You tell me, Does this sound like an Iraq where "violence, is improving, and life is returning," as President Bush likes to present these days?
It's been three weeks now since the U.S. rained bombs on the Arab Jabour district, where Arabic-language reports suggested something other than a surgical cleansing of "al Qaeda" had been the result. According to these reports, the concept of pre-bomb warning by the Americans being some sort of absolution of responsibility for civilian destruction appears to have been a P.R. sham:
Arab Jabour aftermath
Saturday, January 12, 2008
An initial report from Al-Hayat says many innocent residents of Arab Jabour who didn't leave following a warning were killed in the bombing, and other innocent residents' homes and lands were destroyed, but on the other hand a local Awakening person said only terrorist hideouts were targeted. The reporter summarizes the state of the question as "murky"....These are heavy-handed, military "solutions" that are not properly reported to the American people. This allows President Bush, Senator McCain, and many other U.S. officials to describe an Iraq that is a pure fantasy. Sadly, they are lying, as should be no surprise to anyone familiar with how they got us into this in the first place.Many residents who escaped were unable to return to their homes, but some who did return affirmed the destruction of their homes and agricultural lands, while the American forces and the Iraqi government have released no report on the killed and wounded or on material damage.
Ayad al-Ubeidi, 35, a resident of Arab Jabour, said the American forces did not allow the families in the target area sufficient time to leave, and that led to the killing of many of them. He said the Americans distributed leaflets some hours before the attack, asking residents to leave their homes. However, Saif Salman, a member of the Arab Jabour Awakening, said the Americans asked the area residents to move to a secure area 10 days before the attack, but not all of them were able to do that.
Independent reporter Dahr Jamail is a lonely voice these days pointing out the realities. He can be heard on this excellent edition of the syndicated radio program, Counterspin, telling it like it is. The Jamail interview begins about 10 minutes into the 28-minute AUDIO FILE, PLAY IT HERE:
Is Mosul next on the hit list?
According to today's story on CNN International:
Iraq set for new offensive in Mosul
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi political and military leaders and U.S. military commanders have traveled to the northern Iraqi city of Mosul ahead of a planned offensive on al Qaeda in Iraq loyalists, according to a senior U.S. military source.Little beyond military "tactical" P.R. is reported here. The Americans and their Iraqi collaborators seem to be facing resistance that has not joined up with any "Awakening" in Nineveh Province. That's all lumped in with "al Qaeda," so a big swath of destruction is rationalized--raze first, ask questions later. It will be hard for information about the reality of what happens there to get out. Only the military's P.R. seems to make it into our papers.
Saturday's meeting portends a major confrontation between U.S. and Iraqi troops and al Qaeda in Iraq militants, who have a strong presence in the diverse, sprawling city of Mosul, the capital of Nineveh province -- a region long beset by conflict.
Iraq's Defense Ministry last Sunday announced a major movement of Iraqi forces to Mosul as a prelude to an offensive aimed at clearing the region of Islamic fighters loyal to al Qaeda in Iraq....
The stepped-up effort in Mosul is part of Operation Iron Harvest, the U.S.-led offensive in Nineveh, Diyala, Tameem, and Salaheddin provinces that kicked off last month.
A hotbed of fighting and tension between insurgents and security forces, Mosul has been a destination for insurgents crossing into Iraq from Syria.
Last week, a deadly blast at a residential building in Mosul and an attack the next day that killed the head of Nineveh's police prompted Iraqi officials to redouble attention on the city -- where al Qaeda in Iraq has had a strong presence.
Al-Maliki, who has recently broached the issue of confronting militants there, called for a "decisive" confrontation with al Qaeda in Iraq militants and the deployment of more Iraqi troops.
Undoubtedly, President Bush will continue to issue soothing rhetoric on his wars, helpful for Republican candidates to latch onto, like this from a Thursday talk in Nevada:
President Bush: I believe Iraqi moms want the same thing that American moms want, and that is for their children to grow up in peace. That's what I believe. (Applause.) I don't believe that people welcome violence. They got sick of it. People want to be free. People want to live in peace, whether you're Methodist or Muslim, whether you're American or Iraqi. And what you're watching play out now is that -- folks are becoming more confident in their capacity to self-govern. They're becoming confident that if they step up and expose these extremists or push these extremists out of their neighborhood, there will be enough muscle to help them.Indeed, muscle.
I'll end for now with this from Dahr Jamail. It is not Mom and apple pie that the Bush/McCain "surge" has wrought:
"Reality Is Totally Different"
Iraqis on "Success" and "Progress" in Their Country
By: Dahr Jamail
... In response, Professor S. Abdul Majeed Hassan, an Iraqi university faculty member wrote me the following:Readers? How about sending that to your Congresspeople or ask your nearest presidential candidate about it. The truth of the matter is that the U.S. has conducted an extremely brutal occupation that has torn the limbs off and ripped apart the body of the Iraqi population. It's just wrong to keep doing it the way Bush/Cheney/McCain and all the rest of the militarist officials want to."The year of 2007 was the bloodiest among the occupation years, and no matter how successful the situation looks to Mr. Bush, reality is totally different. What kind of normal life are he and the media referring to where four and a half million highly educated Iraqis are still dislocated or still being forcefully driven out of their homes for being anti-occupation? How can the people live a normal life in a cage of concrete walls [she is referring to concrete walls being erected by the Americans around entire Baghdad neighborhoods], guarded by their kidnappers, killers, and occupation forces? What kind of normal life can you live where tens of your relatives and your beloved ones are either missing or in jail and you don't even know if they are still alive or, after being tortured, have been thrown unidentified in the dumpsters?
"What kind of normal life can you live when you have to bid farewell to your family each time you go out to buy bread because you don't know if you are going to see them again? What is a normal life to Mr. Bush? If we're lucky, we get a few hours of electricity a day, barely enough drinking water, no health care, no jobs to feed our kids?
"Little teenage girls are given away in marriage because their families can't protect them from militias and troops during raids. Women cannot move unescorted anymore. What kind of educations are our children getting at universities where 60% of the prominent faculty members have been driven out of their jobs -- killed or forced to leave the country by government militias? Is it normal that areas [on the outskirts of Baghdad] like Saidiya and Arab Jubour are bombed because the occupation forces are afraid to enter the areas for fear of the resistance? It is always easier to control ghost cities. It becomes very peaceful without the people."
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