By Nicolas Rothwell.
The Australian, 24 May 2005.
THE struggle for control of the streets of Baghdad reached new heights yesterday, with US and Iraqi forces sealing off the west of the capital, even as insurgents assassinated the head of counter-terror operations in the new Iraqi Prime Minister's office.
A car bomb was also detonated outside a popular restaurant in northern Baghdad, killing at least three people and injuring more than 70, hospital officials and witnesses said.
The bomb exploded outside the Habayibna restaurant in the Talibia neighbourhood at the time police officers usually meet at the restaurant for lunch.
Al-Qa'ida's wing in Iraq claimed responsibility for the assassination of Wael Rubaie, the new commander of a special operations room recently set up by the Ministry for National Security to co-ordinate the fight against insurgents.
A statement from al-Qa'ida in Iraq said its men shot Major-General Rubaie and his driver dead as they headed to work in central Baghdad.
The slayings follow Sunday's killing of another senior government official, Trade Ministry auditing office chief Ali Moussa.
The joint US-Iraqi operation, the largest yet mounted by the two armies, focused on the crucial airport route, the scene of many attacks on Western convoys.
It netted 285 suspected rebels, and raised hopes that the Iraqi army and police might soon be able to take a greater degree of responsibility for security in the city.
As many as 2500 Iraqis, from four military and three police battalions, were involved in the latest crackdown.
Security remains the key to Iraq's future, and the capital is now once more the chief theatre of the struggle.
With Iraq entering a critical phase of its political development -- as the newly elected Shia-dominated Government takes the reins, and a fresh constitution is drafted -- US planners hope soon to begin the process of transferring authority and control to the Iraqi armed forces.
Australian Defence Minister Robert Hill sounded a similar theme at the weekend when he speculated that Australian troops might no longer be needed in provincial Iraq a year from now.
As part of a concerted riposte to the insurgency, American forces were heavily engaged in the far western Anbar province earlier this month, seeking to disrupt the supply routes from the Syrian border region that provide militant fighters with their recruits and armaments.
The latest Baghdad operation, codenamed Squeeze Play, was designed as a response to the spike in insurgent assaults and suicide attacks across the capital over the month since the new Government was announced. But it also signified the new confidence of Coalition planners that elite local units could take the lead role.
Iraqi troops were deliberately excluded from the Anbar province-based Operation Matador because of fears their involvement would spark protests in the Sunni-populated region and concerns that the new national army, largely recruited from Shia areas, was being used as an inter-ethnic weapon.
Tensions between the Sunni and Shia formations inside Iraq continue to define the nation's politics.
Urgent efforts have been under way to reconcile the two religious groups, after protests last week by Sunnis claiming that fresh attacks were being mounted against them by Shia militias.
Sunni clerics and leaders met at the weekend to try to forge a new political alliance, and co-ordinate a re-entry to Iraqi politics, following their community's widespread boycott of the January free elections.
But the political terrain remains deeply shadowed by the continuing quasi-military contest for control of Iraq.
Citation: Nicolas Rothwell. "Battle for Baghdad Streets," The Australian, 24 May 2005.
Original URL: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,15387299,00.html