[uruknet.info] - [daily information from occupied iraq] - [newsletter 08 Feb 2006 - Part One]

uruknet.info   اوروكنت.إنفو :: information from occupied iraq :: informazione dall'iraq occupato

Iraq stories slowly moved off front pages Truth About Iraqis If you haven't noticed by now, keep this in mind: Iraq war coverage is very slowly and subtly moving off the front pages of major US news outlets. But this isn't a surprise, is it? Maybe they are done reporting all the "Good News that's fit to print". But, as I mentioned in my blog yesterday, there are nearly two-dozen specific stories of crime, death, kidnapping, firefights, Badr terrorism and US thievery emerging from Iraq each and every day. Consider also that 18 US soldiers have died in Iraq in less than a week. Yet, it seems Americans no longer care... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20418 Gasoline Crisis in Iraq Pratap Chatterjee, Special to CorpWatch Contract mismanagement and possible corruption in the Iraqi government are fueling a crisis over international gasoline delivery into Iraq. Citing a mountain of unpaid bills, the governments of Turkey and Saudi Arabia have shut off gasoline exports to Iraq. With it's options dwindling and beleaguered Iraqis demanding fuel, Baghdad has begun to negotiate with former arch-rival, Iran. Meanwhile, hundreds of irate Iraqi security guards, who work for the gasoline delivery companies, are threatening to protest along the Kuwait border to demand payment... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20441 As liberal Democrat calls for special prosecutor on Iraq, Democrats duck John Byrne, RAW STORY Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), the feisty septuagenarian congressman who serves as the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee will issue yet another missive to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales later this week calling for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate possible criminal misconduct in regard to the Bush Administration's march to war in Iraq. Just five other Democrats have signed Conyers' letter: Reps. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) Mike Honda (D-CA) and Jim McDermott (D-WA), Susan Davis (D-CA,) and Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) along with Bernie Sanders (I-VT)... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20440 GI Special 4B7: "A Casket Full Of Betrayal" - February 8, 2006 Tomas F. Barton When I saw the picture of Robson de Lima Barbosa looking at his son, Corporal Felipe Carvalho Barbosa in his casket, I am reminded of a stark truth. The people who are in control of America's war machine, will never wind up in a casket with a military uniform on. It is so easy for them who don't go, to say he or she died for their country. That line rolls off their lips with such ease. Kind of like saying, "Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family." Such concern, and thoughtfulness. I heard this so many times during the Vietnam War, until I went to Vietnam. Two weeks after I came home, something was wrong with me. Something died inside of me, and when I saw an American flag, I felt a sense of profound betrayal. For years, I imagined putting an American flag in a casket, so I could grieve. Because, that symbol is the most painful death of my life... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20438 PAUL BREMER – NEW CANAAN’S PONTIUS PILATE William A. Collins ...You’ll recall that President Bush appointed Bremer as the first head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, as soon as the military’s mission in Iraq was "accomplished." The Romans once called this job "proconsul," the appointed ruler of a conquered territory. Their most storied incumbent was Pontius Pilate, though our grasp of his actual duties and performance in Judea remain somewhat hazy. Not so with Bremer’s. His work was precisely laid out in Washington and he performed it with quiet ferocity. His first task was to turn over Iraq’s traditional publicly owned enterprises to foreign investors... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20436 Cartoons of Mass Destruction Paul Richard Harris, Axis of Logic ...But while the present reaction to the cartoons is astonishing to some, and expected by others, these were just jokes, right? No, they weren’t just jokes. Leaving aside whether Muslims are stiff-necked and unable to appreciate a joke, at least one at their own expense, these cartoons were not published to be funny. Nor were they published, as claimed by the chief editor of Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten, to "examine whether people would succumb to self-censorship, as we have seen in other cases when it comes to Muslim issues." They were published to inflame, to denigrate, to anger, to humiliate... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20435 BLAIR: 'BRITISH TROOPS IN IRAN? WE CAN NEVER SAY NEVER' Bob Roberts Deputy TONY Blair yesterday refused to rule out a British military invasion of Iran. He told MPs the rogue Middle Eastern state was helping to spread the "virus" of Muslim fanaticism across the world. It was a problem which needed "sorting", the Prime Minister said. And asked if the British military option was on the table, he admitted: "You can never say never in any of these situations"... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20434 Bush administration lied about Gitmo detainees, many of them are innocent Daisy Cutter, Daily Kos ...But thanks to a new report, we now know what we've suspected for a long time: that many of the detainees at Gitmo are innocent of any crime. 1. Fifty-five percent (55%) of the detainees are not determined to have committed any hostile acts against the United States or its coalition allies. 2. Only 8% of the detainees were characterized as al Qaeda fighters. Of the remaining detainees, 40% have no definitive connection with al Qaeda at all and 18% are have no definitive affiliation with either al Qaeda or the Taliban. 3. The Government has detained numerous persons based on mere affiliations with a large number of groups that in fact, are not on the Department of Homeland Security terrorist watchlist. Moreover, the nexus between such a detainee and such organizations varies considerably. Eight percent are detained because they are deemed "fighters for;" 30% considered "members of;" a large majority - 60% -- are detained merely because they are "associated with" a group or groups the Government asserts are terrorist organizations. For 2% of the prisoners their nexus to any terrorist group is unidentified... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20433 The Twin Plagues Inequality and War DAVID SWANSON Ending the extreme inequality of wealth and well-being in the United States would end the war in Iraq. Ending the war in Iraq and others like it would go a long way toward reducing the inequality. Reverend Dr. Joseph Lowery honored Coretta Scott King at her funeral, speaking in front of four presidents, when he challenged injustice, saying: "We know now there were no weapons of mass destruction over there [standing ovation]... but Coretta knew and we know that there are weapons of misdirection right down here. Millions without health insurance. Poverty abounds. For war billions more but no more for the poor." This wasn't just a challenge to the powerful. This should be taken as a challenge to peace activists to start fighting poverty and to the poor to become peace activists... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20432 Bush Balkanizes the world Jerry Mazza, Online Journal Contributing Writer Paradoxically, Bush & Company’s relentless push for world hegemony seems to be Balkanizing the world, that is, splintering countries, regions, even zip codes, into smaller units, which are more hostile to each other though ethnically more homogenous. Additionally, this push is having the same effect in the United States, breaking it into red and blue states, a division beyond traditional North-South divisions. What’s more voting districts are being split into religious, ethnic, racial, and economic sectors as well, creating the specter of Balkanization... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20431 Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Wednesday, 8 February 2006 Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board, the Free Arab Voice ...In a dispatch posted at 12:10pm Mecca time midday Wednesday, Mafkarat al-Islam reported that mercenaries working with the US military shot and killed two Iraqi civilians near the main garage in the al-'Allawi district of Baghdad. The correspondent for Mafkarat al-Islam reported a traffic warden, who was nearby when the shooting occurred, as saying that there was a column of four-wheel drive vehicles of the sort used by mercenaries working for the US military driving through the area. Without any warning, the traffic warden said, one of the mercenaries in one of the vehicles opened fire on two Iraqi civilians who were crossing the street and who had not noticed the presence of the column. Both civilians died instantly... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20430 Tale of a Connecticut donkey Sheila Samples ...Democrats in that very blue, anti-war state are unhappy with their three-term senator, Joe Lieberman, for his stubborn, rabid support of President Bush and his bloody, illegal war. They pleaded with Joe to recognize that the war on Iraq was planned long before 9-11, that there were no weapons of mass destruction in that pitiful, unarmed country, and that thousands of US citizens and tens of thousands of Iraqi men, women and children are being blown to pieces, maimed, and poisoned with depleted uranium -- all because of a lie. But Joe refused to move. He responded by penning an op-ed in the Nov. 29, 2005, Wall Street Journal, entitled Our Troops Must Stay. In that piece, Lieberman "catapaulted the propaganda" that Iraq was experiencing a great deal of progress, underscored by "continuing security and growing prosperity."... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20439 Soldiers Face Debilitating Diseases NBC 30 They served their time in the military in places like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and more recently, Iraq and Afghanistan. Most returned in good health. But an NBC 30 investigation has found that for some soldiers, their service has meant a long and debilitating death sentence with mysterious diseases. "I have good days, I have bad days," said M. Sterry, of New Haven. "There were eight of us that served together. Six of my friends are dead." She looks healthy, but Sterry is a very sick woman who has no idea how much longer she will live (...) State Sen. Gayle Slossberg said one of the sources of the diseases may be depleted uranium... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20429 Iraqi voices are drowned out in a blizzard of occupiers' spin The deception that launched the invasion of Iraq now increasingly shapes media coverage of the occupation Sami Ramadani, The Guardian Three years after invading Iraq, George Bush and Tony Blair are still dipping into the trough of deception and disinformation that launched the war: hailing non-existent progress, declaring sanctimonious satisfaction with sectarian elections and holding out the mirage of early withdrawal. In reality, the occupation and divide-and-rule tactics have spawned death squads, torture, kidnappings, chemical attacks, polluted water, depleted uranium, bombardment of civilians, probably more than 100,000 people dead and a relentless deterioration in Iraqis' daily lives. Much of this goes unreported in the British and American media, stripped of context or consigned to the small print... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20427 The terror of President Bush: How one word granted one man so much power and control (commentary) Mike Adams Following accelerating criticism that the Bush Administration's domestic spying program violated every possible U.S. law and Constitutional amendment, the Bush Administration has now renamed its blatantly illegal domestic spying program the "terrorist surveillance program." Fox News has already adopted the moniker, resorting to classic Orwellian Newsspeak to convince viewers that since this illegal government operation contains the word "terrorist," it must be okay. Where would George Bush be today without the word "terror," by the way?... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20426 Bush’s budget plans More war at home and abroad Fred Goldstein There is nothing more political than the budget of a capitalist government. And the budget that the Bush administration has submitted to Congress truly embodies the reactionary politics of the White House. Hundreds of billions of dollars for present and future wars. Hundreds of billions in tax cuts for the super rich. Cutbacks and hardship for the workers and the poor. The proposed $2.7 trillion proposal gives $439 billion to the Pentagon, an increase of 6.9 percent. In addition, there is $120 billion more in "emergency" funds for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The total military spending will be $560 billion this year alone... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20423 The Wider War in Iran Robert Dreyfuss Too many observers are adopting a relaxed attitude about the likelihood of a U.S. attack on Iran. Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal told us all to let our guard down, that the influence of the neoconservatives on U.S. foreign policy has evaporated: "As 'Neocons’ Leave, Bush Foreign Policy Takes a Softer Line," said the soothing page one story. An attack on Iran might seem foolish by standards that reasonable people use—but so was the invasion of Iraq... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20421 Three More U.S. Soldiers Killed in Iraq PAUL GARWOOD, The Associated Press ...On Wednesday, the U.S. military said an Army soldier from the 4th Squadron, 14th Cavalry Regiment died of wounds suffered three days earlier in a roadside bombing in Anbar province. A Marine assigned to the 2nd Marine Logistics Group, II Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) was killed Monday in a bombing in Anbar, the command said. Another Marine assigned to the 2d Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward), died in a non-hostile vehicle accident Tuesday during combat operations near Qaim on the border with Syria, the military said... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20443 22 US Reps Want Impeachment Probe Matthew Cardinale, Atlanta Progressive News 22 US Representatives–including two members of the Georgia delegation–have now signed on as co-sponsors of H. Res 635, demanding a probe which could recommend Bush’s impeachment, including the initial sponsor, US Rep. John Conyers, Atlanta Progressive News has learned. 23 US Representatives now total want Bush either to face an impeachment probe or to resign... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20420 When American convoy pass…. Baghdad Dweller US occupation forces killed two innocent Iraqi citizen in the district "Allawi Al-Hilla" this morning. Eyewitness confirmed that A convoy of civilian American cars with shaded glasses fired on two civilians during crossing not paying attention to the passing convoy. This accident above is one of many daily accidents in Iraq, "Americans kill innocent civilians"... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20417 Tomdispatch: Alfred McCoy on How Not to Ban Torture in Congress Tom Engelhardt & Alfred McCoy Alfred McCoy, an expert on the CIA and its history of torture, has some actual news -- the sort that's been sitting unnoticed right in front of our collective, reportorial eyes. Last year's clash between John McCain and the Bush administration over the senator's successful attempt to attach a ban on torture and other abusive interrogation techniques to the Defense Appropriations Bill was heavily reported. After all, it was a heroic tale of a man -- himself tortured pitilessly earlier in his life -- who held off the powers-that-be, rejected their attempts to amend his ban, and finally triumphed by a handy margin in Congress. The ban, now in place, is the law. End of story. Only one problem, reality turns out to lurk in the fine print -– and the McCain amendment has some striking fine print that mainstream reporters failed to attend to; in fact, McCoy tells us, it has a loophole big enough to absolve torturers of their acts and, in combination with an amendment by Senator Lindsey Graham, drive testimony obtained by torture directly into our courts. I would call that news... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=20415 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. 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