Iraqi school guard, wife beheaded as children watch

[Barrett808]

Source: Reuters

BAGHDAD, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Three suspected al Qaeda militants, including two sisters, beheaded their uncle and his wife, forcing the couple's children to watch, Iraqi police said on Friday.

The militants considered that school guard Youssef al-Hayali was an infidel because he did not pray and wore western-style trousers, they told police interrogators after being arrested in Diyala province northwest of Baghdad.

The three cousins executed Hayali and his wife Zeinab Kamel at the all-boys school in Jalawlah in Diyala province, village police chief Captain Ahmed Khalifa said.

No further details were available.

Read more: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L23625414.htm

[Catch22Dem]

1. How cosmopolitan of them

Things are gettin' more saferer over there ev'ry day.

[kurth]

2. Fucking savages

[Barrett808]

6. "My God...the genius of that. The genius. The will to do that."

And then I realized...like I was shot...Like I was shot with a diamond...a diamond bullet right through my forehead...And I thought: My God...the genius of that. The genius. The will to do that. Perfect, genuine, complete, crystalline, pure. And then I realized they were stronger than we. Because they could stand that these were not monsters...These were men...trained cadres...these men who fought with their hearts, who had families, who had children, who were filled with love...but they had the strength...the strength...to do that. If I had ten divisions of those men our troubles here would be over very quickly.

-- Col. Kurtz, Apocalypse Now
http://corky.net/scripts/apocalypseNow.html

[Tesha]

41. Bingo. (NT)

[oldhippie]

29. Hey! Where's your tolerance ? ..........

It's just their culture. Who are we to be judgemental?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

64. Hey, these are just a few bad apples.

Oh wait, that's what we say when U.S. troops murder people.

Disregard.

[Taverner]

56. "...for good people to do evil things, that takes religion"

"With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."

Steven Weinberg

Absolutely fucking true

[soothsayer]

3. wow,that freedom we brought them is really working out

[Frustratedlady]

4. Oh, how awful. Animals!

Those poor children. Their lives are ruined, too.

[lvx35]

5. Oh look, they are are becoming more liberal: Sisters now conduct the beheading of infidels.

Three suspected al Qaeda militants, including two sisters, beheaded their uncle and his wife, forcing the couple's children to watch, Iraqi police said on Friday.

[ohio2007]

7. The fashion police have been kicked out of Sunni Fallujah and set up shop

in Bahgdad area. Geeze, I hope those shopkeepers whop started selling booze again don't pick up on this story

[Igel]

11. Diyala province.

Baqubah was were there was a bit of a US offensive back in July/August, but those who set up shop there went to ground in various villages. The US offensive didn't stop; it became slightly lower key, and has been moving through the area.

Your point isn't far from wrong: When the ISI was kicked out of Ramadi and Fallujah, Baqubah was where they decided to move "capital" of their "caliphate". The Baqubiyoun weren't just real zipped up over the idea; a number of "insurgents" defected, and repeated what happened in Fallujah and Ramadi: US makes first pass, taking out obvious targets; local Iraqis make second pass, doing the stuff that would warrant too much media attention in the US media if US troops did it, and getting more local participation. Then the US/Iraqis set up joint outposts, with diminishing US participating. In Baqubah, they're about halfway through that last sentence, although until the surrounding villages are "cleansed" there are still raids--and in fact there are raids on disobedience villages that we hear about from time to time. Heard about one today, where a Shi'ite village fought off the insurgents.

Probably still no booze in Baqubah, probably still at too much risk from the hardcore takfiri merchants of peace and tolerance ... as long as you have the right submission (the name of the game).

[ohio2007]

18. Baghdad is a night hike away

from Diyala province


http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/8D2F680D-C0DD-4D30-8738-A58E534317EA.htm
the surge flushed them toward the Iranian border direction where they still attack locals with uniforms taken off of dead or defected Iraqi soldiers;
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_world/view/313179/1/.html

It's best for "the awakening" if it doesn't get much western MSM breaking news coverage but I have seen articles about more shops opening up along riverfront areas in Baghdad and yes, booze has returned for sale in some shops again. That has got to irritate those fighters that consider themselves "more muslim" then most Sunni Muslims ;)
Noboby is going to party like its the year 999 with them leaning on the population for protection money payments.

[balantz]

8. So this is the product of our liberation?

Exacerbating their most horrendous social traits. What hatred they have for anything American. And now those poor children will suffer the further horrors of depleted uranium poisoning and witness each-others' sickening demise from our hands.

Long live Democracy, all hail the regime :nuke:
I have to add this because my words have been taken wrong before :sarcasm:

[boricua79]

34. it is a consequence of our enabling this behavior

but the behavior is completely homegrown. And while we in the West often display similar barbaric behavior, I attribute this particular brand to cultural Islam's lack of theological/intellectual development.

Are there good Muslims? Are there good interpretations of Islam that are advanced and compatible with modern life? yes. But, sadly, it is not in the majority in many parts of the middle East, including many parts of Iraq.

So, I know I'll get bashed for being "intolerant of their culture", but that's just how it is. we can enjoy a more civilized Western society precisely because our Western societies have gone through centuries of Enlightenment and REformation-inspired theological, social, moral, and political thought. THEY haven't. They're still stuck on Square One: question the Qu'ran. They haven't passed that stage...the West passed it a long time ago (save a minority of religious nuts that inhabit every Western society).

[leftynyc]

44. No bashing from me

I'm in total agreement. Sharia law sucks. Period.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

9. There are reports of such as this also taking place in Basra -K&R

Here's a link to the article: http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=75396

"Basra is facing a new type of terror which leaves at least 10 women killed monthly, some of them are later found in garbage dumps with bullet holes while others are found decapitated or mutilated," the city's police chief Maj. Gen. Abdel Jalil Khalaf told IRIN in a telephone interview.

"The perpetrators are organized gangs who work under religious cover pretending to spread instructions of Islam but they are far from this religion. They are trying to impose a life style like banning women from wearing western clothes or forcing them to wear head scarf," Khalaf said.

In September, Khalaf added, police found the body of a decapitated woman with that of her also decapitated six-year-old son lying beside her.

"We do believe that the number of murdered women is much higher as more cases go unreported by their families who fear reprisals from extremists," he added.

Read more at link above.

[ohio2007]

10. Basra is under the Iranian influence so when the Brits pul out

the Iranian influenced justice system can lay down the law. And when the US downsizes, Iran can inherit the area's headaches

So they say ;)

[dailykoff]

12. Before or after they threw the babies out of the incubators?

These "oh the savages" stories are always hard to believe. Not that senseless executions aren't ocurring, but that the perps are Iraqi. Al Qaeda is as American as Thanksgiving turkey.

[Teaser]

13. I'm sorry but you went so over the top

that you just fell off the earth.

[dailykoff]

14. It's a trick we use a lot.

Gin up a fake civil war and then push it along to cover whatever corporate piracy is deemed essential to our "national security."

[saigon68]

22. It is a trick Goebbels used

ie: there are filthy vermin who have lice

They must be exterminated.

[dailykoff]

23. I think you're right about that.

Jose Padilla comes to mind, and all those financial assets seized for being connected to "Islamic charities."

[gatlingforme]

37. Goebbels = karl rove, Bush, anybody in office right now

[gatlingforme]

38. Nationalism is the goal of the BUSHes in many respects, maybe

not in every thing they do, but I do believe the fucking bushes are all about propaganda and nationalism and exploiting and assassination and lawlessness, etc.. they are all that and more

[gatlingforme]

39. Mistake, did not mean to reply to my own msg.

[leftynyc]

49. Are you saying that without our presence

the Shia and Sunni would be getting along? Because that's just nonsense. They've been fighting eachother since long before we were even a country.

[dailykoff]

61. There would be no civil war, no.

The "sectarian violence" promoted by the Pentagon and corporate press is frankly a cover story for predation and slaughter conducted in our names for the benefit of private oil and logistics operations, several of them headquartered in Texas.

[gatlingforme]

36. Aint that the truth. hummm, well is this a propaganda thing?

I would not put it passed the bushes to do this at all. one of those stories ....
I can't believe anything that comes from the government anymore.

[dailykoff]

42. It sure seems to fit the pattern.

And not just this "war," either.

[nebula]

15. This is a product of the pure chaos and lawlessness we have unleashed

upon that unfortunate country.

Unfortunate, but not surprising given the utter hellhole Iraq has been turned into
under the occupation.

[Faygo Kid]

31. It bears repeating: We need to get the hell out of there. Now.

These people need to determine their own direction. The perpetrators of such an act are sick and evil men, but the instigators of this unnecessary and illegal war have more blood on their hands - because they have infinitely more power.

That said, this is an appalling example of the unanticipated horrors of war. The chickenhawks just don't get it - war is a last resort. Always.

You are correct, and I continue to be sickened by this war in general, and shocked by such examples of man's inhumanity to man. We need to get the hell out of there. Now.

[happyslug]

16. This sounds fishy

Islam has restrictions on WOMAN'S Clothing, but few on men. Thus the fact they killed the UNCLE for wearing Western Style pants? Why? Wearing pants BY MEN is NOT forbidden. Something is wrong here, I suspect the Uncle was killed for some political reason and this is just an excuse picked up by the press.

[ohio2007]

17. wahibist sect of Islam smells the fishiest

if you aint wahibi muslim
your an infidel.
AQ follows the teachings of that sect, the dominate sect of Saudi Arabia.
You ever see the top brass from the house of Saud prancing around with bushco wearing Levi's and a cowboy hat ?


I didn't think so

[happyslug]

19. My comment was the excuse was his pants, not the Al Queda did not do it.

My comment was the statement as the the "Western Pants" as the excuse. Something else was the reason for the killing, and the real reason was NOT stated.

[ohio2007]

25. SO, in your opinion, what was the real reason you keep close to your vest ?

nt

[happyslug]

28. Knowing Iraq, some tribal grievance.

Which may or may not be related to this war. Among Arabs, the tribe one belongs to is more important than the country one is a citizen of. In fact the tribe is almost as important as the family (and often the same thing). Tribes often cross National Borders (The present border between Iraq and Saudi Arabia was drawn by the British based on how far their planes could fly in 1921, thus at least one tribe (and I suspect more) controls an area that includes Arabia and Iraq.

My point is this article does NOT give enough information to determine WHY this killing took place. Did his tribe view the man as a Traitor (i.e. Supporting the Americans) or was this some sort of inner tribal grievance? A third possibility is tribal discipline, he disobeyed his tribal leaders and the leader wanted to make an example of him (This is a Sunni area so the leadership may be pro-Al Queda and Al Queda did it as a favor to the Tribe, but remember anyone can CLAIM to be Al Queda, so the claim that the killers were Al Queda is meaningless by itself).

[ohio2007]

30. Here's my $.02. Saudi Arabia uses Iraq as a safety valve for their prison system

Those "misguided" youth they capture stirring up anti ruling family opinions and attacks on sacred Saudi oil infrastructures are at some point given a choice;

Life in a Saudi prison or
Death as a Saudi Sunni martyr in Iraq.

It's all off the record but since our MSM ignores the jihadi final testomonial DVD's, the public is left guessing as to who is rolling over and killing the local tribal leadership fighting against the foriegn invaders.

[happyslug]

40. More a way to direct Opposition to the House of Saud, then anything else

People forget, while bin Laden and his family is tied in with the House of Saud (the ruling house of Arabia), bin Laden wants them overthrown as being corrupt tools of America. In this bin laden has support in Arabia. Some support is outside the Royal Household, as such, if Caught, forced to go to Iraq (Or in the alternative views going to Iraq as training against the House of Saud, or another way to Fight the House of Saud).

These last two rationales are even better for people who are in the Royal House (Like bin Laden's Family), it give them legitimacy to oppose the house of Saud (and may be HOW the rest of the bin Laden's family view Iraq and gives support to bin Laden). The problem is we do NOT have enough information to know, Hopefully the CIA does (But Bush and Company may be ignoring it for they are "part" of the House of Saud also, or is the House of Saud part of "Bush and Company"?).

[Lone_Star_Dem]

27. Men are being attacked for haircuts and clothes deemed too "Western"

Pants in general may not be a death sentence, but overtly Western garb and/or hairstyles can be.

Reread the article, it's not just because he wore pants, but rather because "he did not pray and wore western-style trousers." Thus they labeled him an infidel.

Extreme? You bet it is, but that doesn't make it not true.

[USA_1]

20. No Al-Qaeda In Iraq ...

... until Bush invaded.

Don't know if the story is true but it would never have happened if Bush did not invade.

[MetaTrope]

21. Since when has any Iraqi detained by the U.S. been a SUSPECTED al Qaeda militant?

I thought the assumption was that all insurgents are al Qaeda?

[Toots]

24. Just think before the USA invaded Iraq it was a completely secular nation.

Atrocities like this could never have occurred during Saddam's rule. It only happens now because of the USA and it's occupying force..

[ckramer]

26. Like Rummy said

Freedom is little untidy...oooops...

Democracy means free to behead your enemy.

They have to thank Mr. Bush for that freedom.

[Faygo Kid]

32. Stuff happens.

Goddamn war criminals, all of them. And the perpetrators of this horrific act, too.

[NuttyFluffers]

35. it's real sad when life under saddam is better.

not enough electricity, not enough water, even less medicine, no safety, crazy fanatics all over the place, etc. it was bad before, but to be worse than that, with the "most powerful military and economy in the world" is a painful level of failure.

[leftynyc]

62. While I did not and do not support this war

you're living in fantasyland. You're making it sound like everyone got along, sat at campfires and sang kumbaya.

Sadaam was a vicious, power hungry dictator who terrorized his population. That's why you didn't see problems there.

[boricua79]

33. what pig monsters

and what a STUPID interpretation of Islam. Just because you don't pray or wear what they want you to wear doesn't mean that you're an infidel. If you "submit" to the god of abraham (Ibrahim), aka. ALLAH, you are by definition a believer...a "muslim". THat includes Jews and Christians. These Al Qaeda types do not even know their own Qu'ran.

It has nothing to do with Islam. It's backwards tribalism coupled with lack of education...and because historically those societies have been linked with Islam, it takes disguises in "Islamic values".

It's the same stupidity that happens here under Christian values. It's always the same. An uneducated human being acting out their fears and lusts in the form of their religion's "dictates".

[leftynyc]

45. Please don't compare our crazy fundies

to these dangerous lunatics. Unless you have links where people are beheading their neighbors and families for not being "Christian" enough. There is no comparison and cultural relativism is a bullshit call here.

[noamnety]

43. So is this better or worse

than the reasons the US used to justify shooting children's parents in front of their eyes, or starving over a million Iraqis through sanctions?

I guess I'm not understanding the savages comments some have posted, given the full context. I mean, yes, it's savage, but so is all the shit we've been doing over there, so I'm not sure we're in a position to say those people are "savages." That aspect of it seems kinda racist, unless we're applying it to ourselves at the same time.

[leftynyc]

46. Why does the comparison even need

to be made? There are hundreds of threads about how fucked up this war is as is the behavior of this administration.

What the hell does that have to do with sick, demented people beheading their neighbors for not being religious enough? Savages is the mildest thing I can think to say about these people.

[noamnety]

47. I felt I needed to make it

because I felt some comments in this thread were bordering on being racist.

It's good to remember this is an ugly part of humanity - not something those other people are doing because those sorts of people are "savages."

[leftynyc]

48. In my opinion

there is nothing wrong with calling people doing savage things savages. Once you start to compare them to other people, you are lessening their actions. We have people here who want to turn back the clock on women's rights and we have more than our fair share of racists. To compare these annoying individuals to people who behead others because of what they believe in is simply not fair.

[noamnety]

50. How about if we compare

people who behead others simply for what believe, to people who bomb others simply for where they live, or to people who starve others simply because of who their president is?

That's the comparison I was making, those who kill to those who kill. Who's killed more innocent women in Iraq? Who are the savages?

This comment above, for example: "we can enjoy a more civilized Western society precisely because our Western societies have gone through centuries of Enlightenment and REformation-inspired theological, social, moral, and political thought. THEY haven't."

Is there anyway you can interpret that that isn't an incredibly ignorant white supremacist statement?

Do you think the survivors of My Lai or the prisoners in Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo might have a different view of that statement?

[leftynyc]

51. I don't think it's white supremacist

I think it's western supremacist.

Here's the difference I see. This war with Iraq would not have happened with someone else in the White House. Afghanistan, yes; Iraq, no. The problem right now is the administration in charge. Our constitution has not changed - it has been twisted beyond recognition in some cases but it's still the law of the land. It's a good document.

The LAW is the problem in the middle east or anywhere else Sharia law is followed. I'm trying to be very specific here. Sharia law is an abomination. The people that use that law as cover for their barbarism is where the difference is. Our laws have been twisted and when this administration is gone, hopefully we can get back to the way it's supposed to be. In the middle east, the law has to be changed, not the people.

[noamnety]

53. I disagree with several points you made.

The largest one is the presumption that the military isn't used to support death squads, promote neoliberalism, and take advantage of weaker countries under other administrations. My Lai wasn't Bush's fault, it wasn't an isolated incident, it was part of a military culture. Haiti wasn't Bush's fault. All the so called "drug war" activities that weren't, which we took part in in Latin America and South America weren't Bush's fault.

It's nice to say "oh we aren't savages because we have a good constitution" - but that's nothing to do with what the actual people really do, including the actual people in all our administrations. Actual people here participated in My Lai, in Abu Ghraib, in Iran-Contra, in lynchings, in Waco, in the systemic raping of women, in rendition flights, in appalling prison abuses in this country, in police brutality, and so forth.

And actual Americans do things in Iraq that are just as brutal as beheading a person, but we somehow feel superior because dropping white phosphorous on a city is less "savage" than beheading a person. Well, no, it isn't. It uses more technology, where as a beheading is low tech, but it's not any less savage.

Further, the people in that story didn't appear to be acting in support of any administration. That wasn't part of a LAW that they were enforcing as representatives of the government. We, on the other hand, commit some of our savageness over there with immunity from the law, and we've set up the system so that we can operate that way.

As for whether the above comment was western supremacist or white supremacist, ask yourself whether the person who wrote what I quoted was talking about indigenous American peoples from North to South America, or the white people that invaded and later settled here. I thought it was pretty clear they were talking about white culture being superior, rather than "western" culture. Maybe it's just a sign of the arrogance of people I've had this conversation with before, but it always seems to me that when they refer to "western" culture, they are always talking about white people's culture, not really cultures from all the western hemisphere. And it also seems to me that when they talk about our superiority in that regard, they trivialize every atrocity white western people ever committed, as if those atrocities aren't what we built our fortunes on, and continue to build our fortunes on - as if lynchings, burning "witches", crusades past and present, genocide, Vietnam, Hiroshima, as if all of that was just a few bad apples, instead of the norm that fuels us.

[leftynyc]

54. I understand what you're saying

But I disagree. I vehemently stand by my statement about western culture. As an American Jewish Woman, I would much rather live here than in any country stained by Sharia law.

We're fighting a war right now - not one I support, not one that needed to be fought (in Iraq). That atrocities are being commited in the name of my country makes me sick - that's why I'm doing what I can to make sure the next administration reflects what should be American values. I'm not one of those who takes on the collective guilt over what's going on in Iraq. I didn't vote for Bush and have never felt anything but contempt for him and his whole administration. Yes, he's the face of America right now and it's going to take decades to undo the damage inflicted by his band of criminals, however, when I, as a woman, look at western culture versus sharia based laws, there is simply no comparison. I simply do not hate America. I don't even hate Bush - too much trouble. All I can do is try and change things. I have no grand illusions about a non-violent world and where everyone acts like puppies. There are dangerous people all over the place. That's also part of humanity.

And for the record, I have no idea what was in the mind of the person writing about western values. I only know what's in my own heart.

[noamnety]

55. How did you feel about the sanctions?

half a million dead Iraqi children are staining the previous administration's hands, and we collectively, the lot of us, nodded our heads in apathy when it happened. That was more savage than this individual murder.

That is an example of our "superior" western culture. Not an abnormal example, just a routine one.

As a Jewish woman, it probably didn't affect you personally, so you can shrug it off, dismiss it, and those half a million children become invisible. Notions of Western supremacy rely on our ability to do exactly that. But it wasn't invisible to their mothers and fathers. And it wasn't any less savage.

[leftynyc]

57. Don't try to get inside my head sweetie

You have no idea what I have or have not done as a citizen. And to try and claim that because I'm Jewish I can shrug off children's deaths is insulting. You are no longer worth my time.

[noamnety]

59. I'm not judging what you've done as a citizen

And I prefer that you don't call me sweetie, which is condescending and sexist - even coming from a woman.

I'm reading your posts in this thread, and I'm saying that, personally, I believe you would have a very different view of Clinton if it had been your children that he decided were no longer allowed access to food. And I'm saying that it's a cultural thing that we ALL are raised to do, we dismiss the genocides that our own country commits, we excuse it or overlook it unless it affects us directly, and we make sure our history books and the holidays we celebrate gloss over those things.

And then we act like our culture is superior to other cultures, and call those other people a bunch of savages, and we justify it by dwelling on the same actions in their society that we gloss over in our own.

When you blame "this administration" and say "hopefully we can get back to the way it's supposed to be" - you're implying that what you want to get back to is the previous administration. Well, the previous administration was happy to commit genocide by starvation. So are you outraged by that? Are you shrugging off those half million children's deaths? Or is it something you'd like to go back to?

When we say we want to go "back" to how things are supposed to be, I can't help thinking of Langston Hughes:

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed-- Let it be that great strong land of love Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

[galileo3000]

52. Peace and consolation to all affected by this story..

[yurbud]

58. al qaeda = Saudi gov't or Saudi gov't influenced

[leaninglib]

60. Islam is such an incredibly advanced culture.

[happyslug]

63. Any society in decline or crisis gets violent.

Be it the French Commune in 1870, Revolutionary France during the Reign of Terror of 1792, Germany in 1919, England Before and during the english Civil War (1640), ancient Rome during its change form a republic to an empire. Various criss during the time of the Roman and later Byzantine Empires.

The Scary part of these time periods ALL USED RELIGION AS A EXCUSE TO COMMIT ATROCITY. The problem was NOT the religion, but that the Society was in Crisis. In such times people fall back on their most basic beliefs and then use those beliefs to justify whatever action they think must be done. Scoundrels see this occurring and use the same fears to justify their thievery. Be the religion in question, Islam, Christianity, Ancient pagan Beliefs or even communism (Hinduism had been used in India during such crisis as has Buddhism in Ceylon and South East Asia).

My point is the problem is NOT any particular religion, but the fact Iraq is in crisis and as long as that is the situations things like this will occur.