- Monday, September 17, 2007 -- Did you see George all
choked up? In his surreal TV talk on Thursday, he got all emotional over
the killing by Al Qaeda of Sheik Abu Risha, the leader of the new Sunni
alliance with the US against the insurgents in Anbar Province, Iraq.
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- Bush shook Abu Risha's hand two weeks ago for the cameras.
Bush can shake his hand again, but not the rest of him: Abu Risha was blown
away just hours before Bush was to go on the air to praise his new friend.
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- Here's what you need to know that NPR won't tell you.
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- 1. Sheik Abu Risha wasn't a sheik.
- 2. He wasn't killed by Al Qaeda.
- 3. The new alliance with former insurgents in Anbar is
as fake as the sheik - and a murderous deceit.
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- How do I know this? You can see the film - of "Sheik"
Abu Risha, of the guys who likely whacked him and of their other victims.
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- Just in case you think I've lost my mind and put my butt
in insane danger to get this footage, don't worry. I was safe and dry in
Budapest. It was my brilliant new cameraman, Rick Rowley, who went to Iraq
to get the story on his own.
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- Rick's "the future of TV news," says BBC. He's
also completely out of control. Despite our pleas, Rick and his partner
Dave Enders went to Anbar and filmed where no cameraman had dared tread.
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- Why was "sheik" Abu Risha so important? As
the New York Times put it this morning, "Abu Risha had become a charismatic
symbol of the security gains in Sunni areas that have become a cornerstone
of American plans to keep large numbers of troops in Iraq though much of
next year."
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- In other words, Abu Risha was the PR hook used to sell
the "success" of the surge.
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- The sheik wasn't a sheik. He was a fake. While proclaiming
to Rick that he was "the leader of all the Iraqi tribes," Abu
lead no one. But for a reported sum in the millions in cash for so-called,
"reconstruction contracts," Abu Risha was willing to say he was
Napoleon and Julius Caesar and do the hand-shakie thing with Bush on camera.
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- Notably, Rowley and his camera caught up with Abu Risha
on his way to a "business trip" to Dubai, money laundering capital
of the Middle East.
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- There are some real sheiks in Anbar, like Ali Hathem
of the dominant Dulaimi tribe, who told Rick Abu Risha was a con man. Where
was his tribe, this tribal leader? "The Americans like to create characters
like Disney cartoon heros." Then Ali Hathem added, "Abu Risha
is no longer welcome" in Anbar.
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- "Not welcome" from a sheik in Anbar is roughly
the same as a kiss on both cheeks from the capo di capi. Within days, when
Abu Risha returned from Dubai to Dulaimi turf in Ramadi, Bush's hand-sheik
was whacked.
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- On Thursday, Bush said Abu Risha was killed, "fighting
Al Qaeda" - and the White House issued a statement that the sheik
was "killed by al Qaeda."
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- Bullshit.
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- There ain't no Easter Bunny and "Al Qaeda"
ain't in Iraq, Mr. Bush. It was very cute, on the week of the September
11 memorials, to tie the death of your Anbar toy-boy to bin Laden's Saudi
hijackers. But it's a lie. Yes, there is a group of berserkers who call
themselves "Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia." But they have as much to
do with the real Qaeda of bin Laden as a Rolling Stones "tribute"
band has to do with Mick Jagger.
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- Who got Abu Risha? Nothing - NOTHING - moves in Ramadi
without the approval of the REAL tribal sheiks. They were none-too-happy,
as Hathem noted, about the millions the US handed to Risha. The sheiks
either ordered the hit - or simply gave the bomber free passage to do the
deed.
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- So who are these guys, the sheiks who lead the Sunni
tribes of Anbar - the potentates of the Tamimi, Fallaji, Obeidi, Zobal
and Jumaili tribes? Think of them as the Sopranos of Arabia. They are also
members of the so-called "Awakening Council" - getting their
slice of the millions handed out - which they had no interest in sharing
with Risha.
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- But creepy and deadly or not, these capi of the desert
were effective in eliminating "Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia." Indeed,
as US military so proudly pointed out to Rick, the moment the sheiks declared
their opposition to Al Qaeda - i.e. got the payments from the US taxpayers
- Al Qaeda instantly diappeared.
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- This miraculous military change, where the enemy just
evaporates, has one explanation: the sheiks ARE al Qaeda in Mesopotamia.
Just like the Sopranos extract "protection" payments from New
Jersey businesses, the mobsters of Anbar joined our side when we laid down
the loot.
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- What's wrong with that? After all, I'd rather send a
check than send our kids from Columbus to fight them.
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- But there's something deeply, horribly wrong with dealing
with these killers. They still kill. With new US protection, weapons and
cash, they have turned on the Shia of Anbar. Fifteen thousand Shia families
from a single district were forced at gunpoint to leave Anbar. Those moving
too slowly were shot. Kids and moms too.
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- Do the Americans know about the ethnic cleansing of Anbar
by our erstwhile "allies"? Rick's film shows US commanders placing
their headquarters in the homes abandoned by terrorized Shia.
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- Rick's craziest move was to go and find these Shia refugees
from Anbar. They were dumped, over a hundred thousand of them, in a cinder
block slum with no running water in Baghdad. They are under the "protection"
of the Mahdi Army, another group of cutthroats. But at least these are
Shia cutthroats.
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- So the great "success" of the surge is our
arming and providing cover for ethnic cleansing in Anbar. Nice, Mr. Bush.
And with the US press "embedded," we won't get the real story.
Even Democrats are buying into the Anbar "awakening" fairy tale.
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- An Iraqi government official frets that giving guns and
cover to the Anbar gang is like adopting a baby crocodile. "A crocodile
is not a pet," he told Rick. It will soon grow to devour you. But
what could the puppet do but complain about his strings?
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- This Iraqi got it right: the surge is a crock.
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- Greg Palast is the author of "Armed Madhouse: from
Baghdad to New Orleans - Sordid Secrets and Strange Tales of a White House
Gone Wild." See Palast's reports for BBC Television's Newsnight, now
filmed by Rick Rowley and partners, at www.GregPalast.com
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