Fallujah Strikes Back

Here’s some good news from Fallujah of all places.

BAGHDAD, Iraq – In an extraordinary assault, gunmen in the city of Fallujah stormed a kidnappers’ lair and forced the overmatched militants inside to flee, freeing four Jordanian truck drivers held captive, local officials said Wednesday.

Notice how the journalist uses the word “militants” to denote the kidnappers. This old and silly game is shown to be the farce it is in the very next paragraph.

They [the Iraqis] called the kidnappers “terrorists” and outsiders.

The word terrorist appears in quotation marks. Now, granted, the word was an actual quote. The punctuation doesn’t have a sneer on its face in this particular case. Still, if Iraqi leaders in Fallujah are calling these punks a bunch of terrorists I’ve got to wonder who the Associated Press is worried about “offending” with this supposedly loaded and controversial noun.
Oh, and just for the record, this hostage rescue wasn’t carried out by the army. The anti-terrorists in this particular battle were ordinary Iraqis – basically a posse of pissed-off locals.

Sheik Haj Ibrahim Jassam, a tribal leader, said he received word late Tuesday that the men were being held in a house on the edge of the city. Local leaders gathered together armed residents, who raided the house, freeing the hostages and chasing out the kidnappers, he said.

This is huge. Terrorists are now getting their asses kicked by the locals in the biggest hotbed of violent activity in Iraq. They are not Mao’s famous fish who swim in the “sea” of the people. They are hunted by the people.