Southern Tribes Joining Armed Resistance--Dahr Jamail

Tweet BAGHDAD, Jan. 19, 2007(IPS) - Violence is spreading further across Iraq, as Shia Arab tribes in the south begin to engage occupation forces in new armed resistance.

Resistance in the southern parts of Iraq has been escalating over the last three months, leading to increased casualties among British and other occupation forces.
In the last seven months, at least 24 British soldiers have been killed in southern Iraq, with at least as many wounded, according to the independent website Iraq Coalition Casualties. So far at least 128 British soldiers have died in Iraq, along with 123 of other nationalities. Most of these have been stationed in southern Iraq.
Casualties earlier were far lower.
Attacks against occupation forces appear to stem more a growing nationalism.

"This is not about vengeance," a former Iraqi army officer from Kut, 200 km south of Baghdad told IPS in Baghdad. "People have lost hope in the U.S.-led occupation's promises, and they are thinking of saving the country from Iranian influence which has been supported, or at least allowed by the Multi-National Forces."

British and U.S. military leaders tend not to say who has been targeting their forces in the south. They simply call the resistance fighters "terrorists", or they point to the Mehdi Army led by Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr as the only source of disturbance in the south.

While members of the Mehdi Army certainly carry out attacks against occupation forces in southern Iraq, other home-grown resistance seems to have taken root, fed also by earlier memories.

"People here have always hated the U.S. and British occupation of Iraq, and remembered their grandfathers who fought the British troops with the simplest weapons," Jassim al-Assadi, a school headmaster from Kut told IPS on a recent visit to Baghdad.

From Uruknet.info