One more sign that things are going right in Iraq.

In a dramatic turnaround, more than 3,000 Iraqi families driven out of their Baghdad neighborhoods have returned to their homes in the past three months as sectarian violence has dropped, the government said Saturday.

Saad al-Azawi, his wife and four children are among them. They fled to Syria six months ago, leaving behind what had become one of the capital's more dangerous districts — west Baghdad's largely Sunni Khadra region.

The family had been living inside a vicious and bloody turf battle between al-Qaida in Iraq and Mahdi Army militiamen. But Azawi said things began changing, becoming more peaceful, in August when radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his Mahdi Army fighters to stand down nationwide.

About the same time, the Khadra neighborhood Awakening Council rose up against brutal al-Qaida control — the imposition of its austere interpretation of Islam, along with the murder and torture of those who would not comply.

The uprising originated in Iraq's west and flowed into the capital. Earlier this year, the Sunni tribes and clans in the vast Anbar province began their own revolt and have successfully rid the largely desert region of al-Qaida control.

It would appear to me that the Iraqi people are saying NO to the terrorists who have been attempting to bleed them into submission. It would appear to me that this is less a civil war than it is an attempt by outside forces (most al-Qaidas in Iraq are foreigners) to impose something the Iraqi people don't want. And it would appear that the surge has worked -- not that we needed any more evidence to prove that.

So why isn't this front page news in the United States and around the world? Why isn't the truth about the successes in Iraq being trumpeted in the media? And why is one political party in this country still seeking surrender as a strategy for victory at the polls?

And are those things related?

H/T Malkin

Posted by: Greg at 02:31 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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