Iraq Sunnis Not Voting was a mistake

[LostInSpace]

Excerpt: "We made a big mistake when we didn't vote," said Sheik Hathal Younis Yahiya, 49, a representative from northern Nineveh. "Our votes were very important."

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Sunnis Seek Place in New Iraqi Government

By PATRICK QUINN

Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- U.S. Marines and Iraqi security forces launched an offensive Sunday against insurgents in troubled cities west of Baghdad after two days of carnage that left nearly 100 people dead. Sunni Muslim tribal leaders met to determine their place in a Shiite-dominated Iraqi government.

As the Shiite majority prepared to take control of the country's first freely elected government, tribal chiefs representing Sunni Arabs in six provinces issued a list of demands - including participation in the government and drafting a new constitution - after previously refusing to acknowledge the vote's legitimacy.

"We made a big mistake when we didn't vote," said Sheik Hathal Younis Yahiya, 49, a representative from northern Nineveh. "Our votes were very important."

He said threats from insurgents - not sectarian differences - kept most Sunnis from voting.

Sunnis make up 20 percent of Iraq's population of 26 million compared to the Shiite's 60 percent.

Gathering in a central Baghdad hotel, about 70 tribal leaders from the provinces of Baghdad, Kirkuk, Salaheddin, Diyala, Anbar and Nineveh, tried to devise a strategy for participation in a future government. There was an air of desperation in some quarters of the smoke-filled conference room.

"When we said that we are not going to take part, that didn't mean that we are not going to take part in the political process. We have to take part in the political process and draft the new constitution," said Adnan al-Duleimi, the head of Sunni Endowments in Baghdad.

Just west of the capital, U.S. Marines and Iraqi security forces launched a joint operation to crack down on insurgents and terrorists in several troubled cities, the military said.

The operation was underway in several Euphrates River cities in Anbar province, including Heet, Baghdad, Hadithah and the provincial capital Ramadi, where authorities imposed a nighttime curfew, the military said.

Meanwhile, a powerful Sunni organization believed to have ties with the insurgents sought Sunday to condemn the weekend attacks that left nearly 100 Iraqis dead.

"We won't remain silent over those crimes which target the Iraqi people Sunnis or Shiites, Islamic or non-Islamic," Sheik Harith al-Dhari, of the Association Muslim Scholars, told a news conference.

Iraqis, he said, should unite "against those who are trying to incite hatred between us."

They include Iraq's leading terror mastermind, the Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. In a letter to Osama bin Laden found on a captured al-Qaida courier last year, al-Zarqawi proposed starting a civil war between Iraq's Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

Shiites and their clergy-backed United Iraqi Alliance, which received nearly half the election votes, were to decide in coming days on their choice for prime minister.

The two main candidates so far are the former Pentagon favorite Ahmad Chalabi, a secular Shiite, and Ibrahim al-Jaafari, the interim vice president.

Chalabi last week claimed in an Associated Press interview that he had enough support among the 140 alliance delegates elected to the National Assembly to beat Jaafari. He repeated the assertion in an appearance Sunday on ABC's "This Week" television show with George Stephanopoulos.

"I believe I have a majority of the votes on my side right now," Chalabi said.

Shiite politicians have promised not to allow Friday and Saturday's bloodshed escalate into a civil war.

A radical Shiite cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr, who led two bloody revolts against U.S. forces, called on Iraqis' to avoid blaming any religious group.

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Associated Press reporters Maggie Michael and Sinan Salaheddin, in Baghdad, contributed to this report.

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[Guest Remo Williams]

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Where & when have ever sunni, christian, turkmenes, kurds & shia gone along well ? This would require a maturity that I don't see yet.

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They get along fairly well here in the states without anymore conflict than any other social group in this great racial mixing pot we call America.

[Guest DocHoliday]

Hey Remo

Yugoslavia (my ex-country) was thought to be a great melting pot of Christians, Muslims, Orthodox, Gipsy and many other smaller religions/culture and the thing blew up like a crate of TNT..

Even the US isn't as strong in this as I'd like to believe. One wrong event and it can all go to hell.. Like LA (when was it, 20 years ago?) or the civil war 150 years ago.. Usually there were economic and racial issues, but if you vector in religious agendas.. *brr*

I'm affraid it's just a time-bomb.. The cultures of Yugoslavia lived here long before Yugoslavia existed, long before even the US even and they still clashed, when the proper nationalistic "buttons were pushed"... I mean there were mixed couples, families, whole generations of interrelated cultures and they eagerly slaugthered eachother like animals at the onset of 21st century.

You can probably imagine yourself what the "right" buttons for Americans to explode would be.... I can't say I can, but I'm sure there are many. So I'd like to share your faith in this, but can't.