Word: sheikhs
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First, there are the American soldiers, a platoon, which in this case is about 30 men in four Stryker vehicles. Second, the concerned local citizens (CLCs), a neighborhood watch consisting of armed men - all in plainclothes, many overweight - appointed by Sheikh Ali, a Tony Soprano-type character the Americans have come to rely on to keep the peace. The CLCs have been key to America's new "surge" strategy in Iraq...
...Mohammad rhetorically. "Every 100 meters there is a checkpoint for a different group: Iraqi police, Pesh Merga, Badr corps. Most Iraqis have two ID's, one [so they can pass for Shi'ite] and one [so they can pass for Sunni]." The checkpoints serve at least one purpose, says Sheikh Ali, the Shi'ite CLC Godfather of Saha market: the guards burn the neighborhood's trash at night to keep warm. "The goats are starting to complain about that," he jokes...
...Sheikh Ali is sitting in a cafe with U.S. Army Captain Kevin Wynes, a civil affairs officer assigned to the 2-2 Stryker Cavalry Regiment in southern Baghdad. Wynes is on his third tour in Iraq and he tells Sheikh Ali that they are partners in defeating the militants and reconstructing the neighborhood. Says Wynes: "We've been partners from the beginning and we'll be partners until the end." Sheikh Ali smiles and nods and tells the bright-eyed and chiseled-jawed Wynes: "Yes - and when we occupy America we'll be partners in your neighborhood...
Relieved, I handed the flag to an old man in the crowd - he was dressed like a tribal sheikh and had a kindly, weathered face. Through my translator, I told him that the flag belonged to Iraq, not Saddam. The old man turned to his neighbors and had a quick, whispered conversation. Then he gave the flag back to me. "You saved the flag," he said, in Arabic. "So you should have...
...case of Sheikh al-Shuhaib, he and the village's other families - all Shi'ite Muslims - had been kicked out in November 2006 by al-Qaeda fighters, who commandeered the sheikh's house, using it as their headquarters until they were routed by American firepower this past August. Now, after filing a claim with the U.S., he has come back to retake his property and to rebuild. The sheikh is confident that he will get the help he needs from the U.S.: "I do trust [the Americans] helping me rebuilding my house and my village again, and they will...