Baghdad wall has nothing to do with protecting Iraqis

In Focus:

More than a wall

Walling in Al-Adhamiyah has nothing to do with protecting Iraqis

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When the Americans decided to build a wall around Al-Adhamiyah in Baghdad, they claimed that their main concern was to protect the inhabitants. Very noble of them, but was this the real reason? Are the Americans interested in protecting Al-Adhamiyah, or in protecting other areas from fighters based in Al-Adhamiyah? Before answering these questions, let's review a few developments that took place in Iraq of late.

The city of Kirkuk is being Kurdicised. Up until the occupation, ethnic Arabs mostly inhabited the city. Now the Kurds want to annex it to their province. Why is that? Because Kirkuk sits on a lake of oil, and the Kurds need to control the oil as part of their plan to secede from Iraq. The Kurdish scheme is so obvious that Turkey is already saying it cannot allow it to happen. The last thing the Erdogan government needs is a Kurdish state on its southern borders.

Meanwhile, plans are underway to declare a Basra Province in southern Iraq, although no attempts at secession have so far been made. The similarity between the situation in Kurdistan and Basra is worth examining. If things keep proceeding in this direction, Iraq would soon be partitioned into three mini-states. The "no fly" latitude lines the Clinton administration put in place several years ago would determine the borders of those mini-states. Kurdistan is already behaving as a semi-independent state. It is signing oil agreements with other countries, establishing political and economic ties with other nations, and generally ignoring the beleaguered government in Baghdad.

The Americans want to see Iraq divided; Kurdistan in the north, Basra in the south, and the Sunni triangle in the middle. But what does all this have to do with Al-Adhamiyah?

Well, let's not forget that the US administration is faced with a deepening crisis both at home and abroad. In Iraq, the US army is on the defensive. At home, the two houses of Congress, acting in defiance of President Bush, have made it clear that troops must be pulled out by September 2008 at the latest. Should the withdrawal take place -- and it most likely will -- then the whole Project for the New American Century would fall apart. All this planning, all these attempts to control oil resources, would come to nothing. It would be a disaster for the neo-cons. This is why the latter are determined to divide Iraq prior to withdrawal, the aim being to have two out of three mini-states under US control.

The Kurdish government would be pleased to forge a close alliance with the Americans. Such an alliance would offer the Kurds protection from the Turks, the Iranians and the pan-Arab government that may emerge in central Iraq. The southern province would also rush into US arms, for more or less the same reasons. Iraq would thus be reduced to the same status as any of the Gulf states, just another group of sheikhdoms reliant on oil and foreign backing.

This scenario wouldn't be easy to carry out so long as the resistance is going strong. So the fighters must be isolated in their strongholds: in Al-Anbar, Tel Afar, Al-Qaim and Al-Adhamiyah. Furthermore, some effort must be exerted for national unity, through the integration of former Baathists and army personnel into the system. The US administration is already moving in that direction. Also, the Americans claim to be succeeding in breaking the ranks of the Iraqi resistance. Still, why Al-Adhamiyah?

Let's go back to history. Founded at the time of Caliph Abu Jaafar Al-Mansour, Baghdad was built on the opposite banks of the Tigris. The west bank of the river was known as Al-Karkh, the east bank as Al-Rasafa. Until recently, the centre of the city was divided equally between the two banks. The mausoleum of Abu Hanifa was in Al-Rasafa, and that of Imam Al-Kazem was in Al-Karkh, with the Imamayn (two imams) Bridge connecting the two. Al-Adhamiyah took its name from the words "Al-Imam Al-Adham", or Abu Hanifa, a leading Sunni doctrinaire. During the Ottoman era, Al-Adhamiyah had a reputation for rebellion that continued even during the communist tide of the 1960s. Since the fall of Baghdad, Al-Adhamiyah has been active in resistance.

In the early days of the occupation, it was said that Iraq's political elite, Saddam's Hussein included, took refuge in Al-Adhamiyah. At one point, it was said that Saddam attended prayers at the mosque of Al-Imam Al-Adham. US forces reacted to the rumours by shelling the mosque. The main minaret of that mosque still bears the marks of shelling. For the past four years, Al-Adhamiyah has been a hotbed of resistance. The Americans repeatedly declared the area "liberated" from the resistance. But when the Americans tried to send the Iraqi army -- the new one they had created -- to its first real test in Al-Adhamiyah, dozens of Iraqi and US troops were killed. After this, the Americans tried to send troops in dinghies across the river, but suffered further losses.

Al-Adhamiyah is the link between the two banks of the Tigris and the gateway to Al-Waziriya, to the Ministry of Defence and the Green Zone. To isolate Al-Adhamiyah is to deprive the resistance of a vital asset. This is why the Americans built the wall. So there you have it. Al-Adhamiyah is part of the US drive to restrain, not protect, the Iraqis. This quest is likely to fail, as it did repeatedly in the past. The days of the occupation are numbered.

Galal Nassar

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Al-Ahram Weekly Online

Arabs in Kirkuk Dismayed at Ethnic Cleansing

Arabs in Kirkuk dismayed at relocation plan

By Mustafa Mohammed and Sherko Raouf Sun Apr 1, 10:30 AM ET

Arabs forced to move to Kirkuk decades ago by Saddam Hussein expressed dismay on Sunday at the Iraqi government's plan to encourage them to leave the oil-rich northern city and return to their original homes.

Iraq is expected to settle the final status of the ethnically-mixed city in a local referendum by the end of the year. Some officials and analysts have warned it might spark bloodshed.

Kurds want to incorporate Kirkuk into their largely autonomous Kurdistan region, which lies just to the north.

Abu Jabar, a 70-year-old Arab, said he moved to Kirkuk in 1975 from the southern city of Nassiriya with his wife and two children. His extended family now numbers 18.

"Some of my sons have married, had children and bought houses here and do not know anything about their city of origin. They have never been there," Abu Jabar said.

The cabinet last week agreed to give Arab families 20 million dinars ($15,000) each and a piece of land if they voluntarily returned to their original towns. Government sources told Reuters about the decision on Saturday.

Under Saddam, Kirkuk was subject to an "Arabization" policy that drove many Kurds from their homes and brought in Arabs, mostly Shi'ite Muslims from the south.

Iraq's constitution says that in the build-up to the city-wide referendum, the government should reverse Saddam's policy. A big influx of Kurds would sharply increase the odds the vote would result in Kirkuk becoming part of Kurdistan.

The compensation plan for Kirkuk has angered some Shi'ite and Sunni Arab parliamentarians in Baghdad.

Nassar al-Rubaie, head of the parliamentary bloc of radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, said a campaign to collect signatures would be launched to delay the referendum.

"Kirkuk is an Iraqi city. This issue needs to be postponed so we can solve the problem," he told a news conference.

Sharif Najim, a 35-year-old Kurdish farmer, said the relocation of Arabs would stabilize the city.

"They are the reason for the troubles because they took the money and the lands of the Kurds and the Turkmen," he said, referring to the city's Turkish-speaking ethnic group.

FLASHPOINT

Kirkuk, which sits atop one of the world's richest oil fields, could become a flashpoint for wider conflict.

Neighboring Turkey has hinted it might take military action to protect its own national interests.

Ankara fears Iraq's Kurds plan to seize control of Kirkuk as a prelude to declaring full independence from Baghdad, a move that could reignite separatist unrest among Kurds in southeast Turkey. Kurdish officials have repeatedly said they have no plans to separate from Iraq.

Arab Lawyer Harith Hussein, 45, said he moved to Kirkuk from the Shi'ite city of Hilla, south of Baghdad, in 1983.

"The government should provide security first and stop the violence that harvests hundreds daily before agreeing to such decisions that will ignite more violence," he said.

Civil servant Mohammed Khalaf, 29, said his family moved to Kirkuk in 1981 from the town of Hawija. He said he was prepared to return if the process was voluntary.

"If they gave me 20 million dinars, land and if I can move my job to my original city, I will go back," he said.

The United Nations has warned of a "looming crisis" in Kirkuk, where it said ethnic Turkmen and Arabs were being intimidated by Kurdish forces. Since the U.S. invasion of 2003, many Kurds have returned.

Baghdad market bomb 'kills 102'

Seven bombs go off in Kirkuk in further Iraqi violence
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Last Updated: Saturday, 3 February 2007, 15:39 GMT

Baghdad market bomb 'kills 102'

The attack took place in central al-Sadriya district At least 102 people have been killed and 215 injured in a lorry bombing at a market place in Baghdad, Iraqi security officials have said. The attack, the worst this year, took place at the market in central al-Sadriya district. Earlier, a series of car bombs exploded in the northern city of Kirkuk, killing five people and injuring 40 others. The Iraqi violence continues despite a new US initiative that will see an extra 21,500 troops deployed. The BBC's Mike Wooldridge in Baghdad says police sources are now correcting initial reports of a suicide attack at the market and say the lorry had been parked. The attack is the worst this year - 88 people died in the bombing of the Haraj market on 22 January. Only the co-ordinated bombings in Baghdad's Sadr City in November, which killed more than 200 people, caused more deaths. Markets, with their increased potential for casualties, have become a regular target for bombers over recent months. 'Destabilising' In the Kirkuk attacks, seven bombs - one said to be a suicide blast - went off in different parts of the ethnically mixed city over a two-hour period. Seven bombs also went off in Kirkuk in the north Two of the bombs targeted the headquarters of two Kurdish parties - the Kurdish Democratic Party led by of Massoud Barzani, head of the northern Kurdish region, and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, headed by Iraq's President, Jalal Talabani. Others hit a petrol station, Kirkuk's commercial district and several other locations, reports said. Razqar Ali, a Kurdish leader and head of Kirkuk provincial council, accused militants of trying to destabilise the city amid efforts by some Kurds to include it in the autonomous Kurdish region. A curfew was imposed after the blasts and would run from 1600 (1300 GMT) to 0600 on Sunday, AFP news agency said. Earlier, police said gunmen attacked a checkpoint near Samarra, killing six police and injuring another six. Samarra is a mainly Sunni town 125km (80 miles) north of Baghdad where an attack on an important Shia shrine last February sparked Iraq's current sectarian violence.

Attack sparks huge fire at Iraq oil facility

Attack sparks fire at Iraq oil facility

By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press Writer

33 minutes ago


A mortar attack ignited a huge fire Monday night at an oil facility in northern Iraq, shutting the flow of crude oil to a major refinery, and a U.S. Air Force jet with one pilot aboard crashed in Anbar province, a hotbed of the Sunni-Arab insurgency, officials said. Al-Jazeera reported that the pilot was killed.

As Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki prepared for a summit meeting with President Bush this week in Jordan, Britain said it expects to withdraw thousands of its 7,000 military personnel from Iraq by the end of next year, and Poland and Italy announced the impending withdrawal of their remaining troops.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani arrived for an official visit in Iran, where he is expected to seek its help in preventing Iraq's sectarian violence from sliding into an all-out civil war. His departure was delayed by a three-day curfew, which the government lifted Monday.

Two mortar rounds hit the pipeline filtering facility 15 miles northwest of Kirkuk, according to an official at the North Oil Co., speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.

The fire was burning out of control and could take hours or longer to extinguish, and the flow of oil from all of Kirkuk's rich fields has been shut down to the massive Beiji refinery to the southwest, the official said.

After the F-16CG jet went down, a witness said other U.S. warplanes rushed to the crash site about 20 miles northwest of Baghdad and circled above it. The U.S. military, which released a statement on the crash, did not have any information on the suspected cause or the fate of the pilot.

But Al-Jazeera television showed videotape of the wreckage in a field and what appeared to be portions of a tangled parachute nearby, and the broadcaster said the video included scenes of the dead pilot but that they were too graphic to air.

One shot showed an Air Force seal that said Air Combat Command.

Mohammed Al-Obeidi, who lives in the nearby town of Karmah, said by telephone that he saw the jet flying erratically before it nose-dived and exploded in a field.

Separately, police and witnesses said U.S. soldiers shot and killed 11 civilians and wounded five on Sunday night in the Baghdad suburb of Husseiniya. The U.S. military said it had no record of any American military operation in the area.

"We were sitting inside our house when the Americans showed up and started firing at homes. They killed many people and burned some houses," said one of the witnesses, a man with bandages on his head who was being treated at Imam Ali Hospital in the Shiite slum of Sadr City. The police and witnesses spoke with Associated Press Television News on condition of anonymity to protect their own security.

On Monday, about 250 people attended a memorial service outside the hospital's morgue for the 11 victims, saying it was being conducted in the slum because the dead had been followers of the radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The cleric and his Madhi Army militia are both based in Sadr City.

The U.S. command also said three of its soldiers were killed and two wounded in Baghdad on Sunday, the day that Iraq's government began to lift the curfew by allowing Iraqis to leave their homes on foot to shop at their local fruit and vegetable markets. The curfew was imposed Thursday after suspected Sunni-Arab insurgents used bombs and mortars to kill more than 200 people in Sadr City in the worst attack by militants in the war.

The U.S. wants Iran's mostly Shiite government to do more to help Iraq's Shiite-dominated government stem a surge in sectarian violence.

Talabani is a member of Iraq's Kurdish minority, but he had close ties with Iranian officials before Saddam Hussein was driven out by the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

The Bush administration has accused Tehran of arming and providing logistical assistance to Shiite militias, and British Defense Secretary Des Browne said Monday that Iran's behavior in Iraq remains a deep concern.

"Support from within Iran goes to groups who are attacking our forces, but also to groups who are simply fueling the sectarian violence," Browne said in an address to the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London.

Hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said Iran is "ready to help" calm Iraq's fighting.

In other violence, gunmen opened fire on a crowded central Baghdad street on Monday morning, killing six Iraqis and wounding three, including some sitting in a parked car, said police Lt. Ali Muhsin.

Police in western Baghdad found the bodies of two Iraqis who had been kidnapped, blindfolded and shot, said police 1st Lt. Miathem Abdel-Razaq. Each week, the mutilated bodies of scores of Shiites and Sunnis are found across Iraq.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061127/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq