In the January 2005 Iraqi election for the Iraqi National Assembly, he was the leader of The Iraqis (Iraqioun), the largest secular list of candidates with a Sunni leader.
As it became clear that the war was over for the Iraqis, some of their captors approached a Marine unit from the 3rd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, Delta Co., 3rd Platoon which was a part of Task Force Tripoli that had been pushing up toward Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's hometown.
This defilade position gave the Iraqis protection from the powerful long-range direct fire of the M1 Abrams tanks and the M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles.