REMARKABLY LIKE A CIVIL WAR

If this isn't civil war, you could've fooled me.

"A senior U.S. Marine commander said Monday that
insurgents loyal to militant leader Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi had taken over at least five key western
Iraqi towns on the border with Syria and were forcing
local residents to flee."

"In an interview, Lt. Col. Julian Alford, commander of
the 3rd Battalion, 6th Marines Regiment stationed
outside the western Iraqi town of al Qaim, said
insurgents in the area had been distributing flyers
they called "death letters," in which they ordered
residents of this western corner of volatile Anbar
province to leave -- or face death.

"Basically, the insurgents say if they don't leave
they will... behead them," said Alford, who took
command this month of about 1,000 Marines stationed in
the dusty desert area populated by roughly 100,000
Sunni Arabs."

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