Iraq Has Only Militants, No Civilians

[NNN0LHI]

http://electroniciraq.net/news/opeds/Iraq_Has_Only_Militants_No_Civilians-3253.shtml

Name them. Maim them. Kill them.

From the beginning of the American occupation in Iraq, air strikes and attacks by the U.S. military have only killed "militants," "criminals," "suspected insurgents," "IED emplacers," "anti-American fighters," "terrorists," "military age males," "armed men," "extremists," or "al-Qaeda."

The pattern for reporting on such attacks has remained the same from the early years of the occupation to today. Take a helicopter attack on October 23rd of this year near the village of Djila, north of Samarra. The U.S. military claimed it had killed 11 among "a group of men planting a roadside bomb." Only later did a military spokesperson acknowledge that at least six of the dead were civilians. Local residents claimed that those killed were farmers, that there were children among them, and that the number of dead was greater than 11.

Here is part of the statement released by U.S. military spokeswoman in northern Iraq, Major Peggy Kageleiry:

"A suspected insurgent and improvised explosive device cell member was identified among the killed in an engagement between Coalition Forces and suspected IED emplacers just north of Samarra.... During the engagement, insurgents used a nearby house as a safe haven to re-engage coalition aircraft. A known member of an IED cell was among the 11 killed during the multiple engagements. We send condolences to the families of those victims and we regret any loss of life."

As usual, the version offered by locals was vastly different. Abdul al-Rahman Iyadeh, a relative of some of the victims, revealed that the "group of men" attacked were actually three farmers who had left their homes at 4:30 A.M. to irrigate their fields. Two were killed in the initial helicopter attack and the survivor ran back to his home where other residents gathered. The second air strike, he claimed, destroyed the house killing 14 people. Another witness told reporters that four separate houses were hit by the helicopter. A local Iraqi policeman, Captain Abdullah al-Isawi, put the death toll at 16 -- seven men, six women, and three children, with another 14 wounded.

As often happens, the U.S. military, once challenged, declared that an "investigation" of the incident was under way.

And So It Goes

[nightrider767]

1. God, it's me again...

let me please ask of you one thing. Give me one year in hell, but grant this request.

Please send the war-mongers forth so that they may see what war is, the Church war-mongers especially. Let them walk about the battle field. Let them console a comrade who's just lost his maleness. Let them smell the stench of rotting corpses and deal with disfigured orphaned children.

Let them return home in constant moral pain and then espouse the wisdom of war.

[Toots]

2. I feel quite sorry for our military

They are being used to kill and maim Civilians. Not a military uniform to be found on any dead Iraqi. This is going to be a part of their lives forever. They are the best trained military in the world but not for taking the lives of women and children..This is beginning to haunt them and it will continue to do so as long as they live. They deserve a real enemy to engage against, not a civilian population..

[madokie]

5. What they really need is the perpetrators of this illegal war to be imprisoned

let them know that we have a sense of what they've been through and a promise from us to be always by their side. War is hell on the psych and a friendly environment and a loving relationship is the cure.

[spanone]

3. iraq? i thought we won that weeks ago.....

[Echo In Light]

4. Keep swallowin' those lies America