The Missing Circle of Violence in Iraq

The U.S. and the missing circle of violence in Iraq

By Fatih Abdulsalam

Azzaman, June 19, 2008

And finally the U.S. occupation troops have revealed the name of the person behind the deadly car bombing that killed at least 60 people in Baghdad’s Hurriya district, a predominantly Shiite neighborhood.

The revelation of the identity of the attacker is rather unprecedented. Hundreds of such bombings have occurred in Baghdad, killing thousands of people. The blame was routinely directed at al-Qaeda terrorists and their mainly Sunni sympathizers.

The U.S. was then mired in a murderous insurgency in the so-called Sunni Triangle for the control of which it lost its prestige as a military superpower as well as thousands of troops and thousands of tanks and armored personnel carriers.

Analysts have the right to wonder why the U.S. decided to reveal the name of the perpetrator at this particular juncture of its ongoing war in Iraq.

The name as it is clear has Iranian and Shiite connotations. And given the fact that the bombing took place in a predominantly Shiite neighborhood, there will be many in Iraq and perhaps beyond Iraq to raise an eyebrow about the U.S. tactics and propaganda.

Whatever these tactics, the bombing sends a clear message to the Iraqi people. The roots of this message are that there is clear persistence from several quarters to resurrect the deadly and bloody campaign of car bombings and other attacks not only in Baghdad but also in other major Iraqi cities.

The Iraqi government must wake up and take matters into its own hands. It must realize that the seeds of discord, sectarianism and tactics to achieve political ends, for which U.S. politicians are first class masters, will aggravate conditions in an already torn and imploded country.

So long as the sectarian and ethnic militias are there, Iraq will have no peace.

And shockingly enough, the U.S. now has its own militias, which it trains, arms and finances ostensibly in the fight against al-Qaeda.

Militias and mercenaries, whether raised by the U.S. or Iraqi factions, play similar roles.

They are all bent on the destruction of the country. But Iraq’s tragedy is that all militias, whether those supposedly fighting al-Qaeda, or those belonging to the country’s disparate ethnic and sectarian factions, have one thing in common: to hell with national reconciliation and national interests.

It is sarcastic indeed to see the U.S., like other sectarian and ethnic Iraqi factions immersed in the game of militia maneuvering.

All indications are that Iraq is heading towards a new wave of violence and that the current relative security in certain areas is only temporary.

Secretive and filthy agendas are being cooked by militia leaders in Iraq whether political factions or states.

Many Iraqis thought the U.S. came to help them get rid of oppression and tyranny whether by rulers like Saddam Hussein or warlords like their current militia leaders.

Little did they know that the U.S. itself would end up having its own militias whose tactics are no different from those of rival groups.

This is not the right way to search for the missing circle feeding the violence in Iraq.