Copies of pages from Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki's diary were recently found in a Baghdad trash dumpster outside the Green Zone. Translated, here are some excerpts:
December 1, 2006
Reluctantly agreed to do the Amman press conference, but backed out of dinner with W. So it was all smiles and handshakes and camera flashes going off and "I'm the right guy for the job." So why did that jackal's national security house boy Hadley ridicule me in his leaked memo to the Zionist rag NY Times. Can't trust W. Never did like to break bread with him anyway. He eats with his mouth open. A Texas cowboy. Total kafir.
December 24
Shouldn't have done that interview with Wall Street Journal. Jamir says I keep putting my foot in my mouth (I hate it when he uses Green Zone expressions.) Now everyone wants to know if I will quit before my term is up. That's only for Allah to decide, I snarl back.
December 30
Ali did a mediocre job filming the execution, but it was too dark and underlit. Still can't believe the old son of a mother's whore S is gone. Give S enough rope and I say let him swing for an eternity in burning hell. Shiite revenge is a dish best served warm. Wait, make that piping hot! With roasted lamb, cooked figs, stuffed peppers, currants, white rice, and a Merlot I have been saving for this special occasion. What better way to celebrate the first day of the feast of Eid ul-Adha. I will toast your rotting corpse, S, as you are damned for a thousand, thousand years.
December 31
Slept like a baby. Though woke up with a slight stomach ache.
January 1, 2007
I watched and rewatched S's hanging on Google Video. Glad my office has DSL. Didn't know how Ibrahm snuck in his camera phone during the execution. I admire that kind of guile. Like his pluck and enthusiasm. Have decided to reassign him to my security detail. Need to ensure that burial arrangments in Tikrit don't get too out of hand.
January 3
Getting too many phone calls from EU and US State Department officials complaining about the cellphone video. Inshallah, I explain. Then I remind them that S had signed my own death warrant back in 1980. You think I liked living in exile in Syria, and away from my beloved Baghdad? The world wanted and deserved this justice. S gasses Kurds and massacres Shias, and everyone comes down with amnesia. I tell them that if they don't like the job I am doing, then be my guest and call Chalabi in London. Ring him up. Invite Mr. Seville Row Suit back to Baghdad. To relax, I decided to check out some of those new, hot female Farsi bloggers.
January 5
S was a thug and a killer, not a poet. Yet every newspaper in the world reprinted parts of his awful farewell poem. "Unbind your soul. It is my soul mate and you are my soul's beloved. No house could have sheltered my heart as you have." What gibberish sentimentality. S turned Iraq into his own private slaughterhouse. But who is really the real poet? Who got his master's degree in Arabic literature from Baghdad University? Me! I could have studied engineering. Instead, I spent hundreds of hours memorizing Iraq's most prominent court poet Abu Nuwas. And also Mutanabbi and Hariri and Omar Ibn al-Faridh. Though I stopped writing verse for decades, I have the true soul of the poet. Not S.
January 7
I've had it with the parliament. They quarrel like school girls. Best to stand apart and let their words fly. When scorpions are fighting, don't go near them. Let them sting each other to death.
January 8.
Had a terrible nightmare. I saw S's head spring to life and he then turned into a doberman chasing me all over Sadr City. Woke up in a cold sweat. Took an Ambien.
January 9
An explosion on Haifa Street at 3:00 am woke me up. I know from the sound that it was a truck bomb.
January 10
Didn't watch W's speech. No need to. It's a plan that will fail. It's a plan I hate. I've already told him that. Too many Americans are in our country as it is. But I read the transcript of the speech. He mentioned my name enough times. But I still feel that dagger pointed at my heart lurking behind W's words. I'll be blamed for losing Iraq, not him. Infidel. Need to map out counter-strategy in the press. Put W on the defensive. Get under Condi's thin skin.
January 13
Won't return Moqtada's calls. I know what he wants. Can't release his men just yet. Must wait til troop surge goes into effect, sit back, and then watch all those nasty Sunni extremists in Baghdad get exterminated like back alley rats.
January 15
S's half brother's Barzan Ibrahim head falls off during hanging. Oh well. We'll get it right soon enough. As if it matters. Dead is dead is dead. I actually examined the rope with my own hands. Thick hemp. Best there is. Imported from Germany. Different one than the rope used for S. That I keep in my office safe where it stays coiled like a snake.
January 16
The UN says that 34,000 civilians were killed in Iraq last year. My accountant tells me I should open up a Swiss bank account, but I refuse temptation. Need I keep reminding everyone that I am an Iraqi patriot and Arab nationalist, and not some Chalabi embezzler.
January 17
Washington thinks I am weak. Everyone's complaining that I don't deserve the surge. If I don't, who does? You want the Mahdi army in charge? They feel that I can't govern? That I can't lead? That I lack the will? So today I threw down the gauntlet. Called a press conference. And said, "Give me more weapons and arms materiel and then the Iraqi Security Forces will do its job." But you can't fight terrorism with flimsy automatic rifles. I demanded a whole brigade of up-armored Humvees, Bradleys, and Strykers. Throw in a few Apache helicopters for good measure. And then all you Yankees can go home, finallybe with your families, thank you very much. It's Condi and W who are living on borrowed time. Not me. I feel like visiting Tehran and Damascus next month. That will make the White House really turn white.
January 19
I decided to throw the American wolves a bone. Sheik Abdul-Hadi al-Darraji was hauled in. Never liked him anyway. Too ignorant to be an effective press spokesperson. Pity his guard got killed in the arrest. I will send flowers to his family. I like rattling Moqtada's cage. He's gets so excitable that I am told spittle gets caught in his beard. He's nothing like his father.