Tag: Iraq

MEMRI TV quotes from an interview with Saudi cleric Dr Nasser bin Suleiman Al-‘Omar on Al Jazeera.

By Allah, a number of Iraqi religious scholars came to me, and said: “We have a problem.” What was the problem? They said: There have been so many American casualties that they loaded them on trucks and threw them away in the desert. But because the number of casualties was so high… The Iraqi scholars were asking me for a fatwa. They asked me to issue a fatwa on the following question: “Because there were so many casualties, the Americans began to throw them into the Tigris and the Euphrates. The fish have eaten from the flesh of the American and have gotten fat. Are we permitted to eat these fish or not?” Yes. This is the truth, brothers.

Clearly this guy is a graduate of the Robert Fisk School of Journalism

From reader HRT

A positive war story from Backfive

All the media can come up to fill their daily ‘what is wrong in Iraq and here is proof that it is a civil war’ quota is a story about some prisoners having a stoush.

AT least nine prisoners and guards were killed in a gun battle at a Baghdad high-security jail overnight after detained guerrilla suspects, some of them foreign, grabbed weapons and tried to flee, officials said.

Big deal. Still on Iraq, Andrew Bolt has recently visited Iraq and reports Why might is right

It is this spreading of freedom that, for me, was the aim of it all — a spreading of democracy to Muslim lands that had festered with poverty and lethal hatred under hard scabs of tyranny. But that was the theory. Here are some of my snapshots of the up-close reality.

Four peace activists taken hostage in Iraq were shown in an insurgent video broadcast on Arab television today, with a previously unknown group claiming responsibility for the kidnapping.

The Swords of Righteousness Brigade said the four were spies working undercover as Christian peace activists, al-Jazeera television news reported. The station said it could not verify any of the information on the tape.

The Swords of Righteousness and four righteous, holier than thou peace activists…should make for some cutting conversations but then they are most probably just being briefed.

What’s the odds the Swords of Righteousness will get sick and tired of the activists simpering, snivelling preaching and throw them out?

UPDATE: The group’s media advisor has obviously told them that The Swords of Righteousness tag is too clumsy in English so today they are reported as the Swords of Truth Brigade.

If it’s all about truth I wonder then, what they will make of this statement.

A statement released by the Christian Peacemaker Team said: “We are angry because what has happened to our teammates is the result of the actions of the US and UK governments due to the illegal attack on Iraq and the continuing occupation and oppression of its people.”

I would’ve thought what happened to their teammates was the result of;

■ putting themselves in a position to be kidnapped, and
■ being kidnapped by the Truth chaps.

A bit old-fashioned of me, I know, but it comes under the heading of being responsible for your own actions.

A good post on just who is winning the war in Iraq from Samizdata

When it comes to the future of Iraq, there is a deep disconnect between those who have firsthand knowledge of the situation — Iraqis and U.S. soldiers serving in Iraq — and those whose impressions are shaped by doomsday press coverage and the imperatives of domestic politics.

Both Samizdata’s post and the links are worth reading.

Oh my God. The US are using weapons of war in a war

ROME — Italian television aired a documentary yesterday alleging that the United States had used white phosphorus shells ”in a massive and indiscriminate way” against civilians in the November 2004 offensive in the Iraqi town of Fallujah.

“White phosphorus kills indiscriminately.”says My Way News. So do most weapons of war dipshit. Artillery shells, machine guns, rockets, hand grenades and air delivered bombs all have the ability to kill indiscriminately. The big difference is the Coalition do not deliberately target woman and kids. The terrorists do – like car bombs at employment queues.

Maybe the same Italian company could make a documentary about these guys and how they deliberately target non-combatants.

Wonder if the MSM would pick it up and run with it?

Nah.

BAGHDAD – Iraq’s major political parties finalised alliances on Saturday ahead of Dec. 15 polls that will select the first full four-year parliament since the 2003 ouster of Saddam Hussein. Should give the Left weeks of predicting doom, gloom and mahem followed by the normal silence; then rationalization of why so many voted. Of course the piece has to start and finish with US forces casualty lists. Can’t mention Iraq without trying just one more time to lessen the resolve of the US.

If ever there was a woman with ‘victim’ written all over her face, it is Private Lynndie England. From my reading of her life, the word was most probably endorsed on her birth certificate…if there was one. Today’s Australian carries the story under the headline… Jail awaits the mistress of Abu Ghraib. Can anyone imagine a less likely ‘Mistress’ of anything, let alone a goal complex like Abu Ghraib. And yet, here she is, looking down the barrel of 11 years in goal for…. umm….for being photographed standing, with a cigarette in her mouth, pointing at a man’s genitals….I think that’s what it’s all about. I admit, the cigarette bit is worth a couple of years in today’s Nanny State society but, really what else has she done? Humiliated and scared some people from a tribe that slits people’s throats for media supported recruiting clips for psychos to join the Jihad. Just as well she’s not educated and a Lawyer in South Australia. She may have actually killed someone and got a $3,000 fine. I’d hate to think she’s going down to still the braying of the anti-US media but it’s my bet that’s the case.

Aljazeera has some balance coverage of the Aussie hostage in Iraq. They quote Howard as saying; “We can’t have the foreign policy of this country dictated by terrorists.” Tragic as it may seem, this is the only approach viable. It must make the family feel they are in a no-win situation but to take any other stance would only serve to turn the whole war in a twenty-hostages a day situation. The Australian reports that Australia is setting up a Response Team and they will be deployed to Iraq, if they aren’t there already. There will be SASR comms and language experts as well as police and defence personnel

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said the emergency response team, which left Sydney yesterday, would be led by former Solomon Islands regional assistance mission chief Nick Warner and would include federal and state police and defence personnel. It is also expected to include SAS communications and language specialists and will set up headquarters in the secure zone close to Baghdad airport.

Linguists and comms specialists don’t have to be SASR unless there are other SASR teams on-board. I would suggest there is a snatch team going as well and if the Response Team get a fix on these guys then the days of the Shura Council of the Mujahedeen of Iraq are numbered… and the number is small. Sometime in the very near future, they can expect to hear a large noise and while they are recovering from that and muttering ‘what the hell…in arabic, they will feel the sting of 9mm bullets, double-tapped into each and everyone of them. God! I hope they locate them.

An Australian engineer working in Iraq has been posted as taken hostage In other news, our wheat imports to Iraq are under threat as some local government officials claim others in Iraq are tring to sabotage the products with iron filings. Well, at least that’s what I think they are saying. You try and read the Iraq websites fractured english