A U.S. ally in Iraq is murdered.

From McClatchy Newspaper:



BAGHDAD - More than two years ago, Sheik Fasal al Gaood approached the U.S. military with what was then an unprecedented offer: His tribesmen were prepared to help American troops rout insurgents linked to al Qaida from Anbar province in western Iraq.


But the Sunni Muslim tribal leader and former provincial governor met one rebuff after another from American officers, he told McClatchy Newspapers at the time. Discouraged and angry, he warned that U.S. officers risked losing him as an ally.


The Americans eventually came around, and al Gaood renewed his offer. He helped turn some of Anbar's most prominent Sunni tribes into a force in the war against al Qaida's followers. That high-stakes partnership may have cost him his life: Al Gaood and 11 other Iraqis were killed Monday in a bombing at a Baghdad hotel where tribal sheiks who've joined forces with the U.S. were scheduled to meet.


"This is not about Qaida. This is a security breach and recklessness, and it is beyond al Qaida," said Ali Hatem Ali al Sulaiman, a leader of the powerful Dulaim tribe of Anbar. "This attack was about killing any patriot who speaks for Iraq and cares about this country."


In his last interview with McClatchy, three weeks ago in the hotel lobby where he died Monday, al Gaood alluded to internecine trouble brewing in Anbar. He was keenly aware that his life was in peril, saying that his home outside the provincial capital of Ramadi had been destroyed, his cars burned and five of his bodyguards slain by al Qaida.


"Iraq is marching towards the edge of a valley," al Gaood said. "Daily killings, kidnappings and bodies in the street."