Tribal leaders under attack

Azzaman ^ | June 5 2007

[ASC2006]

Three tribal leaders in the northern city of Mosul have been gunned down by unidentified assailants.

Attacks on tribal chiefs in Iraq, particularly in the Sunni-dominated areas of central and northern Iraq have increased recently.

The attacks come following reports that certain tribes were no longer willing to provide refuge for al-Qaeda-linked insurgents and some had mobilized their armed men to have them flushed from their areas.

But it seems the group is too strong to be beaten by Iraqi tribes and its members are reported to be murdering the chiefs of any tribe standing against them.

In the northern city of Mosul, three leaders of major tribes have been killed. The first, Shaikh Khanim Ibrahim al-Sabaawi, was leader of the powerful al-Sabaawi tribe.

Earlier unidentified gunmen had killed Khanim al-Hadi of al-Aqidat tribe and Ghazi al-Hanash of Tai tribe.

Reports that they were liquidated by al-Qaeda still need to be independently verified but eyewitnesses say the three chiefs were shot and killed by unknown assailants.

[ASC2006]

The tribes have many more men then al-Qaeda, but they are greatly outgunned by them, especially outside of Anbar.

[philly-d-kidder]

They had an Article on Stars and Stripes Today about How great it is and hardly any murders..for 4 months.. i believe..

[tobyhill]

I think it’s bad that these tribal leaders are getting killed but this is now the price they pay for ever having done business with Al-Qaeda.

[johnny7]

WTF is azzaman.com?

[ASC2006]

That was Ramadi which is in Anbar a place where our commanders in the field have supported the tribes. Not with nearly as many weapons as I would have given them, but enough so Sattar could buy much of what he needed using money the Saudis have given him.

The Pentagon and local US commanders are still too afraid to use the Anbar model outside of Anbar. They say they are doing it in Diyala. The reality is unless you give the tribes the weapons and support they need to fight al-Qaeda you are simply sending the tribes to the slaughter.

[ASC2006]

Sorry, but if you were to kill every Iraqi politician or tribal leader that ever did business with Iran or al-Qaeda there would be none left in Iraq.

The question is how do we help the tribes to build up local police forces as we did in Anbar.

[tobyhill]

It’s not us doing the killing of these tribal leaders, it’s Al-Qaeda, and that’s what I mean they should have never started any business with them. Al-Qaeda would always rather see a destroyed nation if they weren’t in control of that nation. The best way we can help is tell the tribal leaders to leave their areas with their people and we will mop up the area leaving them with a clean slate on their return. It may not be pretty but at least we can separate the good from bad.

[ASC2006]

You don’t seem to understand why al-Qaeda took over places like Anbar.

It wasn’t because the tribes let them in. It was because there was virtually no security in Western Iraq. And, in late 2003 early 2004 Zarqawi made a deal with the Baathists to work together. So, in comes the Baathists and al-Qaeda in Anbar while Bremer had ruled the US wouldn’t do business with the tribes and there wasn’t enough US troops to do much of anything to protect them. So they were caught between a rock and a hard place.

Some smart tribal leaders and US officers wanted in late 2003 and early 2004 to bring the tribes together to fight as one with the US against al-Qaeda. But, the CPA and Sanchez killed that plan.

Then in 2005 the tribes in Anbar decided to try to unite against al-Qaeda and Zarqawi butchered them because the US refused to help them out of fear we would be ‘giving weapons to the enemy’.

Then in late 2006 we changed our policy toward the tribes and supported them and cities like Anbar that were total warzones now have strong Iraqi police forces and Anbar is moving forward.