Tag: Al-Qaeda

Victims of overseas terrorism to get payout

Prime minister considers retrospective scheme to aid Britons injured in Bali, Egypt and Mumbai

Ned Temko
The Observer, Sunday 9 August 2009

Facing warnings of a “Gurkha-scale” policy misjudgment, Gordon Brown has set aside a cabinet decision to deny financial help to dozens of British victims of terrorist attacks overseas.

Overruling his senior ministers, the prime minister was said last night to be considering the possibility of a “retrospective” scheme to cover more than 200 Britons injured or killed by terrorists in Bali, Turkey, Egypt and Mumbai.

As a result of a legal loophole Tony Blair pledged to close in 2005, British citizens targeted in terrorist attacks abroad have been denied payouts from a scheme put in place after the 7/7 London bombings for domestic victims.

For those such as 29-year-old Will Pike, who suffered crippling injuries in Mumbai, this has meant the prospect of life in a wheelchair with the maximum of £15,000 help from a Red Cross emergency fund.

A committee of senior ministers – including the home, foreign and justice secretaries – finally decided last month to close the compensation loophole, but unanimously rejected making the scheme retrospective, deciding that the price tag could be too high.

Last night a Downing Street spokesman confirmed the decision to set up a “fantastic compensation scheme” for victims of future attacks. He made it clear that the prime minister had not accepted the decision to rule out covering existing victims. “We are still considering whether it is going to be retrospective,” he said.

The rethink came amid signs of anger among victims and their families over the decision to cover only future terrorist attacks. Labour MP Ian McCartney said the families’ “sense of abandonment” was understandable. “It is like the Gurkhas,” he added. “The government has done the right thing by agreeing to a compensation scheme, but unless the scheme is retrospective, it will still be justice denied.”

Trevor Lakin, whose son Jeremy was killed in the 2005 terrorist attack in Sharm el-Sheikh and has been a leading campaigner for other victims, also said the decision was perverse and “unjust”.

Lakin’s insistence that he personally does not want compensation has been cited by at least one minister in defence of the decision not to make the package retrospective. But he said this was a gross misunderstanding of his position. “I have said the only compensation that would make any difference to my own family – to bring Jeremy back – is beyond the government’s ability to provide.”

But he said that the government had a responsibility to many other victims in “real need” of support: “The reason that the government has finally decided to help future victims is that they have looked at the current victims and said, ‘These people need help’.”

Source: www.guardian.co.uk, 9 August 2009

August 10, 2009
Turks increasingly turn to Islamic extremism

By Sebastian Rotella
June 28, 2009

Al Qaeda’s reliance on Arabs is altering as recruits from Turkey and Turkic-speaking areas of Central Asia form a recent wave of trainees, experts say.By Sebastian Rotella

June 28, 2009

Reporting from London – In an audio message from a hide-out in South Asia this month, an Al Qaeda chief did something new: He sang the praises of an ethnic group that once barely registered in the network.

“We consider the Muslims in Turkey our brothers,” said Mustafa Abu Yazid, the network’s operations chief. Lauding Turkish suicide bombers killed in recent attacks near the Afghan-Pakistani border, he declared, “This is a pride and honor to the nation of Islam in Turkey, and we ask Allah to accept them amongst the martyrs.”

The message is the latest sign of the changing composition of Islamic extremism, anti-terrorism officials and experts say. The number of Turks in Al Qaeda, long dominated by Arabs, has increased notably, officials say. And militant groups dominated by Turks and Central Asians, many of whom share Turkic culture and speak a Turkic language, have emerged as allies of and alternatives to Al Qaeda in northwestern Pakistan.

“We are aware of an increasing number of Turks going to train in Pakistan,” said a senior European anti-terrorism official who asked to remain anonymous because the subject is sensitive. “This increase has taken place in the past couple of years.”

Turkey’s secular tradition and official monitoring of religious practice for years helped restrain extremism at home and in the diaspora. But the newer movements churn out Internet propaganda in Turkish as well as German, an effort to recruit among a Turkish immigrant population in Germany that numbers close to 3 million.

“We are seeing almost as much propaganda material from these Turkic groups as we are from Al Qaeda,” said Evan Kohlmann, a U.S. private consultant who works with anti-terrorism agencies around the world. “Turks were perceived as moderate with few connections to Al Qaeda central. Now Germany is dealing with this threat in a community that could be a sleeping giant.”

Germany is especially vulnerable because it has troops in Afghanistan. The threat could also intensify in other countries with Turkish populations, such as France, Belgium and the Netherlands, whose anti-terrorism agencies focus on entrenched extremism in large North African communities.

And the implications are serious for Turkey, a Muslim ally of the West and a longtime gateway to battlegrounds in the Middle East and Asia.

As Al Qaeda’s multiethnic ranks burgeoned in the 1990s, Turks trained in Afghanistan and fought in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Russian republic of Chechnya. In 2003, Al Qaeda suicide bombers killed 70 people in attacks on synagogues and British targets in Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city.

Despite Turkey’s population of more than 70 million, however, Turks were once among the smallest contingents in the network.

“I used to tell the Germans they are very lucky because you couldn’t find much radicalization among Turks,” said Zeyno Baran, a Turkish-born expert on Islam at the Hudson Institute, a think tank in Washington. “No one was paying much attention to Turks because they were considered the safe group.”

Although Turkey works closely with Western anti-terrorism forces, some officials say it devotes more energy to fighting Kurdish separatists. Baran expressed concern that the moderate Islamist government in power since 2002 has lowered its guard.

“With the government’s reluctance to talk about the problem of Islamist ideology, Al Qaeda and groups like that seem to think there’s an opening in Turkey and with Turks,” said Baran, whose forthcoming book is titled “The Other Muslims: Moderate and Secular.”

Combat-hardened Central Asians have adopted a global agenda and tapped a new recruitment pool. Only five years ago, Kohlmann said, there was little need for Turkic-language translators to monitor extremist Internet traffic; now they are in demand.

“These groups are trying to establish their pedigree and catering their propaganda to Turkic speakers who don’t speak Arabic or Pashto,” the dominant language in the Afghan-Pakistani border region, he said. “Their media organizations are saying: We are the equivalent of Al Qaeda for Turks.”

The Islamic Jihad Union, an Uzbek-led group, has alternately competed and worked with Al Qaeda. The organization trained and directed two Turks and two German converts who have agreed to plead guilty in a 2007 bomb plot against U.S. targets in Germany.

Last year, the group announced that another recruit, a 28-year-old Turk born in Bavaria, killed two U.S. soldiers in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan.

During the same period as the attack last year, half a dozen French and Belgian militants were training in Al Qaeda compounds in the Waziristan region of Pakistan. The subsequent description by a French trainee of the nationalities of the fighters he encountered departs from the commonly held image of an essentially Arab movement.

“It’s possible to join different groups: a big Turkish group, an Arab group (the smallest of all the groups), a group of Uighurs from . . . northwest China, the biggest group,” the trainee, Walid Othmani, said during an interrogation by French police after his arrest in January of this year.

Othmani, who is of Tunisian descent, said he trained with a mixed group of Arabs and North Africans that was led by an Egyptian and numbered 300 to 500 fighters.

The Uzbeks, meanwhile, totaled about 3,000, according to Othmani’s confession. He said a Turkish contingent of 1,000 to 2,000 was commanded by a Turk.

It’s not clear how precise his estimates are, investigators say. Some numbers seem accurate, others larger than expected based on previous intelligence. Overall, his account is regarded as credible, investigators say.

The mix of nationalities may reflect the future in the making. Yazid, Al Qaeda’s veteran financial chief, runs the network’s day-to-day operations while Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, devote themselves largely to avoiding capture, officials say. Yazid used his recent audio message to make an urgent appeal for money.

“And here we, in the battlefield in Afghanistan, are lacking a lot of money and a weakness in operations because of lack of money, and many mujahedin are absent from jihad because of lack or absence of money,” he said, according to a translation by Kohlmann’s organization, the NEFA Foundation.

As Al Qaeda weathers hard times, the appeal geared to Turkic speakers suggests that audience is seen as a source of rejuvenation, experts said.

“They are attempting to broaden their appeal, and it certainly looks like an instinctual competitive reaction to the sudden flourishing of Turkic-speaking jihadi groups in the Afghanistan-Pakistan theater,” Kohlmann said. “It’s an evolving recruitment and financing market for them, and they don’t want to be left out in the cold.”

rotella@latimes.com

June 29, 2009
Cooperation and Confrontation between the USA and Russia in Caspian Region

New monopolar world system had created new interests which depend on big powers in Caspian region after the collapse of Soviet Union. This situation shared a chaos on governmental system in this area. Big powers created a competition with Caspian Sea status and energy subjects to use their interests. Dominant power of the USA and Russia shared some conflict and cooperation circumstances as interdependent body in their relations. Particularly common threat position establishes cooperational theme. Caspian region which is second big energy sphere is a bridge between Europea and Asia, also it is a main point of the world domination conditions.

Subjects of Confrontation and Hegemony Tools

Big powers need conflict, cooperation and hard-soft balance tools as political subjects to increase their activity in the region. The USA and Russia have enough advantages according to their situation. But confrontation of powers can be transformed to common interest activities so to analyse foreign politics of states can provide to know near future. Today anxieties of the USA’s foreign affairs to Russia are existing as these subjects:

– Monopoly situation of Russia in energy area,

– Against position of Russia to NATO enlargement,

– Russian force to Georgia,

– Possibility of same circumstances to post-Soviet states by Russia,

– Against position to Western initiatives about Iranian nuclear system.

         The USA used soft balance politics to Saudi Arabia and forced in Iraq to control Middle East which is first big oil sphere in the world. The USA supported first energy sharing agreement BTC in 1994 and for saving energy corridor it founded GUAM to be against CIS organisation about the subject of influence to Central Asia. The USA which a country had acted firstly in energy line plans to establish new cooperations to be dominant power in the region. American supported regional organisation GUAM targets new cooperations with West and to solve regional conflicts with Europen initiated projects. Also GUAM organised first military operations which Russia didn’t join. But Russia created a dilemma over the European energy corridor target of this organisation. Russia works to establish alternative energy lines and coordinate near abroad countries to common aims.

         Russia had an advantage to pressure over the post-Soviet states with energy event. Middle Asian countries which have big energy resources provide energy transportation via Russian territory. External projects are American supported issues. Shortly there is a competition that energy is used as a weapon.

         The USA interfered Afghanistan after the 11 September terrorist attack by this way the super power took a strategic point in Middle Asia. The USA shared a dangerous position for Russia because of the USA founded military points in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzistan after the Afghanistan intervene. So Russia organised Shangai Cooperation Organisation to build an alternative body against the USA with other regional states. It shares a bandwagoning system for this region which had been established by Russia as a main actor.[1] By this way Russia that is a main state of CIS shared strong resist against the USA with its initiatives.

         Bilateral agreements in NATO circle with the USA of Caspian states formed a dependent system to West. In this subject Georgia had been a pro-American arena in this region.[2] On the other hand Azerbaijani and American relations increased after annuling 907. article in the USA that has supporting event to South Caucasus states without Azerbaijan. Russia and Iran speeched as against the USA after opened airspace of Azerbaijan to the USA. Additionally security of BTC is important to the USA. New American forces in Romania and Bulgaria can intervene Caucasus area if there is a problem in Baku Ceyhan pipeline. Also American soldiers in Georgia can be used in emergency circumstances.[3]



         Russia said possible intervenes of Collective Security Cooperation of Shangai Cooperation Organisation to NATO’s activities in this region as against the military activation of NATO. Other advantages of Russia are conflict events as without regional cooperations against NATO. Fergana, Osetia, Abkhazia and Karabakh issues give chances to Russian invasion on the region. Because solutions can be producted by Russian mediator situation. Otherwise western initiated organisation GUAM targets that solutions can be existed without Russia. Nobody can guarantee that Russia will not save its interests about regional conflicts in Ukraine-Crimea, Moldova-Transdiester, Azerbaijan-Karabakh as additionally Georgian conflicts. For this moment Russian conflict politics focused on Georgia in South Caucasus area. Abkhazia and Osetia problems are punishments to Georgia by Russia because of Georgian new Western oriented politics.



         Bandwagoning countries rejected American activities after 2004. These countries supported Russian decisions against to the USA after this date. European Union continued its enlargement politics in Caspian as paralel to American issues. Caspian states easily can depend on West with some projects like Nabucco. Specially European Union projects TACIS, INOGATE[4] and TRACECA[5] can create influence over the regional countries like other cooperational acts. New resist of Caspian states’ outlook shares itself as internal cooperation and contr-politics of Russia. Also America can take an advantage in Caspian status problem against to Russia.



            Obligatory Cooperations in the Region

         There is no possible way to fight new movements’ expansion in the region of Russia which is a problem of American foreign affairs. Struggle to terrorism that is in directly Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan is a main aim of the USA political issue in Middle Asia. There is a Russian anxiety about results of possible conflict between the USA and Iran. Additionally Russia doesn’t want cooperations of these countries[6];

– Iran can buy weapons and nuclear technology from the USA,

– The USA can approve oil and gas transportation via Iran as alternative to Russia in Caspian sphere,

– The USA won’t need Russian support in struggle against Iran issue.



         The USA is a main power about struggle to terrorist movements in this region. Also Russia trusts this power in this subject and main result of that is American military foundation by permission of Russia. There is a new progress to decrease American influence in Manas military point’s closing process. But it can be a start line of enlargement terrorist activations which is Russia’s afraid. There is a different situation in East Europea initiative of the USA about military approach. It shares an interdependent relation among great powers. President Bush again gave his assurance that the proposed American missile shield was not aimed at Russia. NATO summit in Bucharest, Russia scored a partial victory on the question of expanding the alliance. NATO did not invite Ukraine and Georgia, both former Soviet states, onto its Membership Action Plan.[7]

         At the present time in which cold war rivalry is waking up, Caspian region is becoming a field of conflict at the same time a collaboration in view of energy resources and military cooperation to activate grand forces’ sovereignty. Cooperation needs occured by common benefits cause means used to reduce another one’s activity. In this backgroung that power balances are occured outside the states of Middle Asia, bandwagoning countries which got free of being unrelated to others may cause new situations. Of course all the same, political declinations, which work directed by Mackinder’s Heartland Theory, have the ability to form new balances in this region. Athority of the region countries which have rich resources will indicate that the world will being run by how many poles.

[1] Walt, Stephen M. (1987). The Origins of Alliances. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press

[2] Klare Michael T., “Transforming the American Military into a Global Oil-Protection Service”

[3] Purtaş Fırat, TÜRKSAM, “Hazar Bölgesinde Rekabetin Yeni Boyutu: Silahlanma Yarışı”

[4] There are at present 21 countries which have acceded to this agreement with the EU (Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Greece, Kazakhstan, Kyrgisztan, Latvia, Macedonia, Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine and the Republic of Serbia).Thus, all of them have agreed to cooperate towards the establishment of one or several systems of oil and gas pipelines which pass through their territories, while observing the jointly accepted rules embodied in the agreement.

[5] Saraç Naciye, AZSAM “Tarihi İpek Yolu Yeniden Hayata Döndürülüyor”

[6] Prof. Dr. Mark Katz, “The Role of Iran and Afghanistan in US-Russian Relations”

[7] “Bush and Putin’s bittersweet farewell”, 06.04.2008

Mehmet Fatih OZTARSU

Baku Qafqaz University

International Relations

May 23, 2009
Top U.S. Commander in Afghanistan Is Fired

By Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, May 12, 2009

General David McKiernan

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates announced yesterday that he had requested the resignation of the top American general in Afghanistan, Gen. David D. McKiernan, making a rare decision to remove a wartime commander at a time when the Obama administration has voiced increasing alarm about the country’s downward spiral.

Gates, saying he seeks “fresh thinking” and “fresh eyes” on Afghanistan, recommended that President Obama replace McKiernan with a veteran Special Operations commander, Lt. Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal. His selection marks the continued ascendancy of officers who have pressed for the use of counterinsurgency tactics, in Iraq and Afghanistan, that are markedly different from the Army’s traditional doctrine.

“We have a new strategy, a new mission and a new ambassador. I believe that new military leadership is also needed,” Gates said at a hastily convened Pentagon news conference. Gates also recommended that Lt. Gen. David M. Rodriguez, a former head of U.S. forces in eastern Afghanistan who is serving as Gates’s military assistant, be nominated to serve in a new position as McChrystal’s deputy. Gates praised McChrystal and Rodriguez for their “unique skill set in counterinsurgency.”

McKiernan, an armor officer who led U.S. ground forces during the 2003 Iraq invasion, was viewed as somewhat cautious and conventionally minded, according to senior officials inside and outside the Pentagon.

Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top commander of U.S. forces in the region, has pressed aggressively to broaden the military’s mission in Afghanistan and Iraq beyond killing the enemy to protecting the population, overseeing reconstruction projects and rebuilding local governance. Petraeus played a key role in the Obama administration’s strategic review of the Afghanistan conflict and was involved in the decision to remove McKiernan, which Petraeus said in a statement he “fully supports.”

The decision to fire McKiernan represents one of a handful of times since President Harry S. Truman’s removal of Gen. Douglas MacArthur in 1951 that U.S. civilian leaders have relieved a top wartime commander, and is in keeping with Gates’s style of demanding accountability by dismissing senior military and civilian officials for a host of problems, including nuclear weapons mismanagement and inadequate care for wounded troops.

McChrystal is the director of the Pentagon’s Joint Staff. From 2006 to August 2008, he was the forward commander of the U.S. military’s secretive Joint Special Operations Command, responsible for capturing or killing high-level leaders of the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently tapped McChrystal to lead an effort to manage the rotations of senior officers to shore up a base of experience on Afghanistan.

In a statement, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said that Obama agreed with the need for new leadership but that he was “impressed” by McKiernan’s calls for more troops for Afghanistan. McKiernan had successfully pressed the administration to increase the number of troops in Afghanistan, forces that have only now begun to arrive in the country.

Gates did not criticize McKiernan directly and instead praised his decades of “distinguished service.” But senior officials said McKiernan’s leadership was not bold or nimble enough to reenergize a campaign in which U.S. and other NATO troops had reached a stalemate against Taliban insurgents in some parts of Afghanistan.

One senior government official involved in Afghanistan policy said McKiernan was overly cautious in creating U.S.-backed local militias, a tactic that Petraeus had employed when he was the top commander of U.S. forces in Iraq.

“It’s way too modest,” the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “We don’t have 2009 to experiment in Wardak province,” where one such militia has been set up. “I think we’ve got about two years in this mission. The trend lines better start swinging in our direction or we’re going to lose the international community and we’re going to lose Washington.”

Other U.S. military and Afghan officials disagreed with the criticism, however, saying McKiernan’s approach was prudent.

Incidents in which U.S. forces caused high numbers of civilian casualties in Afghanistan had emerged as a major source of discomfort for Gates and Mullen during McKiernan’s tenure, but officials said that was not the reason for his removal. “McKiernan got it, and he’s been much better about responding,” a senior military official said. Gates noted yesterday that civilian deaths in Afghanistan had declined 40 percent since January compared with the same period last year.

Since the Obama administration took over this year, Gates had been weighing whether to replace McKiernan and had asked Mullen and Petraeus for their opinions. Mullen informed McKiernan two weeks ago that a change was needed. Gates then broke the news to McKiernan during an hour-long, one-on-one dinner at Camp Eggers in Kabul on a trip to Afghanistan last week.

Asked by reporters whether this decision would effectively end McKiernan’s military career, Gates replied: “Probably.”

In a statement, McKiernan said it had been his “distinct honor over the past year to serve with the brave men and women” from the 42 nations that have contributed to the international effort in Afghanistan and with the members of Afghanistan’s security forces. “I have never been prouder to be an American Soldier,” he said.

McKiernan took command of the NATO-led mission in Afghanistan in June and was scheduled to serve in the post for two years, a U.S. military official said. Like other top U.S. commanders before him, McKiernan pressed the Pentagon firmly and publicly to provide additional forces to combat rising violence and an escalating Taliban insurgency.

McKiernan oversaw initial troop increases under the Bush administration as well as the ongoing deployment of an additional 21,000 troops this year ordered by Obama. McKiernan has an outstanding request, which neither the Pentagon nor Obama has approved, for 10,000 more troops next year.

Gates told Sens. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.), the top members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, yesterday morning that he was replacing McKiernan. At the news conference, Gates urged the swift Senate confirmation of McChrystal and Rodriguez.

McChrystal has come under criticism for his role in the military’s delay in acknowledging the “friendly fire” death of Army Ranger Pat Tillman, a former NFL player, in Afghanistan in 2004, an incident likely to come up during confirmation hearings.

Staff writers Rajiv Chandrasekaran and Greg Jaffe and staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.

May 12, 2009
Turkey attempts to contain radical Islamists

Cracks emerge in bridge between East and West

By Selcan Hacaoglu

Associated Press / April 4, 2009

ANKARA, Turkey – As the only Muslim member of NATO and a candidate to join the European Union, Turkey has come to be seen as a bridge between East and West, held up by Washington as a shining example of how Islam is compatible with modern democracy.

But as President Obama prepares to come here next week in a trip some herald as a diplomatic milestone, Turkish leaders are grappling with a formidable challenge: radical Islamic groups preaching jihad and vowing to unravel Turkey’s democratic achievements.

The conundrum is twofold: A real threat from Muslim radicals intent on destabilizing the government, and the perception by many that by cracking down, Turkey is betraying the very democratic principles that have helped win it much trust and acceptance in the West.

Listening to the radicals, it’s easy to fathom Turkey’s difficulties.

Yilmaz Celik, a spokesman for the radical Islamist group Hizb-ut Tahrir, was released from prison last month after serving a five-month sentence on terrorism charges.

He says he despises the United States, finds the “Alliance of Civilizations” conference Obama is attending a joke, and believes Turkey’s moderate, Islamist-leaning leadership is a stooge of the West.

“We’re full of grudges and hatred against the United States and Britain for exporting their ideology and giving ‘soft messages’ to deceive the Islamic world, for example, in the shape of an olive branch to Iran,” said Celik, whose group has attracted a following in dozens of countries.

The fine line Celik tries to tread puts Turkey in a quandary.

Turkey’s EU bid depends greatly on its ability to promote itself as a nation that respects civil liberties like freedom of speech.

But the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is also keenly aware of how fragile Turkey’s social and political equilibrium can be. The military has ousted four elected governments since 1960. The government believes its hard line is the only way to keep radical Muslim groups in check.

Turkey has been vigilant against homegrown Islamic militants since Al Qaeda-linked suicide bombers killed 58 people in 2003. Al Qaeda’s austere and violent interpretation of Islam receives little public backing in the country.

However, some radical Muslims here regard Turkey’s friendship with Israel, the United States, and Britain – as well as efforts to join the EU – as tantamount to treason. And the country is still debating the role of religion in the officially secular state.

Celik accuses the United States of waging what he called a “fourth crusade” against the Muslims.

“For us, neither Bush nor Obama is any different,” Celik said. “They are given the same mission. When you look from the outside, Obama might be using a softer language. But Obama is certainly not sincere.”

Celik said Obama’s arrival in Turkey is aimed at “strengthening the United States’ influence in Muslim lands through soft messages.”

Turkey and Germany are among countries that ban Hizb-ut Tahrir.

© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.

Source: www.boston.com, April 4, 2009

April 4, 2009
In Iraq, 2 Key U.S. Allies Face Off

Government Riles Sunni Awakening With Leader’s Arrest

By Sudarsan Raghavan and Anthony Shadid Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, March 30, 2009; Page A01

BAGHDAD, March 29 — A new and potentially worrisome fight for power and control has broken out in Baghdad as the United States prepares to pull combat troops out of Iraq next year.

Iraqi soldiers take position after coming under fire following Saturday’s arrest of Awakening leader Adil Mashadani in the Fadhil area of Baghdad. Fighting continued yesterday as troops swept into the district to arrest Sunni fighters. (By Hadi Mizban — Associated Press)

The struggle, which played out in fierce weekend clashes, pits two vital American allies against each other. On Sunday, Iraqi soldiers backed by U.S. combat helicopters and American troops swept into a central Baghdad neighborhood, arresting U.S.-backed Sunni fighters in an effort to clamp down on a two-day uprising that challenged the Iraqi government’s authority and its efforts to pacify the capital.

But the fallout from the operation is already rippling far beyond the city’s boundaries. Both the Iraqi security forces and the Sunni fighters, known as the Awakening, are cornerstones in the American strategy to bring stability. The Awakening, in particular, is widely viewed as a key reason violence has dramatically dropped across Iraq.

Many leaders of the Awakening, mostly former Sunni insurgents who joined hands with U.S. forces to fight the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq, have long had a contentious relationship with Iraq’s Shiite-led government. But the weekend battles have sparked fresh frustration and mistrust of both the U.S. military and Iraq’s mostly Shiite security forces, according to interviews with Awakening leaders across the country.

“The situation is now very fragile, and no Awakening member would remain silent over this injustice,” said Saad Abbas al-Luhaibi, leader of an Awakening group in Anbar province. The tensions raise concerns that uprisings could erupt in other Awakening-controlled areas — or that many Awakening fighters could return to the insurgency, allowing al-Qaeda in Iraq to fill the vacuum in Sunni areas.

The clashes also opened a window onto the new military relationship emerging between the United States and Iraq, as well as the struggles Iraq’s government will probably face as it takes more control over security.

The violence erupted Saturday minutes after Iraqi and U.S. troops arrested Adil Mashadani, the Awakening leader in Baghdad’s Fadhil neighborhood, on charges of committing sectarian crimes and terrorist acts.

The U.S. military said in a statement Sunday that Mashadani was suspected of extorting more than $160,000 from Fadhil residents, orchestrating roadside bomb attacks against Iraqi security forces and having ties to al-Qaeda in Iraq. Concerned about the impact on other Awakening groups, the military stressed that Mashadani was not arrested because of his role in the Awakening. Mashadani’s deputies have denied the allegations.

In response to the arrest, Awakening fighters took to the streets and rooftops, engaging in fierce gun battles with U.S. and Iraqi troops. At least eight Iraqi soldiers were injured; an additional five were taken hostage but were released Sunday morning, Iraqi security officials said.

By Sunday, Iraqi security forces and American troops had surrounded the neighborhood. Snipers peered from the roofs of buildings as Apache and Blackhawk combat helicopters circled in the overcast sky. Some dropped leaflets urging residents to hand over weapons; the handbills also stressed that there was a legal warrant for Mashadani’s arrest and that no residents were being targeted.

Some Iraqi soldiers viewed the operation as a test of their preparedness to take over security after U.S. troops leave, as well as the government’s ability to exert authority.

“This shows that we don’t need the Americans and that Awakening are not stronger than the government,” Sgt. Wisam Jamil said as he stood on a street swarming with U.S. and Iraqi armored vehicles.

Iraqi soldiers conducted door-to-door searches in Fadhil with the help of informants, targeting Awakening fighters. At one entrance to the neighborhood, once an al-Qaeda in Iraq stronghold, men were dragged from their homes, blindfolded and placed into Humvees. An Iraqi intelligence official calmly crossed off names on a wanted list.

Suddenly, a barrage of gunfire erupted.

“They still think they are strong,” Lt. Ahmed Salah declared.

Iraqi and American military officials insist that Mashadani’s arrest is an isolated incident. Still, the clampdown in Fadhil has provided a spark for anger that has been building for months, particularly since the government took responsibility for paying the Awakening fighters.

In the Baghdad neighborhoods of Dora, Adhamiyah and Amiriyah, Awakening offices were closed. Nearly a dozen of their leaders had switched off their cellphones or declined to answer calls.

“We are being chased right now by the government,” said Ihab Zubai, a spokesman for the Awakening in Amiriyah, in the west of the city. “We’re moving from place to place.”

Awakening fighters across Iraq had the same list of complaints: They had gone without their $300-a-month salary for two, sometimes three, months; the government was trying to marginalize them; and their leaders were being arrested on dubious charges.

“Not even God would accept this,” said Raad Saadoun, a militiaman leaning on his Kalashnikov rifle at a checkpoint in Adhamiyah, in northern Baghdad.

At its height, the Awakening counted 100,000 fighters, who played a decisive role in bringing quiet to Baghdad, Anbar province and other regions. The government promised to bring a fifth of them into the security forces, but only a relative few have made the transition.

In Dora, in southern Baghdad, fighters said the number was minuscule. Of 125 militiamen in one area, three became policemen, said Alaa Abdullah, a 30-year-old fighter. Half simply quit.

“The Americans brought us here, organized us, then abandoned us,” he said.

Abdullah, dressed in green camouflage, had tied a black scarf around his neck. “I am an Iraqi,” it read.

But he acknowledged that patriotism would not feed the seven people in his family.

He and other fighters complained that they often found themselves trapped between a mistrustful government and a vengeful al-Qaeda in Iraq, which had deemed them traitors. Fighters said the government has arrested as many as 11 leaders in the past four months in Dora. Since January, three other commanders had been assassinated, ostensibly by al-Qaeda in Iraq, they said.

Some Awakening leaders said Mashadani, who was placed under arrest at a checkpoint, should have been taken into custody in a more dignified way. Others predicted more uprisings if Mashadani was not released.

“Targeting the Awakening leaders is a red line, and we shall not allow anyone to cross it,” said Essa al-Rufai, an Awakening leader in the northern city of Balad.

Special correspondents Zaid Sabah, Qais Mizher and K.I. Ibrahim in Baghdad and Saad Sarhan in Najaf and Washington Post staff in Kirkuk, Fallujah and Tikrit contributed to this report.

March 31, 2009