Article

2004-08-20 Iraq-Jordan

Iraqi soccer players angered by Bush campaign ads

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Posted by peggy 2004-08-20 11:05|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Guys like this don't deserve anything good to happen for them.

Do not cast pearls before swine......

Posted by peggy 2004-08-20 11:15:45 AM|| 2004-08-20 11:15:45 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 peggy: Guys like this don't deserve anything good to happen for them. Do not cast pearls before swine......

What would you expect from a bunch of Baathists? Note that the article said Iraqi soccer players, with the implication that all Iraqi soccer players think this way. But the reality is that only 3 of 22 are actually quoted, without any direct statement of what the rest of them think. Sounds like the reporter was fishing for something negative, and found his quotes of the day.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-08-20 11:21:26 AM|| [http://www.polipundit.com] 2004-08-20 11:21:26 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 This is like another of those really tight camera angles where they shoot a photo such that twenty or thirty demonstrators fill up most of a photograph. The two dozen people are deliberately shown without any background scenery, which might reveal how few the demonstrators really are. That's essentially what this story is. Note that 3 out of 22 are interviewed, and the implication is that their views are widely echoed by their teammates. But do all 22 think this? And what about the backstory? Were only dedicated Baathists allowed on the soccer team? How is it that these guys are so well-fed and -trained? Could it be that they were involved in some of Saddam's atrocities when they weren't on the soccer field, and earned their privileges in this manner?

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-08-20 11:22:46 AM|| [http://www.polipundit.com] 2004-08-20 11:22:46 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 The article does more than imply, it says outright that to a man they think along similar lines. Of course that could be a outright distortion but when was the last time you read an article in which 22 people were quoted?? There is just as much a chance that the reporter actually interviewed all the players as there is that he just assumed their opinions.

But that said, I don't really care if it was just one player on that team who felt this way. I just can't fathom the depth of the ingratitude of these men, who spit on their freedom and their ability to play in the Olympics without fear of torture. I don't care if its just one who wishes he could be killing our soldiers instead of playing soccer. Its just sickening that even one person like that gets to enjoy a freedom bought with the lives of 1000 of our soldiers.

I know there much I can do about it except to let people know whats going on. If I was in a position of any kind of power, the guy who wants to be part of the "resistance" in Fallujah would be given his wish. I would eject him from the Games for his murderous comments, he'd be fined in poverty and he would have no other sporting option except to join his bruddas in the "run away" footraces in Sadr City.

F-ing jerk!

Posted by peggy 2004-08-20 11:40:26 AM|| 2004-08-20 11:40:26 AM|| Front Page Top

#5 peggy: The article does more than imply, it says outright that to a man they think along similar lines. Of course that could be a outright distortion but when was the last time you read an article in which 22 people were quoted??

I think the reporter is lying. It would be nice to have another source for this report, which was written by either Reuters or AFP, not Sports Illustrated.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-08-20 1:05:02 PM|| [http://www.polipundit.com] 2004-08-20 1:05:02 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 It would be nice to have another source for this report, which was written by either Reuters or AFP, not Sports Illustrated
Say what? I thought Reuters and AFP were considered left leaning biased MSM and now you are saying they are legitimate news sources??? If anything, a Sports Illustrated reporter would be less politically motivated and therefore, less likely to lie.

Unfortunately, ZH, you are avoiding recognizing the obvious. Apart from the Kurds, the majority of Sunni/Shiite Iraqis put tribal and religious membership as high priorities re: their loyalty and gratitude. They are Arab Muslims. We are infidel occupiers. End of story.

Smell the coffee, ZH. It's embaressing to read that a smart guy like you is grasping for straws. Peggy's #4 rebuttal post is spot on.

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 1:27:49 PM|| 2004-08-20 1:27:49 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 IraqtheModel doubts the balance of the reporting and points out the following pic:

Posted by Mercutio 2004-08-20 2:35:46 PM|| 2004-08-20 2:35:46 PM|| Front Page Top

#8 OK, so I never learned how to work the link function......

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/040813/483/olymos23008132026

Posted by Mercutio 2004-08-20 2:36:32 PM|| 2004-08-20 2:36:32 PM|| Front Page Top

#9 rex: I thought Reuters and AFP were considered left leaning biased MSM and now you are saying they are legitimate news sources???

Sports Illustrated sourced this report from AFP or Reuters. I recall having read and dismissed the same exact report yesterday, before SI bought it from one news agency or the other.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-08-20 2:41:10 PM|| [http://www.polipundit.com] 2004-08-20 2:41:10 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 I googled for this news story from Reuters and AFP today, but have not been able to find it. I suspect it's been withdrawn because it is false. Note that Time Warner owns both SI and CNN.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-08-20 2:55:08 PM|| [http://www.polipundit.com] 2004-08-20 2:55:08 PM|| Front Page Top

#11 What I find curious about this story is that it is reported as having being conducted by SI, when in fact it is a Reuters or AFP story that appears to have been pulled. (It appeared on the front page of Yahoo - then on CNN two days later).

Posted by Zhang Fei 2004-08-20 3:06:54 PM|| [http://www.polipundit.com] 2004-08-20 3:06:54 PM|| Front Page Top

#12 ...Sadir told SI.com through a translator, speaking calmly and directly.
I am not sure that SI used secondary sources for this interview, ZF.

Furthermore, the comments from the 2 named lead Iraqi soccer players and the soccer coach were pretty nasty anti-American, so it would seem to me that these sentiments are pretty representative of the team's mindset.

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 4:13:39 PM|| 2004-08-20 4:13:39 PM|| Front Page Top

#13 Well, a picture of Iraqi athletes with American ones does not mean that they would do the same for our soldiers or the president that liberated them. Outside the US, people constantly make distinctions between the American people and our govt and soldiers as if that made their thinking any less wrongheaded.

But I am very curious to hear about the story being pulled. I found it no trouble this morning. So are you thinking what I am thinking that it was put out there as a dirty trick to undermine Bush taking credit for the two teams participation?

I can't believe that i fell for it (although I didn't blame Bush for it) I guess it was the fact that it was too believable coming from Arabs and also because it was in SI. I actually remember dimissing the possibility that they would have any leftie agenda because they are a sports mag but I didn't even think to suspect the CNN connection. That was pretty clever of them. I feel like a sucker right now.

Its just my luck. The first article I post turns out to be a hoax.

Posted by peggy 2004-08-20 4:24:50 PM|| 2004-08-20 4:24:50 PM|| Front Page Top

#14 But I am very curious to hear about the story being pulled.
This SI article is not a hoax, nor were other similar articles "pulled." Just google the key players' or coach's name + Bush and you will get hits that are consistent with the sentiments expressed in the SI article that was posted here, if all you want to do is read additional news stories-sheesh-talk about paranoid conspiracy theories.

Here's one from the BBC-hey, you asked for it-:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3584242.stm
"Iraqi footballers' fury at Bush" August 20, 2004
Iraq's successful Olympic football team has launched an outspoken attack on US President George W Bush. Midfielder Salih Sadir said the team - which won its group stage in Greece - was angry it had been used in Mr Bush's re-election campaign ads.

One accused the US leader of committing "many crimes", and another said he would be fighting US troops if not for Athens.

Their comments were made in a US Sports Illustrated magazine interview. ...
BLAH, BLAH, BLAH...

As well, there were other stories published on 8/12 and 8/13 right after the Iraqi vistory over the Portuguese team and the Iraqi coach made similar anti-American comments as was quoted in the SI article. Here's a sample from Time:
http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,681448,00.html
''A huge victory for Iraq"
...But post-game, thoughts of home dampened the mood. âWe are worried for our families,â says Adnan Hamad Majeed, the Iraqi coach. Weeks after the team qualified for the Olympics, former Coalition Provisional Authority chief Paul Bremer flew into the gutted Peopleâs Stadium in Baghdad for a photo op with the team. âIraq is back,â he kept chanting. Majeed had no use for Bremer that day, or any others â he thinks Iraqi life was better before the American invasion. âNo one is happy in Iraq,â he says. âAll the people are afraid of everything. Theyâre afraid to walk their children to school.â

and
http://www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/sports/special_packages/olympics/9385821.htm
"There are bandits and violence, there is no law," Hamad said earlier this week. "America destroyed my country."

Convinced? Sheesh.

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 5:23:42 PM|| 2004-08-20 5:23:42 PM|| Front Page Top

#15 Zeyad's little brother Nabil reports that one of the quoted athletes is from Fallujah, and the other is from Najaf:

First I have to say from where did those two players came from:
1-Ahmed Monajed
This player came from Fallujah and after the events in fallujah and the military action over there to clean up the city from the terrorist and the thieves, a lot of innocent people died and a lot of houses destroyed, so let's say that Ahmed was one of the people who hurt from the military action, so of course he will say this and about when he said "I will come back to Iraq and kill the Americans" he said that because of what happened in his home. So I think when he said that he say it to express his feelings.

2- Salih Sadir
This player came from Najaf and maybe he said that because the same thing which has been said by Ahmed Monajed, maybe he said that because his city was destroyed and a lot of innocent people died. And when he said Mr. Bush is using us to win his campaign, this is a bullshit.

Posted by Seafarious 2004-08-20 5:37:38 PM|| 2004-08-20 5:37:38 PM|| Front Page Top

#16 In the SI article the soccer players make no secret about their origins, so we don't need Zeyed's little brother , Nabil, to interpret/psychoanalyze the reasons for the players' sentiments, #15. The players are pretty direct and straight forward themselves:
a) Sadir, Wednesday's goal-scorer, used to be the star player for the professional soccer team in Najaf. In the city in which 20,000 fans used to fill the stadium and chant Sadir's name, U.S. and Iraqi forces have battled loyalists to rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr for the past two weeks. Najaf lies in ruins."I want the violence and the war to go away from the city," says Sadir, 21. "We don't wish for the presence of Americans in our country. We want them to go away."

b) Manajid, 22, who nearly scored his own goal with a driven header on Wednesday, hails from the city of Fallujah. He says coalition forces killed Manajid's cousin, Omar Jabbar al-Aziz, who was fighting as an insurgent, and several of his friends. In fact, Manajid says, if he were not playing soccer he would "for sure" be fighting as part of the resistance.

"I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists?" Manajid says. "Everyone [in Fallujah] has been labeled a terrorist. These are all lies. Fallujah people are some of the best people in Iraq."

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 6:14:25 PM|| 2004-08-20 6:14:25 PM|| Front Page Top

#17 rex, notice the 3 Iraqis chosen for the interview make no mention of the many thousands (if not million or more) victims of Saddam's wrath.
SSDD for the Lame Stream Media: Find the guys on the Iraqi team who don't like being liberated and who hate the American "occupiers" even though Iraq is now sovereign and it's their own police on the front lines with Tater.

Posted by GreatestJeneration 2004-08-20 6:18:16 PM|| [http://www.greatestjeneration.com] 2004-08-20 6:18:16 PM|| Front Page Top

#18 Jen, as I said before I think this is a pretty straightforward article and the people interviewed are ones you'd expect to be interviewed because of their profile on the team, not because of their anti-Bush, anti-America sentiments.
a) the 3 guys chosen for the interview or who volunteered comments are high profile guys on the team. As much as you and ZF would like to think that that this was a MSM set-up and/or untruthful interview, whatever, I think you guys are in a state of denial. The 2 players are stars of the team and the 3rd person is the coach...who else should the SI guy interview but those 3? Also, SI is not exactly a hotbed for political discussions or theorists. It's a sports magazine for heaven's sake.

b)notice the 3 Iraqis chosen for the interview make no mention of the many thousands (if not million or more) victims of Saddam's wrath
What's your point? These guys are Arab Muslims. Even though Saddam was a brutal guy, he was an Arab and a Muslim, so their hatred of him and his crimes against them are a distant memory because now they are bonded by the focus on a common enemy - invading American infidels. End of story.

That's what I've been telling you airy fairy pie in the sky neo-cons from the get go. In the ME tribal/religious/ethnic loyalties count more than liberation by infidels. That's why the only Iraqis who have been our consistent allies in this war have been the Kurds, because they are not Arabs and they are only nominal Muslims.

Why ignore the obvious? Re-read the speech by the Malaysian PM and the words of OBL's body guard in the article Tipper posted today. They make no secret of what the goals are for global domination by Muslims so they can "right" the wrongs they perceive have been inflicted on them by Jews and America.

These 3 guys have selective memories about the Iran-Iraq War, Saddam's crimes, etc. because they are united in their hatred of infidels. Who are Zayed and Nabil? Have they ever stepped forward from behind their bloggers' "masks?" Do they have their pictures in the newspapers like the soccer players and their coach? No. And that's the problem with the so-called Muslim moderates. They never take risks and we don't even know who they are or even if they exist except in cyberspace. What kind of "leadership' do Zayed and Nabil provide to other Iraqis as opposed to the well publicized comments of soccer player/coach "stars?"

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 7:25:26 PM|| 2004-08-20 7:25:26 PM|| Front Page Top

#19 rex, I'm not trying to be rude, but you're just virtually irrational and pretty close-minded when it comes to this subject of "hearts and minds" in Iraq.
You pays your money and you takes your choice.
Believe these 3 probably Baathist thug Saddam supporters or pay attention to the Iraqi bloggers who could very well be representative of a good portion of their country.
But I'm not going to have this argument with you again today.
No one made your son serve over there--it's a volunteer military.
We appreciate his service and that of all our other wonderful men and women in uniform and maybe he believes in what we're doing to win the WOT even if his dad doesn't.

Posted by GreatestJeneration 2004-08-20 7:44:39 PM|| [http://www.greatestjeneration.com] 2004-08-20 7:44:39 PM|| Front Page Top

#20 Jen, I don't want to be rude but I think you've hit the toke pipe too often today. I don't have a kid serving in the military. You have confused me with some other poster. Whatever, I think you are right about our having very different views on the feasibility of winning hearts and minds in the ME. On a related note to the Iraqi soccer players' objections to the GWB advertisements, the US Olympic Committee has asked the Bush Campaign to pull the ads. I'm wondering if it's worth the hassle to continue with these ads?
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/08/20/politics1727EDT0653.DTL
"Bush campaign won't stop running Olympics ad despite request from U.S. organizing committee"

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 8:08:34 PM|| 2004-08-20 8:08:34 PM|| Front Page Top

#21 Uh, I don't hit the toke pipe.
The US Olympic Committee asked the Bush campaign to pull ads because it doesn't cut them in on any money.
And Team Bush has refused to do so.
Viva Bush!

Posted by GreatestJeneration 2004-08-20 8:11:25 PM|| [http://www.greatestjeneration.com] 2004-08-20 8:11:25 PM|| Front Page Top

#22 And their not mad because the ads show the "unhappy" Iraqi soccer players:

USOC officials had protested that federal law gives them the exclusive rights to the name.

The ad shows a swimmer and the flags of Iraq and Afghanistan.

"In 1972, there were 40 democracies in the world. Today, 120," an announcer says. "Freedom is spreading throughout the world like a sunrise. And this Olympics there will be two more free nations. And two fewer terrorist regimes."

Quite rightly, the Bush campaign is claiming the liberation of 2 countries in his first term as a wonderful accomplishment.

Posted by GreatestJeneration 2004-08-20 8:16:33 PM|| [http://www.greatestjeneration.com] 2004-08-20 8:16:33 PM|| Front Page Top

#23 rex, got your reply mixed up with one from Dave D. from a thread yesterday.
No "toke pipe" involved--thanks for the insult anyway!

Dave, it's your son we're so proud of and grateful to for his military service in Iraq..and thanks also to Dad (and Mom) for bringing your boy up right!

Posted by GreatestJeneration 2004-08-20 8:22:41 PM|| [http://www.greatestjeneration.com] 2004-08-20 8:22:41 PM|| Front Page Top

#24 I did not say that the US Olymic Committee was asking the Bush Campaign to pull the ad BECAUSE of the soccer players' comments. I said we had exhausted the argument about what the Iraqi soccer players' comments represented and on a related note to the story under discussion here was another article about the GWB advertisement...blah, blah...my point was that the ad was perhaps giving GWB more aggravation and causing him negative publicity instead of what it was meant to do - ie. engender warm and fuzzy feelings in the electorate about liberating Iraqis. It's not whether or not GWB has the right to claim the liberation of Iraq. It's whether or not American voters are going to feel happy about sacrificing blood and money for what appears to be an ungrateful nation. It's whether or not GWB will get into a tussle with the US Olympic Committee over the petty legalities of what he can or cannot do with the use of "Olympic Game" imagery for his re-election campaign.

Posted by rex 2004-08-20 8:36:00 PM|| 2004-08-20 8:36:00 PM|| Front Page Top

#25 Didn't you tell me that you were a Conservative?
I've never heard so much nitpicking and carping from one of our own!
President Bush has a team of expert which includes lawyers and PR people, as well as policy experts and military minds--he's not going to rip off the Olympic Committee.
And liberating Iraq and Afghanistan were strokes of brilliant presidential leadership after the war began on 9/11 and I can only hope that Iran is next!

Posted by GreatestJeneration 2004-08-20 9:00:39 PM|| [http://www.greatestjeneration.com] 2004-08-20 9:00:39 PM|| Front Page Top

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