War crimes....

Amnesty International's newly-released annual report criticize [sic] Wednesday the deaths of around 200 Israelis, at least 130 of them civilians and including 21 children, who were killed in suicide bombings and other "deliberate attacks" by Palestinian militants.

This "deliberate targeting of civilians by Palestinian armed groups," the report says, "constituted crimes against humanity."

The report also charged that the Israel Defense Forces killed some 600 Palestinians, including more than 100 children, between January and December 2003.

According to the report, most of those who died were killed unlawfully, in "reckless shooting, shelling and bombing in civilian residential areas, in extra-judicial executions and through excessive use of force."

The IDF also comes under criticism for "certain abuses" that constitute war crimes, and gives the examples of unlawful killings, obstruction of medical assistance and targeting of medical personnel, the extensive and wanton destruction of property, torture and the use of "human shields."

I recently asked an Israeli-born friend, whose opinion I respect, how militant supporters of Israel can decry the deaths of Jewish children at Palestinian hands, while ignoring the deaths of Palestinian children killed by the IDF. He answered that he thought they'd charge that Palestinian terrorists deliberately target Jewish children, while the IDF strives to avoid civilian casualties--those that happen are by accident.

I think that is their rationale, but such an opinion rests on denial. First, much evidence--such as that cited above--indicates that members of the Israeli military do, in fact, deliberately target civilians. And while their actions may or may not be officially condoned, there is no doubt that bringing to bear the IDF's heavy firepower in densely-populated areas leads to dreadful civilian casualties. You might use the excuse, "We didn't mean to kill civilians," the first few times. But at this stage, the carnage is predictable, and the excuse deceitful.

Complete story here.

Questions remain....

Will the truth behind Nick Berg's murder ever be known?

American businessman Nicholas Berg's body was found on May 8 near a Baghdad overpass; a video of his supposed decapitation death by knife appeared on an alleged al-Qaeda-linked website (www.al-ansar.biz) on May 11. But according to what both a leading surgical authority and a noted forensic death expert separately told Asia Times Online, the video depicting the decapitation appears to have been staged.

[...]

While the circumstances surrounding both the video and Nick Berg's last days have been the source of substantive speculation, both Simpson and Nordby perceived it as highly probable that Berg had died some time prior to his decapitation. A factor in this was an apparent lack of the "massive" arterial bleeding such an act initiates.

[...]

And Berg is seen on the beheading videotape in what appears to be US military prison-issue clothing, sitting in what appears to be a US military-type white chair, virtually identical to those photographed as used at Abu Ghraib prison....

The article raises other questions and inconsistincies, too, not the least of which is that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the individual blamed by the Bush administration for beheading Berg, was reportedly killed long before Berg's death.

Complete article here.

It's official: we've been had...

An urgent investigation has been launched in Washington into whether Iran played a role in manipulating the US into the Iraq war by passing on bogus intelligence through Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress, it emerged yesterday.

Some intelligence officials now believe that Iran used the hawks in the Pentagon and the White House to get rid of a hostile neighbour, and pave the way for a Shia-ruled Iraq.

According to a US intelligence official, the CIA has hard evidence that Mr Chalabi and his intelligence chief, Aras Karim Habib, passed US secrets to Tehran, and that Mr Habib has been a paid Iranian agent for several years, involved in passing intelligence in both directions.

[...]

"It's pretty clear that Iranians had us for breakfast, lunch and dinner," said an intelligence source in Washington yesterday.

Complete story here.

FBI nabs the wrong Muslim (again!)....

Brandon Mayfield just appeared live on CNN. He has been exonerated of any involvement in the Madrid train bombings. The FBI is now admitting that they mistakenly identified a fingerprint as belonging to the Porland, Oregon-resident, attorney, and convert to Islam, who spent two weeks in prison as a result of their error.

Complete story here.

Kerry-Pelosi '04...?

Criticalviewer makes a strong case for nominating Nancy Pelosi to the Kerry ticket.

I'd enthusiastically vote for her! Pelosi has long stood out from among lackluster, apologist Republican-lite Democrats.

Spread the word: Pelosi for V.P.

Remember freedom of speech...?

E.L. Doctorow, one of the most celebrated writers in America, was nearly booed off the stage at Hofstra University Sunday when he gave a commencement address lambasting President George W. Bush and effectively calling him a liar.

Booing that came mainly from the crowd in the stands became so intense that Doctorow stopped speaking at one point, showing no emotion as he stood silently and listened to the jeers. Hofstra President Stuart Rabinowitz intervened, and called on the audience to allow him to finish. He did, although some booing persisted.

Apparently, it was mostly parents and relatives who objected to criticism of Bush. Said one enlightened man, "If this would have happened in Florida, we would have taken him out."

Ah, such respect for the First Amendment! And who says fascism is dead?

Complete story here.

First casualty of war...

The Pentagon seems to be hoping that if they keep denying that the U.S. military massacred an Iraqi wedding party, Americans will come to believe them. Sadly, they may be right.

"There was no evidence of a wedding: no decorations, no musical instruments found, no large quantities of food or leftover servings one would expect from a wedding celebration," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said Saturday. "There may have been some kind of celebration. Bad people have celebrations, too."

"Bad people"? In addition to the callousness of his remarks, such simplistic vilification does nothing to win over the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.

The general's denials are contradicted by every other piece of independent evidence: reporters on the scene, information from hospitals, accounts of survivors and a wedding video that just turned up. On the video, for example, a stocky man with close-cropped hair can be seen playing an electric organ at a wedding. Then in another tape filmed a day later in Ramadi, the same musician is lying dead--his face clearly visible in a burial shroud, dressed in the same tan shirt as he wore when he performed.

A CNN anchor this morning threw in a line that militants may have been hiding out among the wedding party. Even if this were true, would "neutralizing" several suspected militants justify killing 11 women and 14 children (at last count)?

Initially, the military denied that any women or children were killed. With bodies piling up, however, Kimmitt was forced to admit that a "handful of women" - perhaps four to six - were "caught up in the engagement...They may have died from some of the fire that came from the aircraft."

May have died?

One survivor, Haleema Shihab, 32, hid out the night, wounded and bleeding, in a bomb crater with her stepdaughter. She said that American soldiers showed up and one, laughing, kicked her to see if she were alive. "I pretended I was dead so he wouldn't kill me," she said.

According to the Guardian, American commanders remain unrepentant.

Major General James Mattis, commander of the 1st Marine Division, was scathing of those who suggested a wedding party had been hit. "How many people go to the middle of the desert ... to hold a wedding 80 miles (130km) from the nearest civilization? These were more than two dozen military-age males. Let's not be naive."

When reporters asked him about footage on Arabic television of a child's body being lowered into a grave, he replied: "I have not seen the pictures but bad things happen in wars. I don't have to apologize for the conduct of my men."

Bad things do indeed happen in war. Mattis would do well to remember, howver, that U.S. soldiers are subject to the Geneva Convention and not immune from legal prosecution for war crimes.

Complete stories here and here.