Iraqis reclaim Ramadi from insurgents

RAMADI, IRAQ —  They closed down Hissam Hamed’s Internet cafe, told history professor Abid Mohammed how to pray, and killed 16-year-old Ammar Alwani because he scoffed at their religious edicts.

Nearly everyone you talk to in Ramadi has a story about how life under the insurgents calling themselves Al Qaeda in Iraq progressively worsened over the three years they were in control here, finally pushing the residents of this Sunni Triangle city into the unlikely arms of the U.S. military.

When they arrived in the summer of 2003, the Islamic extremists found Ramadi fertile ground for recruits to fight the U.S. Marines and soldiers who had occupied the city after overthrowing Saddam Hussein. Al Qaeda in Iraq even declared an Islamic state of Iraq, with Ramadi its provisional capital.

But over time, the extremists overplayed their hand by imposing strict religious doctrine, hijacking the city government and enforcing a brutal intimidation campaign to keep the locals in line, residents said.

“They killed people right in front of our eyes,” said Sameh Khalif, an apparel merchant on Market Street, referring to insurgents from foreign countries, including Syria, Algeria and Morocco, who flocked to Ramadi.

U.S. Army Lt. Col. Mike Silverman, who commands a unit in charge of northwest Ramadi, permits himself the hope that a corner has been turned here in Al Anbar province, thanks in large part to Al Qaeda in Iraq’s missteps.

“They nearly achieved it, turning Al Anbar into the new Afghanistan,” Silverman said. “But they shot themselves in the foot. Their violent tactics just discredited them further and further.”

‘No friends, no enemies’

Still, no one in the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division, Ramadi’s occupying command, is claiming defeat of Al Qaeda in Iraq, whose strength has ebbed and flowed before.

One Army officer who asked not to be named said neighborhood support could disappear quickly and allegiances shift back to the insurgents if security falters. “The people here reflect what Kissinger said: There are no friends, no enemies. There are only interests.”

U.S. military officers say no neighborhood of Al Anbar was more receptive to the militants than Malaab, an impoverished and orthodox area of Ramadi teeming with unemployed youths. Soon, insurgent fighters were using the neighborhood as a base to store weapons and launch forays against U.S.-led forces, fueling three years of fighting that left much of Malaab in ruins.

“This place was the darkest of the dark,” U.S. Marine Col. Jim Minick said as he led a squad on patrol through newly pacified Malaab.

But the militants’ oppressive tactics and a series of outrages, including the slaying of a wealthy truck fleet owner known for helping neighbors in need, turned many in the neighborhood against Al Qaeda in Iraq.

Nassim Abdullah Saleh, the fleet owner, was kidnapped off the street, led away by masked gunmen and killed in January after word got out he was talking up the Americans.

“They killed the best people,” Khalif said. “We got very angry, but we couldn’t do anything about it because we were afraid.”

Several residents interviewed last week were still mourning the killing of young Alwani. The ambitious 16-year-old was going places in life. But he spoke disdainfully to his classmates of the insurgents’ religious dictates. In February, he was seized while on an errand for his father, taken to a cemetery in the northwest corner of the neighborhood and shot execution-style with four other victims. The killings were recorded on videos and DVDs distributed in the neighborhood as a warning.

“He was a very friendly kid, a real go-getter, and they just lined him up with the others and shot him,” said Attala Turki, an out-of-work engineer. “That’s why we’re tired of the terrorists and ready to accept the Iraqi army and police and the Americans.”

Educators were killed

The militants also targeted Ramadi’s educators, killing several schoolteachers as well as 10 professors at Al Anbar University who refused to teach Sharia, or Islamic law, said Arab history professor Abid Mohammed. As a result, Ramadi’s school system was closed for months because students and teachers were terrified that Al Qaeda would raid classes.

But schools in most of the city have been open since September, officials say, and Mohammed is running a special literacy school for security force recruits working out of the new police station in the Faraj neighborhood.

Young entrepreneur and Internet cafe operator Hamed said Al Qaeda in Iraq threatened to blow up his shop unless he shut down his two computers. “They ruined my income,” Hamed said. “Then suddenly the Iraqi police were here and security has improved, and so I’ve reopened. Of course I support the security forces here.”

That support has been evidenced by a surge in police and army recruits, a downturn in attacks on U.S. forces and a rise in weapons cache recoveries, a cycle fed by improved security. Most insurgents were flushed from Ramadi in 10 U.S.-led military operations between January and mid-April. In its wake, the military left a score of police stations manned by the fresh recruits.

“I couldn’t have joined a year ago. I would have been beheaded,” said police recruit Nasser Ibrahim Hussein, 20, as he stood guard at Ramadi General Hospital.

At the same time, Malaab residents were becoming disaffected, as were other neighborhoods.

Last May, Sheik Hameed Farhan Hays, who heads a tribe on the northern rural fringe of town, told the insurgents that he was arming his own militia to stop them from using his farm to fire mortar rounds at the U.S. forces. The reason: The American forces were firing back with artillery shells that were killing his sheep and endangering his family. The militants responded by burning down the sheik’s house and briefly kidnapping him and two of his sons.

That was the final straw for Hays, who soon would organize a meeting of sheiks to discuss resisting Al Qaeda in Iraq. Among those in attendance was Abu Fahad Jabbar, whose brother had been killed by Al Qaeda for speaking out against the extremists’ extortion practices.

“We found we all had the same sad stories to tell,” Jabbar said. “We started waking up.”

Weeks later, sheiks began spreading the word that it was a matter of honor that tribal youths join the police force, triggering the rush of recruits.

For the moment, at least, residents are breathing a little easier.

“I don’t think the insurgents can come back,” university professor Hassan Raikean said. “Those bad days won’t return because the people have decided they don’t want them.”

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chris.kraul@latimes.com

Kraul was recently on assignment in Ramadi.