Iraq
dn 880
- Iraq Is “Open for American Business,” Says Iraqi PM in Meeting with Trump
- Prominent Iraqi Women’s Rights Activist Reham Yacoub Gunned Down in Basra
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an 220
https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/bombshell-report-finds-iraqi-officials-doubt-trumps-basis-for-escalating-to-the-brink-of-war/
an 220
https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/bombshell-report-finds-iraqi-officials-doubt-trumps-basis-for-escalating-to-the-brink-of-war/
no lnx
‘Bombshell’ report finds Iraqi officials doubt Trump’s basis for escalating to the brink of war
President Donald J. Trump, joined by Vice President Mike Pence, senior White House advisors and senior military personnel, delivers remarks during a national televised address Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2020, from the Cross Hall of the White House, responding to the retaliatory missile strikes against U.S. military and coalition forces in Iraq on Tuesday by the Islamic Republic of Iran. (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)
Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams February 7, 2020
In a “bombshell” revelation that calls into question one of the Trump administration’s stated justifications for assassinating Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani—a move that nearly sparked a region-wide military conflict—Iraqi intelligence officials told the New York Times that they believe ISIS, not an Iran-linked militia, was likely responsible for the Dec. 27 rocket attack that killed an American contractor at an airbase near Kirkuk, Iraq.
The Times reported Thursday that “Iraqi military and intelligence officials have raised doubts about who fired the rockets… saying they believe it is unlikely that the militia the United States blamed for the attack” was responsible.
“All the indications are that it was Daesh,” Brigadier General Ahmed Adnan, the Iraqi chief of intelligence for the federal police at the K-1 air base, told the Times, using the Arabic acronym for ISIS. “We know Daesh’s movements.”
The Trump administration has not released a single piece of evidence showing that the Iraqi militia Khataib Hezbollah, which has ties to Iran, was responsible for the attack on K-1. The group has denied carrying out the attack.
The U.S. responded to the rocket attack days later with deadly airstrikes on Khataib Hezbollah targets in Iraq and Syria, setting off a dangerous escalatory spiral that brought Iran and the U.S. to the brink of war.
On Jan. 2, the U.S. assassinated Soleimani with a drone strike in Baghdad ordered by President Donald Trump. Following the assassination, which was widely condemned as an act of war, the U.S. Department of Defense issued a statement claiming without evidence that Soleimani “orchestrated attacks on coalition bases in Iraq over the last several months—including the attack on December 27th—culminating in the death and wounding of additional American and Iraqi personnel.”
But Iraqi officials told the Times that “based on circumstantial evidence and long experience in the area where the attack took place,” there is good reason to be skeptical about U.S. claims that Khataib Hezbollah was behind it.
As the Times reported:
The rockets were launched from a Sunni Muslim part of Kirkuk Province notorious for attacks by the Islamic State, a Sunni terrorist group, which would have made the area hostile territory for a Shiite militia like Khataib Hezbollah.
Khataib Hezbollah has not had a presence in Kirkuk Province since 2014.
The Islamic State, however, had carried out three attacks relatively close to the base in the 10 days before the attack on K-1. Iraqi intelligence officials sent reports to the Americans in November and December warning that ISIS intended to target K-1, an Iraqi air base in Kirkuk Province that is also used by American forces…
These facts all point to the Islamic State, Iraqi officials say.
“We as Iraqi forces cannot even come to this area unless we have a large force because it is not secure,” Brig. Gen. Adnan said of the area from which the rocket attack was launched. “How could it be that someone who doesn’t know the area could come here and find that firing position and launch an attack?”
In response to the Times report, Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council, tweeted: “Al-Qaeda attacked the U.S. on 9/11 and we went to war with Iraq. If this report is true, ISIS attacked the U.S. and we nearly went to war with Iran.”
Sina Toossi
@SinaToossi
This is huge: Iraqi military & intelligence officials say it’s highly unlikely that a rocket attack that killed an Iraqi-American contractor in early January—& led to an escalation cycle that almost started a war—was carried out by an Iran-allied militia.https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/06/world/middleeast/iraq-iran-hezbollah-evidence.html …
Iraqi soldiers at the K-1 base, which was struck by rockets on Dec. 27.
Was U.S. Wrong About Attack That Nearly Started a War With Iran?
Iraqi military and intelligence officials have raised doubts about who fired the rockets that started a dangerous spiral of events.
nytimes.com
184
3:57 PM - Feb 6, 2020
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119 people are talking about this
CODEPINK
@codepink
The US almost started WWIII based on questionable evidence.
After all of the violence in the Middle East following the attack on US bases, #Iraqi officials are now questioning the US's claim that the #Iran-backed militia Khataib Hezbollah are to blame. https://buff.ly/31CpWqT
Iraqi soldiers at the K-1 base, which was struck by rockets on Dec. 27.
Was U.S. Wrong About Attack That Nearly Started a War With Iran?
Iraqi military and intelligence officials have raised doubts about who fired the rockets that started a dangerous spiral of events.
nytimes.com
47
1:15 PM - Feb 6, 2020
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44 people are talking about this
U.S. officials insisted to the Times that they have “solid evidence” showing that Khataib Hezbollah carried out the attack, but they have not released any of this evidence to the public or to Iraqi officials.
“We have requested the American side to share with us any information, any evidence, but they have not sent us any information,” Lt. Gen. Muhammad al-Bayati, chief of staff for former Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, told the Times.
Ilan Goldenberg, Middle East security director at the Center for a New American Security think tank, tweeted that the U.S. Congress “must ask questions about this and get the intel.”
Responsible Statecraft managing editor Benjamin Armbruster agreed.
“Congress needs to investigate ASAP,” Armbruster tweeted.
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https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/world-war-iii-trends-as-hawks-rejoice-at-trump-decision-to-assassinate-iranian-military-leader/
no lnx
‘World War III’ trends as hawks rejoice at Trump decision to assassinate Iranian military leader
Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams January 3, 2020
As peace advocates voiced alarm at the very real prospect of all-out conflict with Iran following the assassination Thursday night of that country’s top military leader on orders from U.S. President Donald Trump, war hawks who have had their crosshairs trained on Iran for years enthusiastically celebrated Trump’s decision—and even suggested the president should go further by targeting the nation’s oil refineries.
“To the Iranian government: If you want to stay in the oil business leave America and our allies alone and stop being the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world,” tweeted Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a longtime supporter of regime change in Iran.
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Republican Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Tom Cotton (Ark.), Jim Risch (R.-Idaho), and Ben Sasse (Neb.) joined the chorus of applause, hailing Trump for taking “decisive action.”
Trita Parsi, executive vice president at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, tweeted in response to the torrent of praise that “hawks are celebrating [Qassem] Soleimani’s assassination not because they believe it weakened Iran. Or the IRGC. Or that Iran will lose in Iraq. But because they believe we have passed an irreversible point of escalation.”
“From here, war is unavoidable, they believe,” Parsi added. “And celebrate.”
The likely unlawful U.S. assassination of Soleimani—and the jingoistic applause it provoked—led many to express fears of a global conflict, briefly catapulting “World War III” to the top of Twitter’s trending list. Trump, for his part, simply tweeted an image of an American flag following the strike:
Donald J. Trump
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@realDonaldTrump
Trump’s decision to kill Soleimani, as well as at least six others, with a drone strike in Baghdad came after the Pentagon threatened Iran with preemptive action in response to supposed indications it was planning attacks on U.S. forces in the region.
Though the Pentagon did not offer a shred of evidence that Soleimani or militia groups were planning attacks, corporate media outlets dutifully echoed the Trump administration’s line, leading some commentators to see parallels with the buildup to the Bush administration’s 2003 invasion of Iraq.
“I don’t see any way to stop what is coming, war from the Mediterranean to the Indus and harsh repression in the U.S. that may vitiate the 2020 election,” said Barnett Rubin of the Center on International Cooperation. “This is the test for the Democrats: have our leaders learned anything since 2003? I fear the answer.”
Observers warned the U.S. assassination of Soleimani, on top of the Trump administration’s violation of the nuclear accord last year and other aggressive actions, effectively foreclosed the possibility of peaceful negotiations with Iran.
“Whatever happens next, understand and never stop pointing out that Donald Trump walked into office with no crisis with Iran,” said Stephen Miles, executive director of Win Without War. “He then filled his cabinet with warmongers, walked away from a multilateral diplomatic accord, and purposefully engaged in ‘maximum pressure.’ He owns this.”
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei quickly vowed “harsh retaliation” in response to Soleimani’s assassination, and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif accused the U.S. of committing “an act of state terrorism.”
Amid fears of revenge attacks, the State Department on Friday urged U.S. citizens to leave Iraq immediately.
“Trump’s Iran policy has been seeking to incite war with Iran since he reneged on the nuclear deal in May 2018,” said Sina Toossi, senior research analyst with the National Iranian American Council. “If a war breaks out, the blame lies squarely with this disastrous policy and its proponents.”
“Trump thinks he got his Bin Laden moment in an election year,” Toossi added. “In reality, he’s made the worst strategic mistake by an American leader since the Iraq invasion. The consequences will be felt for years to come.”
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Protests Rage Outside U.S. Embassy in Iraq After U.S. Airstrikes Kill 24
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Thousands of Iraqis Gather in Tahrir Sq. to Demand Protest Movement Remain Peaceful
1219
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mosul
quite LOT of history isis, al-q; syrian civil war isis metasticize, gain ground
https://kpfa.org/episode/letters-and-politics-november-25-2019/
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https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/the-destruction-of-a-society-first-the-u-s-invaded-iraq-then-we-left-it-poisoned/
no lnx
‘The destruction of a society’: First the U.S. invaded Iraq — then we left it poisoned
Written by David Masciotra / Salon September 8, 2019
The political and moral culture of the United States allows for bipartisan cooperation to destroy an entire country, killing hundreds of thousands of people in the process, without even the flimsiest of justification. Then, only a few years later, everyone can act as if it never happened.
In 2011, the U.S. withdrew most of its military personnel from Iraq, leaving the country in ruins. Estimates of the number of civilians who died during the war in Iraq range from 151,000 to 655,000. An additional 4,491 American military personnel perished in the war. Because the bombs have stopped falling from the sky and the invasion and occupation of Iraq no longer makes headlines, Americans likely devote no thought to the devastation that occurred in their name.
With the exception of Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, who is currently polling at or below 2 percent, no candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination has consistently addressed the criminality, cruelty and cavalier wastefulness of American foreign policy. Joe Biden, the frontrunner in the race, not only supported the war in Iraq — despite his recent incoherent claims to the contrary — but as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee acted as its most effective and influential salesman in the Democratic Party.
The blasé attitude of America toward the death and destruction it creates, all while boasting of its benevolence, cannot withstand the scrutiny of science. Dr. Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, an environmental toxicologist at the University of Michigan and recipient of the Rachel Carson Prize, has led several investigative expeditions in Iraq to determine how the pollutants and toxic chemicals from the U.S.-led war are poisoning Iraq’s people and environment. The health effects are catastrophic, and will remain so long after the war reached its official end.
I previously interviewed Savabieasfahani about her initial research, and recently acquired an update regarding her team’s latest discovery that there is a close correlation between proximity to aU.S. military base and birth defects in Iraqi children.
Average Americans, even many who opposed the war in Iraq, seem to believe that once the military campaign is over the casualties of war stop accumulating. What is the purpose of your general research regarding the toxicity of the Iraqi environment resulting from American bombs, munitions and other materials? How does the American invasion and occupation continue to adversely affect the health of Iraqis?
Bombs and bullets have been used on an extreme scale in Iraq. Dropping tons of bombs and releasing millions of bullets leaves toxic residues the in air, water and soil of the targeted population. These pollutants continue to poison those populations years after the bombing stops.
What’s more, the United States imported thousands of tons of military equipment into Iraq to use in their occupation. They include, tanks, trucks, bombers, armored vehicles, infantry weapons, antiaircraft systems, artillery and mortars — some of which are coated with depleted uranium, and much more. These eventually find their way into U.S. military junkyards which remain across Iraq.
There are unknown numbers ofmilitary junkyards scattered across the Iraqi landscape.
Fluctuations in temperature facilitates the rusting and weathering of military junk, releasing toxic pollutants [including radioactive uranium compounds, neurotoxic lead and mercury, etc.] into the Iraqi environment.
Uranium and its related compounds remain toxic for millennia and poison local populations through food, air and water contamination.
The exposure of pregnant mothers to the pollutions of war, including uranium and thorium, irreversibly damages their unborn children. We found thorium, a product of depleted uranium decay, in the hair of Iraqi children with birth defects who lived in Nasiriyah and Ur City, near a U.S. military base.
The destruction of a society does not stop after U.S. bombs stop falling. Environmental contamination which the U.S. leaves behind continues to destroy our environment and poison our people decades after the bombs have stopped falling. The U.S. has a long history of irreversibly destroying human habitats. That must end.
In your groundbreaking new research, you discover that the teeth of Iraqi children have 28 times more thorium if they live near a U.S. military base. What is the significance of that conclusion, and what does the presence of thorium indicate about a child’s health? What kinds of abnormalities and health problems will they experience?
The Iraqi population is potentially contaminated with depleted uranium decay products. Baby teeth are highly sensitive to environmental exposures. Such high levels of thorium simply suggest high exposure at an early age and potentially in utero.
We found uranium and thorium in these children’s teeth and hair. Uranium and thorium were also in the bone marrow of children, all of whom had severe birth defects. The magnitude of public contamination caused by these alpha-emitting radioactive compounds is a serious question to be answered. Our bone marrow data is still unpublished, but we hope to publish it separately.
Thorium is an alpha emitter and, once in the body, it can cause cancer and other anomalies. Impacts can vary depending on the timing and amount of exposure. Childhood leukemia, which has been rising in southern Iraq, is a verified outcome of thorium exposure.
In our study, children with high levels of thorium had multiple birth defects. Our studies show that, across Iraq, children exposed to U.S. war contamination suffer primarily from congenital heart defects and neural tube defects.
Forty-four years after U.S. forces left Vietnam, there are still Vietnamese babies born with birth defects from the American military’s use of Agent Orange. How long do you believe Iraqis will continue to suffer from the American-led war?
If left unmitigated, the population will be permanently exposed to elevated toxic exposures which can impact the Iraqi gene pool.
Through the use of the scientific method, you are gaining the ability to identify a severe problem in Iraq. Considering that the problem is a result of the U.S. invasion, what could the U.S. do to solve or at least mitigate the problem?
The U.S. must be held responsible and forced to clean up all the sites which it has polluted. Technology exists for the cleanup of radiation contamination. The removal and disposal of U.S.-created military junkyards would go a long way towards cleaning toxic releases out of the Iraqi environment.
You are a scientist, not a political analyst, but you must have some thoughts regarding the political implications of your work. How do you react to the lack of substantive conversation about the consequences of war in American politics and the press, and the American establishment’s evasion of responsibility on this issue?
I expect nothing from the American political establishment or their propaganda machines which masquerade as “news media” and feed uncritically off State Department press briefings.
Fortunately, there is a movement to criminalize environmental contamination caused by war. Damage to nature and the human environment must be considered a war crime.
Scientists are currently asking international lawmakers to adopt a fifth Geneva Convention which would recognize damage to nature as a war crime, alongside other war crimes. I hope that will make a difference in our ability to protect human lives and our environment.
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The
View From Tehran: America’s Sordid History of Meddling in Iran
by Maj. Danny Sjursen, USA (ret.)Posted onJune 04, 2019
No war yet! That’s the good news…for now. A few weeks have passed since unhinged National Security Advisor John Bolton – who never saw a regime he didn’t want to change – reportedly ordered the Pentagon to update plans to send 120,000 additional troops into the Persian Gulf. All this preparation and the inherent threat to strike Iran was ostensibly based on vague and unsubstantiated intelligence that Tehran had planned attacks on U.S. troops in the region. Murky and secretive intelligence, preemptive war plans, and unrepentant neocons sowing fear within the American populace. We’ve all seen this movie before, in Iraq, just sixteen years ago, and it didn’t end well. US troops are still there and may be so indefinitely.
If the purported Iranian threats seem manufactured, its because they likely are. And all the wrongs Tehran allegedly perpetrated against the US are exaggerated and overblown. Sure, Iran is, like all countries, an imperfect actor. The Islamic Republic did hold America’s embassy staff hostage during the Carter years. Tehran has backed Hezbollah and Hamas, both of whom once specialized in suicide bombing attacks on civilians.
Still, its worthwhile – particularly in the serious business of war and peace – to step back, slow down, and walk a proverbial mile in others’ shoes. Let me offer, then, the view from Tehran; to see the world and the US through Iranian eyes. An honest historical appraisal of the complicated U.S.-Iranian relationship demonstrates that it was often Washington and its western allies that meddled in the region and acted as the aggressors.
Let us begin in 1941. Though Tehran declared neutrality in that war, Russia and Britain jointly invaded and occupied the country to secure control of its oil reserves. Then, in 1953, when a democratically elected prime minister – Mohammad Mossadegh – dared nationalize Iranian oil (which had been largely under foreign, Western corporate control) the CIA coordinated a coup with MI6 to overthrow the government. The dictatorial Shah was promptly put in power and ruled with an iron fist for the next 26 years. So much for America’s self-proclaimed title as the "beacon of democracy."
Then, in 1980, when Iraq invaded and threatened to destroy Iran, the US openly backed the Saddam Hussein’s aggressive regime. The US provided key intelligence in the form of satellite photos to the Iraqi Army, and granted Baghdad over $1 billion in economic aid. President Reagan, in absurd twist of irony, sent a special envoy, Donald Rumsfeld, to meet with Saddam. Their now infamous picture shaking hands is all over the web. Saddam regularly employed poison gas to attack Iranian formations. It is largely agreed that U.S.-supplied satellite imagery allowed Iraq to better calibrate these illegal, immoral, chemical attacks. Remember how this was viewed from Tehran: the American superpower, which had already overthrown Iranian democracy, was now backing Saddam in an aggressive war that posed an existential threat to the Islamic Republic.
During the eight-year Iran-Iraq War, which caused perhaps a million deaths, the US Navy waged an undeclared maritime war in the Persian Gulf. In the "Tanker War," the US again tacitly backed Iraq, flew the stars and stripes on Kuwaiti vessels to protect them from attack, and, finally, overtly sank the majority of the Iranian Navy in a one-sided sea battle. At the end of the war, a US naval vessel even shot down a civilian Iranian airliner, killing 290 people. The US commander, Captain Rogers, claimed his crew mistook the jet for an Iranian fighter, but even so the plane was fully in Iranian airspace.
In a final twist of the diplomatic "knife," then Vice President George H.W. Bush refused, during a presidential campaign stop, to apologize for the shoot-down. He callously announced"I will never apologize for the United States – I don’t care what the facts are. … I’m not an apologize-for-America kind of guy." Oh, and as for Captain Rogers – he was awarded the Legion of Merit for "exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding service." This, despite the fact that his ship, the USS Vincennes, was actually in Iranian territorial waters when it murdered the innocent civilians onboard the flight.
Then, after the 9/11 attacks – which Iran had nothing to do with – Bush the Younger counted Tehran among Iraq and North Korea in an "axis of evil." Soon enough, Bush II illegally invaded Iraq and toppled America’s one-time friend, Saddam Hussein.By 2003, Iran had American armies stationed on its western (Iraq) and eastern (Afghanistan) borders. It felt genuinely threatened, which was understandable given recent American military actions nearby and the fact that administration neoconservatives were itching for regime change in Iran. "Everyone wants to go to Baghdad. Real men want to go to Tehran," was a common trope around neocon circles in Washington. Given this history, it becomes rather more understandable that Iran would back militias and seek to keep the US military mired in an Iraqi quagmire. If it didn’t, Iran’s leaders worried – they might be next!
None of this sordid history should be misconstrued to obviate Iran of responsibility for its own imperfect foreign affairs, but it does add complexity and nuance to a challenging relationship. Remember that the USstill imposes crippling sanctions on Tehran, surrounds Iran with its military bases, and maintains a naval presence along its coastline. Combined with America’s nefarious history of meddling in and threatening Iran, its hard not to empathize with the Iranian point of view.
Seen in this light, one understands why an average Iranian sees America as the aggressor in the Mideast. Well, frankly, it sort of is!
Danny Sjursen is a retired US Army officer and regular contributor to :{Antiwar.com:(style="box-sizing:inherit"):}:. His work has appeared in the LA Times, The Nation, Huff Post, The Hill, Salon, Truthdig, Tom Dispatch, among other publications. He served combat tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan and later taught history at his alma mater, West Point. He is the author of a memoir and critical analysis of the Iraq War, Ghostriders of Baghdad: Soldiers, Civilians, and the Myth of the Surge. Follow him on Twitter at @SkepticalVet.
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guk no lnx
Ancient city of Babylon heads list of new Unesco world heritage sites
UN also names national park in Iceland among sites protected for their value to humanity
Nicola Davis
@NicolaKSDavis
Fri 5 Jul 2019 16.44 BST First published on Fri 5 Jul 2019 15.12 BST
The ancient city of Babylon
The ancient archaeological site of Babylon, Iraq. The city was first mentioned in the 23rd century BC. Photograph: Hussein Faleh/AFP/Getty Images
The ancient city of Babylon and an Icelandic national park replete with glaciers, ice caves and volcanoes are among the sites that have been added to Unesco’s world heritage list.
More than 1,000 sites around the world – some cultural, some natural, some both – are protected by listing. Landmarks or areas are chosen for their value to humanity.
On Friday, the World Heritage Committee announced the addition of the first of this year’s batch. More sites will be named over the weekend.
Perhaps the most famous site to be added to the list is the city of Babylon in Iraq. The city was first mentioned in the 23rd century BC and may have been home to one of the seven wonders of the ancient world – the Hanging Gardens.
But while Babylon has a history dazzling with palaces and temples, there is little to see of its oldest era and what is left has sustained substantial damage. Saddam Hussein built a replica palace there, while US-led military forces in the area during the Iraq war crushed ancient pavements with their vehicles and filled sandbags with material that included archeological fragments.
Paraty in Brazil
The popular tourist destination of Paraty in Brazil has been recognised for its natural and cultural significance. Photograph: Maria Swärd/Getty Images
Among the other sites listed are the Hyrcanian forests in Iran, an ancient metallurgy site in Burkina Faso, the French austral lands and seas, and the Ohrid region of Albania, which is cited for its natural and cultural heritage. Paraty and Ilha Grande in Brazil – popular destinations for tourists visiting Rio de Janeiro – are also recognised for both their natural and cultural significance.
The selections span countries all over the world. In Iceland, the Vatnajökull national park has been listed. Established in 2008, it covers 14% of the country and is largely spread over the south-eastern central highlands, encompassing the Vatnajökull ice cap. With volcanoes, earthquakes, melting glaciers, explosion craters and geothermal activity, the site is nothing if not dramatic: the nomination document for the site described the park as “an area of alarming natural conflict, but also enchanting harmony.”
A river flowing beneath a glacier in the Vatnajökull national park
A river flowing beneath a glacier in the Vatnajökull national park, described as ‘an area of of alarming natural conflict, but also enchanting harmony’. Photograph: Marco Bottigelli/Getty Images
China has also gained a listing: the migratory bird sanctuaries along the coast of the Yellow Sea and Bohai Gulf. A haven for migratory birds and the home of myriad species of fish and crustaceans, this shoreline boasts a rich ecosystem and is considered to be the largest intertidal mudflat system in the world.
The habitat depends on sediments: according to one report the Yellow River, which discharges into the Yellow Sea, carries an average of 24.7kg of sediment per cubic metre of water at its mouth. The area and the species it hosts, such as the spoon-billed sandpiper, have been under threat from land reclamation.
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kpfa interviw:
608 KIA US in iraq b/c of iran; Petreus went after Al-Sadr which led to ctr-attack (IED?); petr spox --> prss--> congress reso? --> dick c pretext for air strikes? opposed by Jt chief?
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https://www.oasiscenter.eu/en/sunni-muslims-isis-iraq
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/26/world/middleeast/iraq-isis-sunni.html
David Zucchino
Oct. 26, 2017
KARMAH, Iraq — After the Islamic State was finally driven from the central Iraqi city of Karmah last year, Sirhan Sallom returned to his home to find it demolished.
Mr. Sallom, 70, has since waited in vain for help. In Iraq’s deeply sectarian system, he doesn’t expect much from the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad. But he is angry that local and national Sunni politicians haven’t come to the aid of his Sunni Muslim city either.
“These politicians are Sunni — they are supposed to help us,” he said. “They’re useless.”
Fourteen years after the American invasion ended decades of Sunni dominance in Iraq, Iraq’s Sunni Arabs are struggling to reclaim relevance and influence. After they were ousted from government jobs and from the military by the post-Saddam Hussein government, their powerlessness and rage gave rise to Sunni militant movements like Al Qaeda in Iraq and the Islamic State.
Now that those militants are being driven from the Sunni heartland, how the government responds to Sunnis trying to rebuild their lives is likely to have long-term consequences for the country’s stability and security.
More than 3.1 million Iraqis, the vast majority Sunni, remain displaced from their homes after three years of occupation and battles with the Islamic State. Another 2.3 million have returned. As towns like Karmah await rebuilding, Sunni leaders have not received much help from a cash-strapped central government more focused on battling the militants and, more recently, the Kurds.
Since 2003, Sunnis, who make up about a quarter of the population, have lost out to Shiites and Kurds, who were both brutally repressed by an elite Sunni minority under Saddam Hussein. With Iraq’s government now controlled by Shiites, and the Kurds governing their own autonomous area in the north, the Sunnis are in a political no-man’s land.
Image
[A car destroyed during fighting between Iraqi government forces and the Islamic State last year remains on a Karmah street. Residents said rubble from the battle had not been cleared in the absence of aid from Sunni politicians or the Baghdad government.CreditDavid Zucchino/The New York Times
There were high expectations when Haider al-Abadi became prime minister in 2014 that he could turn the page after the divisive sectarian rule of his predecessor, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, and win the confidence of the Sunnis.
Instead, Sunni leaders say, he has forsaken them while forging closer ties with Iran, the hard-line Shiite theocracy next door. Iran now wields tremendous influence over Iraq’s economy, military and government.
Hamid al-Mutlaq, who represents Karmah in Parliament, said the government was more focused on working with Iran and Iranian-armed Shiite militias than helping Sunnis rebuild.
“We are now a displaced people, a completely marginalized people — and it’s getting worse by the day,” he said.
“We have a corrupt government controlled by a foreign power, at the expense of Sunnis,” he added.
But Sunni politicians are mired in local feuds. They can hardly advance their own case when they can’t even agree on where to meet to patch up differences. At a Baghdad conference two years ago, Sunni politicians threw chairs at each other as their bodyguards traded punches.
“Our politicians do nothing for us,” said Ismail Jassim, 39, who relies on donations from neighbors in Karmah to survive in his home, which was burned by militants. “We never see them, except on TV at election time.”
The power of Sunni politicians was greatly diminished by the power-sharing agreement adopted after the American invasion. Under its formula, the prime minister’s post, along with the interior and foreign ministries, are reserved for Shiites. Kurds get the presidency and finance ministry. Sunni Arabs get Parliament speaker and defense minister, but the prime minister is commander in chief, and Shiite army commanders and militia leaders wield significant influence.
Image
[Members of a Shiite militia checked the identity of a Sunni villager in Saladin Province in June. Shiite militias, part of the Iraqi military, have been accused of committing atrocities against Sunnis.CreditSergey Ponomarev for The New York Times]
Iranian-trained Shiite militias are part of Iraq’s armed forces and have battled Islamic State militants since they seized nearly a third of Iraq in 2014. The militias have been accused of atrocities against Sunni civilians, and their presence near Sunni areas has alarmed many residents. A Shiite religious flag fluttered last week at an Iraqi military checkpoint outside Karmah.
Kurds have their own army as well, known as the pesh merga. But Sunnis have no national armed force, only tribal militias blended into Iraqi security forces to fight the militants.
Some Sunni politicians have advocated an autonomous Sunni region, but those proposals have stalled amid partisan bickering.
“Sunnis have no unified leadership,” said Wathiq al-Hashimi, the head of the Iraqi Group for Strategic Studies, an independent research group in Baghdad. “And Sunni politicians seem to care only about narrow personal interests.”
A Kurdish referendum on independence last month further divided Sunnis. Most opposed it, preferring to keep Kurds inside Iraq as a counterweight against Shiite domination; virtually all Iraqi Kurds are Sunni. Many Sunnis cheered the government takeover of contested areas, where Sunni Arabs had seethed under Kurdish control.
But even Sunnis opposed to the Kurdish vote were alarmed when Iraqi forces conducted military maneuvers with Iranian troops inside Iran along the Iraq border.
“We won’t tolerate that kind of foreign interference on top of everything else,” said Sheikh Ahmed al-Karim, a Sunni lawmaker who generally supports the government of Mr. Abadi, the prime minister.
Image
[pix Lacking reconstruction aid, Sirhan Sallom, center, is rebuilding his home with his life savings and the help of his son, Ali Sirhan, right. They expect no help from the government.CreditDavid Zucchino/The New York Times
In Parliament, the Sunni-led bloc has 78 seats, roughly proportionate to their share of the population, but is dwarfed by the Shiite bloc, with 182. The Kurdish bloc has 65 seats. Parliament has fallen increasingly under the sway of Iran, which is locked in a regional power struggle with Sunni countries led by Saudi Arabia.
Mithal al-Alusi, a Sunni lawmaker, has called the government “a cardboard state” because of its ties to Iran. He has asked, acidly, whether Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the commander of Iran’s elite overseas military forces who has advised Iraq’s Shiite militias, had a proper visa to enter Iraq.
Shiites seem driven by a sense of religious grievance and a pan-Shiite destiny. Kurds are motivated by nationalism and dreams of independence. And Sunnis?
“For the Sunnis, there’s a lack of political cohesion about exactly what they want,” said Maria Fantappie, a senior analyst for Iraq at the International Crisis Group.
David L. Phillips, a former adviser at the State Department who has worked on Iraq for 30 years, said Sunnis had failed to organize as effectively as Shiites and Kurds.
“Baghdad is perfectly content to see the Sunnis in disarray,” he said.
There are a few hopeful signs. Because some Shiite factions will oppose Mr. Abadi in April, and Kurdish politics are in upheaval, he will have to court the Sunni bloc to help ensure re-election.
“The Abadi government has never needed the Sunnis more than now,” Ms. Fantappie said.
But Sunnis could suffer political losses in April if hundreds of thousands of displaced Sunni constituents are unable to vote. If hard-line Shiite populists prevail, some reconstruction funds could end up going to poor Shiite regions rather than liberated Sunni areas.
Image
A displaced Sunni family from Muqdadiyah in a squatter camp in Diyala Province in 2013. More than three million Iraqis, most of them Sunni, remain displaced from their homes after fleeing the Islamic State.CreditAyman Oghanna for The New York Times]
The post-Saddam era has proved ruinous for many Sunnis. After 2003, a de-Baathification program stripped hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civil servants of their jobs, including doctors and teachers. Many sacked Sunni army officers joined the Al Qaeda insurgency against American forces, though Sunni tribes later helped drive out the militants in the so-called Sunni Awakening.
Elements of de-Baathification continued, however. Mr. Mutlaq, the Sunni lawmaker who had been a general in Mr. Hussein’s army, said a de-Baathification commission had barred him three times since 2010 from running for Parliament. “Pure political harassment,” he said.
(He appealed, and now sits on Parliament’s security and defense committee.)
Under Mr. Maliki, who was prime minister from 2006 to 2014, many Sunnis who had reclaimed their jobs were purged from the military and government, some for the second time. Festering Sunni resentment helped spur the rise of the Islamic State and allowed its fighters to take over Sunni towns and cities in 2014 with relative ease.
The militants promised a new era of Sunni dominance, drawing widespread support from disenfranchised Sunnis. But they failed to deliver, and the reign of terror they imposed ultimately turned many Sunnis against them.
Now Sunni towns like Karmah, where residents initially welcomed the militants, feel abandoned by their politicians. Karmah, with a population of about 95,000, was liberated in May 2016. The United Nations has provided some aid, rebuilding schools and making emergency infrastructure repairs.
But the only sign in Karmah of the Iraqi agency charged with rebuilding liberated areas is the beginning of construction work on five schools. Mustafa al-Hiti, a Sunni pharmacist who directs the agency, said that just $140 million had been allocated by Baghdad this year for rebuilding all of the areas that had been under Islamic State rule. He estimated total costs for that job at more than $100 billion.
He said international donors had allocated billions of dollars, but much of that money has been slowed by audits amid donor concerns about Iraq’s reputation for corruption.
So Mr. Sallom is rebuilding his home in Karmah using his life savings and the help of his son, Ali Sirhan. Mr. Sirhan, 44, was asked whether he thought Sunni politicians would soon offer help.
“Help?” Mr. Sirhan asked. “Forget help. They don’t even come visit, even if it’s just to say, ‘God help you.’”
Falih Hassan contributed reporting.
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Nahro al-Kasnazan is a wealthy Iraqi sheikh who has been…
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vox
conflict between Iraqi Sunnis and Shias sustains ISIS
One of the single most important factors in ISIS's resurgence is the conflict between Iraq's largest two Arab religious groups: Shias and Sunnis. ISIS fighters themselves are Sunnis, and the tension between the two groups is a powerful recruiting tool for ISIS.
In the most basic theological terms, the Sunni-Shia split in Islam originated with a controversy over who would take power after the Prophet Mohammed's death. Today, of course, Iraq's sectarian problems aren't about relitigating seventh-century disputes; they're about modern political power and grievances. But those do tend to fall along Sunni-Shia lines.
A majority of Iraqi Arabs are Shias, but Sunnis ran the show when Saddam Hussein, himself Sunni, ruled Iraq. Saddam spread a false belief, still surprisingly persistent in the country today, that Sunnis were the real majority in Iraq. Thus, Sunnis felt, and still feel, entitled to larger shares of political power than might perhaps be warranted by their size.
Meanwhile, the Iraqi civil war sparked after the 2003 US-led invasion had a brutally sectarian cast to it, and thepseudo-democracy that emerged afterward empowered the Shia majority (with some heavy-handed help from Washington) at the expense of the Sunni minority. Today the two groups don't trust one another and so far have competed in what they see as a zero-sum game for control over Iraqi political institutions. In 2013, Shias used control over the police force to arbitrarily detain Sunni protestors demanding more representation in government.
So long as Shias control the government, and Sunnis don't feel that they're fairly represented, ISIS has an audience for its radical Sunni message. That's an important part of how the group built up support in Iraq's heavily Sunni northwest.
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iraqi-kurd war/ http://grist.org/news/how-exxonmobil-may-cause-a-civil-war-in-iraq/cf chevron
Fuel on the Fire http://www.fuelonthefire.com/
The departure of the last U.S. troops from Iraq at the end of 2011 left a broken country and a host of unanswered questions. What was the war really about? Why and how did the occupation drag on for nearly nine years? And why did the troops have to leave? Now, in a gripping account of the war that dominated the last decade, investigative journalist Greg Muttitt takes us behind the scenes to answer these questions and tells the untold story of the oil politics that played out through the occupation.
cheney secret task force got info on oil fields
goodman btsb: baker 3 study group, opened to for co's for 1st time in decades, take big chunk 54 oil minitry bldg protected
John Hopkins est 650K dead 55 since 2003 invasion [sanctions killed many kids before?
us sold long list chem weapons dude 49
Blackwater subsequently rebranded itself as "Xe," and has just changed its name to Academi, and is still seeking lucrative government contracts. I reviewed Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army in 2007, and it remains an important read for anyone who wants to understand the way that US-funded mercenaries run amok in America's fields of war (and in America's disaster zones, such as post-Katrina New Orleans), murdering and rampaging with impunity.
www.foreignpolicy.com/.../secret_cia_files_prove_america_helped_sadd...
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:{United States:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: support for Iraq during the :{Iran:(style="font-weight:bold"):}:–:{Iraq war:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: - Wikipedia **...**
en.wikipedia.org/.../United_States_support_for_Iraq_during_the_Iran–Ir...
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New Docs Detail :{U.S. Involvement:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: in Saddam's Nerve :{Gas:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: Attacks **...**
www.theatlanticwire.com/national/2013/...us-involvement...gas.../68698/
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Arming :{Iraq:(style="font-weight:bold"):}:: A Chronology of :{US Involvement:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: - :{Iran:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: Chamber Society
www.iranchamber.com/history/articles/arming_iraq.php
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CIA files show agency was :{involved:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: in :{Iraq's gas:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: attack on :{Iran:(style="font-weight:bold"):}:
www.presstv.ir › United States › Foreign Policy
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:{US Role:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: in Chemical Attacks During the :{Iran:(style="font-weight:bold"):}:-:{Iraq War:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: | @pritheworld
www.theworld.org/.../us-role-in-chemical-attacks-during-the-iran-iraq-w...
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History lesson: When the :{United States:(style="font-weight:bold"):}: looked the other way on **...**
www.washingtonpost.com/...united-states.../0ec828d6-1549-11e3-961c-f22...
Sep 4, 2013 - The U.S. tilt toward Iraq was enshrined in National Security Decision ... was necessary and legal” to prevent Iraq from losing the war with Iran.
History lesson: When the United States looked the other way on chemical weapons
By Glenn Kessler, Published: September 4
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But there is an even more striking instance of the United States ignoring use of the chemical weapons that killed tens of thousands of people — during the grinding Iraq-Iran war in the 1980s. As documented in 2002 by Washington Post reporter Michael Dobbs, the Reagan administration knew full well it was selling materials to Iraq that was being used for the manufacture of chemical weapons, and that Iraq was using such weapons, but U.S. officials were more concerned about whether Iran would win rather than how Iraq might eke out a victory. Dobbs noted that Iraq’s chemical weapons’ use was “hardly a secret, with the Iraqi military issuing this warning in February 1984: ”The invaders should know that for every harmful insect, there is an insecticide capable of annihilating it . . . and Iraq possesses this annihilation insecticide.”
As Dobbs wrote:
A review of thousands of declassified government documents and interviews with former policymakers shows that U.S. intelligence and logistical support played a crucial role in shoring up Iraqi defenses against the “human wave” attacks by suicidal Iranian troops. The administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush authorized the sale to Iraq of numerous items that had both military and civilian applications, including poisonous chemicals and deadly biological viruses, such as anthrax and bubonic plague….
To prevent an Iraqi collapse, the Reagan administration supplied battlefield intelligence on Iranian troop buildups to the Iraqis, sometimes through third parties such as Saudi Arabia. The U.S. tilt toward Iraq was enshrined in National Security Decision Directive 114 of Nov. 26, 1983, one of the few important Reagan era foreign policy decisions that still remains classified. According to former U.S. officials, the directive stated that the United States would do “whatever was necessary and legal” to prevent Iraq from losing the war with Iran.
The presidential directive was issued amid a flurry of reports that Iraqi forces were using chemical weapons in their attempts to hold back the Iranians. In principle, Washington was strongly opposed to chemical warfare, a practice outlawed by the 1925 Geneva Protocol. In practice, U.S. condemnation of Iraqi use of chemical weapons ranked relatively low on the scale of administration priorities, particularly compared with the all-important goal of preventing an Iranian victory.
Thus, on Nov. 1, 1983, a senior State Department official, Jonathan T. Howe, told Secretary of State George P. Shultz that intelligence reports showed that Iraqi troops were resorting to “almost daily use of CW” against the Iranians.But the Reagan administration had already committed itself to a large-scale diplomatic and political overture to Baghdad, culminating in several visits by the president’s recently appointed special envoy to the Middle East, Donald H. Rumsfeld.
In 1988, Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein ordered chemical weapons attacks against Kurdish resistance forces, but the relationship with Iraq at the time was deemed too important to rupture over the matter. The United States did not even impose sanctions.
Without much apparent irony, two decades later Rumsfeld and other members of the then George W. Bush administration repeatedly cited Hussein’s use of chemical weapons against own people as a justification for invading Iraq. (Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill did not respond to questions about her views on how the Reagan administration handled the Iraqi situation.)
For interested readers, we have embedded below an English translation of the French intelligence report on the alleged chemical weapons attack last month because it includes a history of the Syrian chemical weapons program.
National Executive Summary of Declassified Intelligence posted by Glenn Kessler