Headless bodies are apparently being found scattered around Iraq, three of them having turned up around Mosul the past couple of days. Mosul is in one of the “peaceful” provinces of Iraq, according to Comical Allawi, where elections could be held anytime because of the excellent security.
A parked car loaded with explosives blew up as a US convoy was driving by in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul today. US troops then opened fire and killed three Iraqis passing by.
A car bomb exploded Monday outside a primary school in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, killing seven people- including two children- and injuring eleven, police said.
A car bomb exploded in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Monday, killing three people including two bombers and a child, in the third such attack in the country within hours.
The Mosul car bomb exploded as a U.S. military convoy was passing by, wounding six American soldiers, the military said today.
Unidentified gunmen killed Maj. Ghassan Mohammed, director of internal affairs for Abi Taman police station,and his driver in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.
The above incidents all happened within the last week, but the US was busy bombing Fallujah and Sadr city and declaring victory in Samarra, so the peaceful areas of Iraq like Mosul weren’t in the news all that much.
Another interesting Mosul story surfaced yesterday in Newsday, which claims to have gotten a copy of an Arab intelligence report which says Zarqawi, who is currently being targeted by bombs in Fallujah, is in Mosul. This actually makes sense because northern Iraq was Zarqawi’s stomping ground pre-invasion, as his gang, which has close ties to Ansar al-Islam, was based in the Northern No-Fly zone. Both Ansar al-Islam and Zarqawi flourished in northern Iraq where they were protected from Saddam Hussein’s regime by the US and Britain.
Al-Zarqawi’s own militant group has fewer than 100 members inside Iraq, although al-Zarqawi has close ties to a Kurdish Islamist group with at least several hundred members, according to two reports produced by an Arab intelligence service. The Kurdish group, Ansar al-Islam, has provided dozens of recruits for suicide bombings since the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the reports say. And while U.S. forces relentlessly pound the insurgent strongholds of Fallujah and Samarra, claiming to hit al-Zarqawi safe houses, the elusive militant could be hiding in the northern city of Mosul.
[…]
Mosul has become a haven for Islamic militants, and especially for members of Ansar al-Islam. The city is a center for training and dispatching suicide bombers to other parts of Iraq, and a coordination hub between ex-regime loyalists and Islamic militants. Ansar moved many of its operations to Mosul after it was driven out of a remote, mountainous part of northern Iraq by U.S. bombardment during the war. The Baathist regime had strong support in Mosul, and Hussein’s two sons were killed in a gun battle with U.S. troops after taking refuge there.Al-Zarqawi has spent considerable time in Mosul, and he might be hiding there rather than in Fallujah, where U.S. forces have launched numerous air strikes since June on what they describe as al-Zarqawi safe houses. Al-Zarqawi is drawn to Mosul because of the concentration of Ansar members there, and because the city of 2 million people is easier to hide in than Fallujah.
The Newsday piece is well worth reading for a more realistic assessment of the likelihood of Zarqawi being behind even a fraction of the violence he claims and the Bushistas blame on him.
As I wrote this post, 2 more decapitated bodies were discovered in Kirkuk, which is also in a peaceful northern province under Kurdish control, just like Mosul.
In Kirkuk, Lieutenant Colonel Awaad Jibouri said the corpse and head of a former Iraqi army officer, identified as Ali Hussein, was found in a town southwest of the city. Hussein had worked at a U.S. military base in Kirkuk.
A second Iraqi, identified as Taha Abdullah, who worked at a U.S. barracks near Baiji was also beheaded and his body was found on Monday night, Jibouri said.