'You must leave in 24 hours or your heads will be cut, your houses burnt'

[TexasLawyer]

December 09, 2006


http://images.thetimes.co.uk/TGD/picture/0,,373185,00.jpg
Relatives of four Shia victims who were killed
in a mortar attack gather in Baghdad for their
funeral procession (Hadi Mizban/AP)

'You must leave in 24 hours or your heads will be cut, your houses burnt'

Ned Parker, Baghdad

One Shia family saw their neighbours flee, one by one. They stayed - until the al-Qaeda death threat finally landed on the doorstep

The three Azzawi brothers, Hussein, Qadam and Ali, loved their home. Their late father had picked the two-storey villa because it was big enough for his sons to marry and raise children in. He hoped that they would always live there.

That dream ended with a letter, dumped after dark on the Azzawis’ doorstep. The death threat was organised like a business memorandum, with the helpful heading “Subject: displacement”.

It read: “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. You should leave the Sunni areas, including Ghazaliyah, within 24 hours. Otherwise your heads will be cut, your houses and furniture will be burnt just as the militias have done to the Sunnis . . . Signed: al-Qaeda in the land of two rivers and the Mujahidin Shura Council.”

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,175-2494987,00.html

[aquart]

1. So al qaida identifies itself as a Sunni organization.

Figures, since they're Saudi.

[TexasProgresive]

2. They've always been ID'd as a Sunni group.

Most Muslims are Sunni.