Informed Comment

Thoughts on the Middle East, History, and Religion

Juan Cole is President of the Global Americana Institute

Monday, April 30, 2007

Tenet on the Staircase with the Neocons

My column in response to George Tenet's "60 Minutes" interview is available at Salon.com.

Excerpt:


The French call it "the spirit of the staircase" (l'esprit d'escalier), the clever reply to someone that comes to you on your way up to the bedroom after a cocktail party. In his new book, released Monday, former CIA Director George Tenet has delivered himself of hundreds of pages on the staircase, imagining what he should have said or could have said to Richard Perle, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice and the other neoconservatives who marched the country to war in Iraq using the pretext of Sept. 11. In his April 29 interview with "60 Minutes" touting the book, Tenet came across as a spectacularly tragic Walter Mitty, daydreaming about how things would have been different if only he had spoken up, if he'd only been a James Bond-style spymaster instead of a timid, fawning bureaucrat. But of course, when it really mattered, at the critical juncture of his seven-year tenure as CIA chief, Tenet said nothing.


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Rice: Bush didn't Want War

Condi Rice on Sunday denied allegations by former CIA director George Tenet that Bush came into office determined to have a war against Iraq. This is the interview by Wolf Blitzer of CNN:


QUESTION: Because you remember Paul O'Neill, the first Treasury Secretary, where he wrote in his first book, The Price of Loyalty with Ron Suskind, and what Ron Suskind later wrote in his own book, The One Percent Solution, that the Bush Administration came in with a mindset to deal with what they called unfinished business with Saddam Hussein.

SECRETARY RICE: That is simply not true. The President came in looking at a variety of threats. We then had the September 11th events. The September 11th events led to a kind of reassessment of what the threats were. But in the entire period after the President became President, he was trying to put together an international coalition that could deal with Iraq, first by smart sanctions, smarter no-fly zones, then by challenging Saddam Hussein before the Security Council to meet the just demands of the Security Council, and ultimately by having to use military force. But this was an evolution of policy over a long period of time. Of course the President came in concerned about Iraq. President Clinton had used military force against Iraq in 1998. We had gone to war against Iraq in 1991. But the idea that the President had made up his mind when he came to office that he was going to go to war against Iraq is just flat wrong. '


But here is what Bush's ghost writer Mickey Herskowitz reports Bush saying during an interview when Bush was still governor of Texas in the late 1990s:

' “He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999,” said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. “It was on his mind. He said to me: ‘One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.’ And he said, ‘My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.’ He said, ‘If I have a chance to invade….if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it. I’m going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I’m going to have a successful presidency.” '


So that was 1999.

Then we have this account from May, 2000, by journalist Osama Siblani, who met with Bush in Troy, Michigan when he was campaigning for the Republican nomination:

' OSAMA SIBLANI: I met with the President, and he wanted to go to Iraq to search for weapons of mass destruction, and he considered the regime an imminent and gathering threat against the United States.

AMY GOODMAN: You met with the President of the United States?

OSAMA SIBLANI: Yes, when he was running for election in May of 2000 when he was a governor. He told me just straight to my face, among 12 or maybe 13 republicans at that time here in Michigan at the hotel. I think it was on May 17, 2000, even before he became the nominee for the Republicans. He told me that he was going to take him out, when we talked about Saddam Hussein in Iraq. . .

And then he said, ‘We have to talk about it later.’ But at that time he was not privy to any intelligence, and the democrats had occupied the White House for the previous eight years. So, he was not privy to any intelligence whatsoever. He was not the official nominee of the Republican Party, so he didn't know what kind of situation the weapons of mass destruction was at that time. '


Then let us come to January, 2001, when the Supreme Court had installed Bush in power. Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill wrote in his memoirs of the very first Bush cabinet meeting:

'"The hour almost up, Bush had assignments for everyone ... Rumsfeld and [Joint Chiefs chair Gen. H. Hugh] Shelton, he said, 'should examine our military options.' That included rebuilding the military coalition from the 1991 Gulf War, examining 'how it might look' to use U.S. ground forces in the north and the south of Iraq ... Ten days in, and it was about Iraq."


O'Neill specifically said that Bush instructed Rumsfeld to look at military options and how it might look to use US ground forces in the north and the south of Iraq.

How much clearer could it be that Tenet is absolutely right that there was never any serious debate about the merits of 'taking out Saddam' in Bush's inner circle?

For more evidence that the fix was in with regard to Bush and action against Iraq, see my "The Lies that Led to War" in Salon.com.
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25 Killed in Basra Blast;
Political Crisis in Basra as Governor is Unseated ;
Iran will Attend Sharm El Sheikh Meet



On Sunday evening, militiamen set off a bomb that killed 25 and wounded dozens in the poor Hayaniya district in the southern Shiite port city of Basra. Early reports put suspicion on the Mahdi Army of Muqtada al-Sadr.

Militiamen in Basra killed another British soldier on Sunday, bringing the total military fatalities for the UK in April to 12 and making it the worst month of the war in that regard.

Al-Hayat , writing in Arabic, alleges that on Sunday night, the elected Governing Council of Basra decided to fire provincial governor Muhammad Misbah al-Wa'ili, the leader in that region of the Islamic Virtue Party (Fadhila). The move came in the wake of a campaign waged by the rival Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq against him after the Virtue Party withdrew from the Shiite party coalition, the United Iraqi Alliance. Al-Hayat's sources maintained that British forces escorted al-Wa'ili to the airport, from which he left for parts unknown.

Sawt al-Iraq reports in Arabic that the GC vote of no confidence against al-Wa'ili carried by 27 votes. There are 41 seats on the council. Al-Wa'ili was initially elected by a slim margin of 21 to 20, with the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq having the 20. But the Virtue Party only had 15 seats, and was kept in power by 6 independents that voted with it. Obviously, all six have now defected to SCIRI, along with one Virtue member. The Virtue Party is denying the legitimacy of the vote and insisting that al-Wa'ili remains in office. Its spokesman says that 2/3s of 41 is 28, and that that is the number of votes necessary for a vote of no confidence. He implied that SCIRI is trying to monopolize Basra's oil wealth. All of Iraq's oil exports go through Basra these days, since the Kirkuk pipeline keeps getting hit. Iraq export on the order of 1.6 million barrels a day of petroleum through Basra, with up to 500,000 barrels of that being stolen and smuggled out. Political parties and militias are among the major petroleum smugglers in Basra. This article says that anxiety has seized the people of Basra over the conflict. Since all the parties are armed to the teeth, if there really were a constitutional crisis in the province, it could turn really, really bloody.

There are still over 6,000 British troops in the province, and Prince Harry is being sent there. A recently returned British private spoke out over the weekend, maintaining that "Basra is lost, they are in control now. It's a full-scale riot and the Government are just trying to save face."

Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that a source close to nationalist Shiite cleric says that he has sent representatives to Arab countries "to lay the foundation for a Sunni-Shiite alliance." The source said, "Sadr commissioned Aws al-Khafaji and Ahmad al-Shaybani to make a tour of Arab, regional and Islamic states in order to unite Sunnis and Shiites." He added, "The tour will end in the next few days, and will include meetings with Sunni clergymen in the Islamic world, along with political and Islamic personalities in the regional and Arab environs-- to explain the dimensions of the suspicious efforts to provoke conflict between the sects." (The subtext is that al-Sadr's emissaries will try to convince Sunnis that the US is actually behind the death squads killing Sunnis in places like Baghdad. As much as the US presence in Iraq is disliked by those Muslim states, I don't think many responsible people will buy Muqtada's line. For Sunnis, he has real credibility problems. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia won't even meet with PM Nuri al-Maliki these days.)

Iran may have helped the US capture an al-Qaeda operative, Abdul Hadi al-Iraqi, late last year. If so, the two US raids on Iranian personnel in Iraq in early 2007 were particularly rude.

Kucinich's introduction of articles of impeachment against Dick Cheney, which the corporate media has dismissed as Quixotic, got support from the California Democratic Party meeting in San Diego. The the party called on Congress to investigate misconduct by Bush and Cheney and take all appropriate steps, up to and including impeachment. It also called for a withdrawal from Iraq.

Guerrillas in the refinery town of Baiji kidnapped the drivers of 15 fuel trucks about to set out for al-Anbar province to the west, and then set fire to or stole the trucks. (Al-Zaman says they were stolen).

Reuters reports that:


BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed three people and wounded eight others in the southern Baghdad Zaafaraniya district, police said.

BAGHDAD - At least seven Katyusha rockets landed near a Sunni mosque in the northern Baghdad Adhamiya district, killing two guards and wounding seven others on Saturday, police said.


Edmund Sanders of the LAT gives us a thoughtful, sensitive, informed account of the meaning for Iraqis of the assassination attempt Sunday on beloved broadcaster Amal al-Mudarris. A Shiite from south Iraq whose family suffered at Saddam's hands, she has long been a natural target for the Baathists who have been acting as spoilers in the new Iraq. Gunmen shot her in al-Khadra district of Baghdad as she was leaving her home, wounding her seriously in the head. Aljazeera showed her in her dingy hospital bed, the bandaging on her cheek looking amateurishly applied to me. It brought home how badly the medical facilities have deteriorated. Dozens of journalists have been killed in the course of the Iraq War.

Al-Zaman writing in Arabic says that 1 soldier died and 20 were sickened by poisoning at the Iraqi military camp at Kut. Last October, dozens of soldiers were sickened at the same facility.

The US military says that it captured 4 Shiite extremists who had been part of a network importing explosively formed projectiles into Iraq.

Iran has decided to attend the 2-day conference of foreign ministers of Iraq's neighbors in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt that will begin on Tuesday. Iranian FM Manouchehr Mottaki will lead the delegation. In his interview with Charlie Rose last week, Bush said of the possibility that US Secretary of State Condi Rice and Mottaki would have direct bilateral talks, "They could, they could."

Iraqi National Security adviser Muwaffaq al-Rubaie welcomed Iran's participation. He said, "It's very important for Iraq to get the United States and Iran talking to each other."

Remember all those painted schools that the Administration and its supporters endlessly crowed about? It turns out that 7 of 8 major reconstruction projects in Iraq are in danger of failing.

Indonesia, the world's fourth largest country and the largest Muslim country, called for an immediate US withdrawal from Iraq at the Inter-Parliamentary Union. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono seems to envision a United Nations command succeeding the US forces there. Indonesian Speaker of the House Agung Laksono added, "It is a good momentum for the IPU to urge the United States to leave Iraq immediately, because it is immoral if a sovereign state like Iraq is still controled by Washington."

US Senator Dick Durbin says that the Senate Intelligence Committee received information in 2002 that was the polar opposite of Bush administration public pronouncements on Iraq. He says he remained quiet because the briefings of the Intelligence Committee were classified. Well, that is still true, so why is he talking now? And, I have just two words for the good Senator: Daniel Ellsburg.

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Al-Safi: Al-Maliki Must be PM for All Iraqis

The USG Open Source Center summarizes broadcasts of Friday prayers sermons in Iraq last Friday. Note that a representative of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani upbraided Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki of the Da'wa Party for his tendency to speak mainly of the welfare of the Shiites, urging himm to be prime minister of all Iraqis. In contrast, he praises Adil Abdul Mahdi, the Shiite vice president, who comes from the rival Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq. It is a remarkable and telling rebuke, and I think a sign of Sistani's growing impatience with the narrow concerns of the more sectarian leaders of the United Iraqi Alliance.






Iraqi Friday Sermons for 27 Apr Discuss Security, Political Issues
Iraq -- OSC Summary
Sunday, April 29, 2007

Major Iraqi television channels - Baghdad Al-Iraqiyah, Baghdad Baghdad Satellite Channel, Baghdad Al-Sharqiyah, Baghdad Al-Furat, Cairo Al-Baghdadiyah, and Baghdad Al-Diyar - are observed on 27 April to carry the following reports on Friday sermons: Al-Iraqiyah:

Within its 1700 GMT newscast, Baghdad Al-Iraqiyah Television in Arabic - government-sponsored television station, run by the Iraqi Media Network - carries the following report on today's Friday sermons:

"Shaykh Ahmad al-Safi, representative of Grand Ayatollah Al-Sayyid Ali al-Sistani has warned politicians of using the extremist religious rhetoric. In a Friday sermon at the Al-Husayn Shrine, Al-Sayyid Al-Safi stressed the importance of putting an end to the security deterioration in some of the Diyala areas."

"Al-Safi classified terrorism as two kinds, the external terrorism and the official terrorism, stressing that the latter is more dangerous than the external terrorism, especially since it contains political dimensions that affect Iraq's progress and development."

Al-Safi is then shown saying: "I say that the prime minister should not talk about the right of Shiites only. This is not right, taking into consideration that he is the prime minister of Iraq. He should speak about Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, and all sects. When the vice president travels abroad he speaks about Shiites, Kurds, Sunnis, and all sects. However, anyone who speaks harshly to the point of causing moral destruction to others is not an official."

At a Friday sermon attended by Shiites and Sunnis, Shaykh Ahmad Abd-al-Razzaq, imam and preacher of the Falih Pasha Mosque in Al-Nasiriyah, says: "We want an Arab position that pleases our hearts, removes our tears, and saves our blood." . .

Baghdad Al-Furat Television Channel in Arabic - television channel affiliated with the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) led by Abd-al-Aziz al-Hakim, carries within its 1700 GMT newscast a report on today's Friday sermons, as follows:

Shaykh Muhammad al-Haydari, imam and preacher of Al-Khillani Mosque, says: "There are operations now, but they are not as they should be. Therefore, aid should be extended to some areas and a quick action should be carried out to purge these areas from the takfiris (holding other Muslims to be infidel), terrorists, and Saddamists."

Shaykh Hamid al-Sa'idi, imam and preacher of the Buratha Mosque, says: "I stress to you that there are no peoples in the world who have seen an ordeal like the current one in Iraq. We have been bleeding for four years now. Our houses are being demolished, our nerves are being destroyed, and our sanctities are being attacked. However, we are still continuing the march and we are still ready to make sacrifices in order to achieve our aspirations."

Shaykh Talal al-Sa'di, imam and preacher of Friday sermon at Al-Kazimiyah mosque, says: "We are with the security plan and with every step they make. They are aware of the policy of the Al-Sadr Trend and the Al-Mahdi Army."

The channel carries an episode of its weekly "Friday Sermons" program at 2008 GMT, as follows:

Shaykh Muhammad al-Haydari, imam and preacher of Al-Khillani Mosque, says: "Our people and brothers in the Diyala Governorate have been experiencing an ordeal for a long time. The Al-Anbar Governorate has also experienced an ordeal by the takfiris and the criminal gangs, but, all praise is due to God, thanks to the efforts of its sons and tribes and support from the government and the army and police forces, the people there have managed to liberate many areas in the Al-Anbar Governorate. However, the Diyala Governorate is still suffering major problems."

Al-Haydari stresses the "displacement" issue and highlights the suffering of the displaced citizens. He urges the government to solve the problems of these citizens.

Speaking about the Congress debate on the issue of withdrawal from Iraq, Al-Haydari says: "What counts is the position of the Iraqi people. Certainly, more than 99 percent of the people do not want the occupation."

Shaykh Hamid al-Sa'idi, imam and preacher of the Buratha Mosque, discusses the security situation and the daily "booby-trapped cars" in Iraq. He says: "We pinned great hopes on the Law Enforcement Plan, and the government has made serious efforts in this regard." Assessing this plan, he says: "We can say that it is a plan that has managed to achieve something, but regrettably, it has failed to achieve all the desired objectives. However, the plan can be considered one of the signs of hope."

Iyad al-Zamili, imam and preacher of the Al-Diwaniyah Mosque, says: "The higher religious authority is now worried about what is taking place in Iraq. It calls for a quick action. (Terrorist) elements and groups move in the governorates to foment seditions. There is sedition in a certain governorate every day with the aim of disrupting the situation. This is a part of the conspiratorial plan of destroying the entire political process and all the achievements that have been made over the past period."

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Sunday, April 29, 2007

9 US Troops Killed;
60 Killed, 170 Wounded in Karbala;
Over 60 Bodies Found;
Sadr Admonishes Bush


Iraqi guerrillas killed 9 US GIs on Friday and Saturday. Five of them died in active fighting in al-Anbar Province, which doesn't actually seem to have been turned around yet, unlike what is alleged in some quarters. A truck bomb attack had killed 10 Iraqis in the city of Hit on Friday.

Guerrillas blew up a market near the shrine of Abu al-Fadl Abbas in the holy city of Karbala on Saturday, killing a reported 80 persons and wounding 170. [Figures from Aljazeera early Sunday morning.] The sacred character of Karbala makes this sort of attack especially likely to provoke Shiite-Sunni tensions and violence. Wire services report:


' Television images showed a man running down a smoke-filled street holding a lifeless baby above his head. Smoke was rising off the baby. Ambulances had rushed to the blast scene in Kerbala, 100 km southwest of Baghdad. '


Reuters reports on political violence in Iraq on Saturday, revealing that "the war of the corpses" is heating up around the country. Some 17 bodies were found in the streets of Baghdad, victims of sectarian death squads. In the mixed city of Baqubah, 60 miles northeast of the capital, police found 27 bodies. In the northern Sunni Arab city of Mosul, police found 16 bodies. Other important attacks:

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb hit an Iraqi army patrol, wounding two soldiers in al-Qahira district in northern Baghdad, police said. . .

BAGHDAD - Three mortar rounds landed in al-Resala district in southwestern Baghdad killing three civilians and wounding 10 others, including two children, police said.

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed one civilian and wounded three others in Kadhimiya district in northwestern Baghdad, police said. . .

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a group of day labourers killed one and wounded eight in the Zaafaraniya district in southern Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed five civilians and wounded one when they opened fire on their vehicle in Bayaa district in southwestern Baghdad. . .


Young Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr called on Bush to acquiesce in the desire of the Iraqi people that the US set a timetable for withdrawal of its troops from Iraq.

In Islamic lore the Mahdi or promised one will return at the end of time to restore the world to justice. He will be opposed by an evil one-eyed figure, the Dajjal, which is usually translated the "anti-Christ" by analogy with apocalyptic Christian beliefs. Muqtada called Bush the Dajjal.

Muqtada's letter about Bush was read out in parliament by Liqa' Al-Yasin, female MP from the Sadrist bloc. The Shiite cleric called Bush "a great evil," adding, "Bush ignores all the calls asking for withdrawal or for the setting of a timetable for withdrawal, despite the demonstrations that the Iraqi people staged in Najaf and in every spot around the globe."

Muqtada addressed Bush, claiming that the UN had asked for a US withdrawal (not true). He denied that a US withdrawal would throw Iraq into greater chaos:
"What chaos can be greater from what we face in Iraq, in which blood runs every moment, without let-up . . ?" He asked if Bush had just traded Saddam's dictatorship for one of Shiite-hating Sunnis (nawasib) and excommunicators (takfiris). He asked what had become of Bush's debaathification, since he was now asking that Baathists be reinstated in the government. He taunted Bush for having announced an intention to disarm Iraq, complaining that Bush had filled "our beloved Iraq" with weapons. He asked, "How have you fought sectarianism, when you are reinforcing it by building walls and instituting partitions on a sectarian, political basis-- not on a national, Iraqi, Arab or Islamic basis.

Referring to the Democratic Party's dissent from Bush's policies in Iraq, Muqtada asked, "Do you want us to follow your mistakes and your plan, when you have yourselves turned against it? . . . What kind of democracy is this that you desire? Thousands go out to vote, then you go back to national reconciliation with Baathists and terrorists?

Addressing Bush, he said, "While you once predicted that your picture would hang in Iraqis' homes, now it is under their feet . . . You have destroyed the reputation of the West among Easterners generally." He accused Bush of having US troops put their feet on the necks of Iraqis, and desecrating the Qur'an.

He accused Bush of turning Iraq into an arena of contention. He said, "Bush, you wanted to make America more secure, but you have set it ablaze . . ."

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, speaking to a US congressional delegation, rejected US pressure and said that Washington's interference in domestic Iraqi political affairs was a "red line," the crossing of which he could not accept. The main issue that seems to have exercised him is US pressure on his government to change the "de-Baathification" process and to rehabilitate former Baathists (most of them Sunni Arabs) as public persons who can hold high government posts.

The oil investment law passed by al-Maliki's cabinet is also still getting a hard ride.

The LA Times reports on how security is deteriorating in Basra under the pressure of political and militia rivalries, leading to an increase in attacks on British troops.

Retired Lt. Gen. William Odom called on Bush to sign the bill specifying a US troop withdrawal from Iraq. Money quote:

' "The challenge we face today is not how to win in Iraq; it is how to recover from a strategic mistake: invading Iraq in the first place," he said.

"The president has let [the Iraq war] proceed on automatic pilot, making no corrections in the face of accumulating evidence that his strategy is failing and cannot be rescued. He lets the United States fly further and further into trouble, squandering its influence, money and blood, facilitating the gains of our enemies." '


Hmmm. I don't think Odom can be accused by the Republicans of being unpatriotic. He's not just some civilian politician. He isn't even a Democrat. He's a man of substantial military and intelligence experience. Certainly his credentials to speak on the impact of the war on the US military are impeccable.

In a video posted to the internet, an important al-Qaeda leader complained that the Shiites are not joining in the fight against the US but on the contrary are fighting al-Qaeda alongside the US. An anti-Shiite program is common among radical Salafis in Iraq, but had earlier been questioned by al-Qaeda leaders in the east.

Iraq's deputy prime minister, Barham Salih, will visit Iran in May.

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Qadhafi Predicts US Will Lose in Iraq

The USG Open Source Center has reported on a speech by Libyan leader Moammar al-Qadhafi in which he implicitly compares the US presence in Iraq to the Italian occupation of Libya (1911-1943).

Most Americans do not know about the long decades of European colonial rule of Arab countries, or that modern Arab political identity was formed in the struggle for independence from the West. They therefore tend not to appreciate the natural tendency in the region to see the US role in Iraq as an unwelcome revival of colonial habits.

On the Libyan struggle against Italy, see the Mustafa al-Akkad film, "Lion of the Desert," an Anthony Quinn vehicle about Omar Mukhtar's movement.






Libyan leader says US 'will be defeated in Iraq'
Great Jamahiriyah TV
Saturday, April 28, 2007 T20:11:32Z

Libyan leader says US "will be defeated in Iraq"

At 1752 gmt Libyan TV began relaying live pictures of the Libyan leader giving a speech in Sirte on the 92 anniversary of an historic battle against Italian forces. Standing next to the Libyan leader was the son of Umar al-Mukhtar, the Libyan resistance leader. The speech was held at the gravesite of the "martyrs" of the battle.

The Libyan leader recounted the "heroic" exploits of the Libyans at the battle of Al-Qirdabiyah, in which Italian troops were defeated by the "national resistance".

He dealt in great detail with the history of armed resistance to Italian colonialism, and the crimes of the Italians against the Libyan people. He suggested that the thousands of "disappeared" Libyans during the colonial period were abducted and taken to Italy. He called for DNA testing of all Italians to ascertain who were of Libyan stock.

The Libyan leader went to condemn "traitors" who had helped the Italians in Libya, drawing modern parallels with "traitors" in Iraq. He condemned all forms of aggression and colonialism, considering that even the Muslim invasion of Andalus to be a mistake and a "fruitless venture". He heavily criticized the US for invading Iraq. He said its weapons "were ineffective against people who defend their honour and dignity". He added that the US would realize the futility of using force in Iraq, just as it had done so in Libya. The US he continued, will "regret" invading Iraq, and will withdraw defeated "with its hands over its head".

He also touched upon current relations with Italy, saying that the Italians had "apologized for their crimes", and that contemporary Italian leaders "are what we are looking for". However, he said he would not visit Italy until compensation for the colonial period is fully paid. Only then, he added, would Libya be prepared to sign a treaty of friendship with Italy.

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Saturday, April 28, 2007

Saudi Terror Plot Averted
State Dept.: Terrorism up 30%


Condi Rice wanted to delay the news, but it has broken on two fronts.

Warren Strobel and Jonathan S. Landay of McClatchy report that the annual State Department on terrorism will report a nearly 30% rise over the previous year, most of it accounted for by attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In other words Cheney has it exactly backwards. The US military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is feeding terrorism, not preventing or lessening it. "They" won't follow us home if we leave. But they might if we don't.

As if to put an exclamation point on the State Department report, the Saudis were constrained to arrest some 172 persons involved in al-Qaeda terror cells in the Kingdom, who were planning to hijack planes and fly them into the Saudi oil fields. If they targeted the oil facilities cleverly, the terrorists could have taken 10% of the world petroleum supply off the market, at least for a while.

Saudi Arabia pumps roughly 8.56 million barrels a day of the some 86 million barrels a day of oil that are pumped in the whole world. You take any substantial amount of that off the market even for a month, and it would have a major negative impact on world energy supplies and prices.

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3 Marines Killed
Iraqis Resist Pressure for Benchmarks


Sunni Arab guerrillas killed 3 US Marines in al-Anbar.

Veteran foreign affairs correspondent Trudy Rubin argues that the upcoming Sharm El Sheikh conference of Iraq's neighbors is an opportunity for the Bush administration to enlist the aid of Iraq's neighbors in resolving the crisis. If you don't see the Bushies heavily involved or don't see practical follow-through from Washington, she suggests, then you will know that Bush isn't serious about peace making.

Reuters looks at the evidence that the Iraqi parliament is not going to pass the 4 Bush "benchmarks" by June and explains that this is because the Iraqi MPs have constituents who don't want things like reinstatement of Baathists in government jobs. Reuters further warns that too much US pressure could backfire because Iraqi politicians will reject it.

BBC World Monitoring paraphrases the following from al-Sharqiya Television:


' BBC Monitoring International Reports
April 26, 2007 Thursday

SAUDI SAID TO REJECT IRAQI PM VISIT OVER "BIAS TOWARDS A CERTAIN SECT"

Text of report by Dubai-based Iraqi private Al-Sharqiyah TV on 25 April

[Announcer-read report]

A high-level Saudi diplomatic source has announced that Riyadh did not receive Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, currently on a Gulf tour, because of his negative stands towards some sects in Iraq. The source, who asked to remain anonymous, added that Al-Maliki's bias towards a certain sect in Iraq as well as his negative stands towards other sects were among the reasons that prompted the Saudi leadership not to receive him.

Source: Al-Sharqiyah TV, Dubai, in Arabic 1836 gmt 25 Apr 07

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Iranian Press on Iraq Crisis

The USG Open Source Center gives highlights of the Iranian press on the Iraq crisis:






Highlights: Iranian Media on Iraqi Developments  20-26 April 2007
Iran -- OSC Summary
Friday, April 27, 2007

The following are highlights of Iran-Iraq relations as reported in conservative, reformist, and opposition websites monitored by OSC. Majles Vice Speaker Calls for US Troops to Withdraw from Iraq

(24 April) - - During a meeting with Denmark's Foreign Minister in Tehran, Mohammad Hossein Abu Torabi-fard, the Vice Speaker of the Majles, said that Iran "seeks to soothe violence and insecurities in (Iraq) and assist establishment of security and stability as well as strengthening of the legal government of Iraq, which has ascended to power through public vote and the Constitution." Torabi-fard went on to say that the "occupation of Iraq by alien troops has turned that country into a symbol of violence and unrest and a scene of terrorism and massacre of innocent people," and he called on the "occupiers" to withdraw from Iraq (Tehran Fars News Agency -- conservative news agency sympathetic to traditional clerics). Foreign Ministry Spokesman Condemns Attacks Near Iran's Baghdad Embassy

(24 April) Following two car bomb explosions in a parking lot outside the Iranian embassy in Baghdad, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Mohammad Ali Hoseyni described "the ignorant attitude of occupying troops toward such inhumane actions of terrorists as ambiguous." Hoseyni condemned the terrorist attacks, saying: "Such dastardly moves can disrupt the resolve of the two countries to deepen relations . . . (they) are in line with the same series of explosions which shed the blood of innocent Iraqi people on a daily basis and aim to impair Iraq's stability and security" (Tehran Fars News Agency -- conservative news agency sympathetic to traditional clerics). Ahmadinezhad Urges US Troops to Withdraw from Iraq

(23 April) - - Speaking in an interview with an unidentified Spanish television station, President Ahmadinezhad urged the United States to withdraw its troops from Iraq. "However," he said, they stayed in Iraq for the sake of oil reserves and are now facing problems . . . "For the sake of the Iraqi people, Iran was prepared to help, but the US again did not let us play a role in solving the problem" (Tehran IRNA in English -- official state-run news agency). Mehr Editorial Accuses CIA of Aiding Terrorist Groups in Iraq

(23 April) - - An editorial on the conservative Mehr News Agency's website criticized the US for allegedly "using" the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) to "destabilize Iran"; it was purportedly protected by the US Army at Camp Ashraf in Iraq, which the editorial maintained "makes the US government complicit in the terrorist acts that have been carried out inside Iran." It also accused the US, and the CIA in particular, of using the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK) Jundallah (Gods Brigade) for the same goal, and cited Greg Elich of www.GlobalResearch.ca as saying that "US and Israeli officials are setting up front companies to help finance future covert activities in Iran." The editorial concluded by saying that "An old adage comes to mind when thinking about how the CIA armed and financed Osama bin Laden and the Mujahedin in Afghanistan during the 1980s to undermine the Soviet Union: History repeats itself; the first time is tragedy, the second time is farce" (Tehran Mehr News Agency in English - conservative news agency sympathetic to traditional clerics). Iran Cuts Tariffs on Iraq-bound Goods by Half

(22 April) - - Iran's Ports and Shipping Organization (PSO) announced that in line with the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on maritime cooperation between Iran and Iraq, Iran has reduced the port tariffs and costs for the vessels that transport goods to Iraq by 50 percent. The discount, however, does not include oil tankers or the vessel towing expenses that are normally charged by the private sector directly (Tehran Mehr News Agency in English - conservative news agency sympathetic to traditional clerics). Boroujerdi Calls for Stability in Iraq

(22 April) - - In a meeting with Iraqi provincial officials from the Islamic Party of Diala province, the Head of the Majles Commission for National Security and Foreign Policy, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, called the "systematic massacre of Iraqi people" a "dark page of history"; he said that "the enemies of Iraq have very inhumane plots for the whole region and partitioning Iraq is among them." Boroujerdi went on to say that "Iran advocates the restoration of stability and security in Iraq," adding "Iran would spare no efforts to bring the chaotic situation in Iraq to an end" (Tehran IRNA (Internet Version-WWW) in English -- official state-run news agency). Editorial Calls for Creation of 'Collective Security Arrangement' of Gulf States

(21 April) - - An editorial by Mohammad Reza Nuri-Shahrudi argued that Iran and Saudi Arabia should "stand up to the arrogant policies of the West" and "not allow the common enemy of religion and humanity, whose scurrilous intent these days is to create discrimination and division and fan the flames of religious and sectarian war, to achieve its evil aims." The editorial added that "(t)he enemy in Iraq sees it as in its interests to create discrimination and disunity" and urged that a "collective security arrangement of Persian Gulf states" be established, as recommended by the Supreme Leader. Doing so, the editorial claimed, would "gradually diminish this illegitimate presence in the region" and allow the "strategic Persian Gulf region (to) no longer be witness to the heavy investments which have been imposed from . . . an economic, military, and political point of view" (Tehran Jomhuri-ye Eslami (Internet Version-WWW) in Persian -- Tehran daily insisting on strict adherence to Khomeyni's ideals. Claims to be factionally independent but takes extremely conservative positions). Construction of Security Wall in Baghdad Commentary on Wall Being an 'Outright Partition'

(26 April) -- An unattributed commentary in Jomhuri-ye Eslami opines that the construction of the wall in Al-A`zamiyah is "unprecedented" in history and an "outright partition" of Sunnis and Shi`as by the "occupiers," trying to fuel sectarian tension. Shi`as and Sunnis have gotten along in Iraq, according to the commentary. Together they ousted the British from Iraq, and even during the height of Saddam's rule, there was no division. While Al-Maliki has expressed his opposition to the wall and US forces have said they respect the "wish of the government and the people," they have prevented the Al-A`zamiyah residents from demonstrating against the construction of the wall. In the same way that the British used the Sikhs as a "superior class" for their own ends, the "occupiers" are trying to use the Sunnis (Tehran Jomhuri-ye Eslami in Persian, hardline conservative daily). Al-Maliki States Opposition to Wall (24 April) -- Iraqi Prime Minister Al-Maliki said he has asked the US Army to stop the construction of the wall around Baghdad's Sunni section of Al-A`zamiyah, Resalat reported, citing a Fars News Agency report, which in turn cited Al-Jazirah. The report said US forces started the construction of a four-and-a-half kilometer wall on 10 April, purportedly to end religious strife. According to the report, residents of this section have declared their opposition, adding that the wall will fuel ethnic tension and is only intended to protect the "occupiers." Iraqi MP Muhammad al-Dayini called it an effort to divide Baghdad and turn sections into large prisons. According to Resalat, now that Bush and his policies in Iraq have failed, the neoconservatives are preparing to partition Iraq, weaken the Al-Maliki government and fuel religious-tribal conflict. A 23 April Resalat report suggested that, the US aims to return the Ba`thists to power to gain Arab countries' cooperation ahead of the Sharm al-Shaykh sessions. Al-A`zamiyah Residents Prepare To Demonstrate (24 April) -- The residents of Al-A`zamiyah whose movements are "under strict control by the US Army" because of the construction of the security wall, are preparing to demonstrate against the "occupiers," Keyhan said, citing reports from Cairo where Prime Minister Al-Maliki, in a news conference after meeting with Arab League Secretary General Amr Musa, declaried his opposition to the construction of the wall (Tehran Keyhan in Persian, conservative daily edited by Hoseyn Shari'atmadari, Leader Khamene'i's representative at the Keyhan Institute where it is published).

. Iraqis Oppose Building of Wall (23 April) -- Residents of Baghdad have criticized the construction of the security wall by the US Army, Keyhan reported, citing Iraqi sources. According to the report, one resident said the building of the wall is not going to protect Iraqis, it will increase sectarian friction. The plan is to divide the different sections of the city in order for the US to better protect its own forces. Another city dweller said the wall will add to the difficulties of Iraqis, who are unable to drive even now in this area. According to the report, the residents of the affected Al-A`zamiyah area announced that they would target US forces if the building were to continue. Diplomats Continue To Be Detained

. Iraqi Security Official Says Diplomat Kidnapped on US Instructions (25 April) -- A high ranking Iraqi security official said that Iranian diplomat Jalal Sharafi who was released a month ago, was kidnapped on the orders of US security organizations, Resalat reported, citing Fars News Agency. The source added that Sharafi was released because of the intervention of Iraqis in Al-Maliki's government, such as the National Security Advisor Muwafaq al-Rabi'yi and Treasury Minister Baqir Jabar Sawlagh. According to Resalat, he but had to be hospitalized because of "severe torture" by US agents (Tehran Resalat in Persian, conservative daily owned by the Resalat Foundation; associated with traditional merchants and conservative clerics). Commentary on Detainment of Diplomats

(22 April) -- Commentator Mehdi Mohammadi wrote that the attack on the Iranian Consulate was meant to blame Iran for the US "defeat" in Iraq, but the US has failed to show any proof of Iranian meddling in Iraq. Despite diplomatic efforts and over 100 days of waiting, the Iranian diplomats continue to be detained. Mohammadi added that Iran has a great deal of influence in the Middle East. The US ought to know, he warned, that aside from bargaining, "Iran has other means at its disposal and will use them when needed" (Keyhan in Persian). Arbil Kidnapping Indicative of Collapse of US Reputation (21 April) -- Islamic Coalition Party Secretary General Mohammad Nabi Habibi described the 100-day "illegal detention" of the Iranian diplomats as an "unequivocal enmity" toward Iran, Resalat reported, citing Habibi's conversation with Mehr News Agency. Habibi added that pursuant to "repeated US defeats" in the Middle East and especially Iraq, US has resorted to such acts in order "to salvage its reputation" (Resalat in Persian) Iraq Security Meeting in Sharm al-Shaykh

. Reza'i Urges Iran to Participate in Sharm al-Shaykh Conference (25 April) - - On the sidelines of a conference entitled "Persian Gulf, the Symbol of Convergence of Regional Islamic Countries," Dr Mohsen Reza'i, the Chairman of the Expediency Council, answered a question by a Mehr correspondent about whether Iran would participate in the upcoming Sharm al-Shaykh conference on Iraq, saying: "I believe that Iran should take advantage of this opportunity and defend its position and influence in the region while preserving its interests and dignity. While conferences such as Sharm al-Shaykh and Riyadh are being held with special purposes, inter alia, to weaken Iran's role in Iraq and the region, we should not become too sentimental and should powerfully and shrewdly take part in the conference" (Tehran Mehr News Agency in English - conservative news agency sympathetic to traditional clerics).

. Zebari: Success of Sharm al-Shaykh Contingent on Iranian Participation (24) -- Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said the aim of his visit to Tehran is to ask Iranian officials to participate in the Sharm al-Shaykh meetings, Mehr News Agency reported, citing Al-Ahram newspaper. Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Seyyed Mohammad Ali Hoseyni had said Iran's problem with the Sharm al-Shaykh meetings is its "venue and content" (Tehran Mehr News Agency in Persian - conservative news agency sympathetic to traditional clerics).

. Elham: Iran to 'Facilitate' Meeting with Iraq's Neighbors (24 April) - - Government spokesman Gholam Hoseyn Elham said that Iran would "attempt to facilitate the next meeting of Iraq's neighboring countries," a reference to the upcoming conference in Sharm al-Shaykh, Egypt. Elham went on to state that "Given the high significance of Iraq to us and our intention to strengthen the Iraqi government, attempts toward withdrawal of foreign troops from the country and establishment of a popular and legal government are underway" (I assume the quotation ends here) (Tehran IRNA in English -- official state-run news agency). Mottaki on Iraqi Security Meeting

(21 April) -- Regarding Iranian participation in the Iraqi security meeting in Sharm-al Shaykh, Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki said in an exclusive interview with Keyhan 's Gholamreza Taki that even before the first Iraqi meeting in Baghdad, Turkey had expressed interest in hosting the 2 nd meeting and Iran and Syria had agreed to it. It was also decided that should the 2 nd conference not take place in Baghdad, the Iraqi government with the consultation of its neighbors would announce the place. Unfortunately, Mottaki complained, the neighbors were not consulted. Regional or international meetings should not decide the fate of Iraq and its people, he added. In the last few years, he said, Iraq's neighbors incorporated assistance to Iraq and Iraqis in their own developmental plans, but the meetings in Sharm al-Shaykh "sideline the role of Iraq's neighbors." Commentary on Egyptian Venue on Iraqi Security (21 April) -- Commentator Mohammad Bustani's said Egypt is "unsuitable" as the venue for the conference on Iraqi security as Egyptians have lost their former position in the Arab world because of their cooperation with the US. Furthermore, he claimed the US is trying to establish security in Iraq only on the surface but has given the terrorists a free hand. Bustani added that the US and the Ba`thists, who aim to "defeat" the Baghdad Security Plan, forced al-Maliki to bring into the Iraqi Cabinet Ba`thist figures "acceptable" to Washington (Resalat in Persian). '

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Friday, April 27, 2007

Iraq Criticizes Senate Vote;
72 Killed in Violence


An Iraq government spokesman has criticized the Senate vote for a withdrawal of troops from Iraq. (I was going to complain about Iraqi interference in US domestic politics. Then I thought, well, it is only fair that they return the favor.)

All 8 Democratic presidential contenders support a rapid withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.

Former CIA director George Tenet's memoirs contain slams at Vice President Cheney for rushing the country to war with questionable assertions.

Junior officers in the US military are beginning to speak out against the top brass and the mistakes the latter have made in Iraq. Lt. Col. Paul Yingling warns that the US faces the possibility of losing in Iraq.

Guerrilla violence killed about 72 Iraqis on Thursday.

Reuters reports political violence in Iraq on Thursday:
Police found 26 bodies in Baghad. Police found 3 bodies in Kirkuk. In Baghdad, guerrillas used a car bomb to kill at lease 6 and wound 15 in a district near Baghdad University.

Iran is playing hard to get and is still not sure it will attend the Sharm El Sheikh conference on Iraq to be held in early May. Washington had envisaged a conversation there between Secretary of State Condi Rice and the Iranian delegation.

With Blair going out, Labour Party politicians are ordering a rethinking of the UK's commitment to having troops in Iraq.

The USG Open Source Center paraphrases items from the Iraqi Press for April 26:


' Al-Bayyinah runs on the front page a 70-word report citing Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Political Advisor Sadiq al-Rikabi confirming that Al-Maliki will independently nominate the candidates for the vacant ministerial posts and reject the demands of political blocs regarding the upcoming cabinet reshuffle.

Al-Bayyinah carries on the front page a 100-word exclusive report confirming that a seminar will be held in Baghdad University on 28 April to discuss the proposed Oil and Gas Bill. The report adds that parliament member Haydar al-Abadi, former Planning Minister Mahdi al-Hafiz and other Iraqi experts will attend the seminar.

Al-Bayyinah publishes on the front page a 500-word editorial praising late Shaykh Usamah al-Karbuli, Abd-al-Sattar Abu-Rishah and other Al-Anbar tribal chiefs for maintaining the unity of Iraqis and confronting the Al-Qa'ida Organization and other Takfiris in the governorate. . .

Al-Bayyinah carries on the front page a 600-word exclusive report citing sources close to the Association of Muslim Scholars confirming that the Jordanian Intelligence Agency has notified Association Chairman Harith al-Dari to stop his political activities against the Iraqi Government on the Jordanian territories. . .

Al-Zaman runs on page 3 a 300-word report entitled "Al-Fadilah Party Criticizes Government for Keeping Silent About Threats Against Basra Governor." . .

Al-Zaman publishes on page 4 a 550-word report entitled "Salah al-Din Tribal Chiefs Demand Activation of National Reconciliation Project; Al-Shakti: Force Alone Will Not Restore Security, Constitution Should Be Amended." . .

Al-Zaman publishes on page 4 a 200-word report entitled "Iraqi Al-Tawafuq Front Proposes To Postpone Voting on Gas and Oil Bill Until After Amendment of Constitution." . .

Al-Mu'tamar runs on the front page an 80-word report saying that Al-Fadhila Islamic Party has demanded that parliament establish a neutral committee to investigate the situation in Basra. (OSC plans no further processing)

Al-Mu'tamar runs on the front page a 220-word report citing President Jalal Talabani demanding that the sectarian dispute in Tal Afar is contained. . .

Al-Mu'tamar runs on the front page a 40-word report saying that the Iraqi al-Tawqfuq Front withdrew from parliament yesterday to protest the national security law, which they described as illegal. . .

Al-Zaman carries on the front page a 240-word report citing a high-ranking police officer, who requested anonymity, confirming that joint Iraqi-US forces are imposing tight siege around Al-Tahrir District of Ba'qubah to search for Iraqi Islamic State Chairman Abu-Umar al-Baghdadi. . .

Al-Sabah carries on page 4 a 75-word report citing a security source in Wasit denying that Iranian forces have occupied a border police station in Al-Kut. . .

Al-Sabah carries on the front page a 140-word report citing eyewitnesses coming from Maysan saying that the security situation in the governorate is deteriorating, especially assassinations against women. . .

Al-Mada runs on the front page a 120-word report saying that, in the first day of utilizing the technical equipment and explosive sonar, three car bombers and an improvised explosive device were detected. . .

Al-Mada runs on the front page a 110-word report on an Al-Qa'ida operative who recruits 12-year-old children to commit acts of suicide. . .

Al-Manarah runs on page 4 a 200-word report entitled "Basra Teachers Union Declares Open Strike in All Schools in Governorate."

Al-Manarah devotes all of page 5 to a report on the expanded symposium organized by the Civil Society Center in Central and Southern Governorates to discuss the proposed Freedom of Journalism in Iraq Bill.

Al-Bayyinah publishes on page 2 a 200-word report on the demonstration staged by the Passengers Transportation State Company's workers demanding salary increase. . . '

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Thursday, April 26, 2007

Riverbend join Ranks of Refugees from Iraq

Prominent Iraqi blogger Riverbend and her family are at last leaving Iraq. The discussions she reports have happened thousands of times a month among Iraqi families:


Since last summer, we had been discussing it more and more. It was only a matter of time before what began as a suggestion- a last case scenario- soon took on solidity and developed into a plan. For the last couple of months, it has only been a matter of logistics. Plane or car? Jordan or Syria? Will we all leave together as a family? Or will it be only my brother and I at first?

After Jordan or Syria- where then? Obviously, either of those countries is going to be a transit to something else. They are both overflowing with Iraqi refugees, and every single Iraqi living in either country is complaining of the fact that work is difficult to come by, and getting a residency is even more difficult. There is also the little problem of being turned back at the border. Thousands of Iraqis aren't being let into Syria or Jordan- and there are no definite criteria for entry, the decision is based on the whim of the border patrol guard checking your passport.

An airplane isn't necessarily safer, as the trip to Baghdad International Airport is in itself risky and travelers are just as likely to be refused permission to enter the country (Syria and Jordan) if they arrive by airplane. And if you're wondering why Syria or Jordan, because they are the only two countries that will let Iraqis in without a visa. Following up visa issues with the few functioning embassies or consulates in Baghdad is next to impossible.

So we've been busy. Busy trying to decide what part of our lives to leave behind. Which memories are dispensable? We, like many Iraqis, are not the classic refugees- the ones with only the clothes on their backs and no choice. We are choosing to leave because the other option is simply a continuation of what has been one long nightmare- stay and wait and try to survive.

On the one hand, I know that leaving the country and starting a new life somewhere else- as yet unknown- is such a huge thing that it should dwarf every trivial concern. The funny thing is that it’s the trivial that seems to occupy our lives. We discuss whether to take photo albums or leave them behind. Can I bring along a stuffed animal I've had since the age of four? Is there room for E.'s guitar? What clothes do we take? Summer clothes? The winter clothes too? What about my books? What about the CDs, the baby pictures?

The problem is that we don't even know if we'll ever see this stuff again. We don't know if whatever we leave, including the house, will be available when and if we come back. There are moments when the injustice of having to leave your country, simply because an imbecile got it into his head to invade it, is overwhelming. It is unfair that in order to survive and live normally, we have to leave our home and what remains of family and friends… And to what?

It's difficult to decide which is more frightening- car bombs and militias, or having to leave everything you know and love, to some unspecified place for a future where nothing is certain.


Only a few fleeing Iraqis have been admitted to the United States, which is a travesty.

Worse, Iraqis who want to come to the US as refugees seeking asylum often face a catch-22 of being defined as terrorists because they have been victimized. For instance, if a family had a member kidnapped, and payed ransom, and then fled to Jordan and applied to come to the US, their having paid the ransom would be considered a form of material support to terrorism and they would be excluded!

In the past 14 months, 750,000 Iraqis have been forced to flee their homes. And the US media lets politicians get away with saying that things are "improving"!

See Dahr Jamail on the Iraqi refugee crisis in Jordan and Syria.

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Iraq Casualty Numbers Doctored
Attacks Near Mosul, Khalis
Sadr Condemns Wall


Since the Bush administration doesn't actually have any good news on Iraq, they are just making it up. It confirms your worst suspicions. They haven't been counting victims of car bombings when they say that violence is down in Iraq! Bush administration spokesmen and officials are just saying that fewer bodies are found in the streets, victims of death squads. But the number of victims of car bombing has actually increased in this period.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi government is withholding statistics on Iraqi casualties from the United Nations.

It is official: The real parts of the Iraq War are being treated as imaginary, and the imaginary parts are being treated as though they are real.

Early Thursday morning in Iraq, guerrillas in Khalis attacked Iraqi troops, killing 9 and wounding 15, 10 of them soldiers.

In Zumar, west of Mosul, guerrillas attacked the local HQ of Massoud Barzani's Kurdistan Democratic National Party.

Police found 18 bodies in the streets of Baghdad on Wednesday.

Nationalist young Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Wednesday condemned the US plans to build a wall around the Adhamiya district of Baghdad, calling it "evil" and warning it would reinforce sectarianism. Al-Sadr has a pan-Islamic rhetoric, but at night his Mahdi Army goons murder Sunni Arabs in the street. It remains to be seen if he is capable of reining in his goons and actually put together an anti-Coalition alliance of both Shiites and Sunnis.

The House of Representative passed a budget supplemental containing a timetable for withdrawal of US troops, in defiance of Bush, who says he will veto it. The LAT points out that far from being unpopular with constituents back home, the Dems have gotten a lot of support from voters for trying to rescue our trapped troops from the quagmire.

The House of Representatives' Oversight and Government Reform Committee has subpoened Condi Rice with regard to the alledged nuclear weapons program and purchase of yellowcake from Niger.

Speaking of accountability, Dennis Kucinich has introduced articles of impeachement against VP Richard Bruce Cheney.

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Dadullah Claim on UBL "Unreliable"

The USG Open Source Center has translated the transcript of a Pakistani television interview program that casts doubt on the claim by Mulla Dadullah that Usamah Bin Laden planned out the attack on Bagram, and is also behind the guerrillas in Iraq.






Taliban Commander Claim on UBL
Geo News TV
Thursday, April 26, 2007

Program: "Today With Kamran Khan"

Karachi Geo News television in Urdu at 1800 GMT on 25 April relays live from its Karachi studio regularly scheduled "Today with Kamran Khan" program. Noted Pakistan journalist Kamran Khan reviews, discusses, and analyzes major day-to-day developments with government ministers and officials, opposition leaders and noted analysts . . .

Segment V

Kamran Khan says the "most reliable" Taliban Commander Mulla Dadullah has made a "startling revelation" in an Al-Jazeera TV interview that the suicide attack at the Bagram airbase in Afghanistan targeted US Vice President Dick Cheney and it was "planned and supervised by Usama Bin Ladin himself." Khan says this is for the first time in last few years that the report has come about Usama Bin Ladin's operational activity from a "credible source" as Mullah Dadullah is considered close to Al-Qa'ida and he is the top most commander of Taliban.

Kamran Khan establishes telephonic contact in Peshawar with Rahimullah Yusufzai, prominent Afghan affairs analyst, and asks him how "//credible//" is Mulla Dadullah's claim. Yusufzai says when the Bagram suicide attack took place, a Taliban spokesman had then claimed that "the Taliban have carried out the suicide attack." Yusufzai adds that the Taliban at that time did not say that the attack was carried out by Al-Qa'ida or supervised by Usama Bin Ladin. Yusufzai says the attack took place about 2 months ago and Dadullah's claim has come after a long period. Yusufzai thinks that if the attack was supervised by Usama Bin Ladin, he would have claimed it "right away" because it was a big success that the Bagram airbase was attacked, which caused a "big //embarrassment//" to the United States. Continuing, Yusufzai says Dadullah himself has now become a "controversial" figure among the Taliban ranks because of his recent activities, including "beheading" people. Yusufzai says so it is not right to describe Dadullah as "credible" and "important" Taliban leader. Yusufzai believes that Dadullah has made the claim under a "//strategy//" to "//mislead//" the United States and the NATO. Yusufzai thinks that Usama Bin Ladin is "alive, but non-functional and it is not possible for him to plan or supervise Al-Qa'ida activities." Yusufzai says according to his information, Al-Qa'ida does not have enough volunteers and cadres that it could plan attacks like one on Bagram airbase. Yusufzai adds that most of the suicide attacks in Afghanistan are being carried out by Taliban.

(Description of Source: Karachi Geo News TV in Urdu -- 24-hour satellite news TV channel owned by Pakistan's Jang publishing group).

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Wednesday, April 25, 2007

McCaffrey: Iraq Gov't Dysfunctional
Support for al-Maliki Eroding


Now that Senator John McCain has retired the Straight Talk Express, retired general Barry McCaffrey, a veteran of the Gulf War, has taken up the mantle. McCaffrey has recently carried out a study of the situation in Iraq. Highlights (not in original order):


"We’re in trouble."

"The Iraqi government in power is dysfunctional."

"There is essentially no province in Iraq where the central government holds sway."

"Iraq’s neighbors are bearing no good will toward a favorable outcome in Iraq."

" . . . collectively the American people have said that the conduct of the war has been so incompetent that we’ve come to disbelieve the administration has the ability to carry this off."

"The next president, unless the situation in Iraq is dramatically turned around, is pulling the plug."


Gee, I guess Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are in pretty good company after all. It is Dick Cheney who is living in fantasyland.

In contrast, it seems clear that former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld routinely sent spokesmen out to lie to us about cases like that of Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman. Lynch says she was no Rambo, and that Tillman was killed by 'friendly fire' was covered up.

USA Today reports that support for the al-Maliki government in parliament is eroding. He hasn't been able to push key legislation through parliament, and appears indecisive. (I think the problems are structural, not inherent in al-Maliki's personality. He seems pretty decisive to me. But he heads what is essentially a minority government, since his United Iraqi Alliance only has about 85 members in the 275-member parliament after recent defections. He can only survive by depending heavily on the Kurdistan Alliance, a bloc deeply committed to a weak federal government. He doesn't have much of an army of his own, and cannot independently do much about the guerrilla war. It is not clear who could do better.

Kim Gamel of AP writes about the new "dump truck bomb" tactics of the Sunni Arab guerrillas in Iraq.

The LA Times reports a major split in the Iraqi Baath Party. The Baath is more important as a component of the guerrilla war than is usually admitted by the US press and by the Bush administration. Al-Hayat reported this winter that actually the Baath has split into 4 parties, with Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri leading the most influential one.

The US is pursuing indirect diplomacy with Iran on a range of issues now, Warren Strobel and Nancy Youssef report.

Reuters reports political violence in Iraq for Monday.

Regional players don't want the US to depart Iraq.

Tomdispatch considers the Virginia Tech murder spree in a global context, with former State Department official John Brown writing on 'the Cho in the White House.'

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Iraqi Press on Baghdad Wall

The USG Open Source Center paraphrases Iraqi press stories on the plan to build a wall around the district of Adhamiya (A'zamiyah) in Baghdad:






Iraqi Media Highlights Al-A'zamiyah Wall Construction Story, Cites Reactions
Iraq -- OSC Report
Tuesday, April 24, 2007 T14:13:33Z

Iraqi media has increasinlgy highlighted reaction to the construction of Al-A'zamiyah wall and the positions of key players in Iraq as well as citizens of Baghdad. According to Iraqi reports, US troops began building the wall around the predominately Sunni district of Al-A'zamiyah in Baghdad. The wall, which is comprised of reinforced concrete blocks, each of which weighs more than six tons, will be 5.4 km long. The general tone of Iraqi reporting is negative and critical, with some outlets media outlets comparing it to the Berlin Wall and the containment wall first implemented by Israel's former Prime Minister Aiel Sharon, while others opine that it is a sign of a failed US policy to curb sectarian violence in the city. Click here to view a map of the district of Al-A'zamiyah in Baghdad.

Wall of Al-A'zamiyah

Baghdad Al-Sharqiyah Television in Arabic -- Independent, private news and entertainment channel focusing on Iraq, run by Sa'd al-Bazzaz, publisher of the Arabic-language daily Al-Zaman leads its 1300 GMT newscast on 23 April with a report on "a huge demonstration staged in Al-A'zamiyah City to protest the establishment of the wall which the Iraqi security agencies in cooperation with the US forces have started to erect on 10 April to isolate the city." The report notes that the demonstrators carried banners calling for removing "the concrete blocs and barbwire which they said have turned the area into to a big prison."

Demo in Al-A'zamiyah

On the official Iraqi position on this development, Al-Sharqiyah notes "conflicting statements by Iraqi security officials in charge of the security plan with respect to their knowledge of the construction of the construction of this wall. Staff Lieutenant General Abbud Qanbar, commander of the Law Enforcement Plan, denied the existence of this wall. However, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki confirmed that it does exist. Proof of this is that he requested in a news conference with the Arab League Secretary General Amr Musa halting construction of this wall."

Admiral Fox in News conference

The station also cites Admiral Mark Fox, head of the strategic communications brigade of the multinational forces, as saying that "the Iraqi and US forces are working together in Baghdad to establish security, noting that the decision to build the wall was endorsed by the Iraqi Government before the implementation of the project."

After devoting the first nine-minutes of its newscast to the wall issue, the station moves to report on another development by starting its second story with the following sentence:" From Al-A'zamiyah wall to the walls of the Green Zone which are breached sometimes."

Within its Harvest news program, the station at 1808 GMT carries a report citing reactions of several Iraqi politicians. The report notes that "Mahmud Uthman, member of the Kurdistan Alliance, said that the construction of the wall around Al-A'zamiyah area constitutes the height of failure, a bad and shameful step, and a violation of human rights. He stressed that this is a clear proof of the failure of the US and Iraqi governmental policy vis-a-vis preserving security, noting that this step means reaching the end of the road."

For his part, Iyad al-Samarra'i, deputy for the Islamic Party, said that building the wall under the excuse of providing security protection is not enough to a take measure that segregates areas.
For his part, Nassar al-Rubay'i, head of Al-Sadr Bloc in the Iraqi Council of Representatives, said that the wall is a first step towards building more than the Berlin Wall in Iraq. However, Deputy Jalal al-Din al-Saghir said that the idea of building the wall includes positive and negative aspects, adding that the idea is useful in terms of preventing interference in the affairs of Al-A'zamiyah. The negative aspect is infringing on human rights not to mention the consequences of building the wall.
Izzat al-Shahbandar, deputy for the Iraqi list headed by former Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, said that the operation proves the inability of the Iraqi authorities and the occupation forces to devise effective and acceptable means to defend people."

Baghdad Al-Iraqiyah Television in Arabic -- government-sponsored television station, run by the Iraqi Media Network, makes no mention of the development concerning Al-A'zamiyah wall during its 1400 GMT newscast on 23 April. At 1421 GMT, the station carries a recording of the news conference by Brigadier General Qasim Ata, spokesman for the Law Enforcement Plan; and Mark Fox. In the news conference, Ata speaks about the security barriers set up in Baghdad by saying:" I confirm that the security barriers set up in all areas and those proposed to be set up in other areas are temporary security barriers aimed at securing the citizens." He adds that "some brother politicians referred to the barriers as sectarian barriers and others likened them to the China Wall and others likened them to the Berlin Wall." He maintains that "this issue has been blown out of proportion. Why is this focus on Al-A'zamiyah area and why did not the media focus on other areas?" He asks why has not there been focus on barriers built elsewhere by these people "who try to trigger sectarian sedition."

Within its 1400 GMT newscast on 23 April, Baghdad Al-Furat Television Channel in Arabic -- Television channel affiliated with the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) led by Abd-al-Aziz al-Hakim, reports that " Brigadier General Qasim Atta, Law Enforcement Plan spokesman, strongly criticized the role of media in exaggerating the issue of the security barriers which are set up in Baghdad's streets as part of the Law Enforcement Plan." This is followed by a video report which features excerpts of the said news conference. The reporter maintains that "using explosives detectors and surrounding hot areas with barriers are measures which the security services abide by in order to reach the planned level of stability in Baghdad and other areas."

Cairo Al-Rafidayn Satellite Channel in Arabic -- Pro-Sunni, anti-US Iraqi channel believed to be affiliated with the Association of Muslim Scholars, carries as the second news item in its 1200 GMT newscast on 23 April a report on Al-A'zmaiyah wall which starts as follows:" Iraqis have welcomed the decision to halt continuing the construction of Al-A'zamiyah wall with much comfort especially since simil ar walls had only bad impacts on their peoples in the world. For his part, US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker justified the occupation's construction of the wall as an attempt to preserve the city's security." This is followed by a video report on this development noting that "Iraqis received Al-Maliki's statements voiced in Cairo on Al-A'zamiyah wall with comfort especially since Al-Maliki's backtracking means that the decision to build the wall which separates between Iraqis, who have coexisted throughout years peacefully and without resorting to this segregation among their sects, is incorrect."

The report also sounds out the opinion of Iraqis on the construction of the wall.

One Iraqi citizen says:" The prime minister's decision to halt construction of the wall is positive."

A second citizen says: "This is a correct decision by the Prime Ministry represented by the Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki because this is something that might split the people and cause segregation among the components of the people." The reporter notes in the report that "for its part, the US occupation dealt with Al-Maliki's call for halting the construction of the wall cautiously, expressing resumption of dialogue on the construction of the wall which it claims preserves security in Al-A'zamiyah in an attempt to divide Iraqis."

At 1207 GMT, the station holds a telephone interview with Yasir Majid, political writer and analyst, in Baghdad. He argues that "an initial examination of the pertinent statements indicate contradictions and that there are multiple decision-makers, and the unavailability of the least degree of coordination or agreement between the occupation forces and Al-Maliki's government."

Cairo Al-Baghdadiyah Satellite Television in Arabic -- Private Iraqi television known for its opposition to the US presence in Iraq, reports within its 1400 GMT newscast on 23 April on the protest staged by Al-A'zamiyah's residents against con struction of the wall as well as Al-Maliki's statements in Cairo calling for halting construction of the wall. Afterwards, the station features excerpts of the news conference by Qasim Ata showing him as saying that "some media outlets reported that the security forces will build a 12-meter high and five-kilometer long segregation wall in Al-A'zamiyah area. Such reports are inaccurate. As I said, we will set up security barriers which will either be in the form of concrete blocs, barbwire, or sand barricades not only in Al-A'zamiyah area but in all areas suffering from the terrorist and takfiri operations."
Aside from Iraqi media, key players in Iraq have also declared a position on the construction of the wall.

In a statement posted to its website, The Association of Muslim Scholars condemned the construction of the wall. The AMS stated that "Following in the steps of chief criminal Sharon, the other chief criminal Bush now seeks to build sectarian separation concrete walls after the failure of all his plans to eradicate resistance, break the will of the people, and entrench sectarianism among the people's segments.

This ugly crime shows the failure of the security plans of the occupation troops and the current government. Second, it demonstrates that these two sides have reached a hysterical stage. These troops, whose madness has led them to annihilating around one million Iraqis, today seek to impose collective punishment against those who reject their illegitimate presence. In doing so, they followed the example of abhorrent Sharon."

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Tuesday, April 24, 2007

10 Coalition Troops Killed
Dems set Withdrawal deadline
Iraqi crowds Reject Security Wall


It was with a heavy heart that I read that 10 Coalition troops were killed on Monday, 9 of them Americans. The guerrillas who attacked the US outpost also wounded 20 other soldiers, 5 of them seriously.

Militiamen in Basra killed a British soldier.

I'm sad about all this because we won't have round the clock cable television coverage of them, or lower the flag to half mast for them. And although we do not yet know the names of those killed, we know who they are like.

They are like Christopher North of Sarasota, Fl., a hero who aspired to be an FBI agent and who as a teenaged boy loved fast cars and motorcycles.

They are like Wade Oglesby, a painfully shy teenager with a "British sense of humor," an "incredibly nurturing" young man who dropped out of high school to care for his ailing mother and then his sister. When his mother died, he joined the army. His stepbrother said of him, "That kid would bend over backwards and go to the ends of the earth if you needed anything."

They are like Michael Rojas, and Army Staff Sgt. Jesse Williams, of Santa Rosa, "who died on April 8. Williams was killed by a sniper's bullet . . . Williams was 25 years old and on his second tour of duty. He leaves behind a wife, Sonya, and an 11-month-old daughter, Amaya. His wife said Amaya was the pride of his life." Scroll down for the Williams family photos.

They are like Michael Slater, just out of high school in West Virginia, who had all along wanted to join the army to serve us. We are told, "Rachelle Atkins graduated with Slater and described him as energetic, funny and happy. In high school, they worked together at the Red Line Diner in St. Albans, where he was a busboy. “He was really fast,” Atkins said. “I never had to worry about tables needing cleaning because he was always on top of things.”

They were like Kristen Turton, whose mother said of him, "If either of us were ill, he would look after us. I would always get flowers on Mother's Day and we would get lovely presents for birthdays and Christmas. "He was our life and our sunshine. Now he has gone, the sunshine has gone out of our lives."

Saddam is gone. There was never any threat to the US or UK from Iraq, and there is not now one. What is the mission, for which these young people have given their lives this spring? What do we tell their children about why their daddy is no longer there for them? Is it just Karl Rove's best guess about what will win the next election? Better business for Dick Cheney's golf buddies among the Big Oil CEOs? George W. Bush's cokehead emotional shallowness and inability to admit he ever made a mistake? What?

We ask our men and women in uniform to risk their lives, sometimes to sacrifice them, for the security of our nation. But the security of our nation is not in doubt. We ask defense attorneys to defend someone who might be guilty, and prosecuting attorneys to attempt to convict someone who might be innocent, since justice requires a fair trial, and guilt and innocence are seldom clear. In the same way, we sometimes send our military into a war, the justice of which is not clear. They have done their job, the job the American and British publics gave them, uncomplainingly. But if the prosecuting attorney suddenly finds evidence that the defendent is innocent, he has to drop the charges. Iraq is innocent. It isn't a threat to the US. It may now be a threat to itself or its region, because of the civil war. But it and its region will just have to deal with that. And they will deal with it better if we don't keep getting in their way.

That is why the Democratic majority in the House and Senate agreed on a date by which they want US troops out of Iraq. Because enough sunshine has gone out of our lives, enough children are without a parent, enough lives have been blighted, for a mission that no one has been able to define with any clarity.

Monday began with an attempt by the US military to forestall a demonstration in the Sunni Arab district of Adhamiya in northeast Baghdad. The attempt failed, when many hundreds (looked like well over a thousand to me on Arab satellite television) residents nevertheless marched in the streets to protest the building of a wall around their neighborhood as part of the security plan.

There was a great deal of uncertainty Monday about whether the wall building around Adhamiya would be halted. Some local Iraqis likened and its effect to what the Israelis have done in the West Bank, making everyone's life miserable because it is so hard to move around through crowded or mysteriously inactive checkpoints. An Iraqi general insisted that the building works would continue. US Ambassador in Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, affirmed that the US would respect the wishes of the Iraqi government in this regard.

Reuters reports political violence in Iraq on Monday. Among the major incidents:


RAMADI - Three suicide car bombers killed 20 people and wounded 35 others in the Iraqi insurgent stronghold of Ramadi . . .

BAQUBA - A suicide car bomber attacked a gathering of senior police officials in the city of Baquba, killing 10 policemen and wounding 23 . . .

NEAR MOSUL - At least 10 people were killed and 20 wounded when a suicide car bomber rammed his vehicle into the office of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan (PDK) . . .

BAGHDAD - Six people were killed and 14 wounded when a suicide bomber blew up in a restaurant near the entrance to the heavily fortified Green Zone . . .

BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed one person and wounded four others in a parking lot across the road from the Iranian embassy in Baghdad . . .'


My opinion piece on Muqtada al-Sadr and his recent political moves,
"As premier loses stature, radical cleric is gaining it," is available at the "San Jose Mercury News."

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Monday, April 23, 2007

69 Dead in Bombings, Shootings;
Al-Maliki Stops Wall-building at Adhamiya


Reuters reports that a lot of wounded vets from the Iraq War are having to turn to private care. A chilling passage: "Of the nearly 24,000 wounded soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, about a third suffer from some degree of traumatic brain injury, or TBI, according to the General Accounting Office."

What? A third have brain injuries! That's 8,000 persons!

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki asked Sunday that the US military halt its construction of a security wall around the Sunni Arab district of Adhamiya. Al-Maliki spoke from Cairo where he is meeting with foreign ministers of Iraq's neighbors.

The mainstream US media will sidestep this point, but al-Maliki pretty explicitly said that the reason he called off the wall building is that he doesn't want his government compared to that of Israel. That is, the Adhamiya wall is being likened in the Arab world to the Apartheid Wall being built by the Israelis in the West Bank. Al-Maliki made the statement in Cairo, and when he referred to the "other walls" he didn't want the one in Adhamiya compared to, he pointed toward Israel. The Western press is bringing up the Berlin Wall as part of his meaning, but the videotape makes it absolutely clear that his referent was Israel's project. On the other hand, Nassar al-Rubaie, a Sadrist member of the Iraqi parliament, did warn that the US is building a series of Berlin Walls in Baghdad.

The politics of the wall points to the ways in which the Israeli-Palestinian issue is absolutely central to the difficulties the United States is having in being accepted in Iraq. Many Iraqis perceive the US presence as just an extension of Israeli occupation of Arabs and Arab land, and routinely refer to US troops as "the Jews."

The Israeli government has grossly mistreated the Palestinian people, the current condition of which is grave. The wall the Israelis are building is built on Palestinian land and has stolen more land from Palestinians and has in some instances run through Palestinian villages, cutting them in two and separating families. The Apartheid Wall has provoked demonstrations.

So being a foreign military force in an Arab country and looking like they are building security walls similar to that of the Israelis just puts the US and its ally, al-Maliki, in a very difficult position.

Not to mention that walling people up is intrinsically unappealing as a governing strategy. Mahmud Osman, a member of parliament in the Kurdistan Alliance and a former member of Paul Bremer's Interim Governing Council, told al-Zaman that the Adhamiya wall is "the peak of failure" for the new security plan and "a violation of human rights." He added that the wall "is a clear sign of the failure of the American and government policy for safeguarding security." Other MPs complained that the policy would create and reinforce sectarian divisions in the capital.

The US military had planned to build 5 such walls around Sunni Arab districts in Baghdad. It is not now clear if any will be built. Another corner of this story is the unpredictability of the political environment for the US military. It is inconceivable that al-Maliki did not earlier sign off on the Adhamiya wall, but then he changed his mind. The US officer corps in Iraq must be fit to be tied.

Some 69 Iraqis were killed in political violence on Sunday. 11 bodies were found in the capital on Sunday. Suicide bombers in Baghdad hit a police station, striking a blow at the new security plan, killing 12 and wounding 95. Another car bomb in the Saidiya district in the south of the capital killed 6 and wounded 37.

Up north around Mosul, Sunni Arab guerrillas captured a bus with Christian and Yezidi Kurdish passengers, separated them out by religion,and then executed 23 Yezidis. The murders were said to come from a local dispute stemming from the marriage of a Yezidi girl to a Sunni, and consequent Yezidi attacks on the groom.

The word Yezidi comes from the ancient Iranian Izad, a word meaning "God," and is related to the Persian "yazdani," meaning "divine." The religion is a survival of ancient Iranian beliefs and motifs shaped by a Muslim social context. Thus, the 7 angels they revere are probably originally 7 Indo-European gods. The chief angel, Melek Ta'us ("King Peacock"), is said to have extinguished the fires of hell with his tears, so that Yezidis do not believe in hell and are universalists. There are Zoroastrian influences on their beliefs and rituals, though these may actually derive from a common Indo-Iranian ancestry. It is not true, as some outsiders have alleged, that Yezidis are devil worshippers. They believe Melek Ta'us was a good angel, not satan. For a blogger's encounter with Iraqi Yezidis, see this site.

Indo-European peoples called Parsumash immigrated into what is now Iran and Iraq from about the 800s BC, according to the Assyrian clay tablets. These were probably tribal predecessors of the Medes and the Persians. The Kurds are linguistic and cultural heirs of these ancient Iranians, whose mythology was similar to what is in the Vedas. Most Kurds converted to Islam, but some retain older religious ideas.

This incident demonstrates that if the Iraqi conflict escalates (yes, it still can get worse), the Kurds may well get drawn in, willy nilly.

Guerrilla groups in South Iraq are saying that they will attempt to capture Prince Harry and use him to release imprisoned colleagues when he deploys to Basra. This article misidentifies the groups. Thar Allah is not an "Iranian-backed Sunni" group (it is rather Shiite), and I can't find any evidence that the Malik ibn al-Ashtar Brigade is Mahdi Army.

Mohamad Bazzi of Newsday considers the rising importance of young Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr for the future of Iraq's government.

How many terrorists are there in Iraq? Good question. Of 18,000 persons in US custody, only 250 are foreign fighters.

The Fall of John McCain.

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Sunday, April 22, 2007

3 US, 1 Polish-- Soldiers Killed
Protests Against Adhamiya Wall


Iraqi guerrillas killed three US soldiers and wounded 6 others on Saturday.

In a separate attack, guerrillas killed a Polish soldier and wounded others. The attack occurred near Diwaniya in Shiite south Iraq. US troops also came under attack in that area.

A city council member in Fallujah was killed by guerrillas on Saturday. He is the fourth member to be assassinated. The mayor of the city of Musayyib was also killed.

Some Iraqis are voicing criticism of the new wall being built by the US military around the Sunni Arab district of Adhamiya.

Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that many Iraqis, including several members of parliament, are worried that the new US military tactic of erecting concrete walls around troubled Baghdad districts will turn the city into a series of isolated cantons and actually reinforce sectarian divisions. An official in the Iraqi Department of Defense told the Saudi-backed London daily, "The districts that will be isolated by barriers after the isolation of Adhamiya and Dura are al-Amiriya, al-Amili, al-`Adl on the Karkh side of the capital, and Sadr City on the Rusafa side."

The article says that the US will deploy sonar bomb detectors at checkpoints in the Iraqi capital.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said in an interview that he looked with favor on the idea of establishing a separate province for Assyrian Christians in northern Iraq. This statement is controversial, since the way I figure it, it would have to be carved out of Kirkuk province, which is claimed by the Kurds. Assyrians and Kurds generally don't get along, at all.

State Department official David Satterfield, Condi's man in Baghdad, let Massoud Barzani and the Kurds have it in an interview on al-Arabiya on Saturday, over Barzani's inflammatory threats against Turkey and the harboring of 5,000 PKK guerrillas in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Members of the Islamic Virtue Party (Fadhila) staged a small demonstration at the southern Shiite city of Nasiriyah on Saturday to protest the demonstration held last Monday in Basra, sponsored by Muqtada al-Sadr's supporters, that called for the resignation of Virtue Party governor Muhammad al-Wa'ili. The Iranian ambassador to Iraq visited Ayatollah Muhammad Yaqubi, the spiritual leader of the Islamic Virtue Party, on Saturday, in an attempt to mediate the dispute among southern Shiite factions.

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