News & Views 10/29/07

Photo: Iraqi policemen and other residents stand near body bags containing the remains of policemen who were killed in a suicide bomb attack in Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) northeast of Baghdad, October 29, 2007. (STR/Reuters)

REPORTS – LIFE IN IRAQ

42 killed, 49 wounded throughout Iraq until Monday afternoon

Iraqi Journalist Is Killed

An Iraqi editor was slain in Baghdad, the Committee to Protect Journalists announced Monday, raising to at least 122 the number of journalists killed in Iraq since the war started in March 2003. Shehab Mohammad al-Hiti was a 27-year-old editor for the fledgling weekly Baghdad al-Youm, which had been publishing for only three weeks. He disappeared Sunday after he left his home in western Baghdad to go to work, the New York-based advocacy organization reported, citing a source at the newspaper. Iraqi security forces found the journalist's body later that afternoon, it said. About 85 percent of media deaths in the war have been Iraqis, according to the group.

Two Iraqis killed, 10 wounded in a double US airstrike in Tikrit

Two Iraqis were killed and 10 others wounded in two separate US airstrikes Monday on the northern city of Tikrit city, an Iraqi police source said. A US aircraft jolted the Abu Obeid area in west Tikrit killing two Iraqis and injuring seven others, Colonel Ahmed Hasan from Salahaddin province police department said. Shortly afterwards, another US airstrike hit Albo'jail district in east Tikrit injuring a woman and two children, Hassan added. The reason for the two airstrikes, according to the source, is still unknown.

Audio: Attack on Iraqi Village

Early in the morning on Oct. 4, American commando helicopters landed next to the village of Jaisani, a remote farming area just north of Baghdad. They were after a suspected weapons trafficker with ties to Iran. Within an hour, more than two dozen Iraqis inside the village were dead or dying. A U.S. military press release called the dead "criminals" and "terrorists." Now several Iraqi eyewitnesses say that the intelligence was false — and that those killed, including three women, were innocent. That morning, the men at the village checkpoint peered into the pre-dawn darkness. There was something out there — about 30 yards away. It was clear, said one eyewitness, that a ghost was moving. Thamer Mahdi Al Bayati, a 35-year-old engineer, was at the checkpoint. That morning, he was certain that al-Qaida in Iraq was again attacking his Shiite village. "The guard shot two rounds at the ghost. The ghost responded by throwing a hand grenade at the checkpoint," Al Bayati says. "Then heavy fire opened up at the checkpoint—machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades." Men dashed from their houses to the east side of the village, desperate to reinforce the checkpoint. The women and children ran to the west toward what they thought was safe ground.

World's Bravest Orchestra Plays on in Iraq

When the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra (INSO) holds a concert in Baghdad, organisers don't like to advertise: in fact they would prefer as few people as possible know about it. Welcome to the bravest orchestra in the world. The INSO, established in 1959, has survived decades of war, international sanctions, government neglect and vicious sectarian violence that has killed tens of thousands of Iraqis and forced millions to flee for their lives. It saw its music library and instrument store looted after the U.S.-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein in 2003, and one of its main concert venues was destroyed by U.S. missiles. Some members have been kidnapped or killed in sectarian violence, others have received death threats and 29 have joined the exodus of more than 2 million people who have fled Iraq. But amid the discord, the orchestra seeks harmony. Its 60 members are an ethnic and religious cross-section of Iraqi society -- Shi'ite, Sunni Muslim and Christian, and Arab, Kurd and Turkman. They see themselves as a family of survivors. So it was with pride that the orchestra launched into Johann Strauss's 'Blue Danube' to kick off the first concert of their new season, held on a Thursday afternoon at a social club in the western Baghdad district of Mansour, for an audience of invited guests.

Iraq's Aid Crews Lead Secret Lives

They use aliases and keep no business address. Only their immediate family members know what they do. This is the secretive world of Iraqis who work for private aid groups - and feel constant danger from extremists whose targets include Western agencies and their local staff. "We are the people who do good but, like thieves, we work in the dark," said George, an Iraqi running logistics for a group that assists needy Iraqi women. "The thieves, on the other hand, walk the streets with a swagger. No one dares mess with them." He agreed to speak to The Associated Press on condition that he be identified only by his first name. He also refused to be photographed and said his Western aid organization could not be named. The grim irony - humanitarian workers living in fear for offering help - highlights the insecurities facing nearly any endeavor in Iraq. Often, the perils are elevated for local staff who must commute to guarded compounds.

Chalabi back in action in Iraq

Ahmad Chalabi, the controversial, ubiquitous Iraqi politician and one-time Bush administration favorite, has re-emerged as a central figure in the latest U.S. strategy for Iraq. His latest job: To press Iraq's central government to use early security gains from the surge to deliver better electricity, health, education and local security services to Baghdad neighborhoods. That's the next phase of the surge plan. Until now, the U.S. military, various militias, insurgents and some U.S. backed groups have provided those services without great success.That the U.S. and Iraqi officials are again turning to Chalabi, this time to restore life to Baghdad neighborhoods, speaks to his resiliency in this nascent government. It's also, some say, his latest effort to promote himself as a true national advocate for everyday Iraqis.

Definition of Democracy

Again we return to what called Democracy and its definition in language and on the ground. At least I wonder about its meaning in country like Iraq. What it is mean for Iraqi people and for the Iraqi government? Every day we heard about the tragedy stories that happen here and there in under the tent of Democracy. Four years passed and Iraqi people suffer all kinds of tragedies that became part of their new Democratic life … four years and Iraqi people lose their beloved for nothing ...Oh sorry, for democracy’s sake. We got rid of Saddam … Yes, but we still live with same kind of tragedy that reminded us of former regime’s crushing forces. The tragedy of today is committed by Iraqis themselves who killed their brother in cold blood…. May be I use this phrase a lot in my blogs (cold blood)….. Sorry but we are forced to use it because it has good relationship with the tragedies that we live in tragedy of blood. Today morning when I was reading the wires’ news I saw a picture of Iraqi child who was killed in southern governorate. The child killed by hand of Iraqi policemen (according to the site). Those Iraqis (sorry may be I shouldn’t name them as Iraqis because their loyalty not for but to their Parties) were looking for the child’s father who was accused of belonging to militia. The attackers stormed his house but they couldn’t find the father that provoked their anger against the innocent family. This anger resulted of killing the two children and the wife who struggle death in hospital.

IRAQ: Number of girls attending school dropping, say analysts

Education specialists in Iraq are worried about the low school attendance of girls as it could create a huge educational gap. “The fear of losing their children through violence has led many families to keep their children at home but the number of girls kept at home is higher because in addition to the security problem, they are being forced by their families to assist in household chores,” said Sinan Zuhair, a media officer for the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs. “Many families have lost their fathers or mothers and girls are asked to stay at home to help to cook, wash and clean. They are the ones paying the price of the violence since they have to forget about their future to be able to help the lives of their brothers,” Zuhair told IRIN. “The problem is worse in the rural areas where religion is being used by fathers as an excuse to justify why their daughters no longer attend school.” According to Mustafa Jaboury, a spokesman for the Ministry of Education, in the southern provinces, the ratio of girls attending school has dropped from two girls to three boys to one to four.

Marriage in war-torn Iraq turning into mirage

Getting married in Iraq is turning into a dream for the would-be brides and grooms as they are facing two massive difficulties - a lean purse and sectarian confrontation. "It is very difficult to get married in Iraq nowadays because of the economic situation and the soaring cost," said 34-year-old Hussein Ali, an employee at the Ministry of Education. Nowadays, an ordinary wedding costs at least $2,400 dollars (3 million Iraqi dinars), which is a considerable sum of money for Ali, who earns $300 a month. According to traditions, the groom and his family bear the expenses of the marriage, covering the wedding party, furniture, in addition to clothes and jewels, which should be given to the bride ahead of the wedding. "It is not easy for both women and men waiting for proposals, to afford for an expensive dowry, house and the daily costs of sustaining a family," said Ali, confessing that he could not muster enough courageous to propose his girlfriend due to his poor economic condition. "Thinking about marriage is just like thinking about living in the hell," he grumbled.

REPORTS – IRAQI MILITIAS, POLITICIANS, POWER BROKERS

Iraqi troops free 8 kidnapped Sheiks

Iraqi security forces release eight out of the eleven tribal leaders kidnapped from their cars in Baghdad, an Iraqi official says. According to Iraq's Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Mohammed al-Askari, Iraqi security forces rescued them on Monday after fierce clashes with their captives. "We have rescued eight of the hostages and are working to free the others. We killed four of the kidnappers," he said. The Sunni and Shia tribal leaders from Diyala Province who had joined forces against al-Qaeda in Iraq were abducted Sunday as they were traveling home after a meeting with a government official in Baghdad. Police said late Sunday they had found the bullet-riddled body of one of the sheiks, Mishaan Hilan, about 50 meters (yards) away from where the ambush took place.

REPORTS – US/UK/OTHERS IN IRAQ

US grants Blackwater immunity

The US State Department promises Blackwater bodyguards immunity in its investigation into the massacre of Iraqi civilians by the firm. "Once you give immunity, you can't take it away," a senior law enforcement official familiar with the investigation told AP. That means it's possible no criminal charges will be brought, or, if they are, it may take months. Three senior law enforcement officials were quoted by AP as saying that all the Blackwater bodyguards involved were given the legal protections as investigators from the Bureau of Diplomatic Security sought to find out what happened. The bureau is an arm of the State Department. The investigative misstep comes in the wake of already-strained relations between the United States and Iraq, which is demanding the right to launch its own prosecution of the Blackwater bodyguards.

U.S. Military Ignored Evidence of Iraqi-Made EFPs

When the U.S. military command accused the Iranian Quds Force last January of providing the armour-piercing EFPs (explosively formed penetrators) that were killing U.S. troops, it knew that Iraqi machine shops had been producing their own EFPs for years, a review of the historical record of evidence on EFPs in Iraq shows. The record also shows that the U.S. command had considerable evidence that the Mahdi army had gotten the technology and the training on how to use it from Hezbollah rather than Iran. The command, operating under close White House supervision, chose to deny these facts in making the dramatic accusation that became the main rationale for the present aggressive U.S. stance toward Iran. Although the George W. Bush administration initially limited the accusation to the Quds Force, it has recently begun to assert that top officials of the Iranian regime are responsible for arms that are killing U.S. troops.

Iranian Minister Accuses U.S. Of Helping Kurdish Rebels

Iranian Foreign Minister Manoucher Mottaki, at a news conference Sunday with his Turkish counterpart, accused the United States of backing Kurdish separatists waging warfare against Turkey and Iran. Turkey and Iran have been fighting guerrillas with the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, and the Party for Free Life in Kurdistan, or PEJAK, holed up in the mountains of northern Iraq. "The patience of the Turkish government, parliament and nation has come to its end," Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said at the news conference here. Babacan thanked the Iranian government for its support but said he did not subscribe to the theory that Americans were backing the Kurdish rebels. "The U.S. does not seem to be involved in the PKK insurgence," he told reporters. But Mottaki called PKK, PEJAK and the Mujahedin Khalq organization terrorist groups and suggested the U.S. was supporting them. "We do hope that the U.S. administration will take corrective actions regarding clandestine and behind-the-curtain support for the terrorist activities," he told reporters.

COMMENTARY

Homeless in Iraq

American officials report that the number of sectarian and other killings in Iraq has declined since the onset of the military "surge". But, while the number of killings may, indeed, have fallen, does that mean Iraq is really safer? Insecurity in Iraq is most strikingly illustrated by the number of people fleeing their homes. The United Nations estimates that, since July, the number has risen by 60,000 every month. The best estimate is that around 16% of Iraq's population, or one in six Iraqis, no longer live in their homes. Roughly half of those who have fled have also left the country, implying 2 million refugees. This leaves another two million who have been displaced internally, and who represent an emerging humanitarian tragedy. There have been international reports and fundraising campaigns to support Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordan, but the internally displaced have received less attention, despite their greater vulnerability, owing to their proximity to the conflict and the poor standard of basic services in Iraq. They tend to be less visible, and it is more difficult for donors and agencies to assist them. Internal displacement predates the 2003 Iraq invasion. During Saddam Hussein's rule, large numbers of people were forcibly relocated through either conflict or government policy. Since 2003, displacement has affected all the peoples of Iraq, and the central reason remains the same - the use of violence to expel people from an area with the aim of increasing political and economic power. Mixed neighbourhoods across Iraq have been targeted by one side or another as sectarian violence has risen and local militias wield power. The inability of the government or the multi-national force to curb this intimidation reflects the absence of the rule of law. Other factors causing displacement include operations of the multinational force itself, crime, the lack of basic services, and desperate poverty. The complexity of Iraq's society and history means that many people have been displaced more than once, or have returned from exile only to become internally displaced. According to the UN, 69% of those displaced since February 2006 come from Baghdad, which demonstrates the extent of the "sectarianisation" of the capital. Thus, one reason for the "success" claimed by supporters of the military surge may well be that sectarian cleansing in Baghdad has been hugely effective and is now nearly complete.

No Plan, No Peace in Iraq

How did the US come to invade Iraq with no post-war plan for governing Iraq - and how much did Tony Blair know of the matter? John Ware reports in the first of two articles linked to a new TV series. "Iraq will be better," declared Tony Blair five days after the fall of Saddam. "Better for the region, better for the world, better, above all, for the Iraqi people." That contrasts starkly with the 100,000 or so civilians dead, four million refuges inside and outside Iraq, 4,141 coalition solders who have died and the cost to the UK of well in excess of £5bn. [Death toll for Iraqis is much, much higher. – dancewater] Yet it's now clear that Mr Blair knew before the invasion that America's planning for post-war recovery was woefully inadequate - and so was Britain's. There was no properly worked out strategy for the key longer term objective of transforming it into a stable, prosperous nation that the Blair-Bush vision held out. We know this because Lady [Sally] Morgan, Mr Blair's former political secretary, has said he was "tearing his hair out", and his former foreign affairs adviser Sir David Manning has said he was "very exercised about it". The fact that Mr Blair feared the invasion aftermath might be heading for disaster is potentially more damaging to his reputation than his decision to put the full weight of his office behind the intelligence that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. For that he had cover from the Secret Intelligence Service. [To get the real story on the “plan” for Iraq, read the book THE SHOCK DOCTRINE by Naomi Klein. – dancewater]

An Airstrike a Day Won't Keep Insurgents at Bay

This month has seen the smallest number of Americans killed in Iraq than any other month since March 2006. But the reasons may have less to do with progress in the war than with the way we're now fighting it. Just 29 U.S. military personnel have died in Iraq in October so far-down from 65 in September, 84 in August, 78 in July, 101 in June … You get the picture: Fewer, in most cases far fewer, than half as many American soldiers have died this month than in any previous month all year. However, some perspective is warranted. First, all told, 2007 has been a horrible year for American lives lost in this war-832 to date, more than the 822 lost in all of 2006, and, by the time the year ends, almost certainly more than the 846 killed in 2005 or the 849 in 2004. So, what accounts for the decline in American deaths since the summer? It's hard to say for sure, but one little-reported cause is almost certainly a relative shift in U.S. tactics from fighting on the ground to bombing from the air. From January to September of this year, according to unclassified data, U.S. Air Force pilots in Iraq have flown 996 sorties that involved dropping munitions. By comparison, in all of 2006, they flew just 229 such sorties-one-quarter as many. In 2005, they flew 404; in 2004, they flew 285.

In other words, in the first nine months of 2007, Air Force planes dropped munitions on targets in Iraq more often than in the previous three years combined. More telling still, the number of airstrikes soared most dramatically at about the same time that U.S. troop fatalities declined. It's not clear how many Iraqi civilians have been killed or injured as a result of these airstrikes. (Estimating civilian deaths is a difficult enterprise in any war, especially this one, where so much of the country is inaccessible.) However, it's a fair assessment that the numbers have risen substantially this past year. The research group Iraq Body Count estimates that 417 Iraqi civilians died from January to September of this year as a result of airstrikes. This is only a bit less than the estimated 452 deaths caused by airstrikes in the previous two years combined. (These numbers are almost certainly too low, but they probably reflect the trends.)

RESISTANCE

Blair accused over soldier's death

The mother of a British soldier killed in Iraq holds Tony Blair responsible for her son's death as the inquest into his death resumes. Fusilier Gordon Gentle, 19, was killed on patrol in Basra on June 28, 2004. His mother Rose has blamed Army "neglect" for his death. Mrs. Gentle, a bitter critic of the war in Iraq, claims her son would be alive today if an electronic jamming device had been installed on his Land Rover. "There is someone responsible in the chain of command for not issuing this kit. Why didn't that person pass on this information and give the order to make sure it was fitted to the vehicles? Why have it sitting there if it is not fitted? There has been some kind of breakdown in the chain of command. This could have saved Gordon's life," Rose Gentle said.

VIDEO: Truth in Advertising for Military Recruiters

Quote of the day: "If they do it, it's terrorism, if we do it, it's fighting for freedom." - Anthony Quainton, U.S. Ambassador to Nicaragua, 1984: Anthony Quainton - Source: Off the record response of the Ambassador to a group of concerned U.S. citizens when asked to explain the difference between U.S. government actions in Nicaragua and the violence it condemns as terrorism elsewhere in the world.