Here it is, and it is a real headline:
Thousands Returning to a Safer Baghdad
Boy, libs like Jeff who and the MSM who cherry pick numbers will surely just skip over this bit of news...but maybe that is why we are nominated in the weblog awards. We don't let this stuff slip into that good night, we report it:
From Fox News:
BAGHDAD — 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 Qaeda 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 Qaeda 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 Qaeda control.
At one point the terrorist group virtually controlled Anbar, often with the complicity of the vast Sunni majority who welcomed the outsiders in their fight against American forces.
But, U.S. officials say, Al Qaeda overplayed its hand with Iraq's Sunnis, who practice a moderate version of Islam. American forces were quick to capitalize on the upheaval, welcoming former Sunni enemies as colleagues in securing what was once the most dangerous region of the country.
And as 30,000 additional U.S. forces arrived for the crackdown in Baghdad and central Iraq, the American commander, Gen. David Petraeus, began stationing many of them in neighborhood outposts. The mission was not only to take back control but to foster neighborhood groups like the one in Khadra to shake off Al Qaeda's grip.
Betray-us? Nope, fighting for us. The only betrayers are those who put forth and support such crap, and cherrypick statistics for their own sorry gain. God bless our troops and let's pray for continued progress, not for the sake of a political party, but for the sake of freedom for the oppressed and the safety of our men and women in uniform.
