Al-Qaeda threat to attack Iran

[Edweird]

"We give the ... Persians in general, and leaders of Iran in particular, two months to withdraw their support and presence in Iraq," Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, leader of the self-styled Islamic State in Iraq, said in the 50-minute audiotape posted today on Islamist website which has often carried al-Qaeda statements.

In the first such threat by his group, Baghdadi said that unless Iran meets his demands, the group will wage a "brutal war" against Iranians.


"Baghdadi said his group's decision is the result of Iran's support for its fellow Shi'ite Muslims in Iraq, and accused Tehran of being behind the burning of Sunni Muslim mosques and killings of Sunni leaders."

http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,22041098-954,00.html

I'm not too familiar with this website, so I can't vouch for it's accuracy. But, it's in Australia, which automatically makes it more honest than our MSM to me.

So, chimpy wants to attack Iran. "Al Qaeda in Iraq" wants to attack Iran. How much longer can our bought ans paid for "news" outlets cover for the criminals that are lying about EVERYTHING? I wonder if our MSM will cover this?

[LynnTheDem]

1. Saddam Hussein was an enemy of OBL's al Qaeda; George bUsh took care of him.

Funny thang, how George bUsh is always taking care of Osama bin Laden's interests.

[Edweird]

2. A little too convenient. Like our troop withdrawal from Saudi Arabia.

[Pushed To The Left]

3. Notice how easily he got Hussein and he still hasn't found Bin Laden after all these years!

50 years from now, people are going to look back and say "How did America let that guy get away with so much?"

[Edweird]

4. There wasn't any problem finding the Bin Laden family around 9/12.

While they were getting the heck outta Dodge.

[Flatulo]

6. And just how long do you think Musharraf would last if the US had

invaded Pakistan?

Musharraf has been hanging onto power by a thread for years. An unwelcome US invasion would end his reign in 15 minutes. Then we'd have crazy Mullahs holding Pakistani nukes.

Invading Pakistan would have been even stupider than invading Iraq, if yo can believe anything was dumber than that.

PS: It took the Israelis 20 years to find Eichman.

[Wiley50]

5. Smells like a fish market during a month-long Ice Famine

Could be proof that this org is an invention of Bushco

Aircraft carrier Enterprise left yesterday and will take two months to reach the Persion Gulf

GOP politicians seen to be sending signs that they'll cave for pullout in September.

Truth or (unbelievable) coincidence?

[WilliamPitt]

7. Al Qaeda is Sunni

Iran is Shia.

It makes perfect sense.

[Wiley50]

16. Will, You know as well as I do

They're all Al-Queda according to the news we get

[Flatulo]

17. Not to pick nits, but I don't believe any Iranian or Shi'a groups

have been associated in the media with al-Qaeda.

In general, al-Qaeda associates are Salafists, who consider the Shi'a to be infidels.

[Wiley50]

18. This is what I mean

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=1274760

Editor&Publisher: 'NYT' Public Editor Hits Paper's Surge in Blaming 'al-Qaeda' in Iraq
By E&P Staff
Published: July 08, 2007

NEW YORK In a remarkable column today, Clark Hoyt, the newly arrived public editor at The New York Times, charges that the Times in recent weeks has too often gone along with the new drive by the White House and the military to blame insurgent attacks on al-Qaeda. The column arrives on the same day the paper calls for a U.S. pullout in Iraq.

E&P last week had noted the same tendency in the Times in the reporting of Michael R. Gordon and others. A top Times editor admits to Hoyt that the paper's reporting in this regard has become "sloppy."...

Today, Hoyt charges that the Times "in recent weeks...has slipped into a routine of quoting the president and the military uncritically about Al Qaeda’s role in Iraq — and sometimes citing the group itself without attribution.

"And in using the language of the administration, the newspaper has also failed at times to distinguish between Al Qaeda, the group that attacked the United States on Sept. 11, and Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, an Iraqi group that didn’t even exist until after the American invasion.

"There is plenty of evidence that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia is but one of the challenges facing the United States military and that overemphasizing it distorts the true picture of what is happening there. While a president running out of time and policy options may want to talk about a single enemy that Americans hate and fear in the hope of uniting the country behind him, journalists have the obligation to ask tough questions about the accuracy of his statements."

He then quotes Middle East experts he talk with who dispute the heavy focus on al-Qaeda. Then Hoyt reveals:
"Recent Times stories from Iraq have referred, with little or no attribution — and no supporting evidence — to 'militants linked with Al Qaeda,' 'Sunni extremists with links to Al Qaeda' and 'insurgents from Al Qaeda.' The Times has stated flatly, again without attribution or supporting evidence, that Al Qaeda was responsible for the bombing of the Golden Dome mosque in Samarra last year, an event that the president has said started the sectarian civil war between Sunnis and Shiites."...

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_di...

[Flatulo]

20. Sorry, I don't see anything in there associating the Shi'a with al-Qaeda.

From what I can tell by looking at a broad cross-section of sources, al-Qaeda (meanining outside Jihadis who have entered Iraq) is responible for about 5% of the atacks in Iraq. The rest are internacine fighting between Sunni and Shi'a.

[WilliamPitt]

26. Indeed

This is all true, but it still isn't much of a reach to see the logic of Sunni Iraqis attacking Shia Iran. The Iranian government is Shia, and basically owns Iraq by way of Iraq's majority Shia government. The Sunnis, in a very real sense, are facing extermination in Iraq at the hands of the newly-empowered Shia, who were brutalized by Hussein's Sunni crew for decades.

Maliki is the front man, Sadr owns the streets, and the Sunnis are in great peril. Going after Iran, which has its hands all over the Shia government in Iraq, is a no-brainer.

Call them "al Qaeda" or call them a Buick, but it is what it is. I know what you mean about the bullshit labels, but Sunnis attacking Shia Iran isn't all that surprising.

[Edweird]

27. It's lose-lose in any case. We've got I'm-a-dinner-jacket on one hand

and the country that gave us 9-11 on the other. Neither option is particularly appealing. It comes down to what flavor you want your theologically driven dictatorship.

[Flatulo]

29. Speaking of Ahmadinejad , I find it interesting that he is outmanoevered Bush

every step of the way. This guy is a doctorate engineer, so he can't be a dummy.

If Bush attacks Iran's nuclear sites, we instantly make another 70 million terrorists.

If Bush does nothing, or goes through the UN, Iran can carry on with it's clandestine nuke program (which I believe it has a perfect right to do, even though I don't like it).

Either way, Ahmadinejad wins.

[Flatulo]

28. Oh, I completely agree. This is not an unexpected outcome.

I was really addressing the issue of media glossing over the differences between the various factions.

My Iranian friend at work warned me about this four years ago. The schism between Sunni and Shi'a sects goes back 600 years.

[Wiley50]

19. see post # 18 n/t

[lovuian]

8. Al Qaeda = Bush

its amazing to see him threaten Iran with them

[Flatulo]

9. If al-Qaeda = Bush, then who committed all these acts?

http://www.cdi.org/terrorism/terrorist-groups.cfm

"MAIN ANTI-U.S. ACTIVITIES TO DATE: Is suspected of involvement in the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Aden, Yemen. Conducted the bombings in August 1998 of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, that killed at least 301 persons and injured more than 5,000 others. Claims to have shot down U.S. helicopters and killed U.S. servicemen in Somalia in 1993, and to have conducted three bombings that targeted U.S. troops in Aden, Yemen, in December 1992."

Add to this the foiled Millenium bombing plot, and the 1992 WTC bombing.

I'm pretty sure Bush was still nursng a hangover when most of this stuff took place.

Do you really believe that al-Qaeda doesn't exist?

[Edweird]

10. I'm no expert on AQ, but I thought their beef with us was that we had military bases

in Saudi Arabia. The "mission accomplished" banner could easily have been a message to Bin Laden that chimpy had complied with his demands and pulled out. Since they got their way, they pretty much wouldn't have anything else to do. Maybe they've updated their "mission statement" since then, I don't know. Which brings me to Iraq. Is it possible that some pissed off Iraqi's figured out that Al Qaeda scared the crap outta W and at that decided that their name is also AQ?

[Flatulo]

12. You're right about the bases, as far as I can tell.

That was a short-term goal, but the long-term goal is the restoration of the Islamic Caliphate as it existed around 1200.

I think the 'Mission Accomplised' debacle was just macho chest-beating and a photo-op. I never attached much significance to it.

I just cringe a bit when I see a lot of folks on DU taking positions that would seem to imply that Islamic radicalism is not a threat to the West. I work with plenty of Muslim professionals who, while they believe that US actions in Iraq have been pretty unhelpful, acknowledge that there is a problem with the fringe elements in that religion.

[Poiuyt]

11. The Islamic State in Iraq is an al-Qaeda linked group, not AQ itself

Of course, as far as the media is concerned, everyone we're fighting is al Qeada

[Flatulo]

13. I believe you're correct. It is an over-simplification to call

every group al-Qaeda, but there is a common belief that the West is on a Crusade and needs to be violently confronted wherever possible.

[originalpckelly]

14. Ruh-roh, trouble in radical Islam-ville?

I wonder how Iran will respond?

I guess it makes sense, they are radicals on either side of the Sunni-Shi'a divide. I have a feeling that if the radicals go at each other, the moderates will considerate it even more. That doesn't smell good. Just imagine the price of oil if Iran and Saudi got into a war?

[Flatulo]

15. Yeah, word is that the Saudis are considering a nuke progam to counter Iran's

My, what a lovely mess we have created.

When you fuck with crazy religious nutjob-type people, you reap what you sow.

All the more reason to high-tail it outta there.

[dEMOK]

21. Well, we paid bin Laden to fight the USSR - why not Iran as well?... n/t

[Edweird]

22. That was then. This is now. He might contract for chimpy's family,

but I don't think he'll do the US's dirty work for any price.

[dEMOK]

23. IMO (wittingly or not) bin Laden has been doing Cheney/Bush's dirty work all along...

...by giving this totalitarian regime fodder for the fear mongering they've been using to steadily chip away at our Constitution, and the rights we are guaranteed under it.

[Edweird]

24. I see the inverse, chimpy destroying America and turning it into religious monarchy

like OBL wants for the whole world.

[dEMOK]

25. Good point. Let's take this one step further...

Hypothetically -- what if it turns out that the same money is buying (Christian) BushCo and funding (Islamic) terrorism?

Aren't both forces in bed with big oil and big arms merchants?