Free Iraq

JESUS GOD ALMIGHTY -- this is horrible.
 

Greetings Imad,

I need to clarify the picture you included in your above posting.

The aircraft carrier picture with "Fuck Iraq" is a hoax!

Please check snope.com for
verification. I am a former Navy sailor and know that the boat Skipper would be crucified if a photo like that was released to the public.
 

Thank you, AL

I found what you meant.

I have removed that picture.

I replaced it with a more telling one.
 

Hello,

First time posting a comment here 'though I visit several times a week.

I first saw this article about US gang members joining the army to fight in Iraq about 8 days ago. It's now got a bigThere are a number of reports starting to surface. Perhaps the war is "coming home" after all.

markfromireland
 

To “I am a former Navy sailor”

Whatever you said about this picture, I tell you this real founding from our side what we saw from you as a common practise by your follow.

I give you my evidence from War 1991, I was serving in Iraqi Air Force /Air Defence, many rockets and bombes through by US in that war also some Tomahawks did not exploded I saw written on them F.. ,B... and swearing words to Iraqis and to Iraq.

Also in the run to the invasion I saw few pictures shown your follow Navy sailors writing those bad words on some bombs while they loading them on the fighters , sorry I did not have URL, but I am sure 100% from what I saw.

Please the denial of acts by your follows that not can change any thing in the hearts and minds of Iraqis, its obvious to them the daily abuses and killing on the ground.

I think it’s better for you to read the UN reports that highlights how far your country went of Human Rights saga that’s you and other Americans for years sings and prod about the human and respecting the human’s right.

UN Report read carefully and educate your follow Navy sailor this is your mission

http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/05/19/usdom13418.htm
http://hrw.org/us/hrw_response_051706.pdf
 

(The following is the author's impassioned response to Jessie Macbeth's brutally honest - and, I believe, heroically truthful - story.)
Anwaar Hussain, Scream!!!!!: Watch and cry for you were told at the very beginning of this war that, “the fact is that a ghastly drama is being witnessed by the bleeding, lacerated dawns of Iraq. The fact is that America’s sacred cowboys are once again busy doing a liberation job hoping to ride off into the sunset after a job well done. The fact is that as their jets scream away from the blood drenched Iraqi deserts, their compatriots on ground are kicking their way through the decomposing Iraqi corpses, slashing with their bayonets through the walls of meat that stand in defiance of their masters’ vision for Iraq. The fact is that they are indeed in a hurry to get back home to pursue the American dream yet least worried that they will one day be answerable to the misshapen children of Iraq. The fact is that this is any thing but a war of liberation.

Watch and cry for when you were busy debating the plight of a half dead woman, one Terri Schiavo, we continually beseeched you by asking you, “why can't you see the horrendous atrocities that the United States military is visiting upon unarmed Iraqis who never posed any danger to your beloved country? ...

Scream for what is being done even now in Iraq in your name and what is being planned for Iran in the very near future.
 

Too much to believe there are still such people roaming amongst what are supposed to be decent communities..!

I am shocked..!
 

PHOTOS (Not for the faint hearted)
 

Michal Greenberg, Israeli Soldiers; "All in a day's work?": Settlers from the Maon Farm outpost attacked children from the Palestinian village of Umm Tuba yesterday and Saturday, village residents said. They said a woman pushed two children toward thorns on the side of the path as they were walking to school with an Israel Defense Forces escort, but that the soldiers did not do anything about it. The sources also said the soldiers did nothing to stop four people from chasing the children the day before.
--------------------------------
“Whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” (Surely the Torah recognizes this holy way.)
 

Video (8 min), The Wall Of Hate: "Occupation is a fluid term that can be easily be manipulated by the powerful and and occupying powers. When the occupied is portrayed as violent and the occupier as victim then democracy and justice have to be redefined."
 

Khaduri you subhuman, piece-of-pigshit scumbag, you are a war criminal with the Saddam filth.

Your islamic-muslim-arab camel-f*cker of a country needs killing, not educating.

Go swallow rat shit you mother-fucker nigger
 

Paul Craig Roberts, The Administration That Won't Stop Lying: The Bush regime has destroyed Iraq without being able to defeat the resistance. Its greater casualties, however, are the American people, voiceless with no political representation, defenseless in the face of police-state depredations such as illegal warrantless surveillance, the possibility of property seizures, and indefinite detention without charges.

The Bush regime's war on terror has defeated truth and the constitutional protections of liberty in the United States. No conceivable number of Muslim terrorists could inflict comparable damage on America.
 

Adib,
Sorry I didn't post this immediately following yours of 4:00 PM. Are you referring to Jessie Macbeth?
 

Israel to boycott racism conference
 

Dahr Jamail, Easily Dispensable: Iraq's Children: "Cherishing children is the mark of a civilized society." - Joan Ganz Cooney
 

World Council of Churches slams Israel
 

Domestic Spying: NSA has backdoor key to ALL versions of Microsoft Windows: The NSA key is contained inside all versions of Windows from Windows 95 OSR2 onward…
 

Implementing Israel’s Strategy: Let us face the truth, Just like Iraq, all the talk about Iranian nuclear activities is a smoke screen for something else. The most likely answer is a combination of the United States strategic interest in oil, containment of China and Israeli interest. But in 2006 governments are understandably shy about mentioning neo-colonialism and greed as the reasons for invading other countries.
 

China set to be largest economy
 

Dave Kimble, Collapse of the Petrodollar Looming: The announcement by President Putin of a Russian bourse trading oil and gas in Roubles threatens the stability of the US Dollar far more than Iran's bourse alone would do, and continues the slide in relations between the old Cold War foes.

In his annual State of the Nation address to both houses of parliament on 10 May 2006, Novosti reports President Putin said that work on making the Rouble an internationally convertible currency would be completed by 1 July 2006, six months ahead of schedule. To promote the currency, he announced that an oil and gas stock exchange will be created in Russia, that would trade in Roubles.
 

WhatReallyHappened, 9/11 Firefighters: Bombs and Explosions in the WTC
 

Yes, Evelyn.
 

Rice faces silent protest in Boston: Dozens of faculty and students turned their backs and waved protest signs when U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice received an honorary degree from Boston College on Monday.

At one point, a propeller plane flew overhead dragging a sign saying: "Your war brings dishonor." About 100 protesters outside chanted "Stop the Lies. Troops out now" and waved placards including one reading "No degrees for terrorism."
 

For the record: Bush Sees 'Incremental' Progress in Iraq
 

Video (31 sec), Fireman: "bomb in the building start clearing out: This is a clip from the CameraPlanet 9/11 Archive. A firefighter at ground zero clearly says that the building must be cleared because there is a bomb inside. This adds to the weight of testimony from firefighters that bombs were evident in the WTC.
 

Change of pace: I absolutely insist that you watch this!
Video animation, Saturday Night Live: Funhouse with Bush
 

And while we're enjoying ourselves -
Song, LOATHSOME!!! . . . and the text
 

Charles Sullivan, Fruit of the Poison Tree: Every aspect of American politics is enacted within the shell of Plutocratic corporate rule. Therefore, the Plutocratic tree will continue to bear the fruit of Plutocracy, regardless of which party is in power. ...

...America cannot be repaired through mere political reform. The poisonous tentacles of capital have enwrapped every political organ over which it exercises complete dictatorial control. The malignancy of capital is so pervasive and systemic as to require revolution for its removal.

Capital is particularly onerous in that it socializes costs but privatizes profits—an especially insidious form of corporate welfare that is inherently unjust. Long ago the corporate government and the commercial media conspired to create a propaganda empire without equal that keeps the people ignorant and inundated with superfluous lies. Virtually all other industrialized nations have socialized medicine and free higher education for those who seek it. But in America our wealth is plundered in wasteful and repressive militarism, massive corporate welfare and tax cuts for the wealthy.

According to labor historian James Green, during the thousands of labor strikes that have occurred in this country there were 160 instances in which state and federal militias intervened on behalf of the employers. There is not one instance where the militia intervened to protect workers from the tyranny of their employers. These actions reveal who is running the country and who is making policy. There are well over 700 labor disputes in which striking workers were killed by the police, militias, or the hired guns of industry—all of this within a span of 230 years. These are ultra conservative estimates. It is no coincidence that America, the nucleus of capitalism, is the greatest purveyor of violence of any nation on earth, as Dr. King rightly pointed out.

The people have two principle options. Either we stay the course and allow the republic to suffocate and die, or we revolt. Bush and his neocon cabal have no fear that the people will stop him. He and his ilk thumb their noses at the law with impunity and the working class people’s struggle to scratch out a decent living. His Plutocratic policies seem to say, “Let the people eat our shit!”

Whatever course we choose to take it should be evident that there is no easy way out. ...

We must understand that capital government is right wing government in its purest, most violent and repressive form. It is radically anti-people, anti-earth and anti-democracy. The time has come to uproot the tree that bears the poison fruit.
 

Evelyn
Charles Sullivan's position, above, hits the nail on its head. Exactly what I have been saying for eons now.
 

MadAsHell,
With the greatest regret, I must say that I have to agree with you and Charles Sullivan. Wish it were not so.
 

This Jamie MacBeth appears to be exhibiting that all too common American trait: he is a liar.

I would take this interview as a fake until it is corroborated. We all know that attrocities have occured but having a liar as a star witness is not going to halep anyone's credibility.
 

Iraqi PM springs surprise for Blair: At a joint press conference, Mr Maliki said British troops would hand over responsibility in two provinces to Iraqi security forces by next month and that he expected US, British and other foreign troops out of 16 of the country's 18 provinces by the end of the year, ...
 

Insurgents keep U.S. at bay in Ramadi
 

Jim Lobe, Iran the Target of Disinformation Campaign
 

Patrick Cockburn, Which is the real Iraq?: Blair's view: 'We have a government of national unity that crosses all boundaries. Iraqi people are able to write the next chapter of their history themselves' - Tony Blair on a visit to Iraq yesterday

Another view: Two car bombs explode in Baghdad, killing nine. At least 23 more die in attacks elsewhere, bringing the death toll in May to 848 as sectarian violence spreads.

A frustrating aspect of writing about Iraq since the invasion is that the worse the situation becomes, the easier it is for Tony Blair or George Bush to pretend it is improving. ...
 

Iraqi Ministers have one thing in common - Britain
 

Judge shouts down Saddam as female defence lawyer is removed
 

Judge targets me because I'm Shi'a - lawyer: Colleagues feel it's because she's a woman, but Bushra al-Khalil, the lawyer thrown out of Saddam Hussein's trial Monday, said she believes the chief judge is targeting her because she's a Shi'a Muslim defending the former Iraqi leader.

For the Lebanese-born al-Khalil, Saddam is a nationalist hero resisting the US invasion of his country - even though he's charged with crimes against humanity in a crackdown that killed 148 Shi'a.

But for al-Khalil, Arab nationalism outweighs sectarian ties.

"Saddam Hussein is not a sectarian person and it can't be true that he targeted Shi'as for being Shi'as," she said. "The Dujail case was not against Shiites but against people who tried to assassinate the president."

She said she decided to join Saddam's defence the moment she saw him on television being checked by American military doctors after his arrest in December 2003. She contacted the Jordan-based defence team put together by Saddam's daughter Raghad and volunteered her services.

Al-Khalil, who refused to give her age but has been practising law for 26 years, said her defence of Saddam is a national duty of an Arab opposed to what she calls America's attempts to control the Mideast.

"I cannot be neutral when I have to chose between (US President George ) Bush and Saddam. I am for sure with Saddam," she said.
 

Malcom Lagauche, A WOMAN OF HER CONVICTIONS: After the assassination of well-admired Lebanese political figure Rafiq al-Hariri, much speculation came forth that Syria was behind the killing. Not al-Khalil. On February 15, 2005, she told Aljazeera.net:

If we look at the way the assassination has been conducted, it is very sophisticated. I knew al-Hariri’s security measures — no local system could have breached them.

The question is, who stands to benefit from his death? Syria’s enemies. I think al-Hariri’s death is part of the plan to divide the region into tiny helpless sectarian states. This plan has started in Iraq and will continue to hit all other Arab countries.

She was right on the mark with her comments, although, at the time, they contradicted the propaganda coming from the U.S. Sectarian violence is now a part of daily Iraqi life, while Iran and Syria are beginning to see partitions in their societies: partitions that were created from outside.

The U.S. has gone to lengths to perpetrate stereotypes of sectarian differences in the Arab world. However, Bushra al-Khalil does not fit any mold the U.S. had in mind for a female Shia lawyer.
 

Iraq doctor brings evidence of US napalm at Fallujah
 

Stephen Lendman, The threat of Depleted Uranium exposure: real, deadly ... and covered up by the Pentagon and United States Veterans Administration
 

Sabah Ali, The "Deal Government" Fiasco and Iraq's Future
 

Stop the Genocide and abuse of Iraqi People by the squadron’s death of Bader Brigade

We endorse the Stop the Genocide and abuse of Iraqi People by the squadron’s death of Bader Brigade Petition to UN council, US Congress, All Human right Organizations, Amnesty International, Red Cross, All Arabic and Islamic Kings, Presidents and Leaders.

Read the Stop the Genocide and abuse of Iraqi People by the squadron’s death of Bader Brigade Petition

Sign the Stop the Genocide and abuse of Iraqi People by the squadron's death of Bader Brigade Petition
 

Al Basrah.net
 

xymphora . . .
- Stinkin' yellow badges and Israel's Nuremberg Race Law

- John Bolton, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations

- Completely backwards: With the judge in the AIPAC case waiting for a quiet time in August to announce that the AIPAC case has to be thrown out as what the AIPAC defendants did is constitutionally-protected speech (a good rebuttal of the AIPAC arguments is here or here), and American Attorney General Gonzales announcing that he believes American journalists should be prosecuted for writing about classified materials, the United States is headed to the interesting position where disclosure of classified material, obtained by de facto agents for a foreign government with the intent to deliver such material to a spy for that foreign government so foreign generals and spies can read it and act on it, will result in no crime as laws against espionage are unconstitutional, while the exact same classified material, handed to an American journalist so that Americans may find out about it, will result in prosecution of the journalist with no constitutional protection. They have it completely backwards.
 

undermine human rights in Iraq, UN mission says

1-sectarian killings, intimidations and threats have become one of the most significant forms of human rights violation. As a result, the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) has increased considerably, affecting many communities and creating further tensions and socio-economic problems.”
2-“Ongoing military operations, especially in western and central Iraq, have also severely affected the enjoyment of human rights and have resulted, at times, in the loss of life of civilians.”
3-The Medico-Legal Institute in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, issued 1,294 death certificates in March and 1,155 in April, the report says. Most of those deaths, which include only individuals who have not been identified or whose death is violent or suspect, died as a result of gunshot wounds.
4-Targeted assassinations continued against politicians, members of the public administration, including police, army and judges, other professionals and people perceived to be associated with the Multinational Forces (MNF), according to the report, with a resulting impact on the functioning of key institutions, such as the judiciary.

5-Other human rights defenders from the Prisoners of War Organization and the Association of Disabled Females were assassinated in front of their homes, UNAMI says.
6-reported that as of 30 April, there were a total of 28,700 detainees – 15,387 in the custody of the MNF; 7,727 held by the Ministry of Justice; 176 juveniles held by Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs; 5,077 held by the Ministry of Interior and 333 by the Ministry of Defence.
 

Kaddouri the only person posting here is some sad freak spammer called 'Evelyn' (who obviously has no job, family or self esteem). What a pathetic example of 'humanity'. A sad lonely person with nothing better to do al l day but post any old shit here

shame how a bit of cyberspace controls your life too. Thats also your problem, YOU NEED TO GET A LIFE

Tell 'Evelyn' to see a shrink, he/she obviously needs one
 

Subject: Re: (رسالة من قريب لنا في (بغداد) وصلت لل
تو (21\05\2006): تدهور جديد في الأوضاع الأ
منية في (بغداد
Date: Sat, 27 May 2006 11:42:37 +0100

Thank you Akh abu shehab.I received a phone call yesterday from my cousin who is a professor in Folrida.His brother in Baghdad lives in the Daoudi area.He is a Civil engineerwho informed that 8 civil engineers were killed in one day at the same time.This was not publicised anywhere.He fears for his life.Cannot imagine how difficult it is for those who are amidst all this day and night.We have nothing but prayers to Allah.
 

Imad

I watched the U.S. morning (sic.) "news" shows -- e.g. "Good Morning America" (ABC), "The Today Show" (NBC), etc. -- and there was no coverage of this at all; instead, they had happy news like the car wash that has opened a place where Mr. and Mrs. Average American can wash their dogs as well as their cars.

Meanwhile, America's illegal army of occupation in Iraq is committing war atrocities like what you see depicted below (note how the Times, patriotically conservative as ever, uses the word "Killed" as opposed to "Murdered", "Massacred", etc.), every day, just like they did in Vietnam. Each and every American is individually responsible for these murders and torture sessions, because they voted for Bush. Think of this next time you see an American. He (or she) is a murderer, a beast and a monster.
======
Military Expected to Report Marines Killed Iraqi Civilians
By THOM SHANKER, ERIC SCHMITT and RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.
The New York Times
Published: May 26, 2006
WASHINGTON, May 25 — A military investigation into the deaths of two dozen Iraqis last November is expected to find that a small number of marines in western Iraq carried out extensive, unprovoked killings of civilians, Congressional, military and Pentagon officials said Thursday.

The military is looking into civilian deaths in Haditha, Iraq.

Hammurabi Human Rights Group, via Associated Press
An image from videotape taken shortly after a fatal raid in Haditha, Iraq. Residents there said several marines carried out unprovoked killings.

Two lawyers involved in discussions about individual marines' defenses said they thought the investigation could result in charges of murder, a capital offense. That possibility and the emerging details of the killings have raised fears that the incident could be the gravest case involving misconduct by American ground forces in Iraq.

Officials briefed on preliminary results of the inquiry said the civilians killed at Haditha, a lawless, insurgent-plagued city deep in Sunni-dominated Anbar Province, did not die from a makeshift bomb, as the military first reported, or in cross-fire between marines and attackers, as was later announced. A separate inquiry has begun to find whether the events were deliberately covered up.

Evidence indicates that the civilians were killed during a sustained sweep by a small group of marines that lasted three to five hours and included shootings of five men standing near a taxi at a checkpoint, and killings inside at least two homes that included women and children, officials said.

That evidence, described by Congressional, Pentagon and military officials briefed on the inquiry, suggested to one Congressional official that the killings were "methodical in nature."

Congressional and military officials say the Naval Criminal Investigative Service inquiry is focusing on the actions of a Marine Corps staff sergeant serving as squad leader at the time, but that Marine officials have told members of Congress that up to a dozen other marines in the unit are also under investigation. Officials briefed on the inquiry said that most of the bullets that killed the civilians were now thought to have been "fired by a couple of rifles," as one of them put it.

The killings were first reported by Time magazine in March, based on accounts from survivors and human rights groups, and members of Congress have spoken publicly about the episode in recent days. But the new accounts from Congressional, military and Pentagon officials added significant new details to the picture. All of those who discussed the case had to be granted anonymity before they would talk about the findings emerging from the investigation.

A second, parallel inquiry was ordered by the second-ranking general in Iraq to examine whether any marines on the ground at Haditha, or any of their superior officers, tried to cover up the killings by filing false reports up the chain of command. That inquiry, conducted by an Army officer assigned to the Multinational Corps headquarters in Iraq, is expected to report its findings in coming days.

In an unusual sign of high-level concern, the commandant of the Marine Corps, Gen. Michael W. Hagee, flew from Washington to Iraq on Thursday to give a series of speeches to his forces re-emphasizing compliance with international laws of armed conflict, the Geneva Conventions and the American military's own rules of engagement.

"Recent serious allegations concerning actions of marines in combat have caused me concern," General Hagee said in a statement issued upon his departure. The statement did not mention any specific incident.

The first official report from the military, issued on Nov. 20, said that "a U.S. marine and 15 Iraqi civilians were killed yesterday from the blast of a roadside bomb" and that "immediately following the bombing, gunmen attacked the convoy with small-arms fire."

Military investigators have since uncovered a far different set of facts from what was first reported, partly aided by marines who are cooperating with the inquiry and partly guided by reports filed by a separate unit that arrived to gather intelligence and document the attack; those reports contradicted the original version of the marines, Pentagon officials said.

One senior Defense Department official who has been briefed on the initial findings, when asked how many of the 24 dead Iraqis were killed by the improvised bomb as initially reported, paused and said, "Zero."

While Haditha was rife with violence and gunfire that day, the marines, who were assigned to the Third Battalion, First Marines, and are now back at Camp Pendleton, Calif., "never took what would constitute hostile fire of a seriously threatening nature," one Pentagon official said.

Women and children were among those killed, as well as five men who had been traveling in a taxi near the bomb, which killed Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas of El Paso.

Although investigators are still piecing together the string of deaths, Congressional and Pentagon officials said the five men in the taxi either were pulled out or got out at a Marine checkpoint and were shot.

The deaths of those in the taxi, and inside two nearby houses, were not the result of a quick and violent firefight, according to officials who had been briefed on the inquiry.

"This was not a burst of fire, but a sustained operation over several hours, maybe five hours," one official said. Forensic evidence gathered from the houses where Iraqi civilians died is also said to contradict reports that the marines had to overcome hostile fire to storm the homes.

Members of the House and Senate briefed on the Haditha shootings by senior Marine officers, including General Hagee and Brig. Gen. John F. Kelly, the Marine legislative liaison, voiced concerns Thursday about the seriousness of the accusations.

Representative John Kline, a Minnesota Republican who is a retired Marine colonel, said that the allegations indicated that "this was not an accident. This was direct fire by marines at civilians." He added, "This was not an immediate response to an attack. This would be an atrocity."

The deaths, and the role of the marines in those deaths, is being viewed with such alarm that senior Marine Corps officers briefed members of Congress last week and again on Wednesday and Thursday.

The briefings were in part an effort to prevent the kind of angry explosion from Capitol Hill that followed news of detainee abuse by American military jailers at Abu Ghraib prison, which had been quietly under investigation for months before the details of the abuse were leaked to the news media. "If the accounts as they have been alleged are true, the Haditha incident is likely the most serious war crime that has been reported in Iraq since the beginning of the war," said John Sifton, of Human Rights Watch. "Here we have two dozen civilians being killed — apparently intentionally. This isn't a gray area. This is a massacre."

Three Marine officers — the battalion commander and two company commanders in Haditha at the time — have been relieved of duty, although official statements have declined to link that action to the investigation.

Senator John W. Warner, a Virginia Republican who heads the Armed Services Committee, said he expected senators would review investigators' evidence, including photographs by military photographers that Mr. Warner said were "taken as a matter of routine in Iraq on operations of this nature when there's loss of life."

Lawyers who have been in conversations with the marines under investigation stressed the chaotic situation in Haditha at the time of the killings. And they expect that the defense will stress that insurgents often hide among civilians, that Haditha on the day of the shootings was suffering a wave of fluid insurgent attacks and that the marines responded to high levels of hostile action aimed at them.

Much of the area around Haditha is controlled by Sunni Arab insurgents who have made the city one of the deadliest in Iraq for American troops. On Aug. 1, three months before the massacre, insurgents ambushed and killed six Marine snipers moving through Haditha on foot. Insurgents released a video after the ambush that appeared to show the attack, and the mangled and burned body of a dead serviceman. Then, two days later, 14 marines were killed when their armored vehicle was destroyed by a roadside bomb near the southern edge of the city.

The Marines also disclosed this week that a preliminary inquiry had found "sufficient information" to recommend a criminal probe into the killing of an Iraqi civilian on April 26 near Hamandiyah, a village west of Baghdad.
 

Imad, I think you are right to keep this online.
 

In Haditha, Memories of a Massacre

“...In Haditha, families of those killed keep an ear cocked to a foreign station, Radio Monte Carlo, waiting for any news of a trial of the Marines.

"They are waiting for the sentence -- although they are convinced that the sentence will be like one for someone who killed a dog in the United States," said Waleed Mohammed, a lawyer preparing a file for Iraqi courts and the United Nations, if the U.S. trial disappoints. "Because Iraqis have become like dogs in the eyes of Americans.''”

Washington Post Foreign Service, Saturday, May 27, 2006; A01. By Ellen Knickmeyer

“...Aws Fahmi, a Haditha resident who said he watched and listened from his home as Marines went from house to house killing members of three families, recalled hearing his neighbor across the street, Younis Salim Khafif, plead in English for his life and the lives of his family members. "I heard Younis speaking to the Americans, saying: 'I am a friend. I am good,' " Fahmi said. "But they killed him, and his wife and daughters."

The 24 Iraqi civilians killed on Nov. 19 included children and the women who were trying to shield them, witnesses told a Washington Post special correspondent in Haditha this week and U.S. investigators said in Washington. The girls killed inside Khafif's house were ages 14, 10, 5, 3 and 1, according to death certificates....

...Insurgents planted the bomb on a side road off one of Haditha's main streets, placing it between two vacant lots to try to avoid killing -- and further alienating -- Haditha's civilians, residents said. It went off at 7:15 a.m. Terrazas was driving the Humvee, and he died instantly. Two other Marines in the convoy were wounded.

"Everybody agrees that this was the triggering event. The question is: What happened afterward?" said Paul Hackett, an attorney for a Marine officer with a slight connection to the case...

...In the first minutes after the shock of the blast, residents said, silence reigned on the street of walled courtyards, brick homes and tiny palm groves. Marines appeared stunned, or purposeful, as they moved around the burning Humvee, witnesses said.

Then one of the Marines took charge and began shouting, said Fahmi, who was watching from his roof. Fahmi said he saw the Marine direct other Marines into the house closest to the blast, about 50 yards away.

It was the home of 76-year-old Abdul Hamid Hassan Ali. Although he had used a wheelchair since diabetes forced a leg amputation years ago, Ali was always one of the first on his block to go out every morning, scattering scraps for his chickens and hosing the dust of the arid western town from his driveway, neighbors said.

In the house with Ali and his 66-year-old wife, Khamisa Tuma Ali, were three of the middle-aged male members of their family, at least one daughter-in-law and four children -- 4-year-old Abdullah, 8-year-old Iman, 5-year-old Abdul Rahman and 2-month-old Asia.

Marines entered shooting, witnesses recalled. Most of the shots -- in Ali's house and two others -- were fired at such close range that they went through the bodies of the family members and plowed into walls or the floor, physicians at Haditha's hospital said.

A daughter-in-law, identified as Hibbah, escaped with Asia, survivors and neighbors said. Iman and Abdul Rahman were shot but survived. Four-year-old Abdullah, Ali and the rest died.

Ali took nine rounds in the chest and abdomen, leaving his intestines spilling out of the exit wounds in his back, according to his death certificate.

The Marines moved to the house next door, Fahmi said.

Inside were 43-year-old Khafif, 41-year-old Aeda Yasin Ahmed, an 8-year-old son, five young daughters and a 1-year-old girl staying with the family, according to death certificates and neighbors.

The Marines shot them at close range and hurled grenades into the kitchen and bathroom, survivors and neighbors said later. Khafif's pleas could be heard across the neighborhood. Four of the girls died screaming.

Only 13-year-old Safa Younis lived -- saved, she said, by her mother's blood spilling onto her, making her look dead when she fell, limp, in a faint.

Townspeople led a Washington Post reporter this week to the girl they identified as Safa. Wearing a ponytail and tracksuit, the girl said her mother died trying to gather the girls. The girl burst into tears after a few words. The older couple caring for her apologized and asked the reporter to leave.

Moving to a third house in the row, Marines burst in on four brothers, Marwan, Qahtan, Chasib and Jamal Ahmed. Neighbors said the Marines killed them together...

...The final victims of the day happened upon the scene inadvertently, witnesses said. Four male college students -- Khalid Ayada al-Zawi, Wajdi Ayada al-Zawi, Mohammed Battal Mahmoud and Akram Hamid Flayeh -- had left the Technical Institute in Saqlawiyah for the weekend to stay with one of their families on the street, said Fahmi, a friend of the young men.
A Haditha taxi driver, Ahmed Khidher, was bringing them home, Fahmi said.

According to Fahmi, the young men and their driver turned onto the street and saw the wrecked Humvee and the Marines. Khidher threw the car into reverse, trying to back away at full speed, Fahmi said, and the Marines opened fire from about 30 yards away, killing all the men inside the taxi.

After the killings, Fahmi said, more Americans arrived at the scene. They shouted among themselves. The Marines cordoned off the block; then, and for at least the next day, Marines filed into the houses, looked around and came out.

At some point on Nov. 19, Marines in an armored convoy arrived at Haditha's hospital. They placed the bodies of the victims in the garden of the hospital and left without explanation, said Mohammed al-Hadithi, one of the hospital officials who helped carry the bodies inside. By some accounts, some of the corpses were burnt.

The remains of the 24 lie today in a cemetery called Martyrs' Graveyard. Stray dogs scrounge in the deserted homes. "Democracy assassinated the family that was here," graffiti on one of the houses declared….

…Another point of dispute is whether some houses were destroyed by fire or by airstrikes. Some Iraqis reported that the Marines burned houses in the area of the attack, but two people familiar with the case, including Hackett, the lawyer, said warplanes conducted airstrikes, dropping 500-pound bombs on more than one house.

That is significant for any possible court-martial proceedings, because it would indicate that senior commanders, who must approve such strikes and who would also use aircraft to assess their effects, were paying attention to events in Haditha that day...

...In Haditha, families of those killed keep an ear cocked to a foreign station, Radio Monte Carlo, waiting for any news of a trial of the Marines.

"They are waiting for the sentence -- although they are convinced that the sentence will be like one for someone who killed a dog in the United States," said Waleed Mohammed, a lawyer preparing a file for Iraqi courts and the United Nations, if the U.S. trial disappoints. "Because Iraqis have become like dogs in the eyes of Americans.''”
 

Bob Nichols, Confident U.S. generals commit war crimes: Uranium as a force multiplier
 

Wayne Madsen, Classified French DGSE intelligence report: Al Qaeda Training Camp passed from Control of CIA to Bin Laden in 1995
 

Boeing unveils lightweight bomb for urban combat
 

Eli Stephens, Haditha: the "M" word hits the media: I was actually shocked to read the headline in the Washington Post: "In Haditha, Memories of a Massacre." 24 Iraqi civilians were killed in cold blood by U.S. Marines in Haditha last November, and for once this slaughter is being called by its right name: "massacre." Just last week, 16 Afghan civilians and a larger number of alleged Taliban fighters were killed by U.S. bombing in Kandahar, and not one corporate media source joined me in calling that a massacre, just as they wouldn't call the aerial murder of 45 people at an Iraqi wedding party a massacre either. Does it have to be a face-to-face confrontation, murder "in cold blood" before it qualifies as a "massacre"? Does that antiseptic, you can't see the whites of their eyes aerial bombing never qualify? [ . . . ]

Back in Haditha, we'll no doubt be revisiting the "few bad apples" theory to explain the murders. And certainly it's true that neither George Bush nor Donald Rumsfeld, nor even any medium-level commander in Iraq ordered this particular massacre. But that doesn't excuse this sentence in the Washington Post article: "Two U.S. military boards are investigating the incident as potentially the gravest violation of the law of war by U.S. forces in the three-year-old conflict in Iraq." No. The "gravest violation of the law of war" was the invasion of Iraq, the unproked assault on another country, the ultimate violation. Everything else follows from that.
 

Chris Floyd, Bleak House: How America was Conquered by Hell's Bottom: The end of the Cold War made no difference to the Pentagon's corrupting dominance of American policy. The expected "peace dividend" following the Soviet collapse never materialized; the Pentagon simply found new enemies to stir the same public fears and feed its own paranoia: Saddam Hussein, "rogue states," Islamic extremism.

Today, of course, with the never-ending "war on terror," the Pentagon has completely devoured the state, bending the entire government to its will. It commands limitless sources of corporate patronage and political muscle. It trumps diplomacy, it controls the vast intelligence services, with their secret armies, secret prisons, and their secret surveillance of American citizens. It dominates the entire globe, with more than 720 bases strung across the earth. The Bush Regime has also unleashed the "nuclear priesthood," discarding arms control treaties, building a new generation of deadlier nukes – and once more pressuring Russia, still in the crosshairs of thousands of U.S. warheads, to respond with a new arms race. ...
 

Malcom Lagauche, CHANGING HISTORY: Journalists and historians have been granted the most power on Earth: they can change things that have already happened.

It is amazing how a few years can not only create a cataclysmic situation in Iraq, but how the history of the country prior to March 2003 changes daily. Much of the change comes not from U.S. administration officials, but from the so-called "progressive" press that opposes the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

A few days ago, I read an article about how Iraqi doctors are suffering because they have little technical literature and what they have is often outdated. That I agreed with, but the following reasons were preposterous. The writer said that the Iraqi medical system was in bad shape for 30 years and that Saddam Hussein would not allow doctors and healthcare professionals to leave Iraq, under penalty of death. I have no idea where this assumption originated.

It is well known that under the Ba’athist regime, a priority was medical care. The government paid for tens of thousands of healthcare people to go to foreign countries to study, primarily in the U.S. and U.K.

During the Ba’ath years, not only medical students studied abroad, but engineers and scientists as well. When they came back to Iraq, they participated in the growth and development of the country that led it to be the most progressive country in the Middle East.

However, we now have so-called journalists saying that Iraq was a huge prison that would not allow its people out. When one reads such an article today, he/she can easily be persuaded that this was the case. [ . . . ]

Hundreds of articles have been written that tell of the excellent education, healthcare and engineering programs in Iraq prior to U.S. involvement, yet have a disclaimer of "don’t get me wrong, I’m not sticking up for Saddam," or, "I disagreed with the war, but at least Saddam is gone."

Anybody who writes in such a manner can not call him/herself a journalist. First of all, if he/she can not write a meaningful article using words powerful enough to describe the subject without injecting a useless editorial phrase, the piece loses credibility. Secondly, if a writer praises Iraq under Saddam yet says he/she does not want to give him credit, illogic reigns. How did Iraq attain such a status without the influence of Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath Party? [ . . . ]

Juan Cole is the darling of Iraq writers for many leftists. I have a hard time knowing where his sympathies really lie, but maybe I am not bright enough to understand. However, I did write to him one time concerning a statement he made. He called Saddam Hussein "crazy."

I wanted to know on which information he based his facts. Maybe he could enlighten me to some research of which I was unaware. His response was that Saddam "just has that look about him." [ . . . ]
 

Ghali Hassan, Media’s Distortions to Justify the Occupation of Iraq: [ . . . ]

Despite the atrocities and the suffering inflicted by the U.S. and its allies, Iraqis are united against the Occupation. If there is any divide, this “divide, already narrower in Iraq than in some parts of the Arab world, is by all accounts shrinking each day that Iraqis agree their most immediate problem is the occupation”, wrote The Washington Post correspondent R. Chandrasekaran. Only three years ago, Iraqi Christians, and Muslims lived together in harmony despite their religious and political differences. If there is any division between Iraqis today, the division has been created quite deliberately by the U.S. Occupation.

The recent demonstration in Basra and in Baghdad jointly organized by the Al-Sadr movement and the Association of Muslim Scholars showed that all Iraqis are united against the U.S. Occupation and terrorism. This unity contradicts the West's perception of Iraqis as a divided society and rejects the occupiers' imperialist policy of “divide and rule” masquerading as U.S.-imposed “federation of Iraq”. As noted earlier, the invasion was an act of aggression in violation of international law and norms. U.S. forces and their allies have no right to be in Iraq. The Iraqi people have right to resist and live in freedom.

As a result of media distortion of facts, many people in the West, Americans in particular, continue to support an illegal war of “Supreme crimes” perpetuated in their name. The Western media should follow an ethic of moral responsibility toward the Iraqi people and provide impartial and accurate information to the outside world. The media’s distortions to justify the ongoing Occupation of Iraq amount to complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity. It is the duty of civilised people to hold the perpetrators of this unjustified war accountable for their crimes.

It appears that the common agenda of Western governments led by the U.S. is the revival of the old Western colonialism masked in the fake rhetoric of “democracy” and “liberation”. Any kind of resistance to the current imperialist aggression in Iraq is legitimate resistance.

The Iraqi people have a legitimate right to resist, and use all forms of resistance to liberate their country. “International law grants a people fighting an illegal Occupation the right to use ‘all necessary means at their disposal’ to end their occupation and the occupied are entitled to seek and receive support”.

While many Westerners, Americans in particular, may have difficulty understanding the violence in Iraq, only the full and immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq will bring pace and security to the Iraqi people. No amount of U.S. violence will quell the desire of the people of Iraq to achieve freedom, sovereignty and national independence.
 

Eric Johnston, World is blind to real situation in Iraq: activists
 

Truth About Iraqis, 2006: The year the carving of Iraq goes into effect
 

MadAsHell, 9:51 AM (above):
"Each and every American is individually responsible for these murders and torture sessions, because they voted for Bush. Think of this next time you see an American. He (or she) is a murderer, a beast and a monster."

Points of fact:
1. We did not all vote for Bush (though, indeed, you did not use the word 'all').
2. There is good reason to think that the 2000 & 2004 elections were stolen.
3. Regardless of 1. and 2., believing that ordinary American citizens have much (or any) control over the electoral process is a myth. Many Americans themselves still hold this mistaken belief.
 

Wayne Madsen's new book, JADED TASKS - Brass Plates, Black Ops & Big Oil: The Blood Politics of George Bush & Co.: Intense investigation into the wicked worldwide powers and their ties to the Bush clan.

This investigative account details how America's economic and intelligence associations with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan led to the devastating September 11 attacks and illustrates the role that private military companies are playing in George W. Bush's "new world order." Based on personal interviews, never-before-published classified documents, and extensive research, this examination details the criminal forces thought to rule the world today—the Bush cartel, Russian-Ukranian-Israeli mafia, and Wahhabist Saudi terror financiers—revealing links between these groups and disastrous terrorist events. [ . . . ] ADD TO CART
 

Palestinians Referendum Text -- Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has given Hamas 10 days to endorse a plan accepting the idea of a Palestinian state alongside Israel or he will submit the plan to a referendum. Here is the text of the 18-point plan, drafted by senior Palestinian militants imprisoned in Israel. [See article for 18 points]

Signed by:
Marwan Barghouti, Fatah, secretary general
Sheik Abdel Khaliq al-Natsche, Hamas, senior leadership
Sheik Bassam al-Saadi, Islamic Jihad
Abdel Rahim Malouh, PFLP, deputy secretary general
 

Fresh evidence of 'executions' by rogue US marines in Iraq: Fresh photographic evidence seen by US investigators is believed to reveal that some of the 24 unarmed Iraqis killed in the Iraqi town of Haditha after an American died in a roadside bomb in November were in effect executed, it was reported yesterday.

According to Congressional and defence officials quoted by the Los Angeles Times, the pictures show wounds to the upper bodies of the victims, who included several women and six children. Some were shot in the head and some in the back.
 

Look into her eyes -
VIDEO (3 min), Haditha: The Iraq War "My Lai Massacre": Her entire family was murdered by American soldiers in their home.

. . . and, a refresher -
Fallujah : America's Guernica
 

Truth About Iraqis, Killed in Iraq for wearing shorts!
 

Ramadi: US raid kills seven civilians in Iraq
 

Eli Stephens, "Nobody was killed at Abu Ghraib"
 

Revealed: how US marines massacred 24


Evidence looks bad for Marines, official says
 

Israel attacks 2 militant bases in Lebanon
 

The massacre and the Marines


What we've all been waiting for -
US 'winding up' Iraq deaths probe
 

Calling all 'historians' -
9/11: World Trade Center Building 7 was NOT hit by an aircraft: Controlled demolition freefall collapse (slow motion)
 

Kim Petersen, Whither Elementary Morality?: Israel is a state erected on the destruction, still ongoing, of another state and its indigenous people. Israel has been in existence since 1948: a 58-year fact-on-the-ground. Chomsky holds that the passage of time does give legitimacy to the state of Israel. As a solution to the current violence, Chomsky concedes this violent fact-on-the-ground by referring to the "reality" of options available to the Palestinians. Chomsky argues that it is in the best interests of the dispossessed and brutalized Palestinians and the brutalizing Zionist dispossessors to agree to a confederation, but the "reality" is that the outcome will probably be a two-state solution.

In other words, to end the present suffering of Palestinians, the Palestinians should agree to their dispossession and in return they will be rewarded, supposedly, by a cessation of the violence against them for the audacity of wanting to live on their land. What does elementary morality posit about such reasoning?

Further, since the Zionists have consistently violated international law and international agreements that they have undertaken, and since they have refused to delimit their Zionist state, why would any thinker suggest that Palestinians should reach an agreement on territorial sharing with the Zionists? Zionist leader David Ben-Gurion stated, "The acceptance of partition does not commit us to renounce Transjordan. One does not demand from anybody to give up his vision. We shall accept a state in the boundaries fixed today -- but the boundaries of the Zionist aspirations are the concern of the Jewish people and no external factor will be able to limit them."

Zionist morality is apparently quite different than conventional elementary morality. In 1937, Ben-Gurion wrote, "I support compulsory transfer [i.e., ethnic cleansing]. I don’t see anything immoral in it." Following the logic of Ben-Gurion, the Nazis were operating within the bounds of morality when they were transferring European Jews.

Chomsky’s statements provide cover for several decades of Zionist expansion. Is Chomsky correct? Does the passage of time obviate morality and legitimate evil deeds?

By the same "reality"-based logic, shouldn’t Chomsky also call for gifting Iraq’s oil to the invader-occupiers in exchange for partial restoring of Iraq’s sovereignty and ceasing the lethal violence against Iraqis? After all, the "reality" is that as long as the Iraqis resist occupation, Iraqis will die in large numbers.
 

The Macbeth video IS a fraud. The US Army has released a statement saying Macbeth never served in the Army as he said he did. There is enough going on that should call for our outrage at the way this war has been prosecuted without relying on false testimony. I hope you will reconsider and remove the video, otherwise you risk having other news you print be disbelievable because of the actions of a liar.
 

To Imad Khadduri and others who believe the Jesse MacBeth story:

This has been thoroughly discredited as a fraud from all directions. He even posted his altered DD214 which he forgot to alter enough to make it anything less than a huge joke.

Apparently you want to believe this story because it helps you spread the LIES you push on people. Check wikipedia under "jessie macbeth" and you'll see. EVERYONE KNOWS this is bullshit!

Jesse MacBeth didn't even make it out of boot camp in the Army--he was kicked out for failure to meet basic military standards of conduct and performance! His OWN SISTER has said he's mentally ill!

Issue a correction or you'll look like liars just like he is. Your entire collection of propaganda is worthless with nonsense like this.
 

Jesse Macbath is a fraud:

http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3957

http://www.qando.net/Details.aspx?Entry=3955

http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3956

http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3918

http://hotair.com/archives/the-blog/2006/05/23/jesse-macbeth-video-goes-viral/

http://hotair.com/archives/top-picks/2006/05/22/anti-war-video-bogus/

http://justcitizens.blogspot.com/2006/05/nimrod-of-week.html

If you haven´t read it all before commenting, please don´t even bother contacting me...