| Friday, February 24, 2006 |
| A world of chaos |
Make no mistake about it... Iraq isn't on the brink of civil war, it's in the midst of one...
[U.S. Amb. Zalmay] Khalilzad, in a conference call with reporters, said: "What we've seen in the past two days, the attack has had a major impact here, getting everyone's attention that Iraq is in danger."
The country's leaders, he added, "must come together, they must compromise with each other to bring the people of Iraq together and save this country."
Mr. Khalilzad's comments are the most explicit acknowledgment so far by an American official of the instability of the situation. The killings and assaults across Iraq that began Wednesday have amounted to the worst sectarian violence since the American invasion. The death toll in the latest wave of violence has included seven U.S. troops and ten Iraqi imams... Says the Independent UK:
It is a measure of the degree of violence that seven American soldiers were killed by bombs on Wednesday in the separate struggle between the resistance and the US occupation. Although the presence of 130,000 American troops is justified by saying that they are preventing a civil war, it is not clear what they can do to prevent it happening. Meanwhile, religious leaders in Iraq use the Friday call to prayer to call for calm and to plead for unity...
They're also hoping a daytime curfew will stem the sectarian violence, as it's euphamistically being called by the U.S. media...
At the HuffPo, Jack Murtha says we've already lost the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people...
U.S. and U.K. leaders have got to be shitting right now... (although did you see Richard Perle on Hardball last night? He's living in a fantasy world, actually appearing to believe things really aren't that bad... wow...)
The Guardian's Simon Tisdal describes the chaos in Iraq as the Middle East's perfect storm...
But if you think this means we're getting out of Iraq sooner rather than later, think again...
Iraq isn't the only place where chaos is unfolding. The Philippines is in the midst of a serious coup crisis pitting the U.S. backed president, Glorida Arroyo, against members of her own Army...
The Saudis barely averted a suicide bomb attack at a major oil facility ...
...and Christians and Muslims are killing each other in Nigeria...
So when Bush says in another canned speech today, that:
Some critics have pointed out that the free elections in the Middle East have put political power in the hands of Islamics and extremists, in the case of the Palestinian elections, a notorious -- notorious terrorist organization. Critics argue that our policies of promoting democracy are backfiring and destabilizing the region... He can count me among the critics.
Tags: Iraq war, War, Bush, Middle East, News, Civil war, Violence,Foreign policy |
posted by JReid @ 1:22 PM   |
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