Category Archives: Iraq

Arabian Peninsula, Caliphate, History, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Uncategorized, Wahhabi

Faith of MENA: Return of the Ikhwan under a Chubby Caliph……..

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KuwaitCox2 “Wahhab was forced to flee from Medina, and in a more rural inland area – in the Nejd- he was adopted by the Saud family. With a combination of camel riding warrior power and Wahhabi religious zeal, the Saud regime spread across Arabia. In 1802 an army of 12,000 Wahhabi warriors attacked the Shia in the city of Karbala, slaying 4,000 of the city’s inhabitants and smashing Shia holy sites. In 1803 they attacked Mecca and, aware of the slaughter in Kabala, the Meccans opened their town to Saud rule. Against images, the Wahhabi warriors smashed opulent graves, and they forbade smoking. After taking power in Medina they smashed grave-sites again, including the tomb of the Prophet Mohammed. In 1813, the Ottoman sultan sent expeditions against Wahhabism. The defeated head of the Saud family was taken in a cage to Istanbul and beheaded……….”

Ikhwan is an Arabic word that means “brothers”. Ikhwan is now used in Arabic to refer to the Muslim Brotherhood. For many decades, the term Ikhwan when used in Egypt referred exclusively to the Muslim Brotherhood. Outside Egypt also the term was used in recent decades, at least since the 1950s, to refer to the Muslim Brotherhood. The other older original “Ikhwan” are dead. Or are they?

The original ‘Ikhwan’ were quite different. They did not grow in the cosmopolitan atmosphere of old Cairo. They sprouted in the Arabian desert of what is now called Saudi Arabia. They were the zealous Wahhabi militias allied to King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud. They helped him conquer his homeland of Nejd, then conquer Al-Ahsaa (Eastern Arabia), Hijaz (Mecca and Madinah), and large chunks of northern Yemen. They also made a stab at conquering Kuwait which was under British protection, hence a no-no.

Eventually things fell apart for them. Ibn Saud was getting used to mingling with “civilized” Westerners, like the British who provided him with financial aid for some time. He realized, or was told, that the Wahabi zealots, his Ikhwan, his brothers, were outdated. They had served their purpose in helping him expand his Nejdi emirate to include most of the Arabian Peninsula. It was time to make deals with the British and eventually with the Americans. The Ikhwan’s usefulness had ended, and it was time for them to disappear.

Fast forward to the Caliphate in Syria and Iraq. The ideology of ISIS is similar to the Saudi Ikhwan, in spite of such modern trappings as the Omega watch on the fat wrist of the funny chubby Caliph and the Hello-Kitty pink box shown in the media. Like other Salafis and zealous Wahhabis of our time, they are not averse to using modern technology, especially means of transportation and tools of communication. They are still into blowing up and destroying monuments of Islam and other faiths, but they have learned to appreciate the joys of You-Tube and network news.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Caliphate, Cinema, Iraq, Syria, Terrorism, Wahhabi

The Hollywood Caliphate of ISIS: Illusions of Sectarian Harmony in Iraq……..

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Masked terrorists attacked and killed worshipers in a (Sunni) mosque in Iraq last week. This reminded people of the brief but ugly sectarian civil war in 2006-08. The sectarian war that has resumed now with the mass killings of many non-Wahhabis by the terrorists of ISIS in Al-Anbar and other provinces. Even the Mubarak-appointed shaikh of Al-Azhar in Cairo, who did not bat an eyelash when ISIS were killing so many others, protested this “sectarian” attack.

My own guess is that the attack probably was not “sectarian” but that it was intended to provoke more sectarian hatred. That the perpetrators were almost certainly not “Shi’a” militias, but Wahhabi Salafis seeking to further muddy the waters. The rule of thumb in these terror incidents is to look for whoever benefits from them politically, and that should be obvious in this case.

The same arguments that were so publicized to explain the political and security troubles in Iraq in recent years will be used again after Haider Al-Abadi forms his government. If he is allowed to form his government. In fact the “sectarian” argument will be used again by former Baathists and their foreign Arab backers before he forms his government; I’d say starting next week. Ultra sectarians using the “sectarian” argument against others. Western governments frustrated with the whole Arab sectarian war will grasp this argument as the cause and root of all their troubles in Iraq. They will press Al Abadi to compromise by handing over ‘meaningful’ portfolios to the former Baathists. He, like Al Maliki, like any other Iraqi leader with the same sense and the same insecurities, will refuse to hand over the Defense or Security portfolios to former Baathists. Back to square one.

The root cause of Iraq’s current troubles is two-folded. It is a combination of domestic sectarian mistrust and foreign Arab meddling. The domestic Iraqi issue may take care of itself if outsiders would stop meddling and feeding the sectarian insecurities. Some of the Arab neighbors of Iraq, the Saudi princes and and Qatari and Emirati potentates who financed Wahhabi terrorism in Iraq long before they opened the Syrian front, have not accepted the regime change that was brought by the Western invasion of 2003. Their intolerant ideology, money, and volunteers are what gave birth to ISIS and its absurd Hollywood-style Caliphate.

Cheer

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Revolutions, Iraq, Jihadis

The Wahhabi Caliphate and Saddam Hussein………

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“Jihadists targeting minorities are “worse than Saddam”, a Kurdish commander says, standing near a sand barrier at a front line in north Iraq, the militants’ black flag fluttering in the distance…………..”

This is true: of course these Wahhabi cutthroats are worse than Saddam. Saddam was methodical: he targeted anyone who opposed his rule, but he did not care about their religion. He did not seek to convert anyone to whatever faith he believed in (if any). His beef with his opponents was political, not religious.
Ironically, many current officers of ISIS (ISIL? WTF?) reportedly served under Saddam in the military and security services. Outgoing prime minister Al Maliki even hinted that some of his own officers who had been formerly with the Baathist army has helped the fall of Mosul by abandoning their units. But then Al Maliki may have been trying to exonerate his government from the mess.
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Iraq, Jihadis, Misogyny, Wahhabi, Women

Captive Women of the Caliphate of Mosul……

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Iraqi minister for human rights Mohammed Al Sudani claims that the Mosul Caliphate have recently killed about 420 Yazidi citizens. He also said they are holding more than 690 young Yazidi and Shi’a women under ‘rough conditions’, and that they are subjected to physical and psychological torture. He added that the militias also hold 75 Shi’a women from Sanjar.

No report yet of how many Sunni or Christian women the Wahhabis have abducted. It should be noted that when it comes to women, especially young women, the terrorists are equal opportunity kidnappers. Like the princes who gave the their start, they can find a cleric to issue any fatwa permitting any kind of depravity.

The story continues. The AP also reported tow weeks ago that ISIS fighters have taken hundreds of Yazidi women in Iraq as war booty, concubines (i.e. potential sex slaves). Other recent reports note that the Wahhabi terrorist group is working to lure young women and girls from the West to come to Syria and Iraq for the purpose of “sex jihad”. This may be a sort of rehearsal for when the Wahhabi cutthroats go to Paradise, as they expect, and partake of the unlimited virgin huris. If they ever make it there.

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Politics, Iraq, Jihadis

Iraq: Finally, a Possible Peaceful Transition in an Arab Country?…….

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In Iraq, Nuri Al Maliki has finally wisely decided to withdraw his nomination as prime minister for another term. He will remain until the new PM, Dr. Haider Al Abadi, is voted on by Parliament and sworn in. This is a healthy development for a country with very unhealthy politics: an Arab head of government giving up his job peacefully, forced to do so through the political process. Al-Maliki’s departure, especially the mechanism of it, can be good for the future of democracy in Iraq. That depends on the kind of unifying leader Al Abadi turns out to be.

The culture of term limits and peaceful transition of power is not known or respected in the Arab world. It is now done peacefully in only three Arab states: Lebanon, Tunisia, and Iraq. Let’s hope that others will follow suit. From Bahrain to Egypt and Libya and Algeria. Who knows, maybe some day Saudi Arabia and Qatar and Syria and others will have term limits on their leaders, preferably sometime before hell freezes over. Term limits to be determined by a constitution, not by death or by an ambitious military officer staging a coup d’etat (as in Egypt) or by a not-so-brotherly prince staging a palace coup (as in Saudi Arabia and the UAE).
It is an understatement to say that Iraq has serious problems. Much of these problems have been aided and worsened by corrupt Iraqis from opposing political sides. Things look grim even with Al Maliki gone: sectarian passions have been let loose and it will not be easy calm them.

Yet some of the problems, including the new violent sectarianism, were encouraged and helped along by neighbors who had sought to reverse history back to the days of clan and tribal dictatorship and to use Iraq as a battlefield for their rivalries and their sectarian prejudices. In so doing, they have allowed killer Jihadis easy blood money and easy access to the borders of Iraq, hence to the civilian populations of Iraq who get slaughtered in their towns and cities by uninvited foreign Wahhabi terrorists.

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Iraq, Jihadis, Jihadists, Shit, Syria, U.S. Foreign Policy, Wahhabi

Horseapples and Stupidapples and Bullchips and Ghazwatshit from Iraq and Syria to Washington………

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“President Barack Obama promises to stop genocide in Iraq and not to do “stupid shit,” meaning virtually anything that might actually stop the genocide. Hillary Clinton rightly proclaims that avoiding “stupid shit” does not a strategy make, though she, too, vigorously opposes stupid shit. And television’s favorite administration critics—Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham—continue their heartfelt advocacy of stupid shit, i.e. more bombs dropped on the bad guys and more arms supplied to the good guys, without any thought whatsoever of what they’d do next in the likely event that this hardly decisive intervention failed. Please convince me that the lunatic jihadis………….”

An appropriate scatological analysis of a truly fecal situation, since it is not only Iraq that now faces going up shit creek. Here is my interpretation of Leslie Gelb‘s excellent piece of political frustration:

Mr. Obama is accused by Hillary, in a softer Clintonian way, of applying the kind of Stupid Shit he himself had criticized earlier in U.S. Middle East policy. Mr. Obama responds politely that Mrs. Clinton is peddling Horse Shit to American voters. Senators McCain and Graham ignore the gross Obama and Clinton metaphors. The senators are above all that watered-down shit: they continue to peddle their same old pure unadulterated plain shit they have been trying for years from Iraq through Syria, Iran and Ukraine.

Meanwhile the Wahhabi cutthroats of ISIS (a.k.a ISIL)continue to spread some real blood-stained shit from the outskirts of Damascus to the outskirts of Baghdad. They also threaten to spread more of it to the outskirts of the capital(s) of the Wahhabi princes and shaikhs who had initially recruited, armed, and paid them to start on their Ghazwat of Shit. That other Caliph, Erdogan of Turkey, who for three years did not meet a terrorist Jihadi or his weapons and money that he would not allow through into Syria, he also faces some challenges on that front.

Wait, that is not all; there is a bonus! The battle-hardened Jihadis might bypass Baghdad and Damascus and have their shit hit the fan in Berlin and Paris and London and New York first. Before they turn on to pay back the fellow Wahhabi princes and potentates who got them on their way.
Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Iraq, Jihadis

Jihadi Terrorist Roots in Mosul………

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Wikileaks 2008: “AQI/ISI insurgents will probably continue to target convoys and patrols in Mosul on the basis of their ability to effectively carry out these attacks. Insurgents may also be selectively targeting high-profile MRAP vehicles with SVBIEDs both for propaganda purposes and for their ability to defeat these heavily armored Coalition vehicles.AQI/ISI is the predominant insurgent group operating in Mosul and is affiliated with a majority of SVBIED attacks in the city. There were multiple Coalition and Iraqi Security Forces offensive operations in Mosul during 2008 that have degraded AQI/ISI’s ability to carry out attacks. However, the latest series of SVBIED attacks show that AQI/ISI still has a residual capacity to conduct high-profile attacks in Mosul…………….”

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Al-Qaeda, Iraq, Jihadis, Misogyny, Sex, Slavery, Syria

Luring ISIS and her Sisters: the Return of Jihad Sex……

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“The self-proclaimed Islamic State, formerly known by the acronym ISIS, is actively recruiting Western women and girls. And in the process this “caliphate” that now occupies large swathes of Syria and Iraq is showing, once again, that it’s almost as shrewd with social media as it is ruthless on the battlefield. The tweets and blogs apparently are written by Western women married to jihadi warriors. They aim to persuade would-be “sisters” in Europe and the United States to travel to the Middle East to help this al-Qaeda spinoff build its extremist vision of an Islamic society ……………”

“Tunisia, the largely moderate North African country, has struggled to stymie the flow of hundreds of young men leaving to fight alongside rebels in Syria’s more than two-year-long, bloody civil war. Now, the interior minister says, the country must also slow a stream of young Tunisian women leaving for Syria on “sexual jihad.”……………….”

The story continues. The AP reported yesterday that ISIS fighters have taken hundreds of Yazidi women in Iraq as war booty, concubines (i.e. sex slaves). Other recent reports note that the Wahhabi terrorist group is working to lure young women and girls from the West to come to Syria and Iraq for the purpose of “sex jihad”. A sort of rehearsal for when the Wahhabi cutthroats go to Paradise, as they expect, and partake of the unlimited virgin huris. If they ever make it there.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Al-Qaeda, GCC, Iraq, Kuwait, Salafi

Gulf SDGT: New Sanctions on Some Al Qaeda Moneybags………

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August 6, 2014: “The U.S. Department of the Treasury today imposed sanctions on three key terrorist financiers under Executive Order (E.O.) 13224. Two of the individuals designated today, Shafi Sultan Mohammed al-Ajmi and Hajjaj Fahd Hajjaj Muhammad Sahib al-‘Ajmi, are Kuwait-based and support the Syria-based, al-Qaida-linked terrorist organization Al Nusrah Front (ANF); one individual, ‘Abd al-Rahman Khalaf ‘Ubayd Juday’ al-‘Anizi, is a financier and facilitator of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), previously known as al-Qaida in Iraq (AQI). Each has been designated as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT). ANF and ISIL continue to receive donations from private citizens located predominantly in the Arabian Peninsula to fund their operations. Today’s actions target individuals who play key roles in the external financing and facilitation of terrorists in Syria and Iraq, including particularly dangerous foreign fighters……… said Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence David S. Cohen……………”

June 13, 2008: “The U.S. Department of the Treasury today designated the Kuwait-based Revival of Islamic Heritage Society (RIHS) for providing financial and material support to al Qaida and al Qaida affiliates, including Lashkar e-Tayyiba, Jemaah Islamiyah, and Al-Itihaad al-Islamiya. RIHS has also provided financial support for acts of terrorism. The RIHS offices in Afghanistan (RIHS-Afghanistan) and Pakistan (RIHS-Pakistan) were designated by the U.S. Government and the United Nations 1267 Committee in January 2002 based on evidence of their support for al Qaida. At that time, there was no evidence that the Kuwait-based RIHS headquarters (RIHS-HQ) knew that RIHS-Afghanistan and RIHS-Pakistan were financing al Qaida………………”

In other words: not only funding and encouraging sectarian takfiri volunteers to massacre civilian citizens of Iraq (and Syria and Lebanon), but also ally with remnants of Saddam Hussein’s Baath henchmen.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Al-Qaeda, Baath Party, GCC, Iraq, UAE

A Rehabilitation of the Iraqi Baath Party? Good Cop, Bad Cop, Ugly Cop……

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This is not about Iraqis rehabilitating the Baath: most Iraqis would have nothing to do with the party. I mean the outsiders, the foreign Arabs, seeking to rehabilitate the Baath. Seeking to rehabilitate the Baathists as guardians of the ‘eastern gate’ of the Arab world. The good old days of Iran-Iraq War, Desert Storm, Iraqis suffering an international blockade, another long war, and the rest.

There are many former, actually current, Iraqi Baathists hanging around the capitals of absolute tribal Arab potentates and princes. From Manama to Abu Dhabi, they seem to have their uses, be it as mercenaries in the security forces or interrogators or small cogs in the regime sectarian media propaganda of these Persian Gulf potentates.

The Wahhabi crazies of ISIS, the Caliphate of pink Hello-Kitty and female genital mutilation and destroying churches and shrines and chopping heads, are making a lot of noise in the northwest of Iraq. They are definitely the ‘bad cop’ of the terrorist campaign in Iraq (but not necessarily in Syria, where there are too many such groups). So who can be the ‘good cop’ of the terrorist campaign in Iraq? Who else would the forgetful fools in the neighborhood select but the remnants of the Tikriti Baath Party? The logic might go like this: if the Mubarakist remnants, the feloul, maneuvered themselves into aborting the Egyptian revolution of 2011 and regaining power in Cairo in 2013, why not the Baathist remnants in Iraq?

I don’t mean the have-been softened Baathists like Iyad Allawi who are now acting as representatives of the Al Saud and other petroleum princes. No, I mean real true blue Baathists who have now gone temporarily religious for the convenience of it.

So the ISIS and its presumptuous Caliphate is the “bad cop” which is supposed to make the Baathists the “good cop”. Then there are the “ugly cop” in the neighborhood, those potentates who aid and abet it all.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]