Gun Battle with Sunni Arabs in Downtown Baghdad

Juan Cole 03/29/2009

The Shiite government of Iraq arrests Adil Mashhadani, an Awakening Council or Sons of Iraq leader who had turned against the radical Salafi fundamentalists and took a salary from the US to fight them. Then a major gunfight breaks out between the government and armed Sunnis in the Fadil district of Baghdad.

The Nuri al-Maliki government does consider many of the “Sons of Iraq” to be criminals and terrorists and is declining to accept most of them into Iraq’s security forces or army, out of fear of a coup.

Situation not stable.

End/ (Not Continued)

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 and an adjunct professor, Gulf Studies Center, Qatar University. 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