Re: [A-List] IRAQ: Killer of U.S. Soldiers Becomes a Hero

["Leigh Meyers" <the.buffalo.in.the.midst@xxxxxxxxx>]

I read a story early on in the war about soldiers guarding a line-up
for propane distribution to civilians.

The soldiers refused to fill a woman's tank because of it's apparently
dilapidated condition and when she complained a soldier shoved her
aside.

At that point, a car stopped... two males got out and one of them
walked up to the soldier, put a pistol to his head and shot him dead.

They escaped into the crowd, and to the best of my knowledge were
never apprehended.

Tsk, tsk.

Leigh

On Jan 7, 2008 1:20 PM, Charles Brown <charlesb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40691
>
> IRAQ: Killer of U.S. Soldiers Becomes a Hero
> By Ali al-Fadhily and Dahr Jamail*
>
> BAGHDAD, Jan 7 (IPS) - The recent killing of two U.S. soldiers by their
> Iraqi colleague has raised disturbing questions about U.S. military
> relations with the Iraqis they work with.
>
> On Dec. 26, an Iraqi soldier opened fire on U.S. soldiers accompanying
> him during a joint military patrol in the northern Iraqi city Mosul. He
> killed the U.S. captain and another sergeant, and wounded three others,
> including an Iraqi interpreter.
>
> Conflicting versions of the killing have arisen. Col. Hazim al-Juboory,
> uncle of the attacker Kaissar Saady al-Juboory, told IPS that his nephew
> at first watched the U.S. soldiers beat up an Iraqi woman. When he asked
> them to stop, they refused, so he opened fire.
>
> "Kaissar is a professional soldier who revolted against the Americans
> when they dragged a woman by her hair in a brutal way," Col. Juboory
> said. "He is a tribal man, and an Arab with honour who would not accept
> such behaviour. He killed his captain and sergeant knowing that he would
> be executed."
>
> Others gave IPS a similar account. "I was there when the American
> captain and his soldiers raided a neighbourhood and started shouting at
> women to tell them where some men they wanted were," a resident of
> Mosul, speaking on condition of anonymity, told IPS on phone. "The women
> told them they did not know, and their men did not do anything wrong,
> and started crying in fear."
>
> The witness said the U.S. captain began to shout at his soldiers and
> the women, and his men then started to grab the women and pull them by
> their hair.
>
> "The soldier we knew later to be Kaissar shouted at the Americans, 'No,
> No,' but the captain shouted back at the Iraqi soldier," the witness
> told IPS. "Then the Iraqi soldier shouted, 'Let go of the women you sons
> of bitches,' and started shooting at them." The soldier, he said, then
> ran off.
>
> The Association of Muslim Scholars, a Sunni organisation, issued a
> statement saying the Iraqi soldier had shot the U.S. soldiers after he
> saw them beat up a pregnant woman.
>
> "His blood rose and he asked the occupying soldiers to stop beating the
> woman," they said in the statement. "Their answer through the translator
> was: 'We will do what we want. So he opened fire on them."
>
> The story was first reported on al-Rafidain satellite channel. That
> started Iraqis from all over the country talking about "the hero" who
> sacrificed his life for Iraqi honour.
>
> The U.S. and Iraqi military told a different version of the story.
>
> An Iraqi general told reporters that Kaissar carried out the attack
> because he had links to "Sunni Arab insurgent groups."
>
> "Soldier Kaissar Saady worked for insurgent groups who pushed him to
> learn army movements and warn his comrades about them," a captain of the
> second Iraqi army division told IPS. "There are so many like him in the
> army and now within the so-called Awakening forces (militias funded by
> the U.S. military)."
>
> One army officer speaking on condition of anonymity described Kaissar's
> act as heroic. "Those Americans learned their lesson once more."
>
> Sheikh Juma' al-Dawar, chief of the major al-Baggara tribe in Iraq,
> told IPS in Baghdad that "Kaissar is from the al-Juboor tribes in Gayara
> -- tribes with morals that Americans do not understand."
>
> The tribal chief added, "Juboor tribes and all other tribes are proud
> of Kaissar and what he did by killing the American soldiers. Now he is a
> hero, with a name that will never be forgotten."
>
> Many Iraqis speak in similar vein. "It is another example of Iraqi
> people's unity despite political conspiracies by the Americans and their
> tails (collaborators)," Mohammad Nassir, an independent politician in
> Baghdad told IPS. "Kaissar is loved by all Iraqis who pray for his
> safety and who are ready to donate anything for his welfare."
>
> Col. Juboory said Kaissar who had at first accepted collaboration with
> the U.S. forces "found the truth too bitter to put up with." The colonel
> said: "I worked with the Americans because being an army officer is my
> job and also because I was convinced they would help Iraqis. But 11
> months was enough for me to realise that starving to death is more
> honourable than serving the occupiers. They were mean in every way."
>
> Independent sources have since told IPS that Kaissar was captured by a
> special joint Iraqi-U.S. force, and he is now being held and tortured at
> the al-Ghizlany military camp in Mosul.
>
> Despite a recent decline in the number of occupation forces being
> killed, 2007 was the deadliest year of the occupation for U.S. troops,
> with 901 killed, according to the U.S. Department of Defence.
>
> (*Ali, our correspondent in Baghdad, works in close collaboration with
> Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who has reported
> extensively from Iraq and the Middle East) (END/2008)
>
>
>