| By Truth about Iraqis Of course.
Just consider. The US investigation said 1) four people died and 2) they took fire from the house and 3) the troops acted appropriately.
 But the AP video shows at least five children and four women killed.
Furthermore, this picture from AP shows at least six corpses, four of what are discernible are children.
Has no one questioned the discrepancy in the death toll?
Tsk, tsk ...
What will this kind of justice breed, I wonder ...
Iraqi PM Maliki must be wondering the same thing today. He just received a sharp rebuke from the White House:
The White House on Friday sought to soften criticism by Iraq's prime minister over allegations that U.S. Marines killed two dozen unarmed civilians in the western town of Haditha last November.
White House press secretary Tony Snow said that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had told U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad that he had been misquoted. But Snow was unable to explain what al-Maliki told Khalilzad or how he had been misquoted.
"That is a little too complicated for me to try to read out," Snow said at a briefing where he was pressed to explain how al-Maliki's remarks were supposed to have been distorted. "It becomes a little convoluted and so I don't want to make a real clear characterization because it's a little hazy to me," Snow said.
The prime minister was quoted a day earlier as saying the Haditha deaths were "a horrible crime." He also was quoted as saying, "This is a phenomenon that has become common among many of the multinational forces. No respect for citizens, smashing civilian cars and killing on a suspicion or a hunch. It's unacceptable."
Now we know why the US refused to sign on to the International Criminal Court, to save itself an almost daily humiliation, methinks.
From Wikipedia: The U.N. General Assembly called the "United Nations Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Establishment of an International Criminal Court" in Italy, where the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court was adopted on July 17, 1998.
Almost all states participating voted in favor of the statute; the United States joined Israel, People's Republic of China, Iraq, Qatar, Libya and Yemen in voting against it.
Israel reversed its decision and signed the statute just before the conference closed, but later reversed again and nullified its signature. Initially, the United States under Bill Clinton signed the treaty but never submitted it for ratification. When George W. Bush took office in 2001, he nullified the signature amid bipartisan consensus on the matter.
Update: More on Ishaqi:
From the Associated Press: A U.S. ground force conducted the Ishaqi attack, said two defense officials in Washington. After being fired upon from the targeted building, the soldiers pulled back and called in airstrikes by an Air Force AC-130 gunship, which attacked and collapsed the building, they said.
One of the officials said the investigation into the circumstances of the Ishaqi attack found that four people in the building were killed by U.S. forces, including two women and a child. The main target of the attack, said by U.S. intelligence to be an al-Qaida figure, ran from the building but was later captured, the official said.
Caldwell said that a search found "the body of Abu Ahmed plus three noncombatants," while the "investigating officer concluded that possibly up to nine collateral deaths resulted from this engagement but could not determine the precise number due to collapsed walls and heavy debris."
Local Iraqis said there were 11 dead, contending they were killed by U.S. troops before the house was leveled.
The bloody aftermath of the attack was captured at the time in the footage shot by an AP Television News cameraman. The video became the focus of attention Friday when the BBC aired it in the wake of recent allegations of U.S. troops killing unarmed civilians.
The footage shows at least one adult male and four of the children with deep wounds to the head that could have been caused by bullets or shrapnel. One child has an obvious entry wound to the side and the inside of the walls left standing were pocked with bullet holes. A voice on the tape said there were clear bullet wounds in two people.
The video includes an unidentified man saying "children were stuck in the room, alone and surrounded."
"After they handcuffed them, they shot them dead. Later, they struck the house with their planes. They wanted to hide the evidence. Even a 6-month-old infant was killed. Even the cows were killed, too," he said Hello Mr. Soldier Man could you tell us how the collateral damage happened and you could tell us why you came out with a pronouncement of innocence on the same day the BBC aired their video?
Can you also tell us why you have been able to determine no misconduct but a) you do not know the exact number of collateral deaths and b) why the same said children and women appear with gunshot wounds? |
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