In the Iraq edition, the front-page story of Az-Zaman was on the “discovery of Iranian weapons” in a hideout in Ba'quba, following a raid by security forces. According to the Iraqi daily, the raid revealed Iranian-made IEDs that are fitted with shaped charges capable of penetrating armored vehicles. According to the American Army, these potent explosive devices were responsible for the death of over 170 American soldiers since 2004. It should also be pointed out that, according to military experts, armor-piercing explosives do not require a high level of technological proficiency, and that they can be, and have been, manufactured locally in Iraq.
The newspaper said that the American army presented these weapons as “a new proof” of Iranian involvement in arming Iraqi groups. The daily also quoted Mouaffac al-Rubai'i, the national security advisor, who stated that Iranian support for Iraqi militias has diminished in the past weeks.
Az-Zaman’s international edition gave an even more sensational coverage to the story. In the London edition, instead of speaking of abstract “armed groups,” the daily specified “Shi'a militias, whose parties participate in the government” as the beneficiaries of Iranian support. As to the location in which the weapons were discovered, Az-Zaman International said that the village is “considered a haven for the Mahdi Army.” The London-based daily also said that the raiding units found enough material to manufacture 150 anti-armor IEDs in the hideout, which is not too far from the Iranian borders.
Al-Mada covered the same story in its inside pages, but without a mention of the Iranian connection. The paper simply stated that the village that was raided was a Shi'a one.
In addition to the story on the Iranian weapons, Az-Zaman (international edition) devoted the rest of its front-page story to a report by the right-wing Jamestown Foundation on “(the Iranian) participation in formenting sectarian confrontations in Iraq.” Among the charges leveled in the report, it was alleged that over 5,000 apartments and residences are used as “safe houses” for Iranian operatives in multiple cities in Iraq.
Al-Mada’s front-page coverage was centered on the state of health of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani. The newspaper did not hold back in terms of expressing sympathy with the ailing president. In addition to the front-page story dedicated to his health, and assuring the readers of his “stable” condition, the daily published a “letter” in its front page from “the family of Al-Mada” wishing good health to “Mam Jalal” (“uncle Jalal”, as Talabani is endearingly called among his supporters) and recounting his admirable qualities.
Such displays of hagiographic rhetoric to persons in power may sit uneasily with the ideal of a free and critical press. But another question is: If Talabani is, as the newspaper asserted, “in very good health” and “stable condition”, and suffers of no serious ailments, why all the concern on the part of the newspaper?
Lastly, the Iraqi academic Falih 'abd al-Jabbar wrote an article in the government-owned Al-Sabah al-Jadeed warning against the flight of the urban middle class from Iraq. The emigration of the educated and the skilled from the country, 'abd al-Jabbar argued, follows a more basic need than economic opportunity or future prospects, instead, middle-class Iraqis are leaving in order to save their lives.
'Abd al-Jabbar believes that this loss is irreparable, since most of the émigrés will probably never return. The analysis takes a more sinister approach when 'abd al-Jabbar establishes a formula of “quality vs. quantity” among Iraqis. The major problematic for 'abd al-Jabbar is that “authentically urban” Iraqis are being replaced by “rural” ones who are now flooding the cities. These newcomers, whom the author refers to as “the marginal and migrant groups,” carry in them the seeds of social ills, they are “pre-modern”, their society is “closed,” “hierarchical” and “has a strong tendency towards violence,” according to 'Abd al-Jabbar.
Aside from the classist generalizations contained in the argument (whether regarding the “modernity” of city-dwellers, or the destructive effects of rural-to-urban migration), the author disregards the fact that most cities in the Global South have witnessed the same dynamics in terms of a sharp rise in the urban population; what distinguishes one experience from another is not the “quality” of urban residents, but the conditions in which they are integrated into society, and the quality of the state that is charged with building their social and educational infrastructure. Most importantly, such an analysis that “ranks” the “quality” of the population allows us to blame the spread of murderous sectarianism and increased violence on the sociological make-up of Iraq, and prevents us from investigating the institutions of political patronage that were built over the last years, fixing the livelihood and political identity of Iraqis –- almost exclusively -- around their sectarian belongings.
