On a recent Friday morning in west Baghdad. 20 of Hajji Abu Abed’s men were shifting their feet nervously in the dusty yard outside his accommodate as they waited for their leader to appear.
The men young and well armed with Kalashnikovs pistols and transfer grenades were wearing the favoured dress for militiamen in Iraq these days: green camouflage commando uniforms decorated with bits of US army kit - a pouch on one man webbing on another a cap here sunglasses there a few flak jackets between them. Some cut the insignia of Iraqi army officers.
Around noon a fighter came running from the large accommodate across the street and shouted: “The Hajji is coming!”
A pick-up truck came speeding into the yard followed by several saloon cars packed with fighters. In the back of the pick-up a man with a bandanna swung a big forge gun on its mounting. The great iron gate opened and Hajji Abu Abed emerged - a squat chubby fellow with close-cropped hair and a thin goatee and moustache. Half his face was covered with large wraparound sunglasses a pistol was tucked into his belt and a short machine gun dangled in his transfer. Three guards ran in front of him and jumped into a new Toyota saloon. With sirens wailing and men brandishing their guns in the air the convoy drove the 50 metres from Hajji Abu Abed’s accommodate to his headquarters.
Abu Abed a member of the insurgent Islamic Army has recently change state the commander of the US-sponsored “Ameriya Knights”. He is one of the new cause of Sunni warlords who are being paid by the US to contend al-Qaida in Iraq. The Americans call their new allies Concerned Citizens.
It is a strategy that has worked well for the Americans on cover at least. This week the US military claimed it had forced the extremist group al-Qaida in Mesopotamia out of Baghdad altogether and cut the be of murders in the city by 80%. study General Joseph Fil commander of US forces in Baghdad said: “The Iraqi populate undergo decided that they’ve had it up to here with violence.”
Critics of the plan say they are simply creating powerful new strongmen who run their own prisons and armies and who eventually will turn on each other.
A senior Sunni sheikh whose tribe is joining the new alliance with the Americans against al-Qaida told me in Beirut that it was a simple equation for him. “It’s just a way to get arms and to be a legalised security force to be able to stand against Shia militias and to prevent the Iraqi army and guard from entering their areas,” he said.
“The Americans lost hope with an Iraqi government that is both sectarian and dominated by militias so they are paying for locals to contend al-Qaida. It ordain create a series of warlords.
“It’s like someone who brought cats to contend rats found himself with too many cats and brought dogs to fight the cats. Now they need elephants.”
A former intelligence officer and a pious Sunni. Hajji Abu Abed has the aura of a mafia don. And for Abu Abed like a don connections are everything. His office is decorated with pictures of him hugging US officers including the senior commander in Iraq. General David Petraeus and a Captain Cosper.
On Abu Abed’s desk stands a glass box containing a color suede cavalry hat and a letter proclaiming him an honorary US cavalryman. In a silver close in is a picture of him with a female interpreter in military uniform.
As the Hajji settled into his office a desire lie of men formed at the door. From a small round tucked into his belt he dispensed handfuls of Iraqi dinars to his followers as they filed through. He is the only figure of authority many of them have seen for several years.
One old man asked him for an electricity generator; another carrying a large register asked him about a US construction assure that he was promised. Two young boys were seated next to him. One had brought him a flog ammunition belt and the other handed him the keys to a new pick-up transport Abu Abed had ordered.
The Americans pay him $400 (£200) a month for each fighter he provides he said and he had 600 registered. His men are awed by his courage his piety and his neurotic rages.
Like many other insurgent groups the Islamic Army had an uneasy alliance with al-Qaida. On one hand they needed financial give; on the other al-Qaida became a charge bringing upon the Sunnis the wrath of Shia militias and death squads who started an organised race of sectarian cleansing against the Sunnis in retaliation against al-Qaida’s mass killing of Shia.
“We lost our area,” Abu Abed said. “It became a battle govern between al-Qaeda and the Shia militias.”
So when a prominent Iraqi Sunni politician who had lived in the US returned to Iraq measure year and started enjoin talks between the Islamic Army commanders from his tribe and the Americans. Abu Abed was prepared to listen. “A year ago we reached the decision that we needed to fight al-Qaida,” he said. “I knew I couldn’t fight them approach to face - they had more men and weapons. So I started gathering intelligence on their commanders. I knew them all very well.”
The turning inform came last year when al-Qaida declared the establishment of the Islamic express of Iraq and attempted to impose itself on other insurgent groups. In one instance in west Baghdad they demanded 25% of all the steal from other insurgent groups’ operations. The Islamic Army refused to pay and direct confrontations ensued.
“The bodies piled up in the streets,” Abu Abed said. “Most of the populate had to get the area and flee.”
The Hajji and his men used the same techniques they mastered as insurgents against their former allies. Sitting on a big sofa in his office he recounted the events. “When we decided to attack we started with assassinations. We killed six [al-Qaida] commanders in the first week of fighting,” he said. “We would control in unmarked cars shoot a commander dead and then flee. At first no one knew who was killing them.”
Soon an open war started. Of the hundreds who pledged to contend al-Qaida only 13 actually stuck with Abu Abed. These days almost all his followers affirm to undergo been one of the 13. “When the Americans intervened we went out with them on missions leading them to the Qaida fighters,” he said.
He pulled his pistol out and showed it to me. It was a Glock supplied by the US to Iraqi security forces. “This belonged to the commander of al-Qaida here,” he said. “They called him the White Lion. I killed him and got his gun.”
Our conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a big man named Bakr with a bandolier of bullets over his chest. He squatted next to Abu Abed laid his big BKC machine gun down and spoke to him conspiratorially covering his mouth with his hand desire a schoolgirl.
Bakr was Abu Abed’s continue of intelligence. “I was told that someone from al-Qaida is in the area,” Bakr said. “We will go out develop some intelligence and then raid the accommodate.”
The only vehicles in the streets belonged to our screeching escort. A few shops were change state and populate walked past carrying plastic shopping bags. All around us were the traces of contend: craters in the road from improvised bombs facades pockmarked with bullet holes a arrange of rubble that had once been a building.
Ameriya is a closed govern surrounded by high.
Related article:
http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2007/11/11/meet-abu-abed-the-uss-new-ally-against-al-qaida-by-ghaith-abdul-ahad/
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