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A map of al Qaeda's proposed Sunni Islamic State, from an al Qaeda video. |
Posted on 11/22/2007 9:31:51 AM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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A map of al Qaeda's proposed Sunni Islamic State, from an al Qaeda video. |
Al Qaeda in Iraq may be down, but it is not out. While al Qaeda has suffered a major setback after US and Iraqi forces launched multiple offensives throughout Iraq, the terror group still retains some capacity to conduct attacks. Today, al Qaeda attacked the Awakening movement two villages north and south of Baghdad. The battles resulted in scores killed on both sides, including 10 al Qaeda fighters. Meanwhile, Iraqi and Coalition forces have killed or captured several senior al Qaeda leaders over the past week.
"Gunmen dressed in Iraqi army uniforms launched an attack on Howr Rajab, a Sunni village south of Baghdad, killing three soldiers and wounding three," the Associated Press reported. "They then commandeered a military vehicle and charged into the village where they assaulted the headquarters of the Howr Rajab Awakening Council, a local anti-Qaeda front, killing 10 of its members and wounding four."
The Howr Rajab Awakening teamed up with the Iraqi Army and repelled the attack. Upwards of 18 civilians were killed in the fighting. "Dozens of men wearing Iraqi army uniforms entered the area and opened fire randomly at people," an Awakening member told the Associated Press. "The Iraqi army intervened and along with Awakening members fought back. There were fierce clashes ... which are still ongoing."
The day prior to the attack in Howr Rajab , al Qaeda in Iraq distributed pamphlets ordering the Sunnis to reject the Coalition efforts to restore security and rejoin the insurgency. "There will be many battles between us," a pamphlet in the town stated. "We will bomb each and every house in the village and chop the heads of people unless they return" to the anti-American insurgency."
Al Qaeda in Iraq also struck at the village of Al Kulaiyah in Diyala province. "Villagers from Shiite Al-Ambagiyah tribe defended themselves and in the ensuing clashes nine people were killed," AFP reported. "Seven fighters from Al-Qaeda and two from the Ambagiyah tribe were killed in the gun battle that lasted an hour," said police Lieutenant Colonel Ibrahim Abdullah.
Al Qaeda in Iraq has continuously targeted the Awakening movements which have sprung up in Anbar, Diyala, Baghdad, Babil, Ninewa, Salahadin, and Tamin provinces. The Awakening has fought al Qaeda's attempts to impose its Islamic State in Iraq. These movements have organized local and provincial security forces, and have encouraged members of the tribes to join the Army and local and national police forces.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
At Least 11 Dead in Baghdad Attack (Who did IT?)
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By CARA BUCKLEY
BAGHDAD, Nov. 22 — Sunni insurgents dressed as Iraqi Army troops stormed a village southeast of Baghdad at dawn today, killing at least 11 people during a three-hour firefight before American and Iraqi soldiers drove them off. However, a local sheik said there were at least 20 more dead.
The village, Hawr Rajab, has been the site of fierce struggles between two rival Sunni groups, the foreign-led Al Qaeda of Mesopotamia and members of the so-called Sunni Awakening, who are allied with the American forces here.
The head of Hawr Rajab’s Awakening Council, Sheik Maher al-Maenee, said 50 attackers burst into the village from three entry points at 6:30 a.m. One local resident said the insurgents overran an Iraqi army checkpoint and commandeered two tanks.
The attackers were wearing Iraqi Army fatigues, Mr. al-Maenee said, along with Awakening Council uniforms stolen during previous raids. Iraqi troops fought back, killing at least three.
"There will be many battles between us. We will bomb each and every house in the village and chop the heads of people unless they return" to the anti-American insurgency, said one leaflet, put out in the name of Al-Qaeda.
The attackers fled south toward Bsuaifi, an area considered a Qaeda stronghold.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
I agree.. Also smacks of desperation IMHO. We need to keep the pressure on them.
Nearly all use "al-Queda" in the reports....cept the NY Times.....
Funny thing happened on the way to that quagmire....it seems to have become Al Qaeda’s tar baby.
The most important part of the story as far as I'm concerned.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Qaeda kill 10 in Baghdad while mortars hit Green Zone
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Thu Nov 22, 2007 11:59 AM EST162
By Waleed Ibrahim
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Al Qaeda militants killed at least eight police in southern Baghdad on Thursday, raking them with machinegun fire from a stolen Iraqi army vehicle, police said.
Separately, police said insurgents fired 10 mortar bombs at Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone just before dusk, in attacks coinciding with the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday.
A Reuters witness said he saw what appeared to be a body hanging from a damaged minibus in the zone, which houses the U.S. embassy and many government ministries. Police said there were casualties, but had no details.
The eruption of violence ran against the trend of a sharp drop in attacks in recent months.
Al Qaeda in Iraq militants opened fire on a neighborhood police patrol in the Hawr Rajab area of Baghdad, a mainly Sunni Arab area, approaching in at least one of two vehicles they had stolen after shooting at least two Iraqi soldiers.
An Interior Ministry official confirmed that eight "Awakening Council" police patrol members had been killed. He said three Iraqi soldiers were killed and another three were wounded, and that two al Qaeda gunmen had also been killed.
Mortar and rocket attacks on the Green Zone were almost a daily occurrence earlier this year but have fallen off dramatically, along with overall declines in levels of violence in Baghdad and elsewhere.
The falls in attacks have been attributed to a "surge" of 30,000 extra U.S. troops, which became fully operational in mid-June, and the growing use of neighborhood police units.
Mainly Sunni Arab tribal sheikhs have been organizing young men into the local police units, known as concerned local citizens, to drive out Sunni Islamist al Qaeda.
HUMVEES SEIZED
Police at Baghdad's Yarmouk hospital said two Iraqi army "humvee" vehicles had been seized at the start of the attack at Hawr Rajab. The police patrol did not challenge the occupants because they took them for soldiers. Continued ...
The bodies of eight of the patrol and two soldiers were taken to the Yarmouk hospital in western Baghdad, Iraqi police said. Another four were wounded.
Reuters Television footage showed several coffins being loaded onto the back of a police truck to be taken to hospital. Another was tied to the top of a dilapidated car.
A young woman and two toddlers, one of them crying, sat on the ground next to one simple wooden coffin.
Separately, Iraqi soldiers supported by U.S. forces killed 19 al Qaeda fighters north of the city of Baquba, Major-General Abdul-Karim al-Rubaie, the head of Iraqi military operations in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad, told Reuters.
The al Qaeda fighters were killed in an area controlled by the al Qaeda-linked Islamic State in Iraq, he said. Two members of a neighborhood police unit there were killed in the operation and another three were wounded.
The neighborhood patrols, backed by the U.S. military as part of a counter-insurgency strategy, have been spreading through other areas after they were pioneered last year in western Anbar, once the most dangerous province in Iraq.
Attacks on such units are common but Thursday's bold assault was one of the biggest in Baghdad.
On November 13, U.S. and Iraqi forces killed an estimated 15 al Qaeda gunmen in a fierce, day-long battle in Adwaniya, just south of Baghdad, after al Qaeda fighters attacked two neighborhood police checkpoints there.
(Additional reporting by Wissam Mohammed)
(Writing by Paul Tait, editing by Andrew Roche)
© Reuters 2007. All Rights Reserved.
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I'm sure the leftists, Dems, MSM and NYT will decry and denounce this gross violation of the Geneva Conventions by our enemy. Should happen any time now ...
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
29 killed as al Qaeda in Iraq attacks Sunnis, Shiites
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Al Qaeda in Iraq insurgents disguised as members of a Sunni alliance council attacked the council's headquarters outside Baghdad on Thursday, leaving at least 18 people dead, police said.
A former insurgent and member of a Sunni Awakening group guards an area in Hor Rajab earlier this week.
Another gunbattle involving al Qaeda in Iraq militants, in a Shiite village near Baquba, left 11 people dead, eight of them insurgents, police said.
The ambush at the Sunni Awakening Council's headquarters started a five-hour firefight with security guards at the council's office in the suburb of Hor Rajab, southwest of Baghdad, police said.
The Hor Rajab Awakening Council is one of several Sunni groups -- some of them former insurgent groups -- that have joined forces with U.S. and Iraqi troops. 
Watch how troops, civilians took on al Qaeda »
The Sunni groups formed the unlikely alliances to battle al Qaeda in Iraq, a Sunni militant group comprising mostly foreign fighters.
The al Qaeda in Iraq militants were dressed in Hor Rajab Awakening Council uniforms when they ambushed the headquarters and nearby checkpoints with light arms and rocket-propelled grenades, police said. The ambush came just after midnight.
LOL!
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