[UrukNet] - [Daily Information from Occupied Iraq] - [newsletter 06 Apr 2006 - Part Two]

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Thousands Of Both Tactical Errors And Illegalities Ali Al-Hail ...The mother of all illegalities in Iraq was of course, the invasion (...) All other illegalities followed soon. The war with all its brutal ramifications was illegal. The occupation was illegal. The elections were illegal as they were imposed by the occupation and were conducted under the occupation. Legally speaking, what was based on illegality is naturally, in itself illegal. The constitution (upon which the occupation focused and which was given 'the’ priority while ordinary Iraqis were deprived to basic living) was illegal and inhumane. The marginalization of Sunnis who constitute 42% of the population (see CIA’s Facts Book) in favor to Shi’is was illegal. By the same token, the trial of Saddam is illegal, because the tribunal is taking place under the occupation (...) Amongst all these thousands of tactical errors and illegalities, the only thing in Iraq which is not illegal, is the resistance to the occupation according to the International law... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22332 How GI Resistance Altered the Course of History Paul Rockwell ..."Sir, No Sir," the untold story of the GI movement to end the war in Vietnam, is a documentary. It's not a work of nostalgia. It's an activist film, and it comes at a time when GI resistance to the current war is spreading throughout the United States. There are more than 100 films - fiction and nonfiction - about the war in Vietnam. Not one deals seriously with the most pivotal events of the time - the anti-war actions of GIs within the military. T he three-decade blackout of GI resistance is not due to any lack of evidence. Information about the resistance has always been available. According to the Pentagon, over 500,000 incidents of desertion took place between 1966 and 1977. Officers were fragged. Entire units refused to enter battle... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22330 DAILY WAR NEWS FOR THURSDAY, April 6, 2006 Today in Iraq U.S. patrol struck by roadside bomb south of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. There were no reports on the number of casualties. Bomb goes off near police patrol in western Baghdad, killing a policeman and wounding five. A second bomb exploded when another group of police arrived at the scene, injuring two additional policemen. Four corpses of men in their 20s, handcuffed and blindfolded, found in southern Dora district. South of Baghdad, gun men in three cars ambush five truck drivers on their way to the capital from the town of Mahawil, killing all of them and stealing their trucks. Five civilians killed and two wounded when gunmen shoot at their cars near police station in Haswa. Car bomb explodes near sacred Shiite shrine in Najaf, killing at least 15 people... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22325 Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Thursday, 6 April 2006 Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice. http://www.freearabvoice.org In a dispatch posted at 2:20pm Makkah (Mecca) time Thursday afternoon, Mafkarat al-Islam reported that an Iraqi Resistance bomb exploded by a US military patrol on the main road in the al-Haqlaniyah area northeast of al-Hadithah, some 300km west of Baghdad. The correspondent for Mafkarat al-Islam reported eyewitnesses in al-Haqlani yah as saying that the bomb went off as a patrol of several Humvees was driving by. The blast completely destroyed one Humvee, killing three US troops and severely wounding a fourth... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22319 Juxtaposition of the day Eli Stephens Last night I was watching CNN Headline News. The story about the video apparently showing an American pilot being dragged away from his crashed helicopter was shown, complete with the U.S. military's reaction: "We are outraged that anyone would create and publish such a despicable video for public exposure. The terrorists continue to demonstrate their immoral disregard for human dignity and life." The very next item broadcast was a U.S. military "snuff video" showing three pre sumed Iraqi resistance fighters being "taken out" by a Hellfire missile fired by a remote-controlled unmanned drone as they were apparently planting a roadside bomb... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22318 The Anti-War Movement? Cindy Sheehan Being a so-called anti-war movement leader (at least to the MSM), brings much responsibility and so much love for the people and the groups who are working hard to end this insane occupation, but is this enough? Recently, a blog written by an acquaintance, Scott Ritter, on AlterNet was called to my attention, where Scott, who is a self-proclaimed Republican conservative who courageously opposed this war from the beginning, is predicting the eminent demise of the anti-war movem ent. At first, I was highly offended and defensive at what I thought was Scott's arrogant attack on the movement that I am so intimately and overwhelmingly involved in. But then, after my knee-jerk reaction, I realized that for all of the wrong reasons, Scott was partially correct... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22317 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA Below the radar: Secret flights to torture and 'disappearance' AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL USA In May 2005, three stunned and traumatized Yemeni men emerged from a covert network of US-run prisons scattered across continents. They had been transported from site to site on secret flights and detained since 2003 without any contact with the outside world. Amnesty International went to Yemen to interview them and the men's gruelling stories shed a glimmer of light on the murky system of c aptures, transfers and secret detention that has been developed by the USA in the "war on terror". Muhammad Bashmilah and Salah 'Ali Qaru were arrested in Jordan and transferred to US custody in October 2003. Two months later Muhammad al-Assad was arrested in Tanzania and handed to US officials. As far as their families were concerned, the men then "disappeared". In fact, they were held in at least four secret US-run facilities, probably in three different countries... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22316 Evidence Suggests White House Conspiracy Jason Leopold Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald stated in a court filing late Wednesday in the CIA leak case that his investigators have obtained evidence during the course of the two-year-old probe that proves several White House officials conspired to discredit former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of the administration's pre-war Iraq intelligence. This is the first time the special counsel has acknowledged that White House officials are alleged to have engaged in a coordinated effort to undercut the former ambassador's credibility by disseminating classified intelligence information that would have contradicted Wilson's public statements... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22314 Justifying the need for the 'war on terror' Rabble News The following document was written as a response to the publication in early March of Manifesto: Together Facing the New Totalitarianism authored by Salman Rushdie, Irshad Manji and ten others. Even though the "cartoon controversy" is not in the news or the editorials any more, we find it important to circulate this response to the "manifesto." We believe that the main assumptions behind the "manifesto" as well as the dominant Western media interpretations of the controversy are based on a "clash of civilizations" framework which has been seeping more and more deeply into the way Western citizens are encouraged to interpret international relations, foreign policy and the actions and speech of Muslims. This framework is serving to create and stir distrust and hatred of Muslims in Western countries and is helping to convince the people of those countries of the justifiability of continuing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and possibly of starting new wars... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22308 GI Special 4D6: "I Don't See Any More Good" - April 6, 2006 Thomas F. Barton What's working and what's failing in the US-led effort to battle the Iraqi insurgents? On Friday, video journalist Brian Palmer, who was embedded with US Marines in Iraq's volatile Anbar province, gives us an uncensored, inside look at the extremely dangerous and often overwhelming job of fighting the committed insurgency. "I don't see any more good coming out of being here," Lance Corporal Damon Broussard told Palmer. "You can only make so much progress and then you have the guys hiding behind the scenes planting IEDs and stuff ... You can only do so much until you friggin' slam your face into the wall so many times."... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22334 Der Spiegel's Interview with Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz "The War Is Bad for the Economy" Frank Hornig and Georg Mascolo SPIEGEL: Professor Stiglitz, at the beginning of the Iraq war, the United States administration was hoping to almost break even in terms of the costs ... Stiglitz: ... they truly believed the Iraqi people could use their oil revenues to pay for reconstruction. SPIEGEL: And now you are estimating the cost of war at levels between $1 trillion and $2 trillion. How do you explain this difference?... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22333 Shootout at the Plantation: Colonial Masters Turn on the Hired Help Chris Floyd So now we are down to the raw meat at last. One by one, the justifications mouthed by the makers of the Iraq War have been stripped away, revealed as gossamer tissues of lies and obfuscation: weapons of mass destruction, Iraqi involvement in 9/11, reducing terrorism in the world and of course, bringing democracy to the poor Iraqi people. This last rag has been the one clutched most fiercely of late by the warlords in Washington and Lon don, but now it too has been cast aside into the blood and muck. All that's left is the naked, slathering beast of power, imposing its will on a conquered land – and blaming its victims, even as it chews them to pieces.. Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22331 Iraqis struggle to cope with lower food rations INSTITUTE FOR WAR & PEACE REPORTING A government decision to cut food rations has hurt poor Iraqis who cannot afford high prices on the open market, say economists and Baghdad residents. Despite rising poverty in Iraq, the government has decided to cut the food ration budget from $4 billion to $3 billion in 2006, as the country shifts from a socialist to a free market economy. The Iraqi government has provided subsidies on basic food items such as flour and sugar for decades. The United Nations expanded the program when the country was under crippling economic sanctions. However, subsidies have now been cut on staples including salt, soap and beans... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22312 GI Special 4D5: Atlanta - April 5, 2006 Thomas F. Barton ...My son, Sgt Ryan Montgomery Campbell, died while supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom just south of Baghdad almost two years ago, April 29, 2004. He and 7 other members of his battery were targeted and killed by the driver of a vehicle bearing an improvised explosive device. A day has not gone by that I have not cried for my son. He was my child and my dear friend. I miss him so much. And hardly a day has gone by that I have not blamed President Bush f or my son’s death. I am so angry with Bush for deceiving us, the world, and especially for deceiving my son and his fellow troops... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22313 The Iraqis aren't fools… Faiza Al-Arji ...But now, who tore Iraq apart but this ugly occupation? The picture gets clearer when we all meet, feel that our hearts are united, and there is one enemy targeting us, wanting to tear our unity apart, and divide our country… The Iraqis aren't fools, these calamities strengthen our unity and solidarity. People in Baghdad collect donations, from all families, from all sects and ethnics, building the demolished mosques, so that Al-Athan (= the Islamic call for prayer) should rise and call in the Iraqi cities: Allahu Akhbar….GOD IS Great… This is what they want to deprive the Iraqis from hearing…. Someone out there is targeting our identity and religion, to shred them… The Iraqis aren't fools… Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22310 Interview: Iraqi blogger Riverbend Firas Al-Atraqchi, Aljazeera.net When Iraqi blogger Riverbend, 26, checked her email account on March 28, she was surprised to find about 800 messages congratulating her for being nominated as a finalist for the Samuel Johnson Prize for contemporary non-fiction. Due to persistent power outages and failing phone lines, she was unaware that two days earlier she and 18 others had been listed as candidates for the £30,000 award. "I was walking on air," she told Al Jazeera.net when it finally sank in. Riverbend, who describes herself as a 26-year-old computer specialist, insists on remaining anonymous. Riverbend's blog Baghdad Burning began to make waves in late 2003 and quickly became one of the most read Iraqi blogs. She offered an Iraqi woman's perspective on the US invasion and the first months after the fall of Baghdad... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22306 The sham of 'sovereignty' in occupied Iraq ... Imad Khadduri "In a meeting last Wednesday (March 29, 2006) that was held at 'president' Jalal Talabani's home near the Green Zone, which assembled the heads of the various Iraqi sectarian parties for crisis discussions, the American ambassador Khalilzad joined the gathering along with the US Consul, Robert Ford. Upon being seated, Khalilzad responded to the usual welcoming greetings of the assembled. He then turned to Jalal Talabani with a sarcastic smile and intoned in broken Arabic (as he had learned a broken Lebanese accent of Arabic during his studies at the American University of Beirut): "Mam (uncle) Jajal, have you heard of the latest joke?"... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22307 Strange way to win hearts and minds Foreign Policy Despite public statements after the Abu Ghraib scandal indicating that the United States would reduce the Iraqi prison population, the Brookings Iraq Index released this week shows it has more than doubled since June 2004 (pdf report, see p. 17). There are now around 15,000 Iraqi prisoners held by U.S. and Allied forces, in addition to those held by the local authorities... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22327 Helen and Sylvia, the new face of terrorism Nigel Morris and Jonathan Brown Two grandmothers from Yorkshire face up to a year in prison after becoming the first people to be arrested under the Government's latest anti-terror legislation. Helen John, 68, and Sylvia Boyes, 62, both veterans of the Greenham Common protests 25 years ago, were arrested on Saturday after deliberately setting out to highlight a change in the law which civil liberties groups say will criminalise free speech and further undermine the right to peaceful demonstration... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22321 'The war is illegal. I can't pay for a government killing machine' Geneviève Roberts A man has vowed to go to prison rather than pay taxes which he believes would fund a "blatantly illegal war" in Iraq. Robin Brookes, 52, appeared at Swindon County Court for refusing to pay a £580 income tax bill. Describing an imminent seizure of his goods as "blood money", the doll's house designer, from Market Lavington in Wiltshire, said: "I don't want to break the law, and I want to contribute to education and health, the law and the police force, but I cannot pay for a government's killing machine... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22315 Chomsky summary Xymphora ...To summarize what I feel about Chomsky: * Only in the United States could anyone have a 'debate’ on the Lobby issue. The basic Mearsheimer/Walt thesis is absolutely true, and everybody in the world knows it (...) * Chomsky isn’t an idiot, and is fully informed, so he knows the thesis is true. * Despite this, Chomsky went out of his way to publish on the matter (he didn’t have to comment on it, and he certainly didn’t have to attack it), thus using his considerable intellectual reputa tion to provide cover for the Lobby to allow it to continue to do the evil that it does... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22297 www.uruknet.info: a site gathering daily information concerning occupied Iraq: news, analysis, documents and texts of iraqi resistance available in Italian and English.   You receive this newsletter because you subscribed it. If you think it was an abuse, or simply if you don't want to receive it any more, click here to unsubscribe from the newsletter.