US embassy cable - 05BAGHDAD3806

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BAGHDAD 003806 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR INR/R/MR, NEA/PPD, NEA/PPA, NEA/AGS, INR/IZ, INR/P 
 
E.0. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: OPRC, KMDR, KPAO, IZ, Media 
SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION: IRAQI GOVERNMENT, CONSTITUTION, TAL 
AFAR; BAGHDAD 
 
SUMMARY: Discussion on the Constitution and Terrorism were 
the major editorial themes of the daily newspapers on 
September 14, 2005. END SUMMARY. 
 
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TABLE OF CONTENTS 
------------------------------- 
 
A. "Why Do They Insist on Destroying Tal Afar?" (Al-Basa'er, 
9/14) 
B. "The Islamic Emirate of Al-Qa'im" (Al-Bayyan, 9/14) 
C. "Who Are the Iraqis Who Will Ratify the Constitution?" 
(Al-Ittihad, 9/14) 
D. "On Tal Afar" (Al-Sabah al-Jadeed, 9/14) 
E. "The Constitution and Other Crises" (Al-Ittihad, 9/14) 
 
SELECTED COMMENTARIES 
---------------------------------------- 
 
A. "Why Do They Insist on Destroying Tal Afar?" 
(Al-Basa'er, weekly, affiliated with the Muslim Scholars 
Association, anti coalition, published this front-page 
unattributed editorial) 
 
"The city of Tal Afar was well-known for its patriotism and 
sacrifice in defending Iraq's values and homeland; this city 
was one of the first to resist British occupation and its 
citizens were able to liberate their city after a severe 
battle with the enemy. Today, this city again resists the 
British and the American occupation of Iraq and has since 
the beginning of the war. Tal Afar has caused the occupation 
forces to suffer huge losses. 
 
"However, there are some citizens who stood with the 
occupation forces against their own people. There were many 
initiatives by different groups wanting to solve problems 
that arouse among the citizens of Tal Afar but these 
attempts were thwarted by known political groups who claimed 
that what was happening in Tal Afar was terrorism. 
 
"These groups deliberately inflamed the crisis and in the 
end, a misguided attack was waged against this city by the 
occupation forces in cooperation with an elected Iraqi 
government. This government, like the former government, 
gave the green light to the occupation forces to attack and 
destroy the city of Fallujah. They attacked Tal Afar in 
order to satiate their hatred and bring an end to the brave 
resistance of its citizens. These acts will never affect the 
honest and patriotic Iraqis who will continue their jihad to 
defeat and destroy evil and force the occupation out of 
Iraq." 
 
B. "The Islamic Emirate of Al-Qa'im" 
(Al-Bayyan, affiliated with the Islamic Al-Dawa Party led by 
Al-Ja'afari, published a third-page column by Salim Rasoul) 
 
"Terrorists have established a new Taliban like emirate in 
the city of Al-Qa'im and they have named it the Islamic 
Emirate of Al-Qa'im. They believe that this emirate is the 
first step in establishing a great Islamic emirate in Iraq 
led by the emir of the believers Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi. The 
terrorists who were arrested during the military operations 
in Tal Afar announced that they celebrated the establishment 
of their emirate by beheading everyone in the city of Al- 
Qa'im who opposed them. 
 
"We know that the terrorist ideology of Al-Qaeda in Iraq is 
focused on establishing extremist emirates--we know that 
fact very well and the Islamic world knows it too. The fact 
is, secular regimes consider radical Islamic emirates to be 
a clear and present danger to their existence and they 
prevent them from entering their countries. At the same 
time, these secular regimes ally themselves with terrorists 
and provide them with money, weapons, and material support 
to kill Iraqi people. 
 
"Now, after we exposed this supposed emirate will those 
regimes continue supporting Zarqawi? We realize that this 
emirate is situated near Syria and it's possible that its 
borders extend to include Syrian land. The Pan Arab media 
reports that the official policy of Arab states is that they 
are neutral and don't support Baghdad. Some of these regimes 
announce that they support the Iraqi resistance in order to 
expel the occupation from Iraq. When we say resistance we 
mean the radical Zarqawi movement. Do not blame us if we 
distrust the official Arab stance but we formulate our ideas 
according to what's published in the Arab media which is 
definitely reflective of Arab regimes. What the terrorists 
perpetrated in Al-Qa'im is an example of what they want to 
implement throughout the world. Those terrorists began in 
Iraq and they may expand to neighboring countries. 
Therefore, these countries had better support Iraq to 
eradicate this destructive ideology." 
 
C. "Who Are the Iraqis Who Will Ratify the Constitution?" 
(Al-Ittihad, pro-coalition, affiliated with PUK led by 
Talabani, published this page-three editorial by Abdul Hadi 
Mahdi) 
 
"When the January 30th elections were announced some bet 
they would fail due to the deteriorating security situation 
and the lack of skills of the Iraqi police and army at the 
time. Many political parties demanded postponement of the 
elections until the security situation stabilized though 
they gave no guarantees that security would improve. But, on 
election day, Iraqis defied predictions when millions of 
them turned out en masse and went to the polls in ways that 
amazed observers. 
 
"Iraqis did not care about threats to thwart the elections. 
After the results were announced, some lists received 
millions of votes which represented Iraqis. Then, the 
National Assembly was established to represent these 
millions and a president and his deputies were elected and 
the cabinet was elected too. The constitutional committee 
was established based on the winning electoral list. 
 
"However, the committee was not established according to 
electoral representation but was established according to 
national priorities so as not to marginalize any Iraqi sect. 
So, another group was added to the constitution drafting 
committee and this group represented the brothers who did 
not participate in the elections. The millions of Iraqis who 
participated in the elections are Iraqi citizens and they 
belong to this country. 
 
"But recently we started to hear statements that included 
unacceptable expressions revealing mistrust of fellow 
Iraqis. The masses of millions will keep moving forward to 
vote for the constitution while some of our brothers, who 
were added to the constitutional committee, say in their 
press conferences that they want a constitution that all 
Iraqis agree upon. What this really means is that the people 
who did not participate in the elections are the only 
Iraqis. We hope that those people will use the right words 
to unite the Iraqi people." 
 
D. "On Tal Afar" 
(Al-Sabah al-Jadeed, independent, published this front-page 
editorial by Ismaeel Zayyer) 
 
"Our enemies have begun lamenting the victory of Iraqis' 
will and thus began displaying their hatred towards the new 
Iraq. We all listened to the announcement of the Minister of 
Defense, Dr. Sa'doun Al-Dulaimi, and the Minister of 
Interior, Mr. Bakr Jabr, about how the security forces 
killed 157 and detained more than 200 terrorists while the 
Iraqi Army suffered less than four causalities. These 
figures show the government's well-organized and firm policy 
against terrorism. The causalities of the enemy were fifty 
times that of the Iraqi Army in the Tal Afar military 
operation. 
 
"I watched the enemies' report on Tal Afar and I noticed 
that they were talking about Iraqi Army causalities and 
ignored terrorist losses. They continued publishing fake 
stories on "Tal Afar and how its citizens resisted. Jawad Al- 
Khalesi's office stated that the Tal Afar operation's main 
goal was to refute dialogue with the Sunnis. Moreover, both 
the Muslim Scholars Association and Adnan Al-Dulaimi spoke 
about similar stories. 
 
"Frankly, this is wrong and it's one of the biggest mistakes 
of the Sunni association. No one in Iraq will believe that 
they are telling the truth and they will never be able to 
prove those claims. Furthermore, they claimed that the 
displaced families in Tal Afar would exact revenge upon the 
Sunnis when they return to their city but this contradicts 
values, religion and patriotism. First of all, Sunni 
political groups such as the Muslim Scholars Association 
should not endeavor to harm people who belong to other 
sects. In fact, their duty is to fight Sudanese, Syrians, 
and Saudis who have entered the country to behead and loot. 
Where were those who weep for national unity today when 
Zarqawi turned Tal Afar into 18 weapons caches? Where were 
they when terrorists intimidated the city? Now, we want to 
ask the tribes of Rabee'a in northwestern Iraq what they did 
to stop the terrorism that is coming from outside of Iraq's 
borders." 
E. "The Constitution and Other Crises" 
(Al-Ittihad newspaper, affiliated with the PUK led by Jalal 
Talabani, published this page-five editorial by Editor-in- 
chief Fryad Rawandouzi) 
 
"It seems that the constitutional crisis has not ended 
because Sunnis have not agreed to the proposed draft and 
there are new requests from an influential Shi'a movement 
[i.e. al-Ja'afari's party] to re-review the draft and hold 
further discussions-under the pretext that the earlier draft 
was cooked up in the constitutional kitchen (under the 
auspices of party leaders) and not the constitutional 
committee. 
 
"It is illogical to have the constitutional committee sit 
for another session when they could hardly reach agreement 
on the final draft. But this committee should meet again to 
look at the amendments, which have sought to minimize the 
differences to the constitution      without altering its 
intrinsic principals. 
 
"The most dangerous step likely to occur in the lead-up to 
October 15 is yet another request to amend the draft 
constitution; for any such request will lead not only to the 
destruction of the document but also to a ministerial crisis 
and the dissolution of the National Assembly. All members of 
the constitutional committee were dismayed and shocked by 
the strange request to review the draft document again. 
 
"Is it possible to overcome existing obstacles? The 
amendments regarding water resources, the identity of Iraq, 
and international conventions should not be barriers to the 
constitution-all doors should remain open. It is not wise to 
sacrifice what we've reached thus far. The constitution will 
not satisfy all parties but it will satisfy the needs of the 
majority. 
 
"Accordingly, we should not return to square one and destroy 
what we've built. The only way forward is a return to 
dialogue before it is too late." 
 
SATTERFIELD