I wasn't going to post this inflammatory lead in the "Times" until I read this Professors blog about it. Nice to have a PHD in Communications who is tenured available for comment. He must be tenured, or he wouldn't last writing things like this about the "Times" I am really growing to love "Blogs".
"Ranting Professors."
________________________________________
THE NEW YORK TIMES BACKPEDALS -- ON THE JUMP Well the New York Times backs down from its claim that most of the two million people in Sadr City follow the cleric al-Sadr. But the followers of Sadr in Sadr City are the new threat, and that means the Shiia are now a threat, thank you very much. (I love the part of the article where they note that the primary threats had been common criminals and Baathist remnants. They aren't even willing to put foreign fighters on the list.) That's whats on the front page above the fold.
On the jump, they backpedal in a big way. Well, not everyone follows Sadr, he's young, he doesn't have that much influence, so on and so forth (that difference between the tone of what's on the front page and the direction the article takes on the jump, that's one of the benefits of looking at the article in paper version.) In fact, Najaf, where Sadr is headquartered is so quiet, the US Marines have gone home and handed off that town to a combination of Iraqis and Spaniards, so it would have been awfully hard to sustain a theory Sadr had much more influence than he does. But it's still the lead article above the fold, still a story that Sadr is making big time trouble, still giving Sadr an enormous amount of attention -- and therefore being picked up by broadcast. And broadcast has a tendency, when they pick up Times stories, to pick up the jist from above the fold, not the overall nuance of the article. (And you have to believe they know that.)
But before we all decide the Times is onto something, we should reread Pam Hess's piece from September. Hess has the context of the situation, from Najaf. So read (or reread) her piece and then ask yourself -- is the Times reporter giving us information that would explain why the situation on the ground has changed? If not, then they have a story about Sadr's ten thousand Baghdad followers protesting, and their claim that the entire area is about to go up in flames remains their prediction, which may or may not play out, but which isn't yet supported by what they have reported. And all they are doing is giving a troublemaker the attention he desires for a p.r. stunt.
rantingprofs.blogspot.com
___________________________________
October 11, 2003
Iraqi Shiite Anger Raises New Fears for U.S. Soldiers
By IAN FISHER - NEW YORK TIMES
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Oct. 10 — Shiite Muslim anger against Americans spilled into Friday Prayers in Sadr City, the poor Baghdad district where two Iraqis and two American soldiers were killed Thursday night.
The violence and subsequent public outrage raised fears of new dangers to United States troops from the followers of Moktada al-Sadr, a young anti-American Shiite cleric. Up to now, the main threat to American forces has come from loyalists to Saddam Hussein.
A seething throng of perhaps 10,000 people gathered on Friday to pay respects to the two men they believe were killed by American forces the night before.
"No, no, to America!" they chanted as wooden coffins holding the remains of the men were paraded along a main street in this impoverished neighborhood of some two million people, once called Saddam City and now renamed Sadr City in part for Mr. Sadr's father, a popular cleric who was assassinated in 1999 on what many believe were Mr. Hussein's orders.
Sheik Abdel Hadi al-Daraji, an aide to the younger Mr. Sadr, delivered the sermon at Friday Prayers and issued a defiant demand: no American soldiers should be allowed inside Sadr City.
"America, which calls itself the supporter of democracy, is nothing but a big terrorist organization that is leading the world with its terrorism and arrogance," Mr. Daraji said.
For the last six months, the greatest threat to United States soldiers has come from common criminals or loyalists to Mr. Hussein, who belongs to the Sunni branch of Islam, a minority in Iraq. The Shiites, who were repressed under Mr. Hussein, have been more supportive and have rarely been thought responsible for attacks on American soldiers.
But tensions have been growing for several days between American troops and Mr. Sadr's followers, who represent only a fraction of Iraq's majority Shiite population. If the Shiites turned in large numbers against the American occupation, the effect could be explosive.
On Wednesday, 1,000 or more of Mr. Sadr's followers blocked off streets in front of the American headquarters in downtown Baghdad in a tense but largely peaceful demonstration demanding the release of another cleric allied with Mr. Sadr.
The cleric had been arrested after guns and ammunition were found in his mosque, according to Lt. Col. George Krivo, an American military spokesman.
The Jump
Despite the visibility of Mr. Sadr's followers, there is some debate about the extent of his actual influence among Shiites, many of whom follow more moderate religious leaders. It is not hard to find people, even in Sadr City, who speak openly against Mr. Sadr.
"You put a badge on your chest and wrap a piece of green cloth on your head and you become the defender of the faith," said Saad Khudair, owner of a barbershop. "It's not right. They are thugs."
Colonel Krivo also cautioned against making too much of either the incident or Mr. Sadr, who is about 30, and his followers, many of whom are poor young men without jobs.
"Let's not paint the whole area, or the whole two million plus people who are living there, with the same brush," he said. "There are specific areas there that are challenging, just as there are specific areas throughout the country that are challenging. So be careful not to generalize too much about this area."
The spark for the recent violence appeared to be a suicide attack on Thursday morning at an Iraqi police station, in which a bomber crashed through a gate in a car and detonated a powerful bomb, killing at least eight other people.
Several hours later, United States troops surrounded Mr. Sadr's headquarters several blocks away. Local residents and clerics said that the soldiers entered the headquarters and that several of them were beaten up and had their guns taken away.
Iraqi witnesses said that militia members then blocked off the street in front of the headquarters, and that a short time later three Humvees with Americans drove up to the blockade.
Accounts differ as to what happened next. Colonel Krivo said the soldiers arrived after several people requested aid.
"There were some people that came out, met with the forces and said, `Please come in. We need to show you something important,' " he said. It was at that point that people in the crowd attacked, the colonel said.
In addition to the two American soldiers who were killed, four others were wounded. Colonel Krivo said a special unit was called in to rescue them, sparking an exchange of gunfire that witnesses said lasted an hour or more.
"From our reports, we believe this was a deliberate and planned ambush," Colonel Krivo said. "This was not just a hasty act."
The soldiers faced an arsenal of weapons that included small arms and rocket-propelled grenades, as well as explosives, Colonel Krivo added.
But many people in the neighborhood said the soldiers fired first.
"The Americans started shooting randomly," said Hassan Khadhim, 22, owner of a shop next to where the shootout took place. "Mostly, they were shooting in the air to frighten people. So our people shot back at them."
Some witnesses, however, agreed that it was an ambush.
"Moktada's people were hiding behind the mural waiting for them," said Muhammad Kadhim, 31, a post office employee. "When the Americans came they started shooting at them, and all the Americans were trying to do was just to leave."
The mural to which he referred is a huge billboard on a traffic circle painted with the faces of Mr. Sadr's father, Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr, and Muhammad Baqr al-Sadr, an Islamic scholar and founder of the religious Dawa Party who was executed by Mr. Hussein in 1980. The two men were not immediately related. One of the two Iraqis killed Thursday night was shot at the base of the mural, witnesses said.
Despite the proximity of the bombing and the later shootout, Colonel Krivo said there was no evidence to suggest they were linked in any way, though he said he could not rule it out.
Given the similarity to previous bombings, suspicion fell immediately on pro-Hussein forces or foreign fighters who have come to Iraq to battle Americans and who are generally held to be responsible for much of the chaos in Iraq.
Colonel Krivo said that American troops would continue patrols in Sadr City, and that he did not believe the incident on Thursday marked the start of any widening confrontation.
Still, a confrontation with Mr. Sadr and his followers does not seem out of the question.
American officials have long eyed him with concern, for his anti-American oratory, his close ties with radical clerics in Iran and his insistence on establishing an Islamic state in Iraq.
Perhaps the biggest concern is his militia, the Jaish Mehdi. Though the American authorities have banned militias, his followers have roamed the streets of the neighborhood over the last two days carrying rifles — some apparently those that were donated by Americans to Iraqi police officers — grenades and even rocket-propelled grenades.
At Friday Prayers they acted as armed security guards, some planted on rooftops with machine guns. One man surveyed the crowd with a telescope.
There was no Iraqi police officer in sight.
nytimes.com |
