It was even mentioned even on Al-Hayat 14-1-2007:

On the ground heavy presence of gunmen can be seen in the Sunni areas, and the presence of the militias in the Shiite neighborhoods, both divisions organized armed patrols and checkpoints to check the identity.

The armed groups, which was formed to resist the occupation, today is focused on the war declared with the militias, so that the Islamic Army said in a letter that the battle against Shiite radicals is more important than the battle against the American occupiers.

Keld Bach kindly extracted the most important part of the report [and I hope he understand why I failed to answer his question about this report "The jihad now is against the Shias, not the Americans" I was gathering information of two weeks old]:

Mahdi Army and Badr Brigades form a unified sectarian "Baghdad Liberation Army" to purge Sunnis from Iraqi capital

For the past two weeks the information came very chaotic, gradually and tying all the loss ends together then you can understand what is going on.

Few days ago I reported the following [see here]:

Iraqi government sectarian militias will attack Sunni neighborhoods tomorrow (Friday) under the slogan [Baghdad Liberation]. Expectations are about 40000 [???] militia members are marching right now into Baghdad.

Number seems heavily exaggerated but count with me:

Mahdi Army, Badr Birgade joined with members of small parties like Al-fadhila and Iraqi Hizballah. And for sure all these people are just militias; they never had a military training so add to the number Iranian "Revolution Guards’.

Back to the Battle

All this rumors about the "BBB", started after Iraqi resistance captured a document [see the image]:

The Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq:

Baghdad must be the capital of Shiite region and from there, the rest of Iraq will be liberated…..follow these instructions:

1- Preparedness and readiness to the fight rallying on the material and moral approach.

2- Storing arms and munitions in all areas of Baghdad, make advantage of Hussainiyat [Shiite mosques], homes, shops, hospitals, schools, and cars.

3- Encourage Shiite families to position themselves in Sunni areas at vital locations.

4- Constant pressure legal and illegal on the Sunnis.

5- A unified army has been formed from all political and religious parties about  40,000 fighters joint military (Iraqi, Iranian, Lebanese) headquarters in Baghdad that the army has been distributed to all areas of Baghdad regimental system.

6- The opening of a large number of command centers in all regions of Baghdad and is working the same time as the recruitment and volunteered for this great army.

7- 5000 fighters have been involved in training courses in the Islamic Republic of Iran, and 1500 fighters in the camps of Hizbullah in Lebanon.

8- The attack carried out in three consecutive phases, namely : fast.

A- Isolate and fully patrolling the Sunni areas.

B- Bombing the Sunni areas with mortars and Katyusha rockets and missiles (RPG) for a an hour.

C- Immediate attack, from several areas.

9- Actual operations will start at 500 o’clock Friday morning to take advantage of the curfew, according to the instructions of the central command of the Joint Military.

10- Take all measures of caution against hostile operations and avoid units overlapping.

11- Prepare all hospitals, clinics, private clinics, ambulances and volunteers to evacuate and treat injuries. 

12- Not allowing any media presence [official and non-official] in the operations areas to cover the battle for whatever reason.

13- In the case of occupation forces involvement, withdraw all units and the Iraqi government promised us of intervention to prevent the American forces from reaching the areas.

All this and the occupation forces are playing this together with the Iranian Militias according the plan.

To be continued….