Iraqi resistance is as popular as the deposed dictator

by Sami Orfali

December 2003

BAGHDAD - On my way back home in al-Masbah area, four young men jumped off their car holding Ak-47 and hand grenades. They were trying to ambush Fadel al-Tamimi, one of the well off personalities living in our neighborhood.

To their surprise, al-Tamimi had his bodyguards on board and both groups engaged in a battle. Assailants looked better trained than the bodyguards and in no time shot dead two of them. The mini battle, which was aimed at robbing the industrialist al-Tamimi, was heard in the neighborhood and attracted a joint force of Iraqi police and American troops.

Once the joint force appeared on the scene, thieves opened fire and engaged in another battle, this time using hand grenades and grenade propellers.

Before killing all four thieves, the Americans had lost one of their men.

Within no time, media learnt of the event and came to the scene. An hour later, the mini war on my house’s doorstep was broadcast on all satellite television channels. The news went as follows: “A group of Iraqi resistance ambushed a joint force of American occupation troops and the Iraqi police and took out one American soldier before all of the Iraqi resistance assailants were shot dead.”

The satellite channel talked to witnesses, who knowing the love of most Iraqis to exaggerate stories, talked about the heroic resistance interception of an American patrol and how Americans, afraid for their lives, shot “in the air and everywhere without differentiation before they killed the four Iraqi martyrs.”

The witness, who happened to be my barber, then gave a lesson in nationalism and how Iraqis wanted to see all occupation forces out of the country. He then showered viewers with complaints about lack of security and lack of electricity and water supply.

The story of four thieves in Baghdad was suddenly transformed into an issue of pan-Arabism and the virtue of martyrdom facing the occupying imperials. The barber, who like all other barbers in Baghdad living under the deposed Iraqi dictator was an officer in the Iraqi intelligence thanks to his profession which made out of him one of the regime’s ears, was lying. And guess what, the world, especially the Arab world, believed him.

Apparently, only al-Tamimi, his bodyguards, his family and my family new that the so-called resistance was in fact part of Baghdad’s organized crime.

Baghdad has become a scary city. On top of it, this organized crime receives the blessings of all anti-American zealots.

Reports about resistance comes almost exclusively from Baghdad, the so-called Sunni triangle and in a few instances, attacks occur in Najaf or in Nassiriyah. Apart from crime which is currently living under the pretext of resistance, other resistance forms involve the usage of mortars, propelled grenades, Sam 7, Katyushas, hand grenades and AK-47.

Under Saddam, the above list of guns was only found in the hands of the army and the Baath militia. Ever since I was born and raised here, I have never heard of a citizen who owned a Katyusha rocket, or for that purpose a Sam 7.

The deposed dictator was always precautious not to arm people whom he feared would topple his regime someday. The only armed people where his loyalists, most of whom are today either involved in sabotage action or organized military operations against Americans.

In areas where Saddam’s loyalists are not found like in southern and northern areas, anti-American military operations are minimal, of course except when an oil carrier explodes in Nassiriyah. Again, a regular citizen cannot afford detonating an oil carrier against Italian troops. Organized groups, who until April 10, 2003, were restricted to Saddam’s supporters, funded the operation.

No matter what you hear on Arab satellite channels, which by the way we abhor to the extent that our interim Governing Council kicked them out of its news conference, reports are false and seem to have been broadcasted as they are on purpose.

One reason behind this false information on the so-called resistance might be that Arab rulers, who own these stations, intend to let pan-Arab and Muslim steam off by depicting Iraq as a resisting nation that should fall on top of all other domestic issues such as freedom of expression.

Until now, resistance has had only one face: A Baathist one. Saddam is now hiding, but the so-called resistance is certainly his style, no matter who some wishful Arab thinking might want to believe otherwise.

Sami Orfali is a Baghdad-based freelance writer and student at the Baghdad University. He wrote this article for Alternative