Middle East Leadership, Succinctly: “The fact that they hate his guts is immaterial………”
“In an interview with The Christian Science Monitor at his mountaintop headquarters in northern Iraq, Kurdish President Massoud Barzani described Ninevah governor Atheel al-Nujaifi as a "criminal" and said a warrant would be issued for his arrest in connection with an incident this month involving U.S. forces. He also said Nujaifi had failed to secure the provincial capital of Mosul. Mr. Barzani offered to bring up to 2,000 Christian university students from the troubled city to Kurdistan to continue their studies. At least eight Christians have been killed in the last two weeks in Mosul in the latest wave of attacks on minorities………….The Kurdish government has taken in thousands of Christians who have fled their homes in Mosul. "This also shows the incompetence of the local government in Mosul," said Barzani……… "He is the governor - as much as they hate his guts, he is the governor," said one senior U.S. military official speaking on condition of anonymity. "The fact that they hate his guts is immaterial."…....”
That last statement pretty much describes most our regional leaders, dictators and absolute monarchs. It also succinctly describes US and other Western attitudes toward them. Succinctly: I haven’t used this succinct term much since graduate school; my excellent Linear Programming professor (Prof. Vandermeulen) used it a lot after he filled the blackboard with a system of almost a hundred equations. I intend to use it more often.
Mosul has historically been a hotbed of (Sunni) Arab rough politics. The terrorists, very likely al-Qaeda Salafis and allies, may see the Christians as simply easy targets, and heathens to boot.
Cheers
mhg
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