October 24, 2006
Azzaman - Iraq- Original Article (English)    

President George W. Bush: Has he been misled by Iraqi
politicians from the start of the invasion? (above).

—C-SPAN VIDEO: White House press conference with
President Bush, where he attempts to explains what he really
meant by the phrase 'cut and run,' Sept. 25, 01:03:47

—BBC NEWS VIDEO: Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki
directly contradicts President Bush's comments about
'benchmarks,' and says he is not being told of U.S. military
operations, Oct. 25, 00:01:51

Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki: He he decieving
President Bush, or is he merely inneffective? (below).





Iraqi Shiite leader Abdel Aziz al-Hakim, head of Parliament's largest
bloc and one of the naion's top politicians has called for a partition
of the country along sectarian lines. Al-Hakim is closely allied with
the Iranians. (above).


A man cries over the body of his dead son, killed in the crossfire
between Iraqi troops and insurgents, Oct. 25. (below).





Masked insurgents patrol the streets of Ramadi, Oct. 22.

(above).

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There is no doubt that the United States has sacrificed a lot for Iraq's sake. It has had to accept the tarnished reputation that came with its invasion of the country, and the American people have as a result borne the pain of their government’s military adventure.

While many in Iraq remain, who don't doubt that President George W. Bush is still sincere and honest in his bid to help the country, at the same time they blame him in the immediate aftermath of the invasion for falling such easy prey to stray groups of politicians - whether in Iraq or elsewhere.

These unwise politicians have deceived the President. They convinced him that they knew the path to deliver Iraq from its predicament. But they were wrong, and the President was wrong in insisting on staying the course.

As a result, America has been forced to bear losses that are so huge, they haven’t been seen since the Vietnam War. Its formidable army finds itself humiliated at the hands of the barefoot and lightly armed heroes of the Iraqi resistance.

Washington is now stuck in the Iraqi mud - not up to its knees, but almost up to its nose. The irony is that the commander-in-chief, who could have won the hearts and minds of Iraqis in the beginning, is now as contemptible and loathsome in the eyes of many Iraqis as former leader Saddam Hussein.

Whether in Washington or Iraq, the politicians that deceived the president are still around and apparently he still relishes their advice.

And despite the calamities they have caused, the White House would like to forge ahead with the same policies. The president is again falling victim to the same politicians, who strive to delude him into believing that he can repair the irreparable.

Bush’s mistakes during his Iraqi adventure have turned his dream of democratizing Iraq into a joke. Average people both in and out of Iraq now mock the United States and its stated purpose of spreading democracy and human rights. How naive Bush has been in the years since his invasion. He believed he could educate a group of Iraqi politicians to respect human rights and democracy.

Poor Bush. Little did he know that it's almost impossible to cure the mental disease that these politicians suffer from ...

It was naive of him to place his trust in them in the first place, and wrong to wait in vain for their democracy to mature, when they had no intention of steering the country toward democracy in the first place. That is why as soon as they came to power, they revealed their true nature by fomenting ethnic and sectarian strife

They began to create stories and spread rumors that their actions and deeds were part of America's roadmap for Iraq.

Among the goals of these [Iraqi] politicians was their determination to partition the country on sectarian and ethnic grounds. They went around saying that "partition" is what President Bush wanted.

But Bush was wise - perhaps for the first time since he invaded Iraq - to publicly deny that he intended to divide the country. These [Iraqi]  politicians are cheats, and they have been stabbing the President of the United States in the back. This is why Iraqis have lost trust in the U.S. and its President.

But if given the chance to choose, I am sure many Iraqis would still side with President Bush. In their eyes, and despite his many blunders, he is more honest than the Iraqi politicians he trusts.

VIDEO FROM QATAR: IRAQI CLERIC ON

THE MUSLIM CONQUEST OF THE WORLD

Al-Jazeera, Qatar: Excerpts from speeches and interviews with Iraqi Ayatollah Ahmad Husseini Al-Baghdadi, May 5 00:12:09, MEMRI

"The Americans are extremely conceited. They do not give the Palestinians or the Iraqis their rights. He who came by force must be removed by force, and by armed struggle."

Ayatollah Ahmad Al-Baghdadi