www.televisionreporter.com: covering the Long War

Barack Obama's Cairo Speech, in full.

Full text of President Barack Obama's speech on Muslim relations, delivered at the University of Cairo.  Text has not been checked against delivery.  

 

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

(Cairo, Egypt)

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

June 4, 2009

 

Remarks of President Barack Obama

A New Beginning

Cairo, Egypt

June 4, 2009

 

I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo, and to be hosted by two remarkable institutions. For over a thousand years, Al-Azhar has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning, and for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt’s advancement. Together, you represent the harmony between tradition and progress. I am grateful for your hospitality, and the hospitality of the people of Egypt. I am also proud to carry with me the goodwill of the American people, and a greeting of peace from Muslim communities in my country: assalaamu alaykum.

We meet at a time of tension between the United States and Muslims around the world – tension rooted in historical forces that go beyond any current policy debate. The relationship between Islam and the West includes centuries of co-existence and cooperation, but also conflict and religious wars. More recently, tension has been fed by colonialism that denied rights and opportunities to many Muslims, and a Cold War in which Muslim-majority countries were too often treated as proxies without regard to their own aspirations. Moreover, the sweeping change brought by modernity and globalization led many Muslims to view the West as hostile to the traditions of Islam.

 Violent extremists have exploited these tensions in a small but potent minority of Muslims. The attacks of September 11^th, 2001 and the continued efforts of these extremists to engage in violence against civilians has led some in my country to view Islam as inevitably hostile not only to America and Western countries, but also to human rights. This has bred more fear and mistrust.

 So long as our relationship is defined by our differences, we will empower those who sow hatred rather than peace, and who promote conflict rather than the cooperation that can help all of our people achieve justice and prosperity. This cycle of suspicion and discord must end.

 I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world; one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect; and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive, and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles – principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.

Kabul's Canadian Cars

Its rare to see a maple leaf sticker  on a car in Canada.  But here in Kabul the red and while flag is slapped on tens of thousands of cars.  

These are Great White North junkers, the cars crashed or crumbling, that don't pass the test at home, now given a new life in the Hindu Kush. (Never mind that some probably wouldn't make it over the pass without a push from passengers.)

Word on the street is these second-hand written-off wrecks are bought in bulk, no questions asked by the Canadian government,  and shipped to Dubai.  Enterprising mechanics cannibalize the ones too far gone, and build one that, at least, moves. The rebuilt wonders then end up on Afghanistan's roads, for one more roll of the odometer.

So why the Maple Leaf Flag, you ask?

One:  all those AirCare checks, Canadian Tire tune-ups, and Canucks' somewhat anal-retentive attitude to car care.

Second: Canadians cars typically have both heat, and air conditioning.  That's a valuable option in the wild temperature swings of the Afghan year.

Add some quick-thinking second-hand car marketing, and that Maple Leaf makes for a proud sign of quality.

But in this global economy, Canada has competition.

More and more German flags are sprouting on bumpers and windshields.

But before anyone think this is becoming a competition, its important to note one fact:

Almost all these cars ... are Japanese.    

  

Whispers of Canada's Kandahar Failure, and Future

Canadian forces will soon face an invasion in Kanadhar.  And its not clear, if they know quite what to do about it. 

Its the first wave of U.S. President Barack Obama's "Afghanistan Surge." Of the 21-thousand new American troops deployed, 15 thousand will be deployed to territory Canadian and British troops were tasked to secure three years ago.  This is no mistake. Few would argue the situation in Afghanistan's south is better today.

Militarily, Canada has never had the force strength to secure the vast stretches of Kandahar,  from the porous desert border with Pakistan, to village mazes of Panjwaii, to the lush orchards of the Arghandab Valley. Starting with largely soft-skinned vehicles, Canadian convoys have pushed more and more armour on to the roads  as bombs increased in number and effectiveness. It took time for old Leopard tanks to be deployed. Promised Leopard 2 tanks, worth more than one billion dollars, still sit in storage. Until just last year, troops didn't even have dedicated Canadian air support.

One solider joked that Rumsfeld said went to war the Army he had, but Canada made it it up as it went along.  

Soliders have fought bravely, even heroically.  Soldiers have died.  Combat operations have successfully swept insurgent villages.  But counterinsurgency strategy follows up  "clear", with "hold" and "build."  Success in these phases, has been decidedly mixed.

Much of Canada's "hold" strategy was built on one of Canada's strengths, the soldier-diplomacy founded in a long history of blue helmet operations. Strong relations, and trust, with the likes of Kandahar's respected Mullah Naquib kept the peace. Then Naquib died.  And warm relations with local elders and tribes have been strained as violence, and insurgent intimidation,  increased.  

Insurgents are actively targeting these local leaders.  One Kandahar source tells me at least one elder is killed each week.    Rural villages have decided stay out of the fight, helping neither Taliban, nor NATO. In Kandahar City, this month:  gunmen brazenly assassinated human rights legislator Sitera Achezai at the gates of her home, three suicide bombers struck the Governor's compound, and others hit the Provincial Council Building while the Chairman, Hamid Karzai's brother,  was inside.  

Diplomats tell me the building of local security forces has been frustrating. Last year, organized well-trained Taliban stormed the Kanadhar Prison, freeing insurgents, breaking community confidence, and waking up western complacency. While police now take the brunt off all deaths in afghanistan, pay remains low (but improving). Corruption is notorious. 

The extent of corruption in Kandahar's reconstruction is rumoured, but yet to be revealed. Accountability for hundred of millions dollars in aid projects is far from transparent.  But beyond that, there are questions about Canada's decision to focus on the 50 million dollar, signature, Dahla Dam and irrigation project, while poverty and insecurity drive discontent.

One Kandahari, now in Kabul, told me he's glad Canada's repairing the Dam. He's also happy America built the airport, and the Russians built hospitals, and the Taliban built mosques.  And he's starting to see a pattern.

Now to be clear: all this is criticism, not outright failure. 

But there is enough concern to send in the Cavalry, in force, in the form of America's mobile armoured Stryker Brigade.  They'll take over border patrol in Spin Boldak, and be deployed in Arghandab, Shah Wali Kot and Khakrez; all districts familiar with Canadian combat operation.  Some 10-thousand Marines will arrive within weeks, to be deployed through Helmand, an area of British operations. 

So far, most concern has focused on the new rules of engagement U.S. forces will observe. Much has been made of the kinder gentler NATO approach, and worries that fire-first cowboys will cause unnecessary civilian deaths and inflame local, growing, anger with foreign presence.  

Less has been said about the fact that 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force being deployed has long experience in Helmand,  even bettering NATO by ordering Pashto language courses as part of the preparations.  The Stryker Bridge has taken a staple of the Canadian forces, the LAV-III light armoured vehicle, and utilized it to secure Mosul and Baqouba in Iraq. 

In short there are lessons both NATO and American forces can learn, from their own unique experiences.    As Canadian Forces move into the last years of this mission, it is an opportunity that should not be lost.

Whispers of failure too easily become fact by infighting. Long after western forces leave,  southern Afghanistan would be left with the consequences, once again.  

Follow up: A Canwest story moved just hours after posting, Canada concedes hard-won territory to Taliban reflects the on-the-ground reality in Panjwaii, the focus of much of Canada's counter-insurgency efforts .

Six Years After Saddam, a turn to Kabul

Its now been more than six years since I started this blog. Six years, to the day, since American troops secured Baghdad's Firdos Square and tore down that statue of Saddam Hussein.  And some years since this blog has been really updated.   

But today is my first full day in Kabul.     

This is a city still very visibly suffering from decades of civil war.  Baghdad's airport road was a constant terrorist target; in Kabul, the dangers are deep potholes, crumbling concrete and an airport that makes BIAP look luxurious. Fear is a common element between the people of Iraq and Afghanistan.  But while the undercurrent in Iraq was some suspicion, anger and resentment, here in Afghanistan there is remarkable resilience, welcome and optimism.  As in Iraq, new towers of steel and glass rise above the ancient streets tangled by traffic. Beyond the city, tribalism of very different sorts. For western troops, a very different fight ... that also grows.

 

The promise from America is that Afghanistan will be neglected no longer.      

And it is an outlook I hope to extend to this blog.  Watch out for a new name, new design. And more postings. 

Change. 

Stay tuned, as they say.

This is The Long War, 

The story isn't finished. And neither am I. 

Time, still, to mark new anniversaries.

- Tom 

Stories from the Sandbox

Some of the stuff I filed from Baghdad, and some older reports from back in Canada:

Bye-bye Back-to-Iraq

You may have heard of Chris Albritton. He's the former AP reporter who set up Back-to-Iraq some years ago, and convinced readers to send him cash to go to the sandbox, and report.

Really the first blogger to get that kind of business model up and running

He did a pretty good job of it, IMHO (full disclosure -- he is a friend), and in the process became a Time Magazine regular.

He's based in Beirut these day, covered the recent conflict. And in the course of it all was firmly placed in the cross-hairs of the pajamahadeen bloggers who think they know what war is all about, because they read the internets.

Chris has had enough.

His last post pretty much sums up much the state of the blogosphere these days:

Subtlety doesn’t seem to have much place in the blogosphere anymore, where you get the most attention and the most hits by putting out whatever half-assed opinion one can muster. You only have to shout loudly enough and play to whatever audience you want to get the attention. Blogging these days seems to resemble bad vaudeville rather than thoughtful commentary.

Well worth the read.

CBS Sadness

Soundman James Brolan, dead.

Correspondent Kimberly Dozier, seriously wounded.

Cameraman Paul Douglas, dead.

I worked with Paul, Kimberly and James for the better part of three months last summer -- her compassion, their humour and professionalism, were a real inspiration.

Here's the story. Facts, not the nuance and narratives of their lives. But I really don't know what to say right now.

Shocked. Saddened.

I'll post more in a day or two.

Samarra File

More than a couple of times I've been miffed about criticism of Iraq reportage -- my point usually is that the journalism is good -- its just nobody notices back home, too interested with shiny, squeaky-wheel, barking-head, partisanship than any solid reportage.

So I'm not going to let this one slip by you.

Tom Lasseter hasn't left Baghdad much since the invasion. Like many of us, he's had friends die, been threatened himself, and holds the military boots to the fire, fairly. No, he doesn't live in the Green Zone. He goes out, like most journalists, when he can, when its safe, and even then some.

This is his latest (IMHO, outstanding) dispatch.

SAMARRA, Iraq - The gunfight by the Tigris River was over. It was time to retrieve the bodies.

Staff Sgt. Cortez Powell looked at the shredded jaw of a dead man whom he'd shot in the face when insurgents ambushed an American patrol in a blind of reeds. Powell's M4 assault rifle had jammed, so he'd grabbed the pump-action shotgun that he kept slung over his shoulders and pulled the trigger.

Five other soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division scrambled down, pulled two of the insurgents' bodies from the reeds and dragged them through the mud.

"Strap those motherf-----s to the hood like a deer," said Staff Sgt. James Robinson, 25, of Hughes, Ark.

The soldiers heaved the two bodies onto the hood of a Humvee and tied them down with a cord. The dead insurgents' legs and arms flapped in the air as the Humvee rumbled along.

Iraqi families stood in front of the surrounding houses. They watched the corpses ride by and glared at the American soldiers.

Fifteen months earlier, when the 1st Infantry Division sent some 5,000 Iraqi and U.S. soldiers to retake Samarra from Sunni Muslim insurgents, it was a test of the American occupation's ability not only to pacify but also to rebuild a part of Iraq dominated by the country's minority Sunnis.

More than a year later, American troops still are battling insurgents in Samarra. Bloodshed is destroying the city and driving a wedge between the Iraqis who live there and the U.S. troops who are trying to keep order.

Violence, police corruption and the blurry lines of guerrilla warfare are clouding any hopes of victory.

"It's apocalyptic out there. Life has definitely gotten worse for" Iraqis, said Maj. Curtis Strange, 36, of Mobile, Ala., who works with Iraqi troops in Samarra. "You see Samarra and you almost want to build a new city and move all these people there."

The whole story is worth the read.

Really outstanding stuff.

Post Ops

The lack of posting should be indirect evidence of my absence -- but to set the record straight, after three months in Iraq I am back in North America for a break.

Rush hour traffic. Late taxes. Fast and not so fast food.

I'll try to keep on throwing out the occasional commentary, perhaps some stories stored in the back of my memory bank over the past two years.

This blog isn't work, rather a labour of love (that is often neglected and fighting competing, paying, suitors).

So your patience is appreciated.

I hope to be back in Baghdad in October.

Stay tuned.

I'l keep posting and hope to add a podcast or two.

This story is not finished. And neither am I.

Inshallah

Daily Constitutional.

So what happens if Iraq's constitutional negotiators don't reach a compromise by August 15th?

Iraq's Transitional Administrative Law (article 61) calls for the immediate dissolution of the National Assembly, with new elections to be held by December 15th. Constitution drafters have up to another year to work thing out.

Now, if they reach agreement, the constitution goes to referendum, where Iraqi voters must must ratify the charter by a simple majority, AS LONG AS two-thirds of the voters in three or more governorates do not reject it.

This essentially gives the Kurds, and Shias, a veto.

If the referendum fails -- same as if they missed the August 15th deadline.

So, as we hit the final stretch, its no surprise to see some very heavy lobbying -- from Shias and Kurds strengthening their demands, Sunnis rejecting the powers that would weaken their position even further, and the U-S pushing for all this to be resolved, according to schedule, so troop withdrawal and exit strategies can be claimed in time for mid-terms.

But, over the weekend, Baghdad's Shia-controlled provincial council threw out the city's outspoken American appointed, former Canadian resident, Sunni, Mayor -- essentially at gunpoint. The national government shrugged their shoulders. Inshallah.

Now, the head of the Badr Brigades, a large, armed, Shia militia aligned with one of the country's main islamic parties, is demanding the oil rich Shia south be granted the same level of autonomy granted to the potentially oil-rich Kurdish north. Hadi al-Amiri appeared before thousands of supporters in the holy city of Najaf. Its is a not too subtle threat. The Badr Brigades, despite Shia leaders' assurances of their disarmament, has been accused of imposing islamic order, and vigilante peace, in places like Basra.

Of course, the Kurds still have their peshmurga militia.

And the Sunni insurgency isn't slowing down.

The point of all this is that constitutions, and democracy, are supposed to protect minority rights as well as majority rule.

The question now, is how much of Iraq's constitution will reduce the former, to ensure that latter -- either regionally or nationally, isn't imposed by force instead of law.

It's crunch time, folks.

This isn't about democracy, or freedom. It is about power.

And all those velvet gloves are coming off.

Peter Jennings 1938-2005

In journalism school, there's a stock piece of advice professors pass on to the bright-eyed, hungry, would-be reporters: pick a pro you admire, and emulate them.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who thought Peter Jennings was that consummate journalist.

I only had the chance to meet him a couple of times: first after public lecture in Toronto, the second in the field here in Baghdad.

At the public lecture, he faced a broadside of criticism from some members of the audience and fellow journalists, for the supposed dumbing down of TV news, of the bias of mainstream media and any variety of journalistic sins. Jennings didn't apologize, challenged the audience on some assumptions, but still allowed that news, and the people who produce it, are fallible.

We try to be perfect, but we won't be, so all we can do is try harder, day in, day out.

His advice after the debate: go out and report. Get out in the world. Ask questions and learn.

Maybe that's why I wasn't surprised when he showed up at a bomb scene here. Some high-profile network faces fly in and out of the country, only leaving the hotel to tape a couple of standups, leaving the reportage to their producers.

Jennings, I was told, was one to witness the story, then report.

There are many tributes, pointing out exactly how much he witnessed, and reported, over his career.

But he also faced criticism over the years. Too cold, too Canadian, some argued. But even those points were challenged on 9/11, and when he took out American citizenship.

"There are a lot of people who think our job is to reassure the public every night that their home, their community and their nation is safe," he told author Jeff Alan. "I don't subscribe to that at all. I subscribe to leaving people with essentially — sorry it's a cliche — a rough draft of history. Some days it's reassuring, some days it's absolutely destructive." (via wires)

Journalism isn't the final word. Its a process, a journey.

Jennings practiced it with with an unwavering sense of balance, fairness, accuracy; with curiosity and honesty, and good dashes of humor and humility. And there was always room for doubt. And surprise.

That's more than a good example.

That's a good life.

Another Baghdad morning

Sounds of gunfire and explosions are not unusual in the capitol: unless there are fatalities, particularly security force casualties, the vast majority go unreported.

The attacks are often spread out, almost randomly across the city. Car bombs, like the one pictured here, explode in the distance. But the bang-bang often hits this neighbourhood.

This is what the streets sound like, after a mortar round landed about a half-block away, a couple of days ago.

After five minutes, things are back to normal. Almost everybody, journalists included, are so used to it, that we only interrupt our work to rubberneck, like slowing down on the highway to check out a stall on the side of the road.

If you can't do anything about it, why be sacred? Just life as usual here. Inshallah.

Steven Vincent

The American embassy here in Baghdad has confirmed the death of investigative freelance journalist Steven Vincent in Basrah.

The New York resident and his translator, Nour Weidi, were abducted by five men in a police car, at gunpoint, Tuesday. His body was discovered riddled with bullet, the translator suffered serious wounds.

Vincent recently published a book on post-war Iraq, In The Red Zone, and was investigating life, and crime, in Basrah. (I noted an earlier CSM article here). He had just filed a critical opinion piece in the New York Times about reconstruction and corruption in the Shia Governate.

There's much speculation that the piece led to a retaliatory killing -- he points out militant Shia infiltration in the police force. But, just as likely, it could be simple crime; journalists are known as walking ATM machines. He was abducted leaving a currency exchange shop.

As a freelancer, Vincent travelled without security.

A read through his excellent blog reveals the extent of this loss:

Layla and I have heard numerous stories about how, on big multi-million dollar projects, Iraqi translators and engineers--which the Americans, British and non-Iraqi NGOs are forced to use because of language difficulties--often accept bribes from companies to steer contract their way. Since most Westerners don't know Arabic, and must rely on the translators and engineers as their eyes and ears, the funding sources are rarely the wiser. "In my case," said the Captain, "there's just me, my database and Iraqi companies. No chance for corruption there."

I'd wanted to introduce Layla to the Gary Cooper side of America, and I felt I'd succeeded. Instead of the evasive, over-subtle, windy Iraqi, fond of theory and abstraction, here was a to-the-point Yank, rolling up his sleeves with a can-do spirit of fair play and doing good. "I want to have a positive effect on this country's future," the Captain averred. "For example, whenever I learn of a contracting firm run by women, I put it at the top of my list for businesses I want to consider for future projects." I felt proud of my countryman; you couldn't ask for a more sincere guy.

Layla, however, flashed a tight, cynical smile. "How do you know," she began, "that the religious parties haven't put a woman's name on a company letterhead to win a bid? Maybe you are just funneling money to extremists posing as contractors." Pause. The Captain looked confused. "Religious parties? Extremists?"

Oh boy. Maa salaama Gary Cooper, as Layla and I gave our man a quick tutorial about the militant Shiites who have transformed once free-wheeling Basra into something resembling Savonarola's Florence. The Captain seemed taken aback, having, as most Westerners--especially the troops stationed here--little idea of what goes on in the city. "I'll have to take this into consideration..." scratching his head, "I certainly hope none of these contracts are going to the wrong people." Not for the first time, I felt I was living in a Graham Greene novel, this about about a U.S. soldier--call it The Naive American--who finds what works so well in Power Point presentations has unpredictable results when applied to realities of Iraq. Or is that the story of our whole attempt to liberate this nation?

I didn't know him, but his penetrating insight, journalistic passion, appreciation for the absurd, and humor obviously shine through.

UPDATE: more of Vincent's work can be found at National Review Online.

For those keeping track: The Committee to Protect Journalists reports at least 45 journalists and 20 media support workers have been killed while covering the war in Iraq since March 2003.

Duty-free fracas

In one of those small, but telling, anecdotes, the Washington Post reports:

Alcohol Banned in Baghdad Airport

BAGHDAD, July 29 -- Iraq's transportation minister, a Shiite Muslim, has ordered a ban on alcohol sales at Baghdad International Airport, declaring that the facility is "a holy and revered" piece of Iraq, a spokesman said Friday.

The airport duty-free shop so far has refused to comply with the order by Salam Maliki. Airport officials said Maliki threatened to have the store's $800,000 supply of alcoholic beverages destroyed.

The alcohol ban heightened fears of some more-secular Iraqis that the Shiite Muslim majority might seek to impose a rigid interpretation of Islamic law in Iraq, traditionally considered to be tolerant in its observance of religious law.

"The airport represents the new Iraq," the [Minister's] spokesman said. "We are an Islamic country."

In the south, liquor and music stores have been fire bombed; women, regardless of their religion, have been forced to wear hijab. There have been a spate of threats, and murders, of barbers in Baghdad, because they offer to shave off beards -- considered by the more fundamentalist muslims as a sign of faith.

And Shiites continue to flex their power in constitutional negotiations, which are likely to conclude that Islamic sharia law will be the main influence on legislation and judicial precedent.

The more cynical observer would see all this all as more of a push for old middle east style authoritarian, political control, than of any religious observance.

Over the months, many of the "old ways" have cropped up in Iraq's new government. Contracts have more to do with contacts than blind tenders. Baksheesh, bribes, help smooth the way. The braver citizens are protesting over alleged Interior Ministry torture.

In short: the future Iraq, despite the democratic trappings, is looking more like Iran than America.

Fog of War

Phillip Robertson has been doing some terrific reporting from here in Iraq.

In the latest file for Salon (reg. req'd) he finds the American sniper that shot Knight Ridder local reporter Yasser Salihee earlier this month".

It is amazing reportage, great writing, sympathetic and objective.

For anyone who wants to choose sides, throw blame, debate right and wrong, criticize coverage -- this is not the war reportage you'll like.

But it is one of the best descriptions of the reality on the ground here, for Iraqis and American soldiers:

"... he brought up a photograph of a white Daewoo Espero sedan on a Baghdad street. The sedan had a single bullet hole in the driver's side of the windshield. Behind the wheel there was a lifeless man, slumped in the seat with a shattered skull and a torrent of blood staining his shirt. The image carried a sudden shock of recognition and despair. The dead man behind the wheel of the car was my friend and colleague, Yasser Salihee.

The sniper lowered his voice when he talked about the pictures of the car and the man inside it. His self-assured manner disappeared and he became nervous. "Here is one of ours. I really hope he was a bad guy. Do you know anything about him?" Then he said, "See, I don't know if I should be talking about this."

"Did you fire the shot that killed him?" I asked."

Street with no name.

It is difficult and dangerous to get around Baghdad for western journalists. Stories that would take a couple of hours back home, often take days here. Given the immediate news cycles of cable tv, the internet and wires, it means many many good stories from Iraq, simply become old news, barely sketched.

That hasn't stopped the Washingon Post from going to the Baghdad neighbourhood where, just last week, 25 children were killed by a suicide car bomber. The story focuses on the family and friends of 11 year old Hamza Firas Khuzai:

On Monday, a single boy stood in the glare of the heat in the two blocks around Hamza's house, staring at something in his hand. He didn't look up as strangers passed.

"They didn't see anything of their life," said Hamza's uncle, Safa Khuzai, speaking of the boys who died. "They spent it with wars, no electricity, no water and no security," he added. "They were all the same age, born at the same time, went to the same school, played the same games, and died together at the same time."

"Even their funeral services at the same time," he said. "A whole generation of this neighborhood gone."

"The streets are so quiet now," Hamza's sister said. "So quiet."

Is is about as good, and honest, a snapshot of life for Baghdad families caught in the violence, conflicted, these days.

Lost in Translation

The military loves jargon. And acronyms. And swearing.

Confusing?

To help everyone out, scroll down and find the new Iraq Slang list, some more obscure than others.

Go to the comments if you have more. Happy to add them when I have time.

Maybe-see TV

CNN presents has a comprehensive look at developments in Iraq over the past year. It follows last week's excellent program on European lessons of terrorism.

Give most journalists an hour, and they can give you a pretty good snapshot of what's happening here.

Still snapshots are static. The NYT's Ed Wong paints a different picture of Falluja's future:

Transformed into a police state after last winter's siege, this should be the safest city in all of Iraq.

Thousands of American and Iraqi troops live in crumbling buildings here and patrol streets laced with concertina wire. Any Iraqi entering the city must show a badge and undergo a search at one of six checkpoints. There is a 10 p.m. curfew.

But the insurgency is rising from the rubble nevertheless ...

Googled.

Search for "Iraq Reporter Blog" on Google and this humble site pops up at the number one spot.

Thanks for all your support.

Feeling Lucky?

The Rise of the Shias

There have been many reports of the rise of Shia theocracy in southern Iraq. Steven Vincent has one of the better ones in today's Christian Science Monitor

"In Basra these days, it's not uncommon to see armed men from Shiite religious groups standing at the gates of Basra University, scrutinizing female students to make sure their dresses are the right length and their makeup properly modest.

Any woman violating their standards of Muslim dignity, relates Henan, a psychology student, is ordered home. "These religious militiamen tell us how to dress, and prevent us from listening to music in public or interacting with male students," she says. "It makes me burn inside."

Henan is not the only Basran furious at the extremist Shiite Muslims who now dominate this southern Iraqi port city bordering Iran. Especially among the middle and intellectual classes, an increasing drumbeat of resentment is rising about what many see as a distortion of Basra's traditionally easygoing, tolerant attitudes toward life.

"No alcohol, no music CDs, woman forced to wear hijab, people murdered in the streets - this is not the city I remember," says Samir, an editor of one of Basra's largest newspapers."

Iran's support of the region, and connection to their politicians, is giving little comfort to American authorites, Iraq's other internal ethnic groups and parties, or Iraq's Sunni neighbours.

Shia authorities in the south are now pushing for the kind of autonomy granted to the Kurds in the north. Southern Iraq holds the country's richest oil field. A good measure of that wealth, that has flowed to Baghdad and central Iraq's Sunnis over the past decades at the expense of the Shias, would stop flowing.

Old CIA friend, shia politician and current Oil Minister Ahmed Chalabi has given some support to the initiative.

In short, all signs point to a weakened Iraqi central government, ethnic divide, power and revenue sharing struggles, and inconsistent standards of democracy and law in the country.

Shia militias, like Moqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi army, still operate. So do the Kurdish Peshmerga. And the Sunni insurgency remains potent.

It is no wonder American officials here are now bringing up the problems of sectarian tensions, quite unprompted by reporters.