Political Football

January 29 update

A lot of fun links if you click here – more new info on the Jamil story. The AP is backing away from the story?

January 14 report below
If you’ve been reading this blog in any detail you’ve read about the story of Jamil Hussein in IRAQ.

This has been a story that opened in November when an awful report was filed by the AP from Baghdad that 6 Iraqis were drug out of a Mosque and burned alive with police near by doing nothing to stop it. That day in that same report, four mosques were “burned down”. As the reality of the situation became more clear – no bodies or families of the “murdered” Iraqis were found, and some of those re-interviewed recanted their stories.

As bloggers read this story they researched and found 61 stories credited to Jamil Hussein, a Captain in the Baghdad Police Force. When the 61 stories were plotted on a map, they were all over Baghdad, although he was stationed in one area. The 61 stories were always very violent and scattered 20-30 miles apart. Bloggers started asking questions and AP got very annoyed.

Initially, both the Ministry of Information and Centcom (the American Information office) said there was no Jamil Hussien in the Baghdad Police. Six or Seven weeks later AP said his name was Jamil Hussein, but was on the payroll as Jamil Gholaiem. Ok, fine, but he’s not talking, says he never has and this is far from over – and how were bloggers wrong? There are still questions that deserve answers.

Michelle Malkin has done a lot of the reporting on this and is in Iraq now trying to discover as many truths related to this and other confusing “reports” as she can. Stay tuned.

Today Powerlineblog reviewed the situation and in part says this:

We assume, but don’t know for sure, that the “Jamil Gholaiem Hussein” who has now been identified is the AP’s source, even though he appears to be the same person who previously denied providing information to the AP. But that is only the first step in answering the questions that have emerged about the AP’s reliance on him as a source.

Why has Hussein been a source for events not just in his precinct, but all over Baghdad?

Has he really been an eyewitness to 61 or more news stories, or has he based his reports on hearsay?

Or is he a front for other sources who don’t want to be identified by name?

If AP still believes that Hussein is a reliable source after the “burning Sunni” story, why has it apparently not cited him as a source for any story since then?

What happened with the burned-down mosques and the immolated Sunnis? The AP originally said that four mosques burned, then changed its reporting to a single mosque (apparently without issuing a correction).

Was Hussein the source for the four-mosque claim?

What does Hussein’s account of these events tell us about his credibility on other stories?

These are only some of the still-unanswered questions. Some answers may never be known, but with Eason Jordan, Michelle Malkin and others digging into the story, there most likely will be further revelations before long.

In any event, as I noted on December 20, the question whether Jamil Hussein exists is quite separate from the question whether he is a reliable source.

Michelle Malkin has a roundup with more commentary here.