Use of the term "al-Qaida" for two distinct, different groups creates confusion and fuels the so-called "war on terror". by Dan Clore
(libertarian)
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
AQI Is Not al-Qaida, al-Qaida Is Not in Iraq
by Dan Clore
(I prefer the transliteration "al-Qaida", but when quoting others, I leave the transliteration as they give it.)
John McCain has repeatedly charged that Iran has provided training and support to "al-Qaeda". He has quickly corrected this to simply "extremists" when it has been pointed out to him that al-Qaida is a Sunni group, whereas the Iranians are Shiite.
However, even after making this correction, McCain has allowed another important misidentification to stand, and critics such as Media Matters for America have also not corrected this error.
McCain and many others refer to two separate, different, distinct groups as "al-Qaeda".
The first group is al-Qaida proper -- the group headed by Osama bin Laden, the group that committed 9/11.
The second group is named "al-Qaida in Iraq" or "al-Qaida in Mesopotamia" (hereafter, AQI). This group was founded in October, 2004, as a resistance group against the occupation of Iraq. It was headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi until his death in 2006.
While the two groups are ideologically allied, and have sometimes cooperated with each other, they remain distinct.
The much ballyhooed "contacts" between al-Qaida and the Saddam regime consisted of meetings in which the two considered working together, but decided against it due to their opposed ideologies. (Al-Qaida is fundamentalist Sunni, while Saddam was a secularist, making him an "infidel dog", as Osama bin Laden put it.)
Otherwise, while Saddam Hussein was in power, al-Qaida stayed outside of the areas that he controlled. Records found after the invasion show that Saddam was actively attempting to capture al-Qaida members in order to turn them over to the Bush administration.
Al-Qaida proper, as opposed to AQI, still barely has a presence in Iraq.
When individuals like John McCain refer to "al-Qaeda", they do not mean al-Qaida, but rather AQI. For example, McCain has stated that "Al Qaeda is in Iraq. It's called Al Qaeda in Iraq.'" But contra McCain, AQI is not al-Qaida, and while AQI is in Iraq, al-Qaida is not in Iraq.
For clarity's sake, I suggest referring to al-Qaida as al-Qaida, and referring to al-Qaida in Iraq as AQI.
*****
News & Views for Anarchists & Activists: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo/
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