Yellow Dates in Iraq in December?

[burrowowl]

Go to Lori Price's site:

http://legitgov.org/index.html#breaking_news

And scoll down to about the middle. It seems that the latest dates can be harvested in Iraq is October. Yellow dates that are harvested as late as December grow in Oman, lower in latitude than Iraq. Apparently there are no yellow date varieties in Iraq.
A Gardian picture shows soldiers standing by Saddam's spider hole with a date tree in the background with yellow fruit on Dec. 16. Strange!?

From Lori's newsletter:

All articles, dates, and links from summaries below are here:
http://legitgov.org/index.html#breaking_news

Betrayed by dates? "...As far as we can determine, the latest date harvest possible in Iraq is in October. We know that most Iraqi dates are harvested in August. The dates shown in the fourth picture here are supposedly from December 16, 2003." --submitted by Mark Yannone

"Yellow dates in December? US soldiers lift the cover of the spider hole where Saddam Hussein was hiding, when the troops captured him on December 13. The photograph shows a date palm laden with yellow fruit in the background. One of our readers, Mr. Sabeel Ahmed insists that, normally, yellow dates are seen only during the months of July-August and not in December." --submitted by Jim Mooney

"While it appears in other areas of the middle east, there are several varieties of date that might be described as 'yellow' when they are ripe, one (see Date Palm of Nizwa) maturing into December, there appears to be none in Iraq, and that the yellow dates of Iraq, would appear to be ripened Sept-Oct. In Dec. they would not be." --submitted by Flash

[eridani]

1. Provenance of photo?

Has it been photoshopped? Can anyone do a chain of custody on it?

[burrowowl]

2. Photograph: Laurent Rebours /AP

Go to the Guardian Unlimited page were there is a slide show of 7 photos of SH's capture.

[pnorman]

3. Here's one:

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/index00.asp

The photo is described as "AFP Photo". I think there was an independent confirmation posted elsewhere. I'll try to locate it later.

pnorman

[evworldeditor]

4. Iraqi Dates Still In Season in December

Here's what they are writing on Al-Jazeerah's forum about the date controversy...

-------------------------------
Hatem Al-Natour, an agriculture engineer at the Arabian Company for Agricultural Systems in Riyadh, said ripe dates could be seen on date palms in summer. “Summer is the season when dates ripen under the sun,” he pointed out. Muhammad Al-Dossary, however, who has been engaged in date cultivation in the Aflaj region for several years, pointed out that there is a special kind of date, “hilali”, which yields its fruits at this time of the year.

Iraq is the native place of hilali dates which are now found in Saudi Arabia and other countries, Dossary told Al-Eqtisadiah, a sister publication of Arab News. “Even yesterday I ate hilali dates taken from the tree,” he told the newspaper. The season for dates is usually between June and July but in some countries, the date ripening period may be extended.
--------------

LINK:
http://www.aljazeerah.info/News%20archives/2003%20News%20archives/December/18%20n/Dates%20Clash%20With%20Saddam's%20Day%20of%20Destiny.htm

[Terwilliger]

8. extended 6 months?

Saddam was captured in July and his "capture" was announced in December.

[cosmicdot]

5. this is the Guardian photo

[JCMach1]

6. What dates were left on my trees have now been consumed

by the birds... I posted this yesterday in my thread. I don't see December dates as a reality.

However, I do see the propaganda value of send * to visit on Thanksgiving and then capturing Saddam on X-Mas... See a pattern there?

Also, there are some legitimate security reasons to keep Saddam under wraps for awhile, especially if he was cooperating. There has been a noted change in tactics (of our forces) since the July/August period. Were they operating on specific information?

I suspect they might have been.

[Terwilliger]

7. Considering what Madeleine Albright said to Mort Kondracke...

about them probably holding on to Osama so they can spring him at an opportune time, I would say this date controversy MAY just uncap the cork on the lie machine.

[Lori Price CLG]

9. Thank you, and thanks for the Guardian pic!

I'm glad this one is getting around, as the Bush dictatorship could look very bad if Keith Olbermann were to report this 'oddity' on his Countdown program...

:)-Lori Price