Posted on 11/22/2004 7:45:06 AM PST by Pfesser
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Gunmen on Monday assassinated a member of an influential Sunni clerics' group that has called for a boycott of national elections, just a day after Iraqi officials announced the balloting would be held Jan. 30 in spite of rising violence in Iraq (news - web sites).
Meanwhile, Iraqi security forces recovered 12 bodies, including five decapitated ones, from an area south of Baghdad, police said Monday. One was identified as a member of the Iraqi National Guard. The bodies were found during a raid Sunday in Latifiyah, about 20 miles south of Baghdad, said Lt. Adnan Abdullah.
Sheik Faidh Mohamed Amin al-Faidhi, a member of the Association of Muslim Scholars, was shot by gunmen at his home in northern Mosul — a sign of the continuing violence that wracks the country.
The slaying could further alienate Iraq's Sunni Arab minority ahead of the Jan. 30 election. The association is already calling for a boycott of the vote, and if many Sunni heed its call, the legitimacy of the election could be deeply undermined.
In an interview with The Associated Press on Monday, Iraqi interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said his government was determined to hold the election as scheduled. He described those calling for a boycott as "the eventual losers" and "a small minority."
"The forces of darkness and terrorism will not benefit from this democratic experience and will fight it," Allawi said. "But we are determined that this experiment succeeds."
The vote for the 275-member National Assembly will be Iraq's first election since Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s fall and is seen as a major step toward building democracy.
But the ongoing violence, which escalated this month with the U.S.-led offensive against Fallujah, has also raised concerns that balloting could be nearly a practical impossibility in insurgency-torn regions. Iraqi authorities insist ballots will be cast even in volatile areas — including Fallujah, Mosul and other parts of the Sunni Triangle.
Twenty nations, including Iraq's neighbors and Western and Arab countries, gathered in the Egyptian resort of Sharm al-Sheik for a conference aimed at showing support for Iraq.
The delegates intended to call on Allawi's government to reach out to its opponents to encourage broad participation in the election. According to a draft of the conference's final statement, they were also to underline their condemnation of "terrorism" in Iraq — a boost to Allawi's and the U.S. military's crackdown on insurgents.
In a gesture to Sunnis, Allawi on Monday ordered an inquiry into a raid by U.S. and Iraqi forces on Baghdad's Abu Hanifa mosque, one of the holiest Sunni shrines in Iraq. The raid just after Friday prayers left three people dead and enraged many Sunnis.
It also brought a condemnation from Iraq's leading Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
Allawi, a Shiite Muslim, conferred Sunday with Sunni officials on several issues, including the Abu Hanifa raid. Allawi told them that "although there had been reports of terrorist activity around the mosque, mistakes appeared to have been made and that he had ordered a full investigation," a statement by Allawi's office said.
Allawi's government has warned that Sunni clerics who incite violence will be considered as "participating in terrorism." Some already have been arrested.
Elsewhere Monday, a U.S. patrol that came under attack returned fire, killing two attackers in Hawija, about 150 miles north of Baghdad, according to witnesses. The U.S. military had no immediate confirmation.
The military said Monday a U.S. soldier died after he was wounded in an attack the night before in Baghdad. At least 1,222 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an AP count.
The former police chief of the northern city of Mosul was arrested after allegations that his force allowed insurgents to take over police stations during this month's uprising, Deputy Gov. Khasro Gouran said Monday.
Brig. Gen. Mohammed Kheiri Barhawi was arrested Sunday by Kurdish militia in northern Irbil, where he fled after he was fired in the wake of the uprising
A rocket slammed into a residential district in the center of Baghdad on Monday, injuring five people including a child, witnesses said. The blast sent a giant cloud of black smoke rising over the eastern side of the Tigris River.
U.S. and Iraqi troops have been clearing the last of the resistance from Fallujah, the main rebel bastion stormed Nov. 8 in hopes of breaking the back of the insurgency before the election.
Allawi called the Fallujah assault was an unqualified success.
"We went to Fallujah and we broke their back," he told AP. "We found enough weapons there to destroy an entire country."
In Fallujah, Marine Maj. Jim West said Sunday that U.S. troops have found nearly 20 "atrocity sites" where insurgents imprisoned, tortured and murdered hostages. West said troops found rooms containing knives and black hoods, "many of them blood-covered."
The storming of Fallujah has heightened tensions throughout Sunni Arab areas, triggering a surge of clashes in Mosul, Beiji, Samarra, Ramadi and elsewhere.
The government's announcement Sunday that elections were set for Jan. 30 reflected Iraqi and U.S. determination to hold the vote despite the persistent violence.
Iraq's Shiites, believed to comprise about 60 percent of Iraq's nearly 26 million people, have been clamoring for an election, and voting is expected to go smoothly in northern areas ruled by the Kurds. But Sunni Arabs, estimated at about 20 percent of the population, fear domination by the Shiites.
During the January election, Iraqis will choose a National Assembly to draft a new constitution. If it's ratified, another election will be held in December 2005. Voters will also select 18 provincial councils and in Kurdish-ruled areas a regional assembly.
I'll probably get in trouble for this but I think it might be a good technique for some of the self-identified "intocables" in this country.
And one of the reasons I say that is that it is very often very effective to turn a groups tactics back on them. Nobody likes turnabout but it's fair play.
And they don't take inbeds with them when they go to take care of bidness. "To Hell They Will Go!" I want that to become as famous as MacAuliffe's "Nuts."
HAHAHA!!!
Yeah, if the Sunnis sit out they can have fun dealing with a government entirely composed of Shia and Kurds. You know, they Sunnis better get with the program. They spent 40 years raping and pillaging and if they don't want to see (their) blood running in the streets they better start flying right.
I've heard the idea of giving the Kurds the oil in the north, give the Shiites the oil in the south, and let the Sunni eat sand. I like it.
Eventually they will get the message just how
alienated WE ARE.
Arab street? pissh, American Street where there's a gun in every home.
LOL!
Can I use it as my new tag line? Please?!
Mucha graccias senor Sheik.
Seems like a good news .
and will be...
......the crazy psychopath to whom the founding of this cult is attributed. The 'prophet' was a schizophrenic who also suffered numerous epileptic episodes
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As a professional in the mental health field I would like to see the professional diagnosis of old Mohammed before I agree he was a 'psychopath'/ schizophrenic. I will continue my research into the historical founder of Islam with a keen eye as to the sources who portray him. You don't expect me to take one source or your word for it do you? Does epilepsy disqualify one from being human? Does Van Gogh's mental illness make him less of a genius painter? Or less of a man? No it does not. I do not accept your premise, even if true (that he was wacko), that mental illness automatically makes the works and legacy of an individual worthless and evil.
Plenty of people have had reason to demonize this man and to distort his words and works for their gain. That was the point of my post to which you took such vehement exception. But for the sake of pursuing your argument let's say he was mentally ill: Does that mean his creation, Islam in his own words, and not the subsequent editors' words, is vile, evil and without redeeming grace as you and so many here assert? Is the religion utterly identical with the alleged mental state of Mohammed? If your answer is yes, as it appears to be, what are we to do with all the followers of Islam? If they are evil shall we kill them all? Convert them? What?
Prove it and if true what shall we do with his 1 billion followers, sir? Kill them all moderate men women and children?
You are a very sick man and I reject your plan for winning the war on terror
The best news coming out of there for a while. An Iraq where sheikhs, mullahs and tribal elders are prominent would be a bad Iraq. Hence the fewer of them, the better.
i agree there are no moderates.
only those who skulk in the shadows and privately cheer each american death. until they are eliminated or TROP
gets a new schtick which does not advocate taking over the world and beheading the infidels (AH THAT READS YOU AND ME),
then death to them all. we are fighting an enemy who for years has been plotting world domination and my kids aren't going to wear burkas.
the fight is now there and here ,so be ready friend.
Yes, kill the terrorist die hards who murder to obstruct a democratic Iraq. I have no problem with that.
I really don't get these muslim apologists.
It's all there in the Koran. For the whole world to see. Not to mention it seems like not a day goes by that some peaceful moslems attack some other religious group.
And don't forget the Arab mindset. While not all arabs are muslim, the "arab street" is quite frankly, insane. And anyone that can say that it isn't needs some meds.
again i vote for the killed part of the question.
islam is a threat to all of non muslims.
us or them baby and i go with the them part.
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