholars has repeatedly pledged to call to a halt as soon as a timetable for the withdrawal of occupation troops is announced. It would dampen as well the sectarian tension, as Iraqis will then look squarely at their future and feel compelled to reach a way to coexist peacefully. And if ever they came to the conclusion that they needed a foreign presence for a while to help them restore order and start real reconstruction, it should definitely not be one composed of troops from countries that harbor hegemonic ambitions over Iraq, but one that is welcomed by all segments of the Iraqi people as friendly and disinterested help.

-- July 20, 2006

Notes

1. See Gilbert Achcar, "A Pan-Iraqi Pact on Muqtada Al-Sadr's Initiative," ZNet, December 9, 2005.

2. "The only hope one could have of avoiding the slide into a full-blown, devastating civil war -- if Sistani were to be assassinated -- is [not the presence of U.S. troops, but] if the forces involved in the political process, i.e. those not already involved in the low-intensity civil war going on in Iraq, were successful in achieving control over their constituencies after an inevitable first outburst of anger, by emphasizing that the perpetrators are either the Baathists or Zarqawi's followers or the like, that their objective is exactly to ignite a civil war, and that the best reply to that is precisely to pay heed to Sistani's insistence on the necessity of avoiding any kind of sectarian war." See "Achcar on Cole Proposals for Withdrawal of US Ground Troops," posted on August 23, 2005, on Juan Cole's blog, Informed Comment, and on ZNet.

3. This analysis was confirmed by Edward Wong and Dexter Filkins's edifying story published in the New York Times on July 17, 2006, under the title "In an About-Face, Sunnis Want U.S. to Remain in Iraq." '

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Ahmadinejad: We are Not a Threat to Any Country, Including Israel

Believe it, don't believe it, that's up to you. But at least we should know what exactly he said, which is not something our US newspapers will tell us about Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech on Saturday:

Kayhan reports that [Pers.] Ahmadinejad said, "Iran is not a threat to any country, and is not in any way a people of intimidation and aggression." He described Iranians as people of peace and civilization. He said that Iran does not even pose a threat to Israel, and wants to deal with the problem there peacefully, through elections:

"Weapons research is in no way part of Iran's program. Even with regard to the Zionist regime, our path to a solution is elections."

Ahmadinejad seems to be explaining what his calls for the Zionist regime to be effaced actually mean. He says he doesn't want violence against Israel, despite its own acts of enmity against Middle Eastern neighbors. I interpret his statement on Saturday to be an endorsement of the one-state solution, in which a government would be elected that all Palestinians and all Israelis would jointly vote for. The result would be a government about half made up of Israeli ministers and half of Palestinian ones. Whatever one wanted to call such an arrangement, it wouldn't exactly be a "Zionist state," which would thus have been dissolved.

The schlock Western pundits, journalists and politicians who keep maintaining that Ahmadinejad threatened "to wipe Israel off the map" when he never said those words will never, ever manage to choke out the words Ahmadinejad spoke on Saturday, much less repeat them as a tag line forever after.

Supreme Jurisprudent Khamenei's pledge of no first strike against any country by Iran with any kind of weapon, and his condemnation of nuclear bombs as un-Islamic and impossible for Iran to possess or use, was completely ignored by the Western press and is never referred to. Indeed, after all that talk of peace and no first strike and no nukes, Khamenei at the very end said that if Iran were attacked, it would defend itself. Karl Vicks of the Washington Post at the time ignored all the rest of the speech and made the headline, 'Khamenei threatens reprisals against US." In other words, on Iran, the US public is being spoonfed agitprop, not news.

Although Iran's protestations of peaceful intentions are greeted cynically in the US and Israel, in fact Iran has not launched a war of aggression in over a century. The US and Israel have launched several during that period of time.

Ahmadinejad made the remarks in a speech inaugurating work on a heavy water nuclear reactor in Arak. I don't think that work is very advanced. The Iranians maintain that it is for peaceful energy generation.

Much of the electricity produced in France, South Korea and Japan is generated by nuclear plants.
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European Force of 7,000 to be Deployed
Israeli Blockade Strangles Lebanon

The illegal Israeli blockade of civilian Lebanese ports continues to inflict massive damage on Lebanon and on ordinary Lebanese from all walks of life. The United States more or less supports this strangling of the little country.

Illegal Israeli cluster bombs go on harming innocent Lebanese. Five were blown up on Saturday, including 4 children.

Israel's illegal air raid on a major oil refinery, which produced the worst environmental disaster in the history of the Eastern Mediterranean, has profoundly harmed Lebanese fishermen.

Italy is now planning to send between 2,000 and 3,000 troops for the peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon. France will send 2000 "within 20 days." Spain will send almost 1,000. Germany may well join in at that level, too.

Israel has vetoed Bangladesh, Indonesia and Malaysia, not in the legal sense. But as the regional superpower it does have a say. The Israelis would prefer Turkey, Egypt and Jordan as contributors. But I can tell you right now that isn't going to happen. Hosni Mubarak and King Abdullah II cannot afford to be seen by their publics as cracking down on Hizbullah on behalf of Israel. As for Turkey, it is being rejected by the Armenian members of the Lebanese government and parliament [Ar.].

Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora says he wants to see Hizbullah integrated into the Lebanese army.

Dick Norton and Thomas Milo on the difficulties facing UN peacekeepers in Lebanon. Both have practical experience on the ground in south Lebanon peacekeeping.

Dozens of local Labour Party activists in Derby have defected to the Liberal Democrats. Most of them are Muslims of South Asian ancestry. They were protesting the Labor Party's strong support of Israel in the recent war on Lebanon. The move is especially embarrassing to Labour because Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett is elected from Derby.

Britain has 1.6 million Muslims in a population of 61 million, and most of the politically active in the community have tended to vote Labor. PM Tony Blair, an evangelical close to George W. Bush on foreign policy, may have started a historic realignment whereby UK Muslims identify with Britain's third party, the Lib Dems. As Muslims become more politicized and the second and third generations become more integrated, they could emerge as an important swing vote, causing parties to compete for them. Such a dynamic would likely have a significant effect on Britain's foreign policy.

The Lebanese Bloggers.

Dennis Perrin debates the Arab Israeli conflict. His blog is Red State Son.
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91.7% of Iraqis Say "US Troops Out"
30 Dead, Dozens Wounded in Civil War Violence

On Sunday morning in Iraq, guerrillas deployed a car bomb to blow up the offices of the al-Sabah newspaper in the Waziriyah District of Baghdad, killing at least 2 persons and wounding at least 20. Sabah was originally set up by the Americans as a newspaper friendly to the new regime.

Question of the week: Would you rather have $1075 or the war in Iraq?

91.7 percent of Iraqis oppose the presence of US troops in their country--a nearly 20 percent increase since 2004. A big majority thinks the US is in their country for the oil.

7 dead bodies showed up in the streets in various parts of northern Iraq Saturday, including in Tikrit and near Kirkuk.

Reuters reports civil war violence in Iraq for Saturday. Policemen were assassinated in Mosul and in Samarra. Reuters reports 20 dead in the political violence, but does not include the 7 mentioned by the Pakistan Times. Lots of other deaths were also no doubt not reported by either one. Among the major incidents:

' ISKANDARIA - A car bomb outside a Shi'ite mosque in the town of Iskandaria south of Baghdad killed three people and wounded 17, police said. . .

BAQUBA - Gunmen in the town of Baquba 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad attacked a Shi'ite family, killing two women and two children and wounding 11. . . [Late reports say 6 were killed and 13 wounded - al-Sharq al-Awsat.]

KIRKUK - Four Kurdish civilians were killed in a drive -by shooting as they were travelling southwest of the ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, police said. . . .

BASRA - Gunmen killed a woman translator and wounded another as they left a British military base in the southern city of Basra, police said. . . Gunmen killed three civilians in Basra, police said. [Also a military intelligence operative who was working near the Iranian border showed up dead - al-Sharq al-Awsat].

TIKRIT - Gunmen in the predominantly Sunni town of Tikrit stormed a bakery on Friday and killed three Shi'ite workers and wounded two, police said. '

Al-Sharq al-Awsat reports that [Ar.] the Basra Provincial Governing Council [PGC] has passed a law allowing it to imprison any journalist who reports violence in the province without checking with the PGC first--even if he or she was reporting something they witnessed with their own eyes. The law contravenes the Iraqi national constitution, which guarantees freedom of the press.

Iraqi tribal chieftains met Saturday in a preparatory conference for a planned meet on national reconciliation. The clan leaders mostly have rural constituents and are no longer very powerful in Iraqi society. Although some are mixed Sunni-Shiite, mostly one or the other branch of Islam massively predominates in the tribe. The power has long ago shifted to urban political leaders. The tribal chieftains are not, moreover, very organized, and nor are their followers. My guess is that the Sunni Shaikhs have been invited to informally stand proxy for the Sunni guerrilla leadership.

Shaikh Abd al-Razzaq al-Wiqa` said in a speech to the group, "Abolishing the law of Debaathification, recognizing the Iraqi Resistance, distinguishing between it and terrorism, and building a national army far from being characterized by sectarian quotas-- these are the significant prerequisites for national reconciliation."

This Sunni point of view is not without merit, but hell will freeze over before Massoud Barzani (the Kurdish leader), Abdul Aziz al-Hakim (leader of the Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq) and Muqtada al-Sadr will sign onto it.

Taysir al-Mashhadani, the Sunni female member of parliament from Baquba who was kidnapped by a Shiite militia, has been released. Typically such releases come after a ransom has been paid.

The Kurdistan powder keg.

Turkey continues air raids against PKK positions in northern Iraq. The Turks have invoked the example set by Israel's bombing of Lebanon.

Ed Wong of the NYT also sees Kurdistan as a cautionary tale against the rush to partition Iraq.

The draft constitution for the Kurdistan Regional Confederacy identifies Kirkuk as an integral part of the federal region. A lot of Turkomans and Arabs in Kirkuk are not going to like this, and they have patrons in Turkey and southern Iraq.

California educator gets into trouble for TWT-- Thinking While Teaching.

That Richard Armitage was the first to mention Valerie Plame's status as a CIA operative to Novak is not very interesting. What is interesting is the ay that Traitor Rove and Traitor Libby immediately figured out that such a leak should be spread around for partisan political purposes.
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EU to send 7000 Peacekeepers to Lebanon
Israeli Cluster Bombs Menace Lebanese Children

European nations have pledged 7000 troops to a peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon. France will lead the force, and will have 2000 of its own troops on the ground.

The Israelis are saying that they won't end their blockade of Lebanese ports until the UN force is in place. LBC satellite news reports that Lebanon is losing $3 million a day in forfeited agricultural and retail business, since no raw materials can be imported into Lebanon at the moment.

the UN estimates that Israel's war on the little country of Lebanon cost that country all the economic recovery strdes it had taken in the past two decades.

The Israeli military extensively used US-made cluster bombs in civilian areas of Lebanon, which is a war crime. The bombs frequently do not detonate, so now south Lebanon is littered with deadly fist-size bomblets that will inevitably kill and disfigure children and other civilians.

The US State Department will investigate whether Israeli deployment of these weapons in civilian areas violated secret agreements under which Washington supplied them to Israel.

Nothing will come of the investigation, given the clout of the Israel lobby in Washington, but someday the relative of an innocent maimed Lebanese may decide to take revenge on the country that supplied the cluster bombs. And the American public will ask in astonishment why anyone should hate us.
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Amara Base Looted as British Withdraw
Qadiri Sufi Order Declared Jihad on Americans, Shiites

Things did not go well in Iraq on Friday according to WaPo.

First, the British withdrew from Camp Abu Naji near Amara. They only gave the Iraqis one day notice. This short notice suggests that the evacuation was done under considerable duress; one suspects that the British position was becoming untenable because of repeated Shiite guerrilla attacks (there were only 1200 British troops there). When they left, they left behind nearly $300,000 in equipment, intending that the Iraqi police should have the use of the base.

Muqtada al-Sadr and his followers on the provincial Governing Council crowed that the Mahdi Army was the first Iraqi group to force a substantial withdrawal of Coalition troops from an Iraqi territory, according to Amit Paley. The LA Times says that the Mahdi Army boasted of having forced the British troops to leave so abruptly.

While a small contingent of Iraqi security forces (mainly recruited from the Badr Corps and the Mahdi Army) was on the base, they professed themselves helpless when some 5000 looters, some armed with AK 47 machine guns, showed up to strip it bare. The poor British officer corps was reduced to maintaining that the camp had been kept in perfectly good order on their departure. God, they must hate Blair.

The day before, the Iraqi troops at the base briefly mutinied when they were told of a plan to transfer them to Baghdad. They were from local families and complained that this was a plan to "get rid of them." The government relented and left them in Amara. It may as well have. If they couldn't stop the looting of their own base on their home turf, what good would they have been in Baghdad?

Then in Ramadi, guerrillas holed up in the Abdul Qadir al-Kailani Mosque attacked US troops. The latter returned fire, and ultimately brought up M1 Abrams tanks and fired at the religious building. It was left with structural damage to its dome and minaret. The guerrillas set the US troops up for a lose/lose situation. By subjecting the mosque to tank fire, they look to Iraqi Muslims like anti-Muslim infidels.

If you thought that attacking a mosque associated with the great Sufi saint Abdul Qadir Gilani (Kailani) might anger members of his Qadiri Sufi order around the world, you'd be right.

Paley also reports:

' In other developments, the head of a major Iraqi sect of Sufism, a mystical branch of Islam that had previously rejected violence against U.S.-led coalition forces, declared holy war on American troops. The leader, Sheik Mohammed al-Qadiri, said his sect would form a new group, the Battalions of Sh[e]ikh Abdul Qadir al-Gaillani, and join the insurgency.

"We will not wait for the Mahdi Army and the Badr Brigade to enter our houses and kill us," said Ahmed al-Soffi, a Sufi leader in the western city of Fallujah, referring to the country's major Shiite militias. "We will fight the Americans and the Shiites who are against us." '

Al-Zaman reports that [Ar.] two civilians were killed and another wounded in an armed clash between Mahdi Army militiamen and Sunni worshippers who were guarding the Great al-Batha' Mosque in the western side of Nasiriyyah (a southern, largely Shiite city). Local police sources said that the battle between the two has been going on for the past two days. Apparently the Mahdi Army is attempting to seize the 11 Sunni mosques in the south, in Amara, Karbala, Najaf, Basra and Samawah, and turn them into Shiite places of worship. The Sadrists generally maintain that Sunni mosques in the south of the country were planted there by Saddam Hussein with money stolen from the Iraqi people, and that therefore southern Shiites are within their rights to take these mosques over. Police in Dhi Qar province, fearful that the situation will worsen, imposed a curfew beginning last Thursday evening throughout the province.

Abdul Mahdi al-Karbala'i, the representative of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani in the holy city of Karbala, ridiculed secular politicians who are hiding in the fortified Green Zone, calling on them to get out among the people so as to see their suffering.

Rapid rises in the prices of fuel and food have imposed severe hardship on most Iraqis at a time of high unemployment and at most flat wages. A lot of anger is building over the issue.

Security has collapsed in oil-rich Kirkuk. al-Zaman says 3 bodies were found there on Friday.

Reuters reports civil war violence for Friday. The list is incomplete, and al-Zaman reports a number of other deaths. Between the two, I'd say they report over 20 deaths from such causes on Friday, and we know that these two also missed provincial incidents.

The head of Iraqi antiquities has fled, in fear of his life. By the way, he mentions Sadrists taking over the ministry, which is ironic, since they are reputed to fund themselves by antiquities smuggling . . .
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Republican Congressional Report on Iran Riddled With Errors

Here is what the professionals are saying about the Republican-dominated Subcommittee on Intelligence Policy report on Iran that slams US intelligence professionals for poor intelligence on Iran: The report demonstrates that these Republicans have poor intelligence . . . on Iran. What follows is summaries of things I've seen from other experts but I can't identify them without permission.

This is the PDF file of the report.

First of all, former CIA professional Larry Johnson and Jim Marcinkowski point out that the Republicans have a lot of damn gall. It was high members of this Republican administration who leaked to the Iranians and the whole world the name of Valerie Plame, an undercover CIA operative who spent her professional career combatting the proliferation of WMD and was, at the time she was betrayed by Traitor Rove and his merry band, working on Iran. Had it not been for these Republican figures, none of whom has yet been punished in any way for endangering US national security, we might know more about Iran.

It is being said that the staffer who headed the report is Frederick Fleitz, who was a special assistant to John Bolton when Bolton was undersecretary of state for proliferation issues. Fleitz was sent to the unemployment line when Condi wisely exiled Bolton to the United Nations, where there is a long history of ill-tempered despots who like to bang their shoes on the podium. So this report is the long arm of Bolton popping up in Congress. It is Neoconservative propaganda.

I repeat what I have said before, which is that John Bolton is just an ill-tempered lawyer who has no special expertise in nuclear issues or in Iran, and aside from an ability to scare the bejesus out of young gophers who bring him coffee and to thunderously denounce on cue any world leader on whom he is sicced, he has no particular qualifications for his job.

Nor do the Republican congressmen know anything special about Iran's nuclear energy program. They certainly know much less than the CIA agents who work on it full time, some of whom know Persian and have actually done, like, you know . . . intelligence work.

We are beset by instant experts on contemporary Iran, like the medievalist Bernard Lewis, who wrongly predicted that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would attack Israel on August 22, based on Lewis's weird interpretation of his alleged millenarian beliefs. Once the Neoconservatives went so far as actually to make fun of reality in the hearing of a reporter, their game was up.

Pete Hoekstra, who is the chair of this committee, has a long history of saying things that are, well, disconnected to reality. Like when he made a big deal about some old shells with mustard gas found in Iraq left over from the 1980s Iran-Iraq War, and claimed that these were the fabled and long-sought Iraqi WMD over which 2600 of our service people are six feet under and another 8000 in wheelchairs. Nope.

Bolton at one point was exercised about an imaginary Cuban biological weapons program, which even his own staffers wouldn't support him on, and I at one point he was alleging that Iranian mullahs were sneaking into Havana to help with it.

This congressional report is full of the same sort of wild fantasies.

On page 9, the report alleges that "Iran is currently enriching uranium to weapons grade using a 164-machine centrifuge cascade at this facility in Natanz."

This is an outright lie. Enriching to weapons grade would require at least 80% enrichment. Iran claims . . . 2.5 per cent. See how that isn't the same thing? See how you can't blow up anything with 2.5 percent?

The claim is not only flat wrong, but it is misleading in another way. You need 16,000 centrifuges, hooked up so that they cascade, to make enough enriched uranium for a bomb in any realistic time fame, even if you know how to get the 80 percent! Iran has . . . 164. See how that isn't the same?

The report cites the International Atomic Energy Agency only when it is critical of Iran. It does not tell us what the IAEA actually has found.

By the way, here is what IAEA head Mohamed Elbaradei said in early March, 2003, about Iraq:

' After three months of intrusive inspections, we have to date found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons programme in Iraq. '

At the same time, Republicans like Donald Rumsfeld were saying he knew exactly where Iraq's WMD was!

Elbaradei was right then, and Fleitz was wrong. Can't get fooled again.

And here is what the IAEA said about Iran just last January:

" Iran has continued to facilitate access under its Safeguards Agreement as requested by the Agency, and to act as if the Additional Protocol is in force, including by providing in a timely manner the requisite declarations and access to locations."

Last April Elbaradei complained about the hype around Iran's nuclear research, and said that there is no imminent threat from Iran.

The only thing that the IAEA knows for sure is that Iran has a peaceful nuclear energy research program. Such a program is not the same as a weapons program, and it is perfectly legal under the Nonproliferation Treaty, which Iran, unlike Israel, has actually signed.

The report allegedly vastly exaggerates the range of Iran's missiles and also exaggerates the number of its longer-range ones, and seems to think that Iran already has the Shahab-4, which it does not. It also doesn't seem to realize that Iran can't send missiles on other countries without receiving them back. Israel has more and longer-range missiles than Iran, and can quickly equip them with real nuclear warheads, not the imaginary variety in Fleitz's fevered brain.

Folks, we are being set up again.
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Turkey Strikes PKK Bases in North Iraq;
At Least 29 Dead in Civil War Bombings, Shootings

Turkish jets bombed bases in northern Iraq on Thursday of the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK), which has been responsible for several terrorist strikes in eastern Anatalia in recent months. The US military, which monitors everything that happens in Iraq electronically, somehow could not figure out that the air raids came from Turkey.

Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani has called on Iraqi politicians to please stay in Iraq and take care of business. Ever since the elections of January, 2005, it has often been the case that much of the cabinet and many parliamentarians were actually in London or elsewhere abroad for much of the time. Sistani must fear that this absenteeism is part of the problem with governance in the country, which threatens everything he has worked for.

1000 British troops have been pulled out of Camp Naji near Amara. They were under constant mortar attack there from nationalist Shiite guerrillas and took 17 shells just Wednesday, leaving one soldier wounded. They turned the base over to the local Iraqi security forces of Maysan province, which is dominated by followers of Muqtada al-Sadr. Half of the British troops will be given patrol duties and half sent to Basra. I can only conclude that the British military felt that its position in Maysan was untenable and that its troops ere in danger to no good purpose.

Iraqi professors and teachers are fleeing the country this year in twice the numbers they did last, in fear of insecurity and even assassination.

Reuters reports civil war violence in Iraq. The reported deadly violence occurred in Ninevah, Salahuddin, Diyala, Baghdad, Karbala, and Kut provinces, i.e. from the north through the center and down to the Middle Euphrates. Many deaths and woundings each day are never reported in the Western press, in part because journalists cannot easily circulate any longer. 3 US GIs were killed in the last day and a half. The other major incidents according to Reuters:

'MOSUL - A hospital in Mosul received the bodies of seven people with gunshot wounds, including five from the same family, a hospital source said. . . Two policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in Mosul, police said.

BALAD - Gunmen killed three policemen on Wednesday at a checkpoint in Balad, 80 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.

BAQUBA - Two policemen were killed and three wounded when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in Baquba, police said . . . A car bomb wounded four policemen and a civilian . . .

BAGHDAD - Two civilians were killed and nine people, including two policemen, wounded when a car driven by a suicide bomber exploded near a police station in eastern Baghdad, a source in the Interior Ministry said. [Eleven persons, mostly policemen, were wounded in 4 other reported bombings in Baghdad] . . .

KERBALA - Gunmen killed four people, three of them from Saddam Hussein's ousted Baath party, in different attacks in Kerbala, 110 km (68 miles) southwest of Baghdad.

[KUT] Police found the bodies of three people, handcuffed and with gunshot wounds, in Kut, 170 km (105 miles) southeast of Baghdad, police said.

Turkmen and Arabs in Kirkuk are protesting next year's referendum that may dragoon them into the Kurdistan Federal Region.

The Kurds don't get it. (Though they actually have managed to develop Turkoman political clients.)

The USG Open Source center report for Aug. 24 paraphrases the Iraqi press:

' Al-Ittijah al-Akhar on 19 August devotes all of page 18 to a report by Dina Hajj Ahmad accusing US companies of trafficking Iraqi women.

Al-Mashriq carries on page 2 a 500-word follow-up report entitled 'Half of Iraqi Children Have Seen Corpses and Torn-off Limbs; Psychiatrists Warn of Generation That Might Turn into Murderers. . .'

Al-Zaman runs on page 13 an 800-word article by Husam-al-Din Abd-al-Aziz al-Ali commenting on the negative influence of increasing oil product prices on the poor in Iraq. . .

Al-Muwatin carries on page 2 a 240-word report citing Parliament Member Samirah al-Musawi confirming that growing numbers of Iraqi families are falling below the poverty line. . .

Ishraqat al-Sadr on 23 August carries on page 3 a 400-word article by Husayn al-Askari commenting on terrorism, poverty, and administrative corruption which are affecting Iraqis. The writer strongly criticizes the US scheme aimed at destroying Iraq in order to satisfy Israel . . .

Al-Bayyinah al-Jadidah carries on page 3 a 1,000-word article by Sayyar al-Jamil strongly criticizing the idea of fragmenting Iraq into three states on sectarian grounds. The writer adds that Iraq is not a new Yugoslavia. . . .

Al-Zaman carries on page 2 an 800-word report on the comments of a number of Iraqis on the use of "unintelligible terms" by Iraqi MPs. . .

Al-Istiqamah carries on page 2 a 70-word report entitled 'Terrorist Group Abducts Priest and Demands Church To Pay Ransom.' . . .

Ishraqat al-Sadr on 23 August carries on the front page a 200-word exclusive report that Nuri al-Maliki has apologized to Al-Sadr City for the attack by multinational forces.

Ishraqat al-Sadr on 23 August carries on the front page a 270-word report that clashes erupted between British forces and Al-Mahdi Army in Maysan Governorate. The report cites eyewitnesses saying that two British tanks were damaged and a number of British soldiers were injured. (OSC plans to process this item)

Ishraqat al-Sadr on 23 August carries on the front page a 400-word exclusive commentary strongly criticizing Iraqi Al-Tawafuq Front member Abd-al-Karim al-Samarra'i for accusing Al-Mahdi Army of attacking mosques in some areas of Baghdad during the death anniversary of Imam Kazim.

Al-Bayyinah al-Jadidah carries on the front page and on page 2 a 1000-word report on documents revealing that one of [Parliament Speaker] Mahmud al-Mashhadani's bodyguards and his brother are involved in terrorism. . . .

Al-Bayyinah al-Jadidah carries on page 4 a 90-word report that Iraqi forces have taken over security responsibility of Rimakin military base in Bayji District from multinational forces. . .

Al-Zaman publishes on page 2 a 200-word report citing a number of Iraqis expressing their dissatisfaction with the increase in concrete blocks on streets as part of the security plan. . .

Al-Ittijah al-Akhar on 19 August devotes all of page 12 to a report on the widespread corruption in Oil Ministry. The report cites parliament members criticizing the ministry for its poor performance and citing citizens demanding the government to resolve the incessant fuel crisis.

Al-Mashriq runs on the front page a 340-word editorial by Dr Hamid Abdallah saying that Iraq is witnessing different kinds of battles on the streets, satellite television screens, and in the parliament. The writer adds that gas stations are witnessing another battle between black market dealers and citizens. . .

Al-Mashriq carries on page 4 a 230-word report entitled 'Strike Paralyses Restaurants and Bakeries in Al-Diwaniyah . . .' [protesting lack of fuel]

Tariq al-Sha'b carries on the front page a 400-word report entitled 'Sit-in in Dhi Qar and Demonstration in Suq al-Shiyukh Protesting Deteriorating Services.' . .

Al-Bayyinah al-Jadidah carries on page 4 a 130-word report citing the director of Dissolved Entities Employees Department saying that the department has reinstated 9,000 employees. . .

Al-Sabah carries on page 8 a 120-word report citing an official source at Dhi Qar Electricity Distribution Directorate saying that US Engineering Corps will hand over 50 electricity generators to the directorate to help solve the electricity crisis. .

Al-Adalah runs on page 2 a 200-word report on a meeting between Abd-al-Aziz al-Hakim and PM Wa'il Abd-al-Latif to discuss the implementation of federalism in Iraq. . . .

Al-Adalah carries on page 4 a 1,000-word report on the comments of a number of Dhi Qar Governorate's inhabitants on the need for adopting federalism in Iraq. . ..

Iraq and Lebanon

Al-Ittijah al-Akhar on 19 August publishes on page 10 a 1,000-word exclusive report entitled 'US Report Admits: Hizballah Achieves Victory and Israel Defeated; 343 Israeli Soldiers Killed and 617 Injured; Marines Participate in Battles.'

Al-Ittijah al-Akhar on 19 August runs on page 15 a 600-word column by Sa'd Mahyu saying that Israel is suffering from a collapse.

Al-Bayyinah al-Jadidah carries on page 13 a 750-word article by Tawfiq al-Haj in which he says that Israel will resume the war against Lebanon soon.

Al-Da'wah carries on page 7 a 450-word unattrib uted article commenting on the Israeli crimes during its attack on Lebanon and calling on the international community to push Israel towards peace.

Al-Da'wah carries on page 7 a 400-word article by Ala Hadi al-Hattab praising Hizballah for succeeding in stopping the Israeli Army 's land attack.

Al-Zaman runs on page 15 a 1,200-word article by Talib Mahdi al-Khafaji commenting on the Israeli attacks against civilians in Qana in 1969 and 2006.

Al-Zaman publishes on page 15 an 800-word article by Ali al-Bahadili discussing the "victory" of Hizballah in the recent war, and criticizing the New Middle East project. . .

[al-Da`wah is the newspaper of the party of the same name, to which Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki belongs]

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South Beirut's Divine Victory

Patrick McGreevy writes from Beirut:

"So . . . I went to Bourj Brajneh and Haret Hreik in the southern suburbs today. No need for words; the pictures say it all. The divine victory seems to have caused quite a bit of destruction: a good thing it wasn't a defeat, eh? The first pictures show some street scenes indicating that, in the suburbs, no one knows who owns the land, who pays the electricity, and that--like the rest of Beirut, there is a vibrant mixture of the secular and the religious/modern."






















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Interior Minister Narrowly avoids bombing;
Bush faces Choice of Withdrawal or Draft

The Bush administration's call-up of 2500 US Marine reservists who have already given 4 years of service shows how desperate it is becoming for military manpower in Iraq. A veterans' organization maintains that this sort of thing is unsustainable, and that Bush will have to move to a draft or else begin a drawdown of US troops soon.

Ellen Knickmeyer updates us on the current status and activities of the Mahdi Army and Sadr Movement of Muqtada al-Sadr in Iraq. The state of the movement is strong.

Iran wants to help southern Iraq with internet technology. Can you say "back door" in Persian?

The US installation of Iran-linked Iraqi religious Shiite parties in power has made Iran the key power in Iraq, according to a British think tank.

As the US Battle for Baghdad has put an extra 3500 US troop in the capital in an attempt to make an long term impact in reducing guerrilla and militia violence there, the guerrillas have been moving their operations elsewhere.

The troops were brought south from Mosul, giving the guerrillas greater freedom of movement in Iraq's second city. So, a suicide bomber with a bomb belt detonated his payload near a police station, killing 2 persons and wounding 8, including policemen.

Reuters reports other incidents of civil war violence:

"BAQUBA - Eight people, including two policemen, were gunned down in different incidents in the religiously mixed city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said." . . .

Iraqi police pulled out six bodies from a small river near Latifiya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad on Tuesday, police said.

BAGHDAD - A civilian was killed and another wounded when a roadside bomb went off in the southern Saidiya district of Baghdad, a source in the Interior Ministry said. '

A roadside bomb in the Dura neighborhood of Baghdad, a roadside bomb killed 2 persons and injured 5, including traffic policemen.

The bomb narrowly missed the Minister of the Interior, Jawad al-Bulani, whose convoy was passing through. The Interior Ministry is in charge of internal security for Iraq.

The article continues:

' AMARA - One British serviceman was wounded and two others slightly hurt during a prolonged mortar barrage on Tuesday on a British base near Amara, 365 km (230 miles) south of Baghdad, the British military said on Wednesday.

FALLUJA - Three civilians and three traffic policemen were wounded by a roadside bomb near a U.S. patrol in Falluja, 50 km (35 miles) west of Baghdad, police said. '

British troops had made a raid into Amara in hopes of catching a major terrorist figure. They were fired on as they withdrew.

The Pakistan Tribune/ wire services add:

"Police in Amara said two civilians were killed in crossfire between British forces and Mehdi Army militiamen."

Joe Lieberman agrees with a rightwing radio talk show host on Middle East policy.
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