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Report: Al-Qaeda driven from Baghdad
 Maj. Gen. Joseph F. Fil Jr said in an interview to the press, on 11/08/2007, in a Green Zone conference room in Baghdad, that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia is driven from Baghdad.
According to Gen. Joseph F. Fil Jr 13% of the city still had not been cleared of militants, including Sadr City and other neighborhoods controlled by Shiite militias. Murder victims are down 80% from the peak in June 2007 and attacks involving improvised bombs have dropped 70%.
Gen. Joseph F. Fil Jr mentioned that Sunni extremist groups could revive and "recover very quickly". He was ascribing the improvement in the general public security in Iraq to improvements in the IRAQI security forces, a cease-fire ordered by the Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, the disruption of financing for insurgents, and, most significant, IRAQIS’ rejection of “the rule of the gun”
Just 24 hours after the press conference, another USA ally, sheikh Faez Al-Obeidi was killed by a suicide bomber, killing him and four of his relatives, in the town of Khalis, Diyala province. The last killing of a pro-US Sheikh Muawiya Jebara was on 10/04/2007.
Summary
There are four reasons to the dramatic change in IRAQ
* General David Petraeus, the commander of the USA led coalition forces in IRAQ, new security plan from 02/2007 and his leadership. He managed to provide more security for the ordinary IRAQIS, and, what is the most important in Washington, to remove IRAQ from the daily headlines in the American media.
* The new IRANIAN foreign-policy and, in that context, the temporary ceasefire declared by the “Mahdi Army” and the radical Shiiaa’ cleric Moqtada Sadr in Baghdad on 08/29/2007 (see - Sadr 08.29.07 ).
* The bypassing of the IRAQI administration by the USA army and, through directly negotiating with local tribes leaders, forming all kinds of pro-American militias and auxiliary forces with no status in IRAQI official legal system. It turned out to be very efficient in confronting Al Qaeda but in the long run those outlaw militias endangers the IRAQI democracy, sovereignty and integrity.
* The internal crisis in Al Qaeda which, generally speaking, is more and more contained to Pakistan and Afghanistan and failed to carry the Global jihad out to the Western Democracies or to other pro-Western Muslim countries.
Despite the current achievements in IRAQ we have to remember - In Iraq, in the current situation, every success is temporary and short living.
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11/11/2007 06:27:30
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