I was following the news about the “improved security” in Baghdad over the last two weeks. I wanted to give myself some time to absorb what is being said and make sure I understand what they are talking about. I also have been talking with family and friends in Baghdad to get a bigger picture.

I have to say, I am losing faith in journalism every day!

My parents, who live in a Sunni neighborhood, tell me that “we cannot leave our neighborhood because if we do we will end up in a Shiite neighborhood and be killed, like what happened to many others>

Many of my friends tell me that “it is all either Shiites or Sunnis now. If you mix, you get killed.”

Is this the “improved security” now?

Today, the TimesOnline said “Iraqi refugees are returning home in dramatic numbers, concluding that security in Baghdad has been transformed.”

Did they go to the Syrian embassy in Iraq and see if Iraqis can get a visa? Did they go to Syria and see if the Iraqis can extend their visas? They did mention that it is difficult to extend the residency, but they insisted that most of the Iraqis are retuning because it is “safe” in Iraq now.

More than a month ago, Syria announced that it was going to facilitate the process of Iraqis entering the country and will require $50 for each visitor. What the American and British media didn’t tell you is that that announcement was a lie. What happened is that Syria continued to deport Iraqis and the $50 was a fee for those who already have residencies and want to leave the country and come back. They have to pay $50 each! Did you know about that?

The Washington Post has been talking about the “improved security” in Baghdad for weeks now. But I wonder why they have at least two Iraqi reporters’ names at the end of every article as contributors! Why cannot the American reporters go out and report this “improved security?”

The New York Times usually takes a short cut and doesn’t give contribution to the enormous work their Iraqi reporters do to make writing a story possible and that’s why yesterday they ran a front page story about the “improved security” in Baghdad. I am sure at least 60% of the work was done by Iraqi reporters because the Americans cannot go out and report in the street!

Baghdad neighborhoods are sealed, barbed wires, Jersey walls, sand bags and other obstacles greet the Baghdadis when they leave their houses, if they do.

Women have to wear headscarf outside the house. Women cannot drive. Men cannot wear shorts. Men cannot walk with women in the street, unless they are relative of some kind. Kids don’t go to schools because they fear to be kidnapped. Employees don’t go to their work for fear of assassinations.

Is this “improved security?”

The power in Iraq now is the Mehdi Army and Badr troops. The decision maker is Ali al-Sistani. The Prime Minister vetos any law to bring any minister from his party or his alliance to justice for corruption. The Iraqis tell the prime minister that militias are killing their sons and daughters, and he says “no militias should be allowed to work in the streets,” and at the same time, he adds 18,000 militia members to the police force [2 weeks ago.]

Is this “improved security?”

Here is a report from today’s Reuters
MOSUL - A truck bomb exploded near the house of a tribal leader, killing one person and wounding three others in Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said. The leader, a member of a local tribal council overseeing neighbourhood policing efforts, was not at his home at the time.

BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier and an Iraqi interpreter were killed when a roadside bomb detonated near their patrol in eastern Baghdad on Tuesday, the U.S. military said. Three U.S. soldiers were wounded.

BAGHDAD - U.S. forces killed six suspected insurgents and detained 10 others during operations targeting al Qaeda in central and northern Iraq on Tuesday and Wednesday, the U.S. military said.

DIWANIYA - Police arrested 30 people, accused of assassinations and other attacks against Iraqi security forces, in the city of Diwaniya, 180 km (110 miles) south of Baghdad, over the past 48 hours, police said.

RAMADI - At least six people were killed when a car exploded outside a courthouse being guarded by police in the city of Ramadi, 110 km (70 miles) west of Baghdad, one police officer said. Another police source put the death toll at four, with 15 wounded.

BAGHDAD - Three policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their patrol in Mansour district of western Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - Iraqi security forces found at least nine bodies in different areas of Baghdad, Iraqi army and police said. Six of the decomposed corpses were buried in the gardens of two abandoned houses in the Saidiya district of southern Baghdad.

LONDON - Two British military personnel were killed in Iraq on Tuesday when their Puma helicopter crashed near Baghdad, the Ministry of Defence said. The ministry said it was too early to speculate on the cause of the crash.

Here is more

BAGHDAD (AP) — Police in Iraq say at least six people are dead after a suicide car bomb exploded at a police checkpoint guarding a courthouse in Anbar province.

Is this “improved security?”

We need to realize that what is happening in Baghdad now is not an improved security situation. What is happening now is the result of violence. Baghdad is carved into sectarian neighborhoods now; Shiite and Sunni neighborhoods. Sunnis cannot go to Shiite neighborhoods and Shiites cannot go to Sunni neighborhoods. Therefore, there are not as many targets in the streets like before. And that’s why you think that the number of people killed in the streets is less and violence has decreased.

What Maliki wanted, which is a sectarian Baghdad ran by his militias, is achieved. He and his poisonous Mullahs, like Sistani, Hakim and Jaafari, wanted to force out the Sunnis and create a Shiite Baghdad. On the other hand, Hareth al-Dhari and his criminals wouldn’t let this happen, so they insisted to stay. The result is hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed. And now, a sectarian Baghdad.

If I live in Baghdad now, I need to stay in my neighborhood. How do I go to work? How do I shop? How do I see my friends? How do I live?

The Sunni neighborhoods are controlled by Sunni insurgents and they are supposed to tell me where to go and where not toand whether I can drive my car in the street or not! And the Shiite neighborhoods are controlled by Shiite militias, Sistani worshippers, and they are supposed to prevent me from going into the neighborhood where I was born and lived for 12 years, Kadhimiya, because it is a Shiite neighborhood and I carry a Sunni first name!

Is this “improved security?”

When Treasure of Baghdad wrote about the miserable security situation in Iraq a few days ago, everyone jumped off their seats and attacked him for saying the truth. Many of the attackers told him that he was lying because “everyone is saying the situation has improved” but him. They told him that people are walking in the streets and living a normal life. They told him to go back to Iraq and see for himself that he was “lying.”

I now invite those deceived [or maybe just mad] people to go to Iraq and tell us what they see. If they do believe that Iraq is “safe” now, why don’t they go and tell us what happens? One of them is a bloger who claims to be Iraqi and knows everything about Iraq, more than Treasure of Baghdad and I do, although he left Iraq more than 25 years ago and was never back since. Now, I invite him to go to Iraq and live “normal life” with his relatives and report from there!

Painting by Iraqi artist Betool Fekaiki

The game is going as planned!

Now, they are saying that PKK members are leaving Iraq and going to Iran to hide from the Turkish military forces!

“The PKK has decreased its forces in Iraqi Kurdistan and they are moving to Iran,” Othman Ocalan, brother of imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, told The Independent. “It is part of PKK tactics that when they feel pressure in one country, they move to another.”

Now, Turkey has no legitimate reason to go into Iraq with major force to rout the PKK out because they are retreating into Iran.

Is Turkey going after them inside Iran?
There is no way Turkey is going to wave the card of “invasion” in Iran’s face. Then, my next question would be: “So, PKK members threaten the Turkish national security when they are in Iraq, but they don’t when they are in Iran?”

Now, the Turkish, Iraqi and American governments have passed three different messages to the Iraqi Kurds, separately.

Turkish message was: We have the force to destroy your stability. We can use it when we want, especially when you are alone.

U.S. message was: We are not going to protect you against Turkey, our NATO ally. You have to find someone else to back you up.

The Iraqi government message was: Well, that’s what’s going to happen when you are on your own. Are you still thinking about having your own separate state?

On Saturday, the Iranian government presented a plan to help Iraq go out of the security bottle-neck. One of the suggestions Iran put in the plan is to delay the work on Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution for at least two years! [Article 140 is the one that demands “normalization and census and concludes with a referendum in Kirkuk and other disputed territories to determine the will of their citizens by a date not to exceed the 31st of December 2007.”

Are you able to connect the dots now?

Although it is a clear and loud intervention in Iraq’s interior affairs, Nouri al-Maliki and his henchmen have not opposed it yet and did not object on the intervention. [Why should they when Maliki is publicly working on the Iranization of Iraq.]

On a different issue, but still in the same horrific situation of Iraq, the Iraqi Red Crescent, or IRC, in a statement announced that the number of the displaced within Iraq reached 2.3 million Iraqis, a 16% increase from last month.

IRC statement also talked about the false promises Maliki’s government ahs given the Iraqis before when it promised to bring back the displaced to their houses when it is safe for them to do so. Although the Iraqi government’s propaganda, backed by every major American media outlet, is working very well on faking the success of the “surge” in Iraq, the displaced have not been able to return to their homes.

IRC also talked about the $25 million Maliki said that the Iraqi government was giving to help Iraqi refugees outside Iraq. the statement said although Maliki announced it months ago, nothing has been given yet. But I am sure the money left the government’s account, it just did not go where it was supposed to go!


Ali has also published a very interesting post about Iraqi and American cultures meeting where he lives.