Posted on 03/10/2006 5:48:59 PM PST by blam
Sunni insurgents 'have al-Zarqawi running for cover'
By Oliver Poole in Baghdad
(Filed: 11/03/2006)
Insurgent groups in one of Iraq's most violent provinces claim that they have purged the region of three quarters of al-Qa'eda's supporters after forming an alliance to force out the foreign fighters.
If true, it would mark a significant victory in the fight against Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of al-Qa'eda in Iraq, and could partly explain the considerable drop in suicide bombings in Iraq recently.
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
"We have killed a number of the Arabs, including Saudis, Egyptians, Syrians, Kuwaitis and Jordanians," said an insurgent representative in the western province of Anbar.
The claims were partly supported by the defence ministry, which said it had evidence that Zarqawi and his followers were fleeing Anbar to cities and mountains near the Iranian border.
It is this move that is believed to have prompted a statement a fortnight ago from the insurgent groups in the central city of Hawija that they were declaring war on al-Qae'da. It is being interpreted by intelligence experts as a response to an unwanted influx of foreign fighters seeking refuge. Iraq's Sunni Muslim insurgents had originally welcomed al-Qa'eda into the country, seeing it as a powerful ally in its fight against the American occupation.
But relations became strained when insurgents supported calls for Sunnis to vote in last December's election, a move they saw as essential to break the Shia hold on government but which al-Qa'eda viewed as a form of collaboration. It became an outright split when a wave of bombings killed scores of people in Anbar resulting in a spate of tit-for-tat killings.
In reaction, the insurgent groups formed their own anti-al-Qa'eda militia, the Anbar Revolutionaries. The group has a core membership of 100 people, all of whom had relatives killed by al-Qa'eda. It is led by Ahmed Ftaikhan, a former Saddam-era military intelligence officer.
It claims to have killed 20 foreign fighters and 33 Iraqi sympathisers. Many more are said to have fled. The United States has confirmed that six of Zarqawi's deputies were killed in Ramadi.
Osama al-Jadaan, a tribal chief, has claimed that with the support of the Iraqi army his supporters have captured hundreds of foreign fighters, and has sought to prevent jihadis entering the country from Syria.
Great news.
MSM?
Bueller?
Yes, excellant news. I notice they are heading over to the Iranian border.
yay
no torture for the captives
Hey buds, don't forget there's a price on his head. Imagine hunting him down and thinking he's only just a terrorist scumbag. It would be like losing a wining lottery ticket.
Are the Sunni insurgents the "good" insurgents? I am getting confused here.
Me too. I guess the insurgents have the insurgents on the run.
So long as they are doing their insurging against the AQ folks, they are the good insurgents.
By Jove, I think you've got it.
An increasing number of the Sunni insurgents are like Democrats who, on a whim, decided one day to actually look for a well-paying job that they intended to show up for, and somehow...landed one! Now, they look back on all the anger which had consumed and threatened to destroy them and their community, and are suddenly realizing, "Gee, what a dope I have been!"
It takes a serious dupe a long time to notice the puppet strings tying his hands, and and even longer time, for some reason, to create the thought of cutting those strings.
Before we boggle in too much in amazement at them, however, we need to compare them to our own multi-generational liberal dupes here at home.
Insurgents against insurgents. Oh, good, says the MSM. Civil war!
BUMP the good news.
The Iraq front of the WOT is going swimmingly, and William F. Buckley, Niall Ferguson, Francis Fukuyama, George Will, etc. are gloom and doom. Bush's strategery (Rice, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, etc.) is genius, and the conservative pundits abandon ship as we win. Go figure.
Well as long as they are shooting each other they aren't shooting at our guys. Sounds like the Sunnis are beginning to accept the fact that they are going to have to participate in the new government of they want to have a say.
Hmmmm.... heading for home base?
Someone always has this SOB on the run ... Please call when they actually Get this waste of a double helix.
The "good" insurgents are the ones not setting off IED's... or blowing up the locals.
Well they're not going to get there through the Kurdish area. Jihadi, meet Peshmerga! (insert evil grin here)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.