US detains top Iraqi Sunni cleric

[spindrifter]

Saturday 24 June 2006, 19:18 Makka Time, 16:18 GMT

US forces detained Iraq's most senior Sunni cleric in the northern Iraqi city of Tikrit on Saturday but released him after a few hours.

Saturday's arrest of Sheikh Jamal Abd al-Karim al-Dabaan, the mufti or religious authority for Iraq's Sunni Arab minority, sparked outrage among Iraq's Sunnis.

<snip>

The US military said it had been acting on intelligence gathered following the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, in a US air strike on June 7. It said it arrested other suspects at the mufti's home.

The Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars said that Sheikh Jamal was taken into custody, along with at least two of his sons, in the early hours of Saturday morning following a raid by US forces.

<snip>

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F48406AD-2A31-4866-9451-B15AA11E928E.htm

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The military claimed it didn't know it was the mulfi's home, yet it was acting on "intelligence?" Wouldn't you want to know whose place you were planning to toss?

[OwnedByFerrets]

1. This is bad enough,

but can you imagine the shit-storm if we were to have killed him....or tortured him?

[spindrifter]

2. Our kids would have had to leave

if that had happened. It's bad enough, as it is.

[TomInTib]

3. This is utter bullshit.

I have been involved in military 'extraction' actions and I can assure you that the planning is to the nth degree.

This isn't the DEA kicking in doors in a housing project.

This is a total lie.

By the way, the sheik and his sons were later released once the shit hit the fan.

[spindrifter]

4. But they must have

known the shit would be hitting the fan if they touched the mufti. It's a no-brainer, eh? So what was their point--it's not like they can really afford to piss off the Sunnis over an affront to their religious people.

[TomInTib]

5. I have been giving this some thought.

I suppose it's because I did so much of that shit 'way back when.

Extraction (and that is what this was, not an arrest) is a potentially sensitive operation.

I can only think that they were trying to mollify al-Sadr and his bunch of Shias.

An insane move, in my opinion.

[OwnedByFerrets]

6. I may get flamed for this,

but sometimes I think we give some of our military TOO much credit. This may have been a complete and total fark-up.

[spindrifter]

7. If it was an honest "fark up" they

would have released the guy as soon as the commanding officer found out what had happened, rather than holding him for 7 hours while everyone is screaming for his release.