On September 7, two Italian women, Simona Toretta and Simona Pari, along with two Iraqis, Mahnouz Bassam and Raad Ali Abdul Azziz, were abducted by a large squad of armed men. There is serious reason to suspect we have not been given the Straight Dope on who did this and why.
Supposedly an Iraqi insurgent group claimed responsibility, but they did it on an internet forum and used a name no one had heard of before. The kidnappers seized Mahnouz Bassam by dragging her by her headscarf, which is a religious abomination in Islam and frankly out of character for any Islamist to do.
The Italian women were humanitarians working for Bridge to Baghdad, the longest-standing antiwar group in Iraq, which had been there since the aftermath of the first Gulf War. Simona Toretta had worked in Baghdad since 1996. They had been bringing humanitarian aid, food, water, medical supplies to Fallujah and were planning to go back there. They had strongly opposed the Italian right-wing prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s participation in the Iraq invasion. Shaykh ‘Abdul Salam al-Kubaisi is a leader of Sunni clerics and had met with Toretta the day before she was abducted. She told him she was feeling threatened by “foreign intelligence.”
All the other kidnappings in Iraq have been done by small groups with their faces hidden who seized people from the road. This abduction was different. It was done by a large group of clean-shaven men with their faces exposed, wearing suits and carrying sophisticated weapons not known to be available to Iraqi insurgents. Unlike the other abductions, these men went to the residence of the Italian women and walked around asking specifically for their location. The abduction squad stopped traffic outside the building and some were heard to say that they worked for the prime minister ‘Allawi.
The question that should be asked is who stands to gain from this abduction of people who opposed the invasion and occupation? This abduction has none of the hallmarks of kidnappings by the resistance. It looks more like the “disappearance” of opponents of the government.
The two Simonas were released unharmed, grazie alla Dea. They flew back to Italy. I thought today’s story in the Washington Post was interesting for what it didn’t tell. It omitted any mention of who their captors might have been, what their captivity was like, or what led to their release.
I had to go to Democracy Now! to get more on the story. Apparently Berlusconi paid ransom (rumored to be one million dollars), but he evades talking about it. The two Italian women were kept blindfolded the whole time, so they know little about who abducted and held them. My heart sank when I heard rumors the other day that they’d been put to death. I’m very glad they’re home safe, but the two Iraqis who were abducted along with them have been ignored by the media. What about them?
I’m very glad they’re home–if there ever was a kidnapping that was totally unjustified and morally bankrupt, this was it. However, the idea of paying ransom bugs me too because of the precedent.
I’m not sure it’s that weird. The kidnapers pretended they belonged to the police, so that could be what witnesses have heard. And apparently, they weren’t taken by an islamist group, but by ordinary criminals who intended to ask for a ransom. At least, that’s how I understand this event.
I’m seconding clairobscur. Considering how common kidnappings like this are in some parts of Italy and how they are governed by certain rules I’m not surprised Berlusconi paid the ransom with full expectation of getting the people back. That’s how the game is played and I wouldn’t be surprised if this isn’t the first time he’s played it. On either side.
Anybody can put up a website, just the same as anybody can invent a name.
I did not followed this case, so I don’t know if what you write here happened like you describe (letting out the clear fact that nobody can know this except those directly involved) but let me for the sake of the argument suppose that it happened like this, and that the two women are not Muslim.
Then I understand perfectly why the kidnappers would not respect the hidjab of someone they see as only wearing a scarf because it is some sort of local folklore = They could have taken it as if the women were only wearing a scarf to “fit in”, hence without any religious conviction behind it. I can imagine people to take this as an insult, some sort of mocking with Islam instead of respecting it. So then you see them tearing it of to “expose the deceivers” and to make clear they can’t “fool” them.
By the way: When it comes to kidnapping in Iraq, it has not that much relations with “Islamists” as it has with all sorts of people who take advantage of/are fed up with/are directly touched by the mess the USA created in Iraq, and this for a variety of reasons and goals.
I would say that you have there now 5 main categories :
Those the CIA wants to link by all means to Al Zarkawi, while nobody even knows if this person is even still alive (or if he even really existed under that name or at all, but that is an other matter).
Foreigners who still come across the leak borders of Iraq, following the calls for “Jihad” and “Death to the Satan” . Which does not even need to be heard from some central “authority” (= organized group).
The real opposition to the occupation of Iraq. These people can be inspried by religious motives but their motives are just as much politcal inspired, and this in combination with hate for the invaders and wanting them out of their country. The popping up of the Mahdi army belongs to this group, yet it also belongs to the next one.
You can see singular people who are so fed up with the whole mess (or have seen relatives die or have family that was humilated by the US Cowboys or tortured or they themselves where humilated or tortured, whatever) and who gather some similar feeling people. And there you have already yet an other group who can create a bit of local chaos and do some attacking and eventually killing.
You have the criminals who made it their habit to abduct people as soon ans the Iraqi society got disrupted by the war. Among them are most certainly criminals Hussein released (most certaily with theintention to create chaos). They started with terrorizing the population and with abducting common Iraqis (and children) from whom they thought they had some money to pay ransom. It did not take long before they saw the much greater potential in abducting foreigners and asking ransom.
(Of course you can have a mix of a few of these 5 groups or of all of them.)
In my opinion the Italian women got abducted by people you can classify under group 5.
Like I said: I didn’t follow this case. Yet from what I heard of it so far, it is said that this stunt did not land well among the common Iraqi population. They did not make themselves popular with abducting this women.
About the rest of your reporting on the case, I don’t know (but that Allawi is a gangster in addition to being a US puppet is not something new).
Salaam. A
Oh Forgot: You have of course also the Baathists, the former army and the former police force who surely instigate and favour one and an other.
But since the Great US Leader had the Most Brilliant Idea fo the Century by dismantling/make jobless the Iraqi army, police force and everyone who was “Baathist” (= in name the entire population, in fact) it is a bit difficult to even get an idea who in reality could instigate or lead what and where.
So I placed these people in my thoughts under groups 3 and 4.
(I really should learn to think “US/CIA” and give everything the desired label.)
On BBC radio I heard one of the reporters suggesting that the most of the kidnappings are now being done by criminals who “sell on” their captives to whichever group stumps up the most - so pretending to be policemen (common IIRC in places like Algeria) or not observing islamic codes doesn’t seem odd, after all do you expect crims in christian countries to stick to christian rules?
Which corroborates the point I was making, that we aren’t being told the whole truth about exactly what is going on there. If anybody does know, they aren’t telling.