BLACKFIVE: 5 Years after Saddam’s capture (video from Iraq)

Vodpod videos no longer available.

more about “BLACKFIVE: 5 Years after Saddam’s cap…“, posted with vodpod

SniperGate

Joe Biden made claims that he was shot at while in Iraq, inside the green zone, then changed his story when questioned about it to say that he was near where a shot landed… Now this is the same man that told Hillary to tell the truth about her “near death experience” while in harms way…

His newest story is that he was in a helicopter in Afghanistan and it was forced down by Al Qaeda, I guess he is trying to show how he too has put his life in danger for America… Turns out it was bad weather that forced his helicopter down…

This is Biden’s sad attempt at trying to show his patriotism because he too, like John McCain, has been in harms way while serving his country…

Why has the media pretty much let this go, they hammered Hillary on it, shouldn’t Joe Biden be held up to the same standards, if not higher now that he is the Vice Presidential candidate?

Come on Joe, let’s start telling the truth. Now that is Change You Can Believe In!!!

When Hillary Clinton told a tall tale about “landing under sniper fire” in Bosnia, she was accused of “inflating her war experience” by rival Democrat Barack Obama’s campaign. 

But the campaign has been silent about Obama’s running mate, Joe Biden, telling his own questionable story about being “shot at” in Iraq. 

“Let’s start telling the truth,” Biden said during a presidential primary debate sponsored by YouTube last year. “Number one, you take all the troops out – you better have helicopters ready to take those 3,000 civilians inside the Green Zone, where I have been seven times and shot at. You better make sure you have protection for them, or let them die.” 

But when questioned about the episode afterward by the Hill newspaper, Biden backpedaled from his claim of being “shot at” and instead allowed: “I was near where a shot landed.” 

The senior senator from Delaware went on to say that some sort of projectile “landed” outside a building in the Green Zone where he and another senator had spent the night during a visit in December 2005. The lawmakers were shaving in the morning when they felt the building shake, Biden said. 

“No one got up and ran from the room-it wasn’t that kind of thing,” he told the Hill. “It’s not like I had someone holding a gun to my head.” 

The rest of the press ignored the flap at the time because Biden was viewed as having little chance of ending up on the Democratic presidential ticket. But even after Biden was selected to be Obama’s running mate last month, his claim to have been “shot at” drew no scrutiny from the same reporters who had savaged Clinton for making a similar claim that turned out to be false. 

FOX News has been asking the Obama campaign for details of the alleged shooting in Iraq ever since Biden was tapped to be vice president. Biden campaign spokesman David Wade promised an answer last week, but failed to provide one. 

Meanwhile, the gaffe-prone Biden has again raised eyebrows with another story about his exploits in war zones – this time in Afghanistan. Biden said he will grill Republican rival Sarah Palin in Thursday’s vice presidential debate about “the superhighway of terror between Pakistan and Afghanistan where my helicopter was forced down.” 

“If you want to know where Al Qaeda lives, you want to know where Bin Laden is, come back to Afghanistan with me,” Biden bragged to the National Guard Association. “Come back to the area where my helicopter was forced down, with a three-star general and three senators at 10,500 feet in the middle of those mountains. I can tell you where they are.” 

But it turns out that inclement weather, not terrorists, prompted the chopper to land in an open field during Biden’s visit to Afghanistan in February. Fighter jets kept watch overhead while a convoy of security vehicles was dispatched to retrieve Biden and fellow Senators Chuck Hagel and John Kerry. 

“We were going to send Biden out to fight the Taliban with snowballs, but we didn’t have to,” joked Kerry, a Democrat, to the AP. “Other than getting a little cold, it was fine.” 

Biden never explicitly claimed his chopper had been forced down by terrorists. Nonetheless, 

John McCain spokesman Brian Rogers said Obama-Biden officials have been less than forthcoming about Biden’s dramatic war stories. 

“They never explained Biden’s helicopter story from last week – which is very similar to the story about getting ‘shot at’ in Baghdad,” Rogers said. 

Marine Corps: 7 – Murtha’s Haditha Conspiracy: 0

The highest pranking Marine officer,Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani, implicated in the Haditha Massacre has had charges against him dropped.

Well it would seem with one case left, that makes this whole thing nothing more than a liberal smear campaign, politicized for the benefit of a few with the sole intention of trying to blame more on Bush…

Seven of the Eight Marines charged have been vindicated, now only Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich is left to stand trial.

 Hey John Murtha, WE ARE STILL WAITING FOR AN APOLOGY TO OUR MARINES.

As I have said before John Murtha and the Mass Media should be brought up on charges for endangering our soldiers on the battlefield. I would venture to call this sham by Murtha treasonous.

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. —  A military judge has dismissed charges against a Marine officer accused of failing to investigate the killings of 24 Iraqis.

Col. Steven Folsom dismissed charges Tuesday against Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani after defense attorneys raised concerns that a four-star general overseeing the prosecution was improperly influenced by an investigator probing the November 2005 shootings by a Marine squad in Haditha.

The charges were dismissed without prejudice, meaning they can be refiled, but Folsom excluded Marine Forces Central Command from future involvement.

Chessani was the highest-ranking officer implicated in the case.

Turkey Invades Iraq

Turkish troops and Air Force have made an incursion into Iraq in pursuit the Kurdish PKK rebels. This is a major escalation of hostilities in the region.

ISTANBUL, Turkey —  Turkish troops have launched a ground incursion across the border into Iraq in pursuit of separatist Kurdish rebels, the military said Friday — an action that dramatically escalates Turkey’s conflict with the militants.

It is the first confirmed Turkish military ground operation in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003, and it raised concerns that it could trigger a wider conflict with the U.S.-backed Iraqi Kurds despite Turkish assurances that its only target was the PKK rebel group.

The PKK militants are fighting for autonomy in southeast Turkey and have carried out attacks on Turkish targets from bases in a semiautonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq.

Private NTV television said 10,000 troops were taking part in the offensive and had penetrated 10 kilometers (six miles) into Iraq. This could not be confirmed independently.

Turkish President Abdullah Gul spoke with his Iraqi counterpart Jalal Talabani late Thursday and gave him information about the goals of the operation, Gul’s office said. Gul also told Talabani about a National Security Council decision to “develop relations with Iraq in all fields,” and invited Talabani to visit Turkey. /**/

The ground operation started after Turkish warplanes and artillery bombed suspected rebel targets on Thursday, the military said on its Web site. The ground incursion was backed by the air force, the statement said.

Turkey has conducted air raids against the PKK guerrillas in northern Iraq since December, with the help of U.S. intelligence, and it has periodically carried out so-called “hot pursuits” in which small units sometimes spend only a few hours inside Iraq.

The announcement of a cross-border, ground incursion of a type that Turkey carried out before the 2003 invasion of Iraq was a major development in the conflict, which started in 1984 and has claimed as many as 40,000 lives.

“The Turkish Armed Forces, which values Iraq’s territorial integrity and its stability, will return as soon as planned goals are achieved,” the military said. “The executed operation will prevent the region from being a permanent and safe base for the terrorists and will contribute to Iraq’s stability and internal peace.”

The state-run Anatolia agency reported that warplanes were seen taking off from the air base in Diyarbakir in southeast Turkey. It said planes and helicopters were conducting reconnaissance flights over the border region, and that military units were deployed at the border to prevent rebel infiltration.

Dogan News Agency reported that the Habur border crossing, a major conduit for trade between Iraq and Turkey, was closed to vehicle traffic. CNN-Turk television, however, quoted Deputy Prime Minister Hayati Yazici as saying the border gate was not closed but that priority was being given to Turkish military vehicles. Trucks routinely ferry supplies bound for U.S. military bases in Iraq through the Habur crossing.

Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a U.S. spokesman in Iraq, said the military had received assurances from its NATO ally Turkey that it would do everything possible to avoid “collateral damage” to innocent civilians or infrastructure.

“Multi-National Forces-Iraq is aware Turkish ground forces have entered into northern Iraq, for what we understand is an operation of limited duration to specifically target PKK terrorists in that region,” Smith said in an e-mailed statement.

“The United States continues to support Turkey’s right to defend itself from the terrorist activities of the PKK and has encouraged Turkey to use all available means, to include diplomacy and close coordination with the government of Iraq to ultimately resolve this issue,” he added.

The Turkish military said its target was the PKK and that it would take care not to harm civilians “and other local groups that do not act in enmity against the Turkish Armed Forces.”

Nihat Ali Ozcan, a terrorism expert with the research center TEPAV, said the operation was launched at this time to hit the group before any infiltration by rebels into Turkey in the spring, the traditional start of the fighting season.

“I think it is aimed to keep the PKK under pressure before the group starts entering Turkey,” he said on CNN-Turk television. “I don’t think the operation is a large-scale one.”

Iraqi border forces officer Col. Hussein Tamer said Turkish shelling on Thursday hit several Kurdish villages in the Sedafan area, some 32 kilometers (20 miles) from the border.

Jabbar Yawar, a spokesman for Iraqi Kurdish security forces, said sporadic bombing was taking place in the border areas, but no casualties were reported.

Fouad Hussein, a spokesman for the semiautonomous Kurdish government, said the Kurdish Peshmerga forces had been put on alert.

He said Iraqi Kurdish forces also had tightened security around bases housing Turkish military monitors operating in northern Iraq with permission from local authorities under a 1996 agreement.

“The government of Kurdistan ordered the Peshmerga forces to be on alert in fear of any Turkish incursion on Iraqi territory,” he said, claiming that Turkish military monitors had tried to leave their bases in violation of the terms of the 1996 agreement.

“Those troops tried to move out but the Peshmerga forces forced them to return to their camps within half an hour,” he said.

In Ankara on Thursday, Turkey’s civilian and military leaders issued a statement after a meeting on national security, saying cross-border attacks by the military would continue as long they were “deemed necessary.”

Come on Baby, Light My Fire – Al Qaeda Style

Another Al Qaeda story the liberals do not want you to read… Burning people alive is the new fad, I guess compared to waterboarding this is really not all that bad, at least in liberal and terrorist eyes… I wonder what our precious liberals would say if we did this… We know that they are not saying that Al Qaeda is evil for doing it… I urge everyone to watch the video, please open your eyes and face the danger.

Al Qaeda’s latest display of terror has made its way onto the Internet, showing horrifying images of what appear to be prisoners in Iraq being doused with an inflammatory liquid and then burned alive.

The video, which appears to have been posted first on Google last December in an alleged anti-Al Qaeda Web film, shows five insurgents standing behind three blindfolded prisoners kneeling at the edge of a burning pit.

“And now that we have captured these scums who committed this dreadful crime, we will burn them with this fire,” the Al Qaeda leader says in Arabic. “The same fire which they committed their crime with.

“And I swear by God almighty that, I swear by God almighty that we will have no mercy on them,” he continues. “Allahuakbar, Allahuakbar.”

As he speaks, two of the insurgents pour liquid on the blindfolded prisoners. Then they push the bound men into the pit, where they are engulfed in flames.

According to the summary — in Arabic and German — included in the nearly 15-minute video posted on Google, many of the clips were found in Diyala, Iraq. The makers of the film say that the originals were “passed to us by others.”

Click here to see the video on a Turkish news site (WARNING: Very disturbing Images).

Al Qaeda Trying To Recruiting Insiders

Al Qaeda even though weakened, is still reaching out and gaining followers. These followers are not desparate and stuck in a war zone nor have they been invaded… It is because of people like this that we must keep our resolve and continue to maintain high levels of security even though it incovenieces travelers. It is another reason we need to put into place stricter immigration policies and it is most definitely a reason to bring the war to them in their home countries. I know, the liberals reading this are already huffing and puffing, well to bad if you do not like it, maybe when they are at your doorstep you will finally wake up to the danger that we face.

WASHINGTON —  The Al Qaeda terror network continues to succeed in recruiting terrorists from the West — possibly the United States.

U.S. intelligence officials on Wednesday told FOX News Al Qaeda has succeeded in strengthening its position in Pakistani tribal regions and is recruiting Western operatives who are better able to help carry out attacks on the United States.

The information comes a day after Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell expressed concerns to the Senate Intelligence Committee about Al Qaeda’s continued efforts in Iraq and Pakistan, and the resurgence of Afghanistan’s Taliban — the ousted regime that gave refuge to Usama Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda terror network.

“Al Qaeda remains the pre-eminent threat against the United States,” he said.

McConnell said Al Qaeda — while being suppressed to a large extent in Iraq — is moving to other regions, including Pakistan, where it continues to try to launch attacks against the United States.

The tribal regions of Pakistan, while within the country’s borders, are lawless and beyond the control of the Pakistani government.

And the next attack on the United states likely would be launched by Al Qaeda from those regions, Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen said in prepared testimony.

Tuesday, The New York Times reported that a senior intelligence official said there is new evidence Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan are training Westerners — most likely including U.S. citizens.

That official said there is no evidence the terror group has succeeded in placing operatives inside U.S. borders.

How To Raise A Suicide Bomber

More proof that Al Qaeda in Iraq is getting desparate… It is sad that all they are doing is training their own children how to die. Unfortunately, the liberals in America will cry that this is all our fault and that we are breeding terrorism. Sorry guys, but this is the reality of the enemy. They choose to raise their children to become weapons of warfare. This is nothing more than a form of 4g warfare.

Then on top of exploiting these children and trying to turn them into terrorists, Al Qaeda has the nerve to use them for ransom to fund their own terror initiatives…

WASHINGTON —  Al Qaeda propaganda tapes released by Multinational Forces-Iraq reveal a possible new trend in the group’s terror strategy in Iraq.

The tapes, obtained by FOX News and later released to the media, are training videos showing black-masked Iraqi children between 6 and 14 being taught how to hold AK-47s, stop a car and carry out a kidnapping, break into a house and break into a courtyard and terrorize the individuals living there.

Footage aired for reporters showed an apparent training operation in which the boys are seen storming a house and holding guns to the heads of mock residents. Another tape showed a young boy wearing a suicide vest and posing with automatic weapons.

They also are shown being taught to use rocket-propelled grenade launchers.

“These were young boys all masked and hooded, all outfitted with weapons; adults were doing the training,” said Rear Adm. Greg Smith, a spokesman for Multinational Forces-Iraq.

“Al Qaeda is clearly using children to exploit other children to get the interest of Jihad spread among teenagers far and wide. They use this footage on the Internet to encourage other young boys to join the jihad movement.”

And at a U.S. military briefing on Wednesday in Baghdad’s heavily guarded Green Zone, he added: “Al Qaeda in Iraq wants to poison the next generation of Iraqis. It is offering children as the new generation of mujahedeen,” he said, using the Arabic term for holy warriors.

The five videotapes found included raw footage that the U.S. military believes was to be used in future propaganda tapes. They obtained the material in a Dec. 4 raid in Khan Bani Sad — about halfway between Baghdad and Baquba.

Other scenes from the Khan Bani Saad video showed masked boys forcing a man off his bicycle at gunpoint and stopping a car and kidnapping its driver along a dusty country road. At one point the boys — wearing soccer jerseys with ammunition slung across their chests — sit in a circle on the floor, chanting slogans in support of Al Qaeda.

• Click here to view video.

Coalition forces also obtained another tape, shot by Iraqi-led forces, that shows a mission in which a kidnapped 11-year-old Iraqi boy is rescued after being held for ransom.

Acting on a tip from a local Iraqi, the forces planned a surprise raid last week on a home in Kirkuk where an 11-year-old boy, the son of a Kurdish mechanic, was being held for a $100,000 ransom by Al Qaeda.

The kidnappers had held the boy, Ammar, for four days.

Kidnapping and extortion are how Al Qaeda in Iraq finances its attacks. It is big business. But this time there was a happy ending.

“As he came out from under that curtain you could tell he looked terrified,” Smith told FOX News in an interview, speaking about the boy. “He gave his name and they said, ‘You’re the one we are looking for,’ and you could tell he was much relieved at that point.”

The raid began before dawn.

“They approached on foot,” Smith said from Baghdad. “They knew precisely what door they needed to go to. They came down a small alleyway. The door was locked, they yelled inside for it to be unlocked, it was not unlocked so they broke the door down.”

The security forces entered a small room.

“The Al Qaeda member who had custody of this young boy was also in shock by the entrance and the quick operations by the Iraq security forces,” Smith said.

One of the kidnappers was caught inside the room where the boy was hiding. All of the shooting and shouting left the boy terrified, according to those who participated in the raid.

“They got him into the car,” Smith recalled. “They handed him a cell phone so he could call his mother, and he was very composed. He just said, ‘Hello. This is Ammar.’

“He said, ‘I am here. I am safe.'”

An officer on the other end of the line could hear the family screaming and shouting. Soon after, the boy was delivered back to cheering neighbors and family members.

This story had a happy ending, but most kidnappings in Iraq do not. Ammar was from a simple family, and his father never could have paid the $100,000 ransom.

In an interview after his son was returned to the family, Ammar’s father said, “The kidnappers told us that if we fail to pay the ransom, they will behead my son and put his head in the garbage can in front of my house. We told them that we don’t have money.”

The raid netted five kidnappers and led the coalition forces to another boy being held in a hideout nearby. He was freed on Sunday.

Al Qaeda’s networks are not difficult to unravel once a successful raid has been completed. Its operatives’ obsessive need to keep accurate books, such as an accountant might, has provided coalition troops with a treasure trove of intelligence.

Much like the Nazis in World War II, Al Qaeda operatives document their every action, be it a bombing or kidnapping. It is the way they get paid by the organization.

The kidnapping ring that was broken last week had recorded 26 other kidnappings. Coalition forces did not know how many had ended in release, and how many in death.

Iraqi Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammed al-Askari told reporters that militants are kidnapping more and more Iraqi children, though he could not offer details or numbers.

“This is not only to recruit them, but also to demand ransom to fund the operations of Al Qaeda,” al-Askari said.

The group included about 20 children being “trained.” At the end of the hourlong video they are sent into their parents’ arms, suggesting the training has parental approval and that the children likely come from Al Qaeda-affiliated households.

The tapes’ discovery adds to Al Qaeda’s exploitation of children as well as women; just last weekend two female homicide bombers wrapped in explosives targeted a Baghdad market, killing nearly 100 people.

Smith said pictures of the bombers’ remains show their faces to have distinctive Down Syndrome features, making them unlikely suspects.

After the attack, Iraqis in Baghdad demanded more protection for markets, saying one of the bombers was not searched because she was known as a local beggar and the male guards were reluctant to search women because of Islamic sensitivities, as women are not searched in public places.

The police are recruiting female officers, yet there does not appear to be a plan to train them to search members of their own sex.

As for the children in the tapes, “We don’t think they were being trained precisely to go out and conduct operations any time soon,” Smith said. “But clearly there is a pattern of training and a pattern of indoctrination that is being used by Al Qaeda.

“Very young individuals who are very obviously innocent and impressionable, these videos convince them early on that the jihadist movement, the Al Qaeda movement, is something they should belong to and look up to.”

All of this suggests that Al Qaeda in Iraq is planning to continue its recruiting operations for years to come, Smith said.

“In this instance we believe it was for a greater purpose than trying to produce footage for film,” Smith said.

“That footage can be used again on the Internet to convince other young boys around the world to join the movement.”

The U.S. military on Wednesday said coalition forces had killed seven suspected insurgents and detained 45 others during five days of raids across Iraq.

Also Wednesday, a roadside bomb exploded near a police convoy transporting suspected Shiite militia fighters south of Baghdad, killing four passers-by and wounding nine other people, police said. At least 19 people were killed or found dead Wednesday across the country.

The roadside bombing was an apparent attempt to free the 10 detainees who were linked to the Mahdi Army militia that is nominally loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, according to police Brig. Gen. Ghassan Mohammed Ali.

He said the detainees had been captured over the past month and had been accused of attacking civilians and U.S. and Iraqi security forces in the city.

The bomb went off in Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, where there have been fierce clashes between rival Shiite militia factions engaged in a violent power struggle in the oil-rich area.

Two women and two men in a car near the explosion were killed, and nine other people — two policemen, three prisoners and four civilians — were wounded, Ali said.

Al-Sadr has ordered his militia to stand in a six-month cease-fire that expires at the end of February, but the U.S. military says disaffected fighters have broken with the movement and persisted with attacks.

Iraqi security forces in the area also often are accused of being infiltrated by militia fighters, particularly from the Badr Brigade, the militant arm of the largest Shiite party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, or SIIC.

Jennifer Griffin is FOX News’ National Security Correspondent.

FOX News’ Courtney Kealy and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Al Qaeda In Iraq Diary Reveals Desperation

Documents seized in Iraq by the US Military show that Al Qaeda leaders are desperate, which can be seen else where in how they are trying to carry out terrorist attacks using mentally disabled women, women, and children…

Yet another story the liberal media does not want you to read, they still are under the assumption that the surge is not working….

BAGHDAD —  A diary and another document seized during U.S. raids show some Al Qaeda in Iraq leaders fear the terror group is crumbling, with many fighters defecting to American-backed neighborhood groups, the U.S. military said Sunday.

The military revealed two documents discovered by American troops in November: a 39-page memo written by a mid- to high-level Al Qaeda official with knowledge of the group’s operations in Iraq’s western Anbar province, and a 16-page diary written by another group leader north of Baghdad.

Click here for the English translation of the diary. (PDF)

Click here for the original version of the diary. (PDF)

In the Anbar document, the author describes an Al Qaeda in crisis, with citizens growing weary of militants’ presence and foreign fighters too eager to participate in suicide missions rather than continuing to fight, said Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a U.S. military spokesman.

“We lost cities and afterward, villages… We find ourselves in a wasteland desert,” Smith quoted the document as saying.

/**/

The memo — believed to have been written in summer 2007 — cites militants’ increasing difficulty in moving around and transporting weapons and suicide belts because of better equipped Iraqi police and more watchful citizens, Smith said.

Click here for video.

The diary, seized by U.S. troops south of Balad, was written in autumn 2007 by Abu Tariq, who refers to himself as sector leader for al-Qaida in Iraq, Smith said. Tariq wrote that he was once in charge of 600 fighters, but only 20 were left “after the tribes changed course” — a reference to how many Sunni tribesmen have switched sides to fight alongside the Americans, Smith said.

The Sunni tribes’ yearlong alliance with U.S. forces is credited with helping reduce violence across the country.

The new organizations, called awakening councils or neighborhood watch groups, were key to helping push Al Qaeda in Iraq out of Anbar province, once one of the country’s most violent. The terror network’s top leaders are now based somewhere in northern Iraq, Smith said, having moved out of Anbar and into Diyala province last year.

“The diary shows that Al Qaeda regards these volunteer citizen groups as a grave threat, and that terrorists are targeting them,” Smith told reporters.

In recent months, attacks on the Sunni volunteers have spiked while overall violence has steadily declined, he said.

Underscoring continued violence between militants and U.S.-allied fighters, clashes erupted Sunday when insurgents stormed two villages in northwestern Iraq, local officials said. Sunni volunteers and Iraqi security forces repelled the attack, but at least 22 people were killed, according to a Sunni lawmaker who heads an anti-Al Qaeda group as well as an Iraqi Army officer.

The U.S. military described both of the insurgent documents Sunday, but allowed reporters to see just four pages of Tariq’s diary, citing security reasons.

The documents tell “narrow but compelling stories of the challenges Al Qaeda in Iraq is facing,” Smith told reporters in Baghdad’s heavily guarded Green Zone. He stressed that the documents revealed the terror group’s weakened operations and morale in only two areas, and that it did not mean Al Qaeda had been defeated.

“This does not signal the end of Al Qaeda in Iraq, but it is a contemporary account of the challenges posed to terrorists from the people of Iraq,” Smith said.

He said the documents are believed to be authentic, Smith said, because they contain details that only Al Qaeda in Iraq leaders could know about battlefield movements and tactics.

Smith said the biggest blow to Al Qaeda, according to the documents, has been former Sunni fighters’ new alliance with the Americans. At least 77,500 volunteers have partnered with U.S. and Iraqi troops countrywide, he said.

Some 15,000 of those are in Baghdad, and the most recent growth has been in awakening councils in Diyala province and the rest of northern Iraq, Smith added.

In Baghdad, one of the neighborhoods most improved with help from Sunni volunteers was Amariyah, on the city’s west side. On Sunday, more than 1,000 people demonstrated in the predominantly Sunni area, protesting the recent arrests of 17 residents.

Shops were shuttered as the crowd pushed through Amariyah, chanting pro-Sunni and anti-American slogans. At one point, demonstrators unfurled a large Saddam Hussein-era Iraqi flag over the crowd.

Iraq’s flag was altered recently, to eliminate three green stars thought to symbolize Saddam’s ousted Baath Party.

Jihadists Use Mentally Disabled Women As Bombs

The recent double bombing in Bahgdad is the latest desperate measure taken by possible Al Qaeda in Iraq terrorists. The mass media covered the bombing as another suicide bombing, however new information has come to light and it shows that mentally disabled women were strapped with explosives and ballbearings and the bombs were remotely detonated by cell phone.

The fact that the women were used in itself is a prime example of the Jihadists loosing battle, however the use of mentally disabled women really highlights how far they are reaching in order to carry out the murder of Iraqis.

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) — Two mentally disabled women were strapped with explosives Friday and sent into busy Baghdad markets, where they were blown up by remote control, a top Iraqi government official said.

 

 

var CNN_ArticleChanger = new CNN_imageChanger(‘cnnImgChngr’,’/2008/WORLD/meast/02/01/iraq.main/imgChng/p1-0.init.exclude.html’,1,1); //CNN.imageChanger.load(‘cnnImgChngr’,’imgChng/p1-0.exclude.html’);

The bombs killed at least 98 people and wounded more than 200 at two popular pet markets on the holiest day of the week for Muslims, authorities said.

In both bombings, the attackers were mentally disabled women whose explosive belts were remotely detonated, Gen. Qasim Atta, spokesman for Baghdad’s security plan, told state television.

Atta said the women were strapped with dynamite and ball bearings, citing members of the bomb squad. The explosives were detonated via cell phone, he said.

An Atta aide said that people referred to the bomber at central Baghdad’s al-Ghazl market as the “crazy woman” and that the bomber at a second market had an unspecified birth disability.

The aide said authorities believe the women were unaware of plans to detonate the explosives. Watch how the use of the women represents a new tactic »

The nationalities and identities of the women have not been released.

U.S. military officials referred to the two attacks as suicide bombings, saying both women detonated the explosive devices.

The U.S. officials also gave a much lower casualty toll, with 27 civilians dead and 53 others wounded.

The Pentagon attributed the attacks to al Qaeda in Iraq and made no reference to the mental conditions of the women.

“By targeting innocent Iraqis, they show their true demonic character,” said Lt. Col. Steve Stover, spokesman for the Multi-National Division-Baghdad.

“They care nothing for the Iraqi people; they want to subjugate them and forcefully create a greater Islamic sharia state,” he said, referring to Islamic law.

The violence marked the bloodiest series of attacks in Baghdad since August, breaking a brief stretch of relative calm as attacks and deaths dropped after the 2007 increase in U.S. troop strength called the surge.

In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the attacks show the reality of the continuing struggle against militants, adding that Iraqis have turned against “these terrible, violent people in their midst who will do anything.”

“It certainly underscores and affirms the decision of the Iraqi people that there is no political program here that is acceptable to a civilized society, and that this is the most brutal and the most bankrupt of movements that would do this kind of thing,” she said at a press briefing. “And I think that will underscore for the Iraqis, and it will make them tougher in the fight.”

The first bomb blew up at al-Ghazl animal market around 10:30 a.m., killing 69 and wounding more than 140. The second blast happened about a half-hour later in the New Baghdad neighborhood pet market, killing 29 people and wounding 67.

Al-Ghazl pet market is a popular destination where people buy and sell cats, dogs, monkeys and other animals. Attackers have struck the market on Fridays — its busiest day — several times in the last year or so.

A January 2007 bombing killed 15 and wounded 52 at the pet market, and 13 people died and 58 were wounded in a November attack.

Saddam’s Downfall

Here’s another story the liberal media does not want you to know. They are so intent on chanting that Bush Lied that they want to bury the truth.

The truth is simple, Saddam Hussein had a program to convince the world that he had weaopons of mass destruction and had all intentions of starting it up once the heat was off. He had the assests in place to resume the program at will, sort of like Iran’s “suspended” nuke program…

The program was so good they he believed it himself…

But the liberals will keep chanting that Bush Lied… Wake up, it is only a lie if he knew it to be false and said it anyways… Bush, Congress, intel agencies around the world, governments around the world believed that he had weapons of mass destruction. The liars are the ones that deny they believed it or campaign that they only believed it because of Bush’s lies…

NEW YORK – Saddam Hussein allowed the world to believe he had weapons of mass destruction to deter rival Iran and did not think the United States would stage a major invasion, according to an FBI interrogator who questioned the Iraqi leader after his capture.

Saddam expected only a limited aerial attack by the United States and thought he could remain in control, the FBI special agent, George Piro, told CBS’s “60 Minutes” program in an interview to be broadcast Sunday.

“He told me he initially miscalculated … President Bush’s intentions,” said Piro. “He thought the United States would retaliate with the same type of attack as we did in 1998 … a four-day aerial attack.”

“He survived that one and he was willing to accept that type of attack,” Piro said.

In 2003, a close aide of Saddam’s told The Associated Press that Saddam did not expect a U.S. invasion and deliberately kept the world guessing about his weapons program, although he already had gotten rid of it.

Keeping up the illusion of weapons program
Saddam publicly denied having unconventional weapons before the U.S. invasion, but prevented U.N. inspectors from working in the country from 1998 until 2002 and when they finally returned in November 2002, they often complained that Iraq wasn’t fully cooperating.

Piro, a Lebanese-American who speaks Arabic, debriefed Saddam after he was found in an underground hideout near his home city north of Baghdad in December 2003, nine months after the U.S. invasion.

Piro said Saddam also said that he wanted to keep up the illusion that he had the program in part because he thought it would deter a likely Iranian invasion.

“For him, it was critical that he was seen as still the strong, defiant Saddam. He thought that (faking having the weapons) would prevent the Iranians from reinvading Iraq,” Piro told Scott Pelley of “60 Minutes.”

Piro added that Saddam had the intention of restarting an Iraqi weapons program at the time, and had engineers available for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

Kuwait invasion after insult to Iraqi women
Piro also mentioned Saddam’s revelation during questioning that what pushed him to invade Kuwait in 1990 was a dishonorable swipe at Iraqi women made by the Kuwaiti leader, Sheik Jaber Al Ahmed Al Sabah.

During the buildup to the invasion, Iraq had accused Kuwait of flooding the world market with oil and demanded compensation for oil produced from a disputed area on the border of the two countries.

Piro said that Al Sabah told the foreign minister of Iraq during a discussion aimed at resolving some of those conflicts that “he would not stop doing what he was doing until he turned every Iraqi woman into a $10 prostitute. And that really sealed it for him, to invade Kuwait,” said Piro.