polly7
polly7's Journal'Falluja Babies' and Depleted Uranium -- America's Toxic Legacy in Iraq
Al Jazeera English / By Dahr Jamail 24 COMMENTS
Two US-led wars in Iraq have left behind hundreds of tons of depleted uranium munitions and other toxic wastes.
March 18, 2013 |
Dr Samira Alani, a pediatric specialist at Fallujah General Hospital, has taken a personal interest in investigating an explosion of congenital abnormalities that have mushroomed in the wake of the US sieges since 2005.
"We have all kinds of defects now, ranging from congenital heart disease to severe physical abnormalities, both in numbers you cannot imagine," Alani told Al Jazeera at her office in the hospital last year, while showing countless photos of shocking birth defects.
Alani also co-authored a study in 2010 that showed the rate of heart defects in Fallujah to be 13 times the rate found in Europe. And, for birth defects involving the nervous system, the rate was calculated to be 33 times that found in Europe for the same number of births.
Full Article: http://www.alternet.org/world/falluja-babies-and-depleted-uranium-americas-toxic-legacy-iraq?paging=off
Out of the Blue: The Many Faces of Depression
by Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance
DBSA thanks the Takeda-Lundbeck Alliance for its unrestricted support for the production of Out of the Blue video series.
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkEyLB5TkXVK8ioW0K0v2tAfZvSXSbxcD
http://www.dbsalliance.org/site/PageServer?pagename=home
A Decade of Occupation
By Yifat Susskind and Yanar Mohammed
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
And yet we hear the same thing again and again from women in the shelters we operate throughout Iraq: Why are we living in these violent times? They dont mourn the fall of Saddam, but women here have suffered 10 years of spiraling abuse, including a spike in honor killings, forced veiling, and a growing tolerance for beating women into subordination.
If you talk to women in war zones anywhere, theyll tell you that domestic violence increases in war-time. But in Iraq, violence against women has also been systematic. And unknown to most Americans, it has been orchestrated by some of the very forces that the US boosted to power.
Like religious fundamentalists everywhere, these sectarian militias and clerics have a social vision for their country that depends on subjugating women. But because the US wagered that they could deliver stability, these men were cultivated as allies in Iraq. As we now know, they never even got the stability they traded womens rights for.
Full Article: http://www.zcommunications.org/a-decade-of-occupation-by-yifat-susskind
Iraq War Among World's Worst Events
By David Swanson
Source: Warisacrime.org
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
A number of U.S. academics have advanced the dubious claim that war making is declining around the world. Misinterpreting what has happened in Iraq is central to their argument. As documented in the full report, by the most scientifically respected measures available, Iraq lost 1.4 million lives as a result of OIL, saw 4.2 million additional people injured, and 4.5 million people become refugees. The 1.4 million dead was 5% of the population. That compares to 2.5% lost in the U.S. Civil War, or 3 to 4% in Japan in World War II, 1% in France and Italy in World War II, less than 1% in the U.K. and 0.3% in the United States in World War II. The 1.4 million dead is higher as an absolute number as well as a percentage of population than these other horrific losses. U.S. deaths in Iraq since 2003 have been 0.3% of the dead, even if they've taken up the vast majority of the news coverage, preventing U.S. news consumers from understanding the extent of Iraqi suffering.
In a very American parallel, the U.S. government has only been willing to value the life of an Iraqi at that same 0.3% of the financial value it assigns to the life of a U.S. citizen.
The 2003 invasion included 29,200 air strikes, followed by another 3,900 over the next eight years. The U.S. military targeted civilians, journalists, hospitals, and ambulances. It also made use of what some might call "weapons of mass destruction," using cluster bombs, white phosphorous, depleted uranium, and a new kind of napalm in densely settled urban areas.
Full Article: http://www.zcommunications.org/iraq-war-among-worlds-worst-events-by-david-swanson
10 Worst People on Forbes 2013 Billionaires List
AlterNet / By Lynn Stuart Parramore
10 Worst People on Forbes 2013 Billionaires List
Oligarchs and monopolists and thugs, oh my!
The Forbes list of billionaires is brimming over with oligarchs, monopolists, thugs, miscreants, and hustlers. Not to mention right-wingers, narcissists, and parasitic predators. The only thing missing is the king of Mexian drug lords, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, whose assets were evidently too hard to calculate this year.
Putting together a list of the worst individuals in this group is a daunting task: How to choose, for example, between telecom monopolists? The richest person in the world, Mexican mogul Carlos Slim Helu, is certainly no friend of humanity, but Silvio Berlusconi, with his special brand of Technicolor depravity, managed to edge him out. There are hundreds of garden-variety jerks to choose from, along with several dozen egregious SOBs like GoDaddys Bob Parsons who deserve dishonorable mention. And there should be a whole separate list of Russian oligarchs. Alas, one runs out of space and time.
While not comprehensive, here, in no particular order, are some of the biggest creeps on the 2013 roster.
http://www.alternet.org/economy/10-worst-people-forbes-2013-billionaires-list
Israeli Doctors Accused Of Collusion In Torture
By Sharmila Devi
Source: The Lancet
Sunday, March 17, 2013
Kamil Sabbagh, Jaradat's lawyer, told an Israeli military judge a couple of days before his client's death that he was being forced to sit for long periods during interrogation, had complained of back pain, and seemed terrified of returning to the Shin Bet detention centre where he was being held. The judge ordered an examination by a prison doctor. Jaradat died at Megiddo prison and it was not known when he was moved there.
Derek Summerfield, an honorary senior lecturer at the University of London's Institute of Psychiatry and campaigner against what he called Israeli physicians violations of human rights, says he wanted to know what part doctors played in the circumstances of Jaradat's death. By Israel's own admission, Jaradat was seen by Israeli doctors 2 days earlier and they found him in good health. The key medical ethical question is what were these doctors examining him for, if not to assess whether he could withstand torture, he tells The Lancet. This is precisely what the campaign regarding medical collusion with torture in Israel was launched for in 2009 and it continues to run.
The IMA said in a statement: The IMA vociferously objects to the claim that medical professionals are involved in torture or abuse, and we will continue to do everything possible with the tools available to us to inform doctors about their obligation to report and to conduct themselves appropriately.
http://www.zcommunications.org/israeli-doctors-accused-of-collusion-in-torture-by-sharmila-devi
Land For Those Who Work It
By Esther Vivas
Sunday, March 17, 2013
The oligarchy in power takes advantage and pulls the strings behind the scenes, negotiating shady urban development deals, redefining rural land to allow it to be used for construction. Corruption cases are multiplying. The culture of backhanders is the order of the day. So is a new despotism by big business at the expense of citizens and our territory. And elsewhere, history repeats itself. Corrupt governments are the best partner for investors who want to acquire land quickly and cheaply. According to an Oxfam report, every six days overseas investors sold an area equivalent to the size of the city of London. It is the fever of the land.
Privatization and land grabbing are the order of the day. Whats more beneficial than what we need to live and eat? The food and financial crisis, which erupted in 2008, gave rise, as has been well documented by the international organization GRAIN, to a new cycle of land grabbing on a global scale. Governments of countries dependent on food imports, in order to ensure the production of food beyond their borders for their own population, as well as agribusiness and investors (pension funds, banks), hungry for new and profitable investments, have acquired fertile lands in the South. It is a dynamic that threatens farming and food security in these countries.
Indigenous people, driven from their territories, are spearheading the fight against the privatization of the land. This is not a new struggle - and is one that was spearheaded by Chico Mendes, rubber tapper, known for his fight in defence of the Amazon and who was murdered in 1988 by Brazilian landowners. Chico Mendes helped create the Alliance of the Peoples of the Forest, comprising indigenous peoples, rubber tappers, environmentalists, farmers against multinationals demanded logging and land reform with communal land ownership and its use for the benefit of farm worker families. As he said: There is no defence of the forest without the defence of the people of the forest.
Full Article: http://www.zcommunications.org/land-for-those-who-work-it-by-esther-vivas
Oh, my!
I had no interest in learning about this man ... but this is fantastic to see. Thanks, Catherina.
Desmund Tutu - Nuclear Weapons Must Be Eradicated For All Our Sakes
By Desmond Tutu
Source: The Guardian
Saturday, March 16, 2013
Until we overcome this double standard - until we accept that nuclear weapons are abhorrent and a grave danger no matter who possesses them, that threatening a city with radioactive incineration is intolerable no matter the nationality or religion of its inhabitants - we are unlikely to make meaningful progress in halting the spread of these monstrous devices, let alone banishing them from national arsenals.
Why, for instance, would a proliferating state pay heed to the exhortations of the US and Russia, which retain thousands of their nuclear warheads on high alert? How can Britain, France and China expect a hearing on non-proliferation while they squander billions modernising their nuclear forces? What standing has Israel to urge Iran not to acquire the bomb when it harbours its own atomic arsenal?
Nuclear weapons do not discriminate; nor should our leaders. The nuclear powers must apply the same standard to themselves as to others: zero nuclear weapons. Whereas the international community has imposed blanket bans on other weapons with horrendous effects - from biological and chemical agents to landmines and cluster munitions - it has not yet done so for the very worst weapons of all. Nuclear weapons are still seen as legitimate in the hands of some. This must change.
Full Article: http://www.zcommunications.org/nuclear-weapons-must-be-eradicated-for-all-our-sakes-by-desmond-tutu
Iran has called for a nuclear weapon free ME and signed the
NPT.
History would say some in Iran may be correct in how they see the west, but that works about as well for ramping up the fear and propaganda as Hussein's incubator babies did.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10178169
America, Iran & Continuing Patterns of Hypocrisy
By Ted Snider
Saturday, March 16, 2013
The history of the C.I.A. is, unfortunately, replete with examples of directors lying to the President and the Congress about what the C.I.A. knew. But those lies were always told by them to defend and protect their agency and to insist that the C.I.A. was right. In his testimony, Brennan lied to the senate by deceptively saying that the best analysis of the agency he heads is wrong. The director of the C.I.A. testified that Iran is bent on pursuing nuclear weapons by dismissing the conclusions of the C.I.A. he directs. And that is hypocritical. It is also foreboding. Brennan, like Tennet before him with regard to Iraq, twisted the intelligence to fit the politics.
The third face of the current generation of hypocrisy on Iran is the hypocrisy on monitoring Iran. Recently, the United Nations General Assembly voted by an overwhelming 174-6 to approve a resolution calling on Israel to open up her nuclear weapons program to international inspectors and to join the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. Only five countries joined Israel in opposing the resolution: Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Palau (all three of which have compacts of free association with the U.S. and never cast their votes at the U.N. inconsistently with America), Canada and the United States.
Iran, according to the National Intelligence Estimate, doesn't have a nuclear weapons program. Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. And Iran is being closely monitored. However, the U.S. still pushes for more, and Iran still faces crushing sanctions and constant threat of war. When the whole world, though, asks Israel to have her nuclear weapons program monitored and to be brought within the framework of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, the U.S. votes no. For the Iranians, this American U.N. vote must be the most glaring example of hypocrisy of all.
http://www.zcommunications.org/america-iran-and-continuing-patterns-of-hypocrisy-by-ted-snider
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