Islam was born in the desert. Thus the modern, Western notion that “deserted” and desolate regions are “safe” should be adjusted in regards to the habitation of Islamic terrorists.
“Al-Qaeda desert base looks abandoned, but is it?” from AFP, October 18:
AL-UDAIM DESERT, Iraq (AFP) “” Wrecks of old vehicles. Passing Bedouins herding emaciated goats. And as far as the eye can see, a dusty, beige, lunar landscape.
The Al-Udaim desert is one of the last refuges in Iraq of Al-Qaeda fighters, who the US army and Iraqi authorities say are increasingly on the defensive.[…]
“They are finished, period. The ones who haven’t been killed are in disarray. The last ones are wandering hungry in the desert,” Colonel Mohammed Khaled Abdelhamid, chief of police in Dhuluiyah, told AFP.
The “Arab” fighters, a reference to the non-Iraqi fighters who spread terror in the region and have assassinated hundreds of civilians [i.e., jihadists], have gone away, Abdelhamid says.
Their local supporters, once very numerous, are keeping quiet, waiting for better days.
Waiting for the Medinan days, so they can implement the verses revealed during that period of Islamic superiority, i.e., the good old days when subjugating infidels, without any apologetics, was feasible.
“The only one left is him”, the police chief said, calling up on his mobile phone a picture of a smiling 30-year old in Arab head-dress — Khaled Habib al-Juburi, the last local Al-Qaeda leader known to be still alive.
A visit to Al-Udaim still involves an impressive escort of around a dozen Hummer vehicles, each crowned with a 14.5 mm machine gun.
Only two months ago, however, the district was completely inaccessible. Al-Qaeda fighters had made it their holiday camp, a little “caliphate” serving as a rest and recuperation centre, though many of their victims ended up abandoned to the vultures.[…]
“The last time I saw men from Al-Qaeda go by was two months ago,” said Salah Saif Iasem, his tanned skin contrasting with the immaculate white of his dishdasha robe.
“They leave us in peace,” the Bedouin added. Have the jihadists really been “wiped out” as the authorities claim? “I don’t think they’ve gone very far…”