A blogger from Iraq reports on the Rashomon-like stew of different conflicting stories from this weekend's incident in Najaf. The "insurgents" are variously Baathists, Salafists, and splinter Shites. All these stories are rather wild, to put things mildly, and contradict each other aggressively on numerous easy-to-determine factual points, and come from sources with axes to grind.
However, he emphasizes one internet rumour. While not yet sourced, the rumour is by far the most plausible. In a nutshell, SCIRI (the main Iranian-affiliated faction) attacked a group of pilgrims, from a tribe politically opposed to SCIRI, at a checkpoint. The pilgrims fought back and SCIRI called in American airstrikes. A cult leader was indeed there but he was just going to Najaf for the annual mourning of Iman Hussein's death.
If true, we have reached the (predicatable) denoument of Bush's Iraq misadventure. Our troops are being used to kill Iraqi civilians whose only "crime" is political oppposition to the Iranian-affiliated government Bush is propping up. There's nothing for us to do and it's time to go home.
Some examples of the hopeless stew of inconsistencies in the stories:
The Iraqi Health Minister’s account: . The group’s military commander was killed in the battle and he was identified as Dhiaa’ Abdul Zahra Kadhim, a man from Hilla.
The Iraqi News Agency quotes an unnamed Iraqi security source that the group’s leader is Ahmed Kadhim Al-Gar’awi Al-Basri (Ahmed Hassan Al-Basri), born 1969
Deputy Governor of Najaf Abdul Hussein Abtan (SCIRI): The deputy governor first said the group’s leader was a Lebanese national, but later he identified him as Dhiaa’ Abdul Zahra Kadhim, from Hilla.
Najaf Governor As’ad Abu Gilel (SCIRI): "The group was led by a man named Ali bin Ali bin Abi Talib. "
Another unnamed captain in the Iraqi Army, quoted by Buratha News Agency: “The leader who was killed claimed he was the Mahdi. He is in his forties and is from Diwaniya.”
Colonel Ali Jiraiw, spokesman for the Najaf police, quoted by the Guardian: "The group is led by Sheikh Ahmed Hassan Al-Yamani,"
I'd also break out the similar inconsistencies on the motivations of the group, but I don't want to run afoul of fair use. It's pretty clear, whatever actually happened, that the group was attacked basically by accident and that nobody knew what it was. The authorities responsible for the attack are spinning wild stories, hoping one will be close enough to the truth to cover their sorry asses. The numerous accounts in the media of numerous women and children among the dead and wounded, supposedly helping "provide cover" just depress me even more and incline me to think that, as reported in the online rumor, it was an accidental attack on a group of (mostly) innocent pilgrims.