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Iraqi Exiles In Syria Fomenting

Juan Cole 10/02/2003

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Iraqi Exiles in Syria Fomenting Violence?

A Kurdish commander associated with Masoud Barzani has charged that some high ranking Iraqi Baath officials had escaped over the border into Syria, and that they were directing attacks on US troops from there. (-al-Hayat) This story strikes me as a little unlikely. How exactly are they communicating with guerrillas still inside Iraq from Damascus? Why would Syria risk making itself a target by allowing all this? It is also very odd that this story was broken just as Barzani went to Damascus for consultations with Bashar al-Asad. It may be that it doesn’t really come from Barzani’s camp, and that a rival is trying to make sure Barzani’s name is mud in Damascus, lest he pick up political patronage from there. Or maybe Barzani is letting Bashar know he can make trouble for him witht eh Americans. The report may be true, it is just that it isn’t obviously so, and their are weird aspects of it.

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About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

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