April 18, 2004

The Marines are tightening up Iraq's border with Syria, which involved a firefight or 2 in al-Qaim that appears to have cost 5 or 6 of our fighting leathernecks their lives (R.I.P):
Marines battle influx from Syria

U.S. Marines have been fighting an aggressive battle along Syria's porous border in recent weeks to stop the flow of Muslim jihadists who come to Iraq to kill Americans and their allies.
    
Maj. Gen. John Sattler, chief of operations for the U.S. Central Command, yesterday disclosed the stepped-up operation that has escaped the limelight as larger battles were fought in Fallujah and Ramadi in western Iran.
[...]
The Bush administration realizes it must stop the influx of jihadists into Iraq if it is ever to achieve political stability.
[Then, will we have to go into Iran and Syria later to get them anyway?--Jen]
Military analysts say the fight-to-the death jihadists perform some of the most gruesome attacks, blowing themselves up to kill scores of allies and, more recently, kidnapping innocent foreigners who have come to Iraq to aid the rebuilding.
    
The State Department announced yesterday that Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has upped the pressure on Syrian President Bashar al Assad to stop the deadly migration.
[...]
Some in the Pentagon believe Mr. Assad is allowing -- and possibly encouraging[I'd almost bank on it.--Jen] -- foreign jihadists to come to Syria and then enter Iraq. Before and during the war last year, Syria opened its borders to high-ranking Iraqis, including Saddam's two sons, who were later sent back into Iraq where they were killed by U.S. forces.
    
Gen. Sattler disclosed that the more aggressive border patrols included fierce fire fights between Marines and cells of foreigners in the desert town of al Qaim, a crossroads for incoming jihadists.
[...]
Gen. Sattler also seemed to back off an earlier Central Command vow to kill or capture renegade cleric Sheik Muqtada al-Sadr. Sheik al-Sadr has been holed up in the Shi'ite "holy"[Quotes added by yours truly!] city of Najaf, after earlier this month unleashing his 3,000-man militia on coalition forces. More than 2,000 U.S. troops are on the city's outskirts, but have been warned by moderate Shi'ite clerics not to wage battle in Najaf.
   
 Gen. Sattler made a special point of saying the murder warrant outstanding for Sheik al-Sadr was issued by an Iraqi judge, not the U.S., a sign that the arrest of the cleric is an now an Iraqi decision.
    
"We know where he is," the general said. "But right now we're letting him continue to marginalize himself and we're not focusing any combat power or combat operations on Najaf."

Good plan, because apparently that marginalization is working out pretty well; his fellow Najafites are getting pretty sick of him!:
Najaf's residents rip radical cleric

But three days spent inside Najaf — within a stone's throw of the golden-domed Imam Ali Mosque and Sheik al-Sadr's well-guarded headquarters — revealed almost no backing from residents for the 30-year-old cleric's armed confrontation with coalition forces.
[...]
But in the rest of the city, many expressed fears that Sheik al-Sadr was leading them not only into bloody and inevitably losing clashes with the U.S. forces, but also toward a Sunni-Shi'ite civil war or clashes between different armed Shi'ite factions.
[...]
Suid said funding for Sheik al-Sadr came partly from Iran and partly from money and gold that he had taken from the charity collections of pilgrims to the holy mosques. He said he would be willing to testify in court against the cleric.
[...]
He claimed to have been a witness when Sheik al-Sadr's supporters killed a local imam.
    
"Al-Sadr is a criminal. ... I want him out. We want peace and quiet. We don't deserve another Saddam," he said.
[...]
Rumors abound in the city, and many of them appeared aimed at discrediting Sheik al-Sadr. It was suggested that after his offices were closed in the teeming Shi'ite slums of Sadr City in Baghdad some weeks ago, the cleric headed for Iran and returned with orders to launch his anticoalition violence — and presumably with extra funds.
    
Najaf residents said most of the cleric's closest militia leaders and advisers are from Sadr City and not from either of the Shi'ite holy cities, Najaf and Karbala.
    
Many houses in Najaf, especially close to the central mosque area, have been inhabited by Iranians.
[Can you say "Hezbollah?" I knew that you could.--Jen] While busloads of Iranian pilgrims visit the holy cities frequently, there also has been a large flow of illegal entrants who gravitate to the holy Shi'ite cities.

After his father's death, Sheik al-Sadr was educated in the Iranian holy city of Qom by Ayatollah Kazem al-Husseini al-Hairi. But in recent days, the ayatollah distanced himself from his former protege, issuing a statement declaring that the national Iraqi police should retake control of all public buildings. Last Monday, the Mahdi's Army of the cleric pulled out of police stations and other public buildings they had occupied.

Reports from Qom quoting Ayatollah al-Hairi's spokesman say the Iranian disowned Sheik al-Sadr several months ago.

I almost feel sorry for al-Sadr: nobody really likes him much!
We've deployed 2,500 men around Najaf's city limits to capture or kill al-Sadr when we feel the moment is right.
Our forces had to close 2 highways into Baghdad, while Falluja reported its quietest day yet:
U.S. Closes Two Highways Into Baghdad

The U.S. military closed down two major highways into Baghdad on Saturday in the latest disruption caused by intensified attacks by anti-U.S. insurgents. U.S. and Iraqi negotiators reported progress in talks aimed at easing the fighting in Fallujah, while the besieged city saw its quietest day yet.

If Falluja's quiet now, it must be because the Marines quit regaling the IslamoNazis with AC/DC's Hell's Bells and Jimi Hendrix, as they did Thursday night!
You bad rocker boys, you!
Don't you know that strict Muslims hate music of any kind? Oh, you do?!