Rusted Sky

Hard to tell, but this is interesting...

Power Line: Jihadists On Defense

On July 4, Zawahiri released a new video tape. The production values are pretty good, and Zawahiri is intercut with other footage, including television clips. What is striking about Zawahiri's message, however, is how defensive it is. And what Zawahiri is defensive about, is events in Iraq.

He begins by talking about Iraq, and that remains the main subject although there are passing references to other fields of battle. His theme on Iraq is the need for unity. Reading between the lines, you can tell that Muslims, including relatively radical Muslims, are distancing themselves from al Qaeda in Iraq, or, as Zawahiri calls it, the Islamic State of Iraq. He criticizes clerics who say there is no duty to carry out jihad in Iraq. He contrasts al Qaeda in Iraq favorably with Hamas, and complains that while Hamas receives near-universal support, al Qaeda in Iraq suffers from "a storm of media campaigns, allegations and claims ... whipped up in their face."

Like this?

Michael Yon : Online Magazine � Blog Archive � Baqubah Update: 05 July 2007

Speaking through an American interpreter, Lieutenant David Wallach who is a native Arabic speaker, the Iraqi official related how al Qaeda united these gangs who then became absorbed into “al Qaeda.” They recruited boys born during the years 1991, 92 and 93 who were each given weapons, including pistols, a bicycle and a phone (with phone cards paid) and a salary of $100 per month, all courtesy of al Qaeda. These boys were used for kidnapping, torturing and murdering people.

At first, he said, they would only target Shia, but over time the new al Qaeda directed attacks against Sunni, and then anyone who thought differently. The official reported that on a couple of occasions in Baqubah, al Qaeda invited to lunch families they wanted to convert to their way of thinking. In each instance, the family had a boy, he said, who was about 11 years old. As LT David Wallach interpreted the man’s words, I saw Wallach go blank and silent. He stopped interpreting for a moment. I asked Wallach, “What did he say?” Wallach said that at these luncheons, the families were sat down to eat. And then their boy was brought in with his mouth stuffed. The boy had been baked. Al Qaeda served the boy to his family.

One thing that's always astounded me about the media coverage in this war is that any HINT of misdoings by OUR troops are immediately trumpeted as true. Yet something like this... isn't it worth a few reporters? Michael Yon's done pretty well being an honest observer of this war (which is something the mainstream media have not) and it's interesting just how quickly something like this will get totally ignored. After all, it doesn't fit the script - that the US is uniquely bad and evil, and the saintly 'freedom fighters' can do no wrong. But back to poor Zawahiri, who's finding out that his 'friends' who are taking the label of Al Quaeda aren't doing the Cause any good at all.

In part, as many commentators have noted, Zawahiri's plea for unity in Iraq reflects the abandonment of al Qaeda by most Sunnis there, and the fact that many Sunnis have joined with the U.S. and the Iraqi government in fighting al Qaeda. But the defensiveness Zawahiri betrays goes well beyond that schism. He plainly is concerned about how things are going in Iraq, and is anxious to generate support for his organization's efforts there.

Hey, good beheading knives are expensive. Things are going badly in Iraq for Al Quaeda BECAUSE of the things Al Quaeda's doing - not because the people are somehow turning away from the kind and gentle message to continue their lives of sin and depravity... carrying tomatoes and cucumbers together without even THINKING about hot vegetable sex! Or soup, maybe...

I've never understood the theory that Iraq is somehow unrelated to the broader war on terror. It would not be possible to read what al Qaeda's leaders have written and listen to their tapes, and hold that view. At one point, Zawahiri exhorts his followers to "[h]urry to Afghanistan, to Iraq, hurry to Somalia, hurry to Palestine, and hurry to the towering Atlas Mountains." If we were to abandon Iraq, can anyone doubt that the flow of jihadists to those other regions, and more, would increase?

Ah, but the assumption is made that it's important - which it really isn't as long as the proper people (Democrats) are elected this next year.

But as I've said before - they'd better be careful what they wish for. The Democrats want control, but show no signs of having the first clue about what to do with it. The Republicans... sigh. We won't go there. Al Quaeda's been able to get in the door, but have made themselves such unpleasant guests that the infidel occupier is seen as preferable, which you've got to admit takes significant doing. To conclude, one final bit from Michael Yon's post....

The big news on the streets today is that the people of Baqubah are generally ecstatic, although many hold in reserve a serious concern that we will abandon them again. For many Iraqis, we have morphed from being invaders to occupiers to members of a tribe. I call it the “al Ameriki tribe,” or “tribe America.”

I’ve seen this kind of progression in Mosul, out in Anbar and other places, and when I ask our military leaders if they have sensed any shift, many have said, yes, they too sense that Iraqis view us differently. In the context of sectarian and tribal strife, we are the tribe that people can—more or less and with giant caveats—rely on.

Most Iraqis I talk with acknowledge that if it was ever about the oil, it’s not now. Not mostly anyway. It clearly would have been cheaper just to buy the oil or invade somewhere easier that has more. Similarly, most Iraqis seem now to realize that we really don’t want to stay here, and that many of us can’t wait to get back home. They realize that we are not resolved to stay, but are impatient to drive down to Kuwait and sail away. And when they consider the Americans who actually deal with Iraqis every day, the Iraqis can no longer deny that we really do want them to succeed. But we want them to succeed without us. We want to see their streets are clean and safe, their grass is green, and their birds are singing. We want to see that on television. Not in person. We don’t want to be here. We tell them that every day. It finally has settled in that we are telling the truth.

Now that all those realizations and more have settled in, the dynamics here are changing in palpable ways.

The world changes. The war changes. Some things get better, some worse. But Al Quaeda? They need to be destroyed - that's a solid constant.

J.