Sometimes you have to wonder if the news media is actually working for the terrorists, especially when they use headlines to warn terrorists of something coming their way.  Take this idiotic news story as an example:

British and American Special Forces have started a secret operation inside the Shiite Sadr City of Baghdad searching for five British hostages, taking advantage of the recently-signed agreement between the Sadr trend and the Shiite ruling coalition, which came into effect last Friday, senior military sources said.

The sources confirmed to Gulf News that “special personnel trained to free the hostages will accompany the Iraqi forces that are allowed to enter the Sadr City according to the agreement to look for and release the five British hostages.”

The five British hostages, a computer expert and four of his guards, were abducted from the Iraqi Finance Ministry in May 2007. The abduction was carried out by kidnappers wearing police uniforms and driving police vehicles.

Well, it’s not much of a secret now – is it?  Not only did the news media alert the kidnappers to be on the look-out, they told everyone that western special forces personnel would be hiding amongst Iraqi soldiers patrolling Sadr City (clearly they seem to know where these victims are being held).

I just don’t get this.  All the media had to do was to keep quiet until AFTER the hostages were free.  Was this a disinformation campaign to get someone to move and blow their cover?  Possibly, but I doubt it since this story is so blatantly stupid I don’t even think your IQ-challenged fascist thug would bite. Yeah, shhhh it’s a secret between us and you reading the article – no one else is supposed to know!

Damned news media could have just killed these kidnap victims, and possibly those trying to rescue them before they can be used in your typical Isamo Fascist snuff-film/media event (e.g., Nick Berg).

Update: Reader Crosspatch has come up, sadly, with the best guess on what this is.  He notes that the story would cause Mahdi Fighters to attack Iraqis under the excuse the Iraqis were hiding western special forces – which means the story could likely be planted by an Iranian operative.  Since this is not a western news outlet the chances of this being a plant by pro-Iranian interests is pretty high, I would think.