Shiite bombed his own, U.S. says
The following story shows that the U.S. military are fully aware of the use of "false flag" terrorism, particularly when practiced by others than the U.S. The U.S. military does not admit, however, to ever use such methods, regardless of the facts.
Shiite bombed his own, U.S. says
Associated Press, 19 June 2008
The U.S. military said Wednesday that it believed a renegade Shiite militiaman was responsible for a truck bombing that killed 25 people in a Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad, asserting that he was trying to reignite sectarian violence for personal gain.
The allegation pointed to a shift in the Iraq conflict, with the U.S. military increasingly concerned about Iranian-backed Shiite splinter groups as the influence of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a Sunni group, recedes.
No group claimed responsibility for the explosion, which devastated a commercial street in Hurriya, where some of the bloodiest incidents of Shiite-Sunnite slaughter took place in 2006. That fueled speculation that Sunni extremists may have been behind the attack.
But Lieutnant Colonel Steven Stover, a military spokesman, said the U.S. command believed the attack was carried out by a Shiite splinter group led by Haydar Mehdi Khadum al-Fawadi, also known as Haydar al-Majidi, who has been sought for months for kidnapping, murder and other crimes.
"We believe he ordered the attack to incite violence against Sunnis," Stover said in an e-mail, "that his intent was to disrupt Sunni resettlement in Hurriya in order to maintain extortion of real estate rental income to support his nefarious activities."
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Attacks designed to produce large numbers of Shiite civilian casualties are the hallmark of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia (…)