Hump day, hump day. We can make it to the weekend. Honest. Hold in there.
AP notes that Christopher Hill has been nominated to be the Ambassador to Iraq. They say this was known but not formal until this afternoon. Really? I'm grabbing this from a March 4th entry by C.I., it's from the Iraqi Foreign Ministry:
Foreign Minister Meets U.S. Secretary of States
Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari met on Monday March 2nd 2009 Ms. Hillary Clinton, U.S. Secretary of State on the sidelines of the International Conference for the reconstruction of Gaza in Sharm El-Sheikh.During the meeting they discussed bilateral relations and President Barack Obama's plan for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, as well as Iraq's regional relations in addition to discussing Iraq's welcome to host the Ministerial Meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Egypt, Jordan and the United States in Baghdad in the coming period.Mrs. Clinton welcomed and supported the convening of the next ministerial meeting in Baghdad during the meeting and thanked the approval of the Iraqi Government on the nomination of the new American ambassador in Baghdad, Mr. Christopher Hill.
If Iraq's Foreign Minister is congratulating and approving Hill, I'd say that's pretty formal. C.I.'s got a link for it but the thing is these links don't work unless you're already in the Ministry. If you're not, you're asked to pick a language ("English" for me) and then you're taken to the homepage.
So I'm using C.I.'s entry as the reference before someone e-mails me and says, "I clicked on the link and it was the home page!"
So'd you hear the one about the PUNK ASS FAUX LEFTIES? They fell in love with Barack and Barack gave them crabs and worse. AP explains that Barack signed signing statements today, just two days after he was slamming Bush for doing the same thing. AP points out:
He also issued a "signing statement" in which he objected to provisions of the bill that he said the Justice Department had advised "raise constitutional concerns." Among them are provisions that Obama said would "unduly interfere" with his authority in the foreign affairs arena by directing him how to proceed, or not to, in negotiations and discussions with international organizations and foreign governments.
Another provision, Obama said, would limit his discretion to choose who performs specific functions in military missions.
The only one who was going to give America a third Bush term was Barry Obama. And he's really proving that each day. Thanks for proving me right, Barry.
It truly is amazing how so many allegedly smart people decided to willfully fool themselves and willing lied to the American people. If they'd told the truth, the fairy tale of Barack would never have taken hold.
Yesterday, there was an Afghan roundtable and I'm including links to that.
The Common Ills
Afghanistan roundtable
9 hours ago
Thomas Friedman is a Great Man
Afghanistan
10 hours ago
Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude
afghanistan roundtable
10 hours ago
SICKOFITRADLZ
Roundtabling Afghanistan
10 hours ago
Trina's Kitchen
Afghanistan in the Kitchen
10 hours ago
Ruth's Report
Talking Afghanistan
10 hours ago
Oh Boy It Never Ends
Friday night movie post on Tuesday
10 hours ago
Like Maria Said Paz
Afghanistan roundtable
10 hours ago
Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills)
The Afghanistan Roundtable
10 hours ago
Stan's in there too! He was doing movies, not the roundtable. But he certainly deserves a link so I'll leave him in the listing. We were offered, Stan, Wally, Cedric and me, the chance to take part but we knew it would move more quickly without us and we knew one of the reasons it was necessary was because a number of women were staying silent on the issue. So it seemed like the statement being made would be stronger coming just from the women in the community.
Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Wednesday, March 11, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, Robert Gates continues speaking but some aren't listening, Thomas E. Ricks can analyze and report but he fails as a media critic (and contradicts himself), Crazy Ass Cockburn distorts the interview Martha Raddatz did this week, and more.
Last night, Tavis Smiley spoke with Thomas E. Ricks, author of the New York Times best seller author of The Gamble, on PBS' Tavis Smiley.
Tavis Smiley: He ran a campaign that was based on getting out of Iraq and getting out quickly. There are millions of Americans who voted for him precisely because of that pledge there are many of us who believe that promises made ought to be promises kept but that's another issue to your point now about it now being as easy as what he thought it was going to be. What then will happen to those millions of Americans who will feel disenfranchised disappionted let down some maybe even lied to if he can't get out, to your point, as quickly as he promised he would?
Thomas E. Ricks: Well first of all, he's already broken a promise because he said he was going to get out one combat brigade a month over the course of many months. Well now he's stopped that. He's going to keep the troop levels more or less the same. By the end of this year, he'll be down to maybe 132,000 troops -- which is where we've been in rough average for the last five years so he's planning on making his big troop withdrawals next year. Whether that happens or not, we'll see. But he said after that, after August 2010, it will stop being a combat mission. Well it doesn't -- the war doesn't end because one president hangs a "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" on an air craft carrier, it doesn't end because one president says the combat is over. Our war ends when American troops stop dying in Iraq.
[. . .]
Tavis Smiley: So forget what Thomas Ricks, Pulitzer Prize winning, number one New York Times best selling author has to say, I'm going to pull these troops out because I told the American people I would, I want to run for re-election and I know I can't run for relection if I'm don't -- if I'm not going to be accountable to what I said I was going to do, so I'm going to pull them out anyway. And then what happens?
Thomas E. Ricks: I don't think that's going to happen, first of all, because Obama has also promised Iraqis he will not abandon Iraq I think he will get the troop numbers down probably close to 50,000 in 2010 but I think he's going to find it's much harder to actually get the last 50,000 troops out That Iraq is going to say "We want you to leave but not yet." So he'll say, 'We can't abandon Iraq so we'll have to continue this mission awhile longer than I'd hoped."
Tavis Smiley noted the discussion of the 'surge' during the lead up to the 2008 general election ("and here comes Thomas Ricks saying 'the surge failed'"). Ricks acknowledged an "improved security" but pointed out "it's purpose was that larger purpose" -- create the space for "a political breakthrough." These are the benchmarks set by the White House, signed off on by Nouri al-Maliki and which were supposed to be achieved in 2007 . . . and then in 2008. And . . . everyone's forgotten them.
Everyone should forget Thomas E. Ricks as a media critic. On Monday's Talk of the Nation (NPR), he was asked a question by a caller and completely blew it -- a question about the shameful media coverage in the lead-up to the illegal war. Tavis asked him about that as well and the reply was laughable. He maintains that the coverage was there. That these issues were covered. That it was covered in real time but "People kind of shrugged" -- the American people shurgged. That's a deception or a denial. The polling showed that the public made a connection between 9-11 and Iraq -- when there was NO connection -- and that was because the White House tied them together -- sometimes directly, sometimes by linkage, sometimes by insinuation. That public record exists and, NO, the media did not call it out. Ricks said, "Yes, the New York Times did screw up with their Weapons of Mass Destruction coverage" -- that would be Judith Miller and Michael Gordon's work. Predominately their work but, at the paper, there were more getting it wrong. And then Ricks wants to insist NYT is "one city's newspaper." The New York Times has a larger profile than the Washington Post, a larger profile and more influence, than any other newspaper in the United States. It is a national paper and it sells more copies outside of NYC than it does in NYC. So it is not just "one city's newspaper." The media is largely based in NYC which is why Today, Good Morning America, et al, will always lead with, "The New York Times is reporting this morning . . ." I don't know if it was some paper envy or what, but Ricks needs to stop down playing the paper's influence. Judith Miller is the scapegoat for everyone. It was Judith Miller! As we've long noted, Miller didn't edit copy, choose the front page, print the papers and toss them to your yard each day. We've also noted MIller didn't book herself on PBS, the Sunday chat & chews, Oprah, et al. Judith Miller screwed up -- and then some -- but the idea that it was only her and that she's responsible requires you believe that until her downfall, Judith Miller was running everything. She was running the New York Times, she was running NBC, ABC, CBS, HARPO Prodcutions, PBS, NPR, go down the list. That's not reality and it's not reality for Thomas E. Ricks to claim of the New York Times' deadly coverage, that's just "one city's newspaper." Nor is accurate for him to claim that the press was reporting reality; however, "the people didn't want to hear it, the congress didn't want to hear it." That's deceptive and it's lying and we don't have time for that nonsense. Thomas E. Ricks works for the Washington Post. June 19, 2004, Howard Kurtz (Washington Post) noted the New Republic's "we feel regret, but no shame" editorial -- they never feel shame, they're incapable of it. Kurtz noted, "News organizations that reported on the war and commentators who backed it have faced a similarly thorny dilemma since the failure to find illegal weapons in Iraq, along with the increasingly violent climate there. Were they wrong -- in which case they owe their readers an explanation -- or simply conveying what many officials and analysts believed at the time?" He mentioned a May editorial in the Post where the paper wondered if they were wrong (the editorial board wondered) and concluded it's too soon to tell. It's no longer too soon. They were wrong. But most pertient to this topic and to the Washington Post was Howard Kurtz' August 12, 2004 front page story "The Post on WMDs: An Inside Story." Walter Pincus, Karen DeYoung, Dana Priest, Leonard Downie and others share, from the reporting and the editorial side, issues that impacted the paper's poor coverage (and it was poor).
On yesterday's broadcast of Tavis Smiley, Thomas E. Ricks declared, "I think the media actually did a pretty good job in asking the right questions [Tavis is shocked and asks, "You-you-do?"] Yes. The problem is nobody wanted to listen, nobody -- we wrote all the stories about all of these problems that might lead -- might be the consequence of Iraq. People kind of shrugged, 'So what it's going to happen'."
People did that, did they? The American people?
For Thomas E. Ricks to attempt to rewrite history and to claim that the fault lies with the American people who just didn't want to hear the truth is beyond INSANE. In fact, let's quote a reporter for the Post explaining to Howard Kurtz how the paper handled (sold) the illegal war: "The paper was not front-paging stuff. Administration assertions were on the front page. Things that challenged the administration were on A18 on Sunday or A24 on Monday. There was an attitude among editors: Look, we're going to war, why do we even worry about all this contrary stuff?"
A reporter for the paper told Howard Kurtz that the attidue among the editors was it didn't matter because "we're going to war." Thomas E. Ricks told Tavis the people had that attitude. The problem with these two conflicting tales is that Thomas E. Ricks gave both of them.
The reporter quoted by Kurtz above is Thomas E. Ricks and he wants to show up five years after that article ran and say it was the people's fault? But he wanted to say, in 2004, the problem was the articles questioning the adminstration were being buried while the adminstration's claims were front paged. You can't have it both ways. I don't know how that played out to most people but I let his opinion expressed Monday pass without comment (we didn't even note it). But we're not going to let him alter the facts.
He may very well NOW feel that the media did a great job. But he's not going to now take the problems he pinned on editors and turn around and pin them on the American people. That's not going to play, it's not going to fly. It needs to stop. Yes, memory is a tricky thing. And five years may seem a stretch but we will not be silent while he not only rewrites history but also changes his own remarks made for public consumption. And I don't know how you go on TV and contradict a front page article your paper ran, one that you were quoted in. I just don't get how that happens. If your memory is that faulty, maybe you should leave media criticism to Howard?
By the way, Tavis Smiley tonight features Tavis interviewing US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. So Thomas E. Ricks is demonstrating that media criticisim is something he should leave to others. While he has one weakness, does Crazy Ass Cockburn have a strength? Patrick Cockburn shows up today suddenly interested in Iraq -- it's a 24-hour bug, it will pass quickly. How does someone claim to be a reporter -- not a columnist -- and get away with including the following in a news story: "Taken together, the bombings show that al-Qa'ida in Iraq, which almost certainly carried them out . . ." What? There is no proof for who carried them out. No reporter -- no real reporter -- would put their name to such garbage. Crazy Ass Cockburn needs an editor and he needs to reaquaint himself with journalism. Yesterday's snapshot included: "Hazim al-Nuaimi, a political analyst, tells Waleed Ibrahim and Aseel Kami (Reuters), 'These attacks raise questions about political power struggles' and he questions the rush by some to blame al Qaeda in Mesopotamia (which is only one of many groups resisting the US occupation)." Today Alissa J. Rubin and Marc Santori note of yesterday and Sunday's bombings, "Iraqi military leaders emphasized that it was too early to draw any firm conclusions but noted similiarties in the attacks in which more than 60 people were killed since Sunday." So with the two most recent bombings that led to massive deaths, even the Iraqi military is just noting similiarities -- they're not even stating who it is is. "Some," Rubin and Santori inform, "Iraqi military officials" believe it may be al Qaeda in Mespotamia with the assistance from former Baathist. That Baathist group is apparently now using the name Al Auda ("the Return"). But those are just possibilities. Patrick Cockburn knows, just knows, what really went down. If he worked for a real paper with a real editorial staff, Crazy Ass Cockburn would have never gotten the following into print: "The Iraqi government is unlikely to ask any US troops to stay on after the agreed withdrawal date at the end of 2011, the US commander in Iraq, General Ray Odierno, has confirmed." When did Odierno confirm that? Not to Cockburn (I asked, M-NF states Odierno's given Cockburn no private interview). Now Martha Raddatz (ABC News) got an exclusive interview with Odierno. Monday's snapshot noted her exclusive interview and this is the section that Cockburn twists around to put forward his lie:
RADDATZ: And you believe we will be completely out of here by 2011?
ODIERNO: We will. We have signed an agreement that says we will be and I think we're on track to do that.
RADDATZ: But that could change? If the Iraqis want it to change?
ODIERNO: It's their decision. It's a decision that they have to make. But I don't see them making that decision right now.
RADDATZ: But would you still say it's conditions-based, until then?
ODIERNO: No, I think it's based on an Iraqi assessment. Again, if we stayed ... Again, our plan is to be out of here by December, 2011. That's the agreement we signed and we will meet those requirements. What, if the government of Iraq asks us, if they ask us to stay, want to renegotiate, then we'll go through renegotiation and we'll decide at that time what that means.
RADDATZ: I guess I look at other places and I look at Bosnia where we were for ten years and they weren't even shooting at each other then, and in terms of stability, being out by 2011 seems pretty rapid.
ODIERNO: Well, again, I think that's a judgment that will have to be made later on.
Crazy Ass Cockburn claims Odierno has confirmed an extension as unlikely. He did no such thing. He did not that 'right now' he doesn't seem them asking the US to stay (which may not be a hunch, he may be speaking factually -- as in, 'No one has asked us to stay right now') but he ends that section noting it's "a judgment that will have to be made later on." He's not confirmed anything but Crazy Ass Cockburn's been lying for some time now. (And thankfully The Cat's Blog and Media Lens have also called him out. Everyone else is uncomfortably looking away from his very public meltdown.) Odierno is not the only one speaking that way. US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told NPR's Robert Siegel (All Things Considered) yesterday and Siegel brought up comments Gates made Feb. 27th (and has been making since, such as two Sundays ago on NBC's Meet the Press):
Robert Siegel: Later that day, you said, we should be prepared to have some modest sized presence for training and helping them with their new equipment providing perhaps intelligence support and so on. Do you believe that all US troops will be out of Iraq by the end of 2011 and are you and the president on the same page here?
US Secretary of State Robert Gates: Oh we're certainly on the same page. The fact is is that if there are no -- if there is no new agreement with the Iraqis, there will be zero US troops in Iraq after at least 2011. What I was alluding to is that I think it is at least possible that the Iraqis in 2011 will come and say, 'We need some logistical support, we need some intelligence support. Can you provide us some very limited help.' I don't know whether that will happen. That's pure speculation on my part but the president's statement is absolutely clear and it conforms to our current committments and that is, according to the agreements we've signed, we will have everybody out of Iraq at the end of 2011. And unless something changes that's exactly what will happen.
Meanwhile, Iraq's Sunni vice president, Tareq al-Hashemi is in the news. Waleed Ibrahim and Mohammed Abbas (Reuters) report he does not believe that Iraq can handle security tasks when the US 'combat' troops leave "but Baghdad will not ask them to stay any longer." Now, repeating, Robert Gates is scheduled to be on Tavis Smiley (PBS) tonight. And speaking of things scheduled, this month groups such as The National Assembly to End the Wars, the ANSWER coalition, World Can't Wait and Iraq Veterans Against the War -- are taking part in a real action. Iraq Veterans Against the War explains:IVAW's Afghanistan Resolution and National Mobilization March 21st As an organization of service men and women who have served in Iraq, Afghanistan, stateside, and around the world, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War have seen the impact that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have had on the people of these occupied countries and our fellow service members and veterans, as well as the cost of the wars at home and abroad. In recognition that our struggle to withdraw troops from Iraq and demand reparations for the Iraqi people is only part of the struggle to right the wrongs being committed in our name, Iraq Veterans Against the War has voted to adopt an official resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and reparations for the Afghan people. (To read the full resolution, click here.) To that end, Iraq Veterans Against the War will be joining a national coalition which is being mobilized to march on the Pentagon, March 21st, to demand the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and further our mission and goals in solidarity with the national anti-war movement. This demonstration will be the first opportunity to show President Obama and the new administration that our struggle was not only against the Bush administration - and that we will not sit around and hope that troops are removed under his rule, but that we will demand they be removed immediately. For more information on the March 21st March on the Pentagon, and additional events being organized in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Orlando, to include transportation, meetings, and how you can get involved, please visit: www.pentagonmarch.org or www.answercoalition.org.
Meanwhile Zoltan Grossman (ZNet) reports on COFFEE STRONG in Washignton, "outside the gates of Fort Lewis". The GI coffeehouse "is using 21st-century outreach tools to connect with soldiers and their families, such as computers for soldiers to access the Internet without Army interference. The historic project also started a website . . . [here] and is planning a radio web stream to connect with military personnel using music and culture." Grossman explains:
Fort Lewis has become a national center of G.I. dissent against the Iraq War, as it was during the Vietnam War. Lieutenant Ehren Watada was tried in February 2007 for being the first commissioned officer to refuse to deploy to Iraq . Peace activists staged a "Citizens Hearing" tribunal to present Watada's case that the war is illegal. (His court martial ended in a mistrial, and has since won most of his legal case, but the Army has still not allowed him to resign his commission.) Other Army refusers, such as Sgt. Kevin Benderman and Spc. Suzanne Swift, have been jailed for a time in the harsh Fort Lewis stockade. G.I. Voice recently hosted a training of active-duty members of Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) who are organizing within the armed forces rather than seeking to leave the military. G.I. Voice points to a new relationship between the growing G.I. movement and the larger civilian anti-war movement. Peace groups can support and do outreach to GIs, working with Iraq War veterans who best understand best how to communicate with the younger military generation. Peace activists could also educate themselves about issues of concern to soldiers, to open respectful dialogue with G.I.s and their families, as a step to working together. The G.I. Rights Hotline (800-394-9544) is a first stop for military personnel and families wanting to explore their options.
Michael Matza (Philadelphia Inquirer) reports on Iraq War veteran Joshua Key who self-checked out of the military and ended up in Canada with his wife Brandi and their children.
His new attorney, Alyssa Manning, said his was a unique deserter's case because Canada's federal court ruled in July that the immigration board had erred. The mistake: it rejected his request for refugee status because the alleged misconduct he said he witnessed did not rise to the level of war crimes.
The board did not need proof of war crimes to give Canada's protection to Key, the court ruled; violations of the Geneva Conventions would suffice.
The court remanded Key's case for rehearing by a different panel in June - the first incremental victory for any of the deserters.
Alyssa Manning's been one of the strongest attorneys war resisters who went to Canada have had. The decision regarding the board ignoring war crimes was handed down July 4th. We covered it July 6th and in the July 7th snapshot. Joshua Key wrote, with Lawrence Hill, The Deserter's Tale. In the book, Joshua writes about growing up in Oklahoma, falling in love with Brandi, struggling to make ends meet for their family, enlisting in the military after he was told that married men with children don't get sent into wars, serving in Iraq and seeing one War Crime after another, returning to the US on a pass and making the decision with Brandi to go underground. This is from the book, page 137, when they're raiding a home in al_Habbaniyah at three in the morning. They found six adult women, three teenage girls, no weapons and no males:
I found Private First Class Hayes with a woman under an empty carport. He pointed his M-16 at her head but she would not stop screaming.
"What are you doing this for?" she said.
Hayes told her to shut up.
"We have done nothing to you," she went on.
Hayes was starting to lose it, and we weren't even supposed to be talking to this woman. I told her that we were there on orders and that we couldn't speak to her, but on and on and on she bawled at Hayes and me.
"You Americans are disgusting! Who do you think you are, to do this to us?"
Hayes slammed her in the face with the stock of his M-16. She fell facedown in the dirt, bleeding and silent. The woman lay still on the ground. I pushed Hayes away.
"What are you doing, man?" I said to him. "You have a wife and two kids! Don't be hitting her like that."
He looked at me with eyes full of hatred, as if he was ready to kill me for saying those words, but he did not touch the woman again. I found this incident with Hayes particularly disturbing because during other times I had seen him in action in Iraq, Hayes had showed himself to be one of the most levelheaded and calm soldiers in my company. I had the sense that if he could lose it and hit a woman the way he had, any of us could lose it too.
Joshua Key is one of the many external refugees created by the Iraq War. Meanwhile Tom A. Peters (Christian Science Monitor) reports on internally displaced refugees in Iraq noting "there are between 1.6 million and 2.8 million" and that Baghdad and Diyala have "created the largest number of IDPs". And there are millions of external Iraqi refugees. Collateral Repair Project is one organization providing assistance. Anam, Ala'a and their son Mustafa left Iraq after threatening notes ("Leave Iraq or you will be killed") and after Anam's mother was murdred ("We found our mother's body cut into pieces"). Before becoming a refugee, Mohammed "was a manager in the Transportation Ministry," his son an engineer but when a local paper published a "hit-list" with Mohammed's name on it, he, his son and his wife left Iraq. Christina and her children Sally, Osama and Marian left Iraq after attempts to kidnap Sally and attack on the children's school bus. There is a UNHCR grant . . . for Christina. Her husband was Egyptian. The children were born in Iraq and their father lived there for 25 years but in the eyes of the UNHCR, the three children are not Iraqi so they will not provide any refugee money for them. These are only some of the stories told at Collateral Repair Project. Alex Valdes (ColorsNW) notes, "Iraqis are spreading out all over the globe in what has become the largest mass migration in the Middle East since hundreds of thousands of Palestinians either fled their homes or were expelled after the creation of Israel in 1948. Most Iraqis have escaped to neighboring countries: 1.5 million in Syria, 700,000 in Jordan, 70,000 in Egypt, 50,000 in Iran and 40,000 in Lebanon, according to the U.N." Joseph Kirschke (Worldpress.org) zooms in on Syria:
These days, Syria, along with Jordan, has more outsiders -- that is, more refugees -- per capita than any other country in the world since the beginning of the Iraq war in 2003. There are no official statistics -- and some estimates exceed one million -- but the toll on Syria's 18 million people is high.
The situation is grave, for the Iraqis, too, of course, as Syria "lacks the resources to adequately provide for the refugees," Amanya Michael Ebye, the Middle East Regional Director for the International Rescue Committee said last fall. And conditions "are rapidly deteriorating."
"Iraqi families are struggling with depleted savings," he added, "and they have limited access to basic services and employment."
Sadly, in many cases. refugees have even compelled their children into prostitution in order to survive. And although some Iraqi children have been allowed to attend school, only some 50,000 were reportedly enrolled as of last year.
Iran's Press TV notes that the first of the 2,500 Iraqi refugees from Syria and Jordan that Germany's agreed to take in will start arriving March 19th. That is a meager number as is the 10,000 the European Union has agreed to take in (of which Germany's 2.500 is part). Deutsche Welle notes, "Last week a senior Swedish official urged other European nations to take in more Iraqi refugees, saying that Sweden will put the matter on its agenda when it assumes the six month EU presidency in July."
Yesterday's bombing in Abu Ghraib resulted in 33 deaths. For the White House, that meant it was time to air a new episode of Spin City. "Well, I mean, obviously there are -- there continue to be, throughout Iraq, security challenges," insisted White House flack Robert Gibbs in yesterday's press briefing. "I think as the President enumerated in the speech that he gave at Camp Lejeune that our government and certainly our military remain strongly committed to ensuring peace and security in Iraq; continued training to give the Iraqis the opportunity and the responsibility for their own security; and that the President will continue to evaluate our policy in Iraq." You know the White House knew it was embarrassing which is why they refused to post it last night. (As of midnight EST it was still not posted. The transcript is finally up this morning.) He danced some more and would have the nation howling were they paying attention, but they aren't. As Mike pointed out last night, the same White House that denies any connection (and there may or may not be one) with yesterday's bad news would be rushing to insist a good connection had the news been good. Their spinners, not truth tellers. Nancy A. Youssef and Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) report US "military commanders and politicitians are quietly fretting that the attacks are in response to the adminisration's plan to move out of Iraq." The reporters note that Iraqi officials are wondering whether "their nation had gotten complacent" in the last months.
Turning to some of today's reported violence . . .
Bombings?
Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad mortar attack which left four injured, a Mosul car bombing which claimed 4 lives and left fourteen people wounded, a Mosul grenade attack which wounded three, a Kirkuk car bombing which claimed 1 life and left ten others injured and, dropping back to last night, a bombing of villages in Sulaimaniyah by Iran resulting in two people being injured and their 2-year-old being killed.
Reuters notes a Jalawla roadside bombing which left three police officers injured.
Shootings?
Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 headless corpse was discovered in Mosul.
Finally, Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report) tackles the hopium:
Lots of folks on the left, it is now apparent, no longer seek anything more than to bask in the sunshine of Barack Obama's smile. No matter how much national treasure their champion transfers to the bankster class, and despite his exceeding George W. Bush in military spending, so-called progressives for Obama continue to celebrate their imagined emergence as players in the national political saga. Having in practice foresworn resistance to Power, they relish in bashing the non-Obamite Left.
He goes on to deconstruct the latest attack from the Cult of Obama and, maybe the Cult needs to be asked that musical question, "If it makes you happy, then why the hell are you so sad?" They really are. The Cult is very, very sad while claiming to be very, very up and happy. Here's Glen Ford again:
Like many of her cohorts, Burnham is quick to grant that Obama "is a steward of capitalism," but maintains that "his election has opened up the potential for substantive reform in the interests of working people and that his election to office is a democratic win worthy of being fiercely defended." Again, if Obama's election opened up the "potential" for reform, so would have Hillary's. They were (and remain) political brother and sister under the skin. The Obamites would be utterly helpless if unable to deploy (and abuse) the term "potential," given the actuality of Obama's presidency. Conveniently, "potential" lives in the future, where it can't be pinned down. That's why Obama's "potential" is a central theme of his Left camp followers – it allows them to claim that the opposition's critiques of their hero might harm the "potential" good he might do in the future. At any rate, the Obamite Left can claim no credit for Obama's progressive "potential," since they did little or nothing that might have caused him to abandon his relentless rightward drift.
iraq
thomas e. ricks
npr
talk of the nation
the new york timesalissa j. rubinmarc santora
martha raddatzabc news
all things consideredrobert siegel
joshua key
mcclatchy newspapersnancy a. youssefsahar issa
mikey likes it
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Iraq and Afghanistan
Tuesday! One day closer to the weekend. And C.I. covers the bombing in Iraq today (the big bombing). The White House had an idiotic reaction and I'll note AFP on that:
The White House dismissed suggestions that two recent bloody attacks in Iraq were a reaction to President Barack Obama's decision to pull out most combat troops by August next year.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said security challenges remained in Iraq, but said US agreements with the Baghdad government would not have been made if they were likely to plunge Iraq back into "danger."
Gibbs was asked whether the two incidents, the latest of which was a suicide bombing on Tuesday that killed 33 people, were an encouragement to those plotting attacks or emboldened those bent on violence.
"No," said Gibbs, adding that he was not aware of any specific intelligence about such a scenario.
Let's be really clear that if today was good news in Iraq, the White House would be claiming credit as they have done before. But when it's bad news? "It has nothing to do with what Barack just said!" Nothing! Did you hear me? Nothing!
The denial becomes the actual answer. Okay, this is from Larry Everest's "'Isn't the Taliban a horror for women? So shouldn't the U.S. stay in Afghanistan?' :"
I have run into a lot of different questions (and misunderstandings) about what the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan are really all about, and will be addressing them in the pages of Revolution. Readers no doubt have—or hear—others. Send those questions to Revolution so we can learn from and address them.
Here’s the first series of questions:
1) I don’t like the U.S. invading countries, and I know that those who make these decisions have their own agenda. But the Taliban are totally brutal toward women and enshrine it in law. So even if the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan isn’t perfect and innocent people get killed, isn’t the U.S. improving things at least a little bit for women in Afghanistan?
The Taliban are a horror for Afghan (and Pakistani) women (and for all oppressed people)—but the U.S. occupation has not made things better. During the 1990s, Taliban atrocities—like stadium stonings of women for “crimes” such as adultery—sickened people across the globe. Today, in the regions that they control, the Taliban continue to attack women for going to school and threaten ( sometimes even kill) women journalists, human rights activists, artists, and athletes.
Many feminists supported the October 2001 U.S. invasion because they convinced themselves that the Bush regime cared about their views and was actually waging war, even in part, to “liberate Afghan women from abuse and oppression,” as one May 2002 letter to President Bush signed by prominent feminists put it.
Reality check. A bloody invasion and nearly eight years of occupation have NOT improved things for Afghan women. Their lives are a nightmare—not significantly different or better than under the Taliban, and in many ways worse:
Today, now, under U.S. occupation…Thousands of young girls and women are confined to their homes, kept out of school or work. “Honor killings” of women are still carried out, and disputes or debts between people are often “settled” using girls as a form of currency. Men are routinely given custody of children in divorces. Violence against women and girls rose 40 percent in 2007, and today nearly 90 percent of Afghan women suffer abuse at home. “Across Afghanistan, women are setting fire to themselves,” the Guardian reports.
Today, now, under U.S. occupation… Every 30 minutes, an Afghan woman dies during childbirth. Overall some 24,000 die each year due to diseases and during childbirth—25 times the number killed in the war. Up to 70 percent of pregnant women don’t get medical attention. 87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate; only 30 percent of girls have access to education in Afghanistan; 70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan.
And today, now, under U.S. occupation… The U.S. “liberation” of Iraq also made the situation for women worse! There are now 740,000 Iraqi widows, many who are destitute and forced into “temporary marriages”—a form of prostitution sanctioned by Islamic Sharia law. Reactionary religious laws have been more deeply enshrined in Iraqi law and governance under the new U.S.-installed regime than under Saddam Hussein. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that of Iraq’s 1.6 million internally displaced people, more than half are women or girls, who are more vulnerable to rape and other forms of sexual violence.
This is not because Bush “messed up” the war on Afghanistan (or Iraq). It is because of the essential nature of the invasion and ongoing occupation of Afghanistan—for reasons I’ll speak to in addressing the next question:
I'm not going to comment on that. If I didn't like it, I wouldn't have included it. However, many sites in the community are doing a roundtable tonight. It's ended up being a roundtable of women with sites in the community and they are addressing Afghanistan so I will say read the above article (use the link) and also look for the roundtable tonight at other sites.
Trouble in England. Terri Judd of Independent of London reports:
Islamic protesters brandishing placards hurled abuse at soldiers parading to mark their return home from Iraq yesterday.
Around 20 men yelled "terrorists" and held homemade signs denouncing the soldiers as "butchers of Basra" and "baby killers" as they marched through Luton in Bedfordshire.
Other signs described the 200 men and women from the 2nd Battalion The Royal Anglian Regiment as "Criminals, Murderers, Terrorists".
The atmosphere further deteriorated when locals waving St George's flags turned on the protesting group chanting "scum" and "no surrender to the Taliban". As the two groups yelled insults at each other, police dogs and riot vans were used to keep them apart.
Last night Bedfordshire police confirmed that two people had been arrested for public order offences.
I'm sure this will be rewritten by War Hawks in the US to insist that it was peace activists who attacked. You know how that goes.
Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Tuesday, March 10, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death, another deadly Baghdad bombing with mass fatalities, Lourdes Garcia-Navarro and Thomas E. Ricks talk Iraq realities while Phyllis Bennis sounds like a raving lunatic, and more.
Let's start with reality and then we'll turn to the nut jobs. Yesterday Thomas E. Ricks appeared on NPR's Talk of the Nation yesterday. Ricks is the author of The Gamble. Appearing with him on the show were NPR's Lourdes Garcia-Navarro (who heads NPR's Baghdad bureau) and Ghassan Adnan (Iraqi producer). Neil Conan is the host of the program.
Thomas E. Ricks: I think that Obama and the people around him are repeating the optimisim of the Bush administration. It's not a departure from Bush to say you want to get out of Iraq. George Bush didn't invade Iraq saying, "I have a great idea. Let's go get stuck in a quagmire for ten years." The original war plan had us down to 30,000 troops by September 2003. Well here we are seven years later. We have more than four times that number of troops and the new president is saying "I want to get us out of Iraq, out of fighting in Iraq by August of next year." Well just because you hang a "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" banner doesn't mean the war ends, just because you say it's a non-combat mission doesn't mean the war ends. The war ends when American troops stop dying. And I was over at the White House the day of the president's speech [Feb. 27th] and I said, "Does this mean American troops will stop dying in August of 2010?" And a military official there said, "No, it does not mean that."
[. . .]
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: I'd just like to speak to something that Thomas Ricks just said. Um, it's kind of interesting, the war ends when no US soldiers are killed here. You know, it's -- through all of this, you tend to forget the Iraqi narrative. We're talking about the Obama administration, what they think, what they believe. Of course there is a sovereign, now, Iraqi government who also has a say in what happens here and what kinds of, you know, US forces remain here and what the war will look like for them. It's not only US soldiers who die but of course Iraqi civilians, Iraqi army, Iraqi police and that also has a -- that characterizes what will happen here in the coming years and months.
Thomas E. Ricks: That's a good point. I should have said "our war ends when US troops stop dying." I think the war goes on for decades.
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: It's just -- possibly. And it's certainly a sobering thought for the Iraqis I speak to here. I do spend -- you know, when you're living in Baghdad and covering it -- I've been covering this since 2002 actually -- we have to deal with the US military and, of course, the Iraqis as well. And we -- you know, it's a balancing act. And our staff monitors six [Iraqi] papers a day, three Iraqi channels, and, of course, we go out. Now the security situation is better, I travel all over the country. Tomorrow I'm going into Anbar Province, up near Haditha. I've been pretty much everywhere now days in Iraq and that, of course, allows you to do reporting as you would in any other country, which means getting on the ground, talking to people and seeing exactly what's going on for yourself. Before we had to rely on the US military. They're the ones that had to take us places, we had to embed, we had to see things through their prism. Now that has changed dramatically and we can really go out in a way that we've never been able to since the early days of the war to see for ourselves exactly what's going on.
Neal Conan: And let me quickly follow up again on something Tom Ricks said, decades, Tom?
Thomas E. Ricks: Yeah, I think there will be people fighting and dying in Iraq for decades.
Neal Conan: And Lourdes Garcia-Navarro, do you agree with that?
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: Well, I think that may possibly be true. As I try and point out in many of my reports, I think the -- for many Americans, they believe that the war is over. I mean there's a lack of interest now that President Obama has said they will be withdrawing US forces in great numbers in the coming year -- not this year, but next year. I think people have sort of thought, 'Well, the war is over in Iraq.' But people die here every single day. There are many simmering conflicts. It might not look like the conflicts that we saw before during the sectarian violence but there are other things that are going on here that could presage many bad days to come. I don' t know, I'm not a prognosticator but certainly Iraq is not stable yet.
Thomas E. Ricks: I think it's a good point that the war has changed several times. It started as a blitzkrieg invasion, then it was a botched occupation, then it was a slow rising but durable insurgency, then it was an American counter-offensive. The war is changing again. It kind of feels like a lull right now. But just because it's changed doesn't mean it's ended and a lot of Americans have stopped paying attention because I think they wrongly think that it's over.
We'll come back to that broadcast -- including Lourdes expanding on her thoughts of the Iraqi government. And Thomas E. Ricks is scheduled to be on Tavis Smiley (PBS) tonight.
From reality to the cracked ravings of Phyllis. Phyllis Bennis would like to be the voice of something. Even she doesn't know what. And that's very clear when she churns out a bad piece like she did at ZNet. First off, Phyllis, where were you in 2008? You managed one carefully worded column questioning Barack. So when you show up today tossing around "we," you really need to just stop. In fact, your 'moral' authority is such that, frankly, you have none. You have no standing. Not on Iraq. You have no standing because you dabble. That's how you end up on CounterSpin over a year after Nancy A. Youssef (in what was her last story for Knight-Ridder -- it flipped to McClatchy the next day) broke the news about the US military keeping a list of the Iraqi deaths. You show up a year after that blabbering on about how the US must be keeping a list and why don't we know about this list and why have no reporters asked about this list. You dabble and you end up looking like a fool. Like an idiot. You have no pull, you have no authority. You need to stop thinking you can show issuing orders every three months via a (bad) Iraq article that reads as if you dashed it off while you had a load of whites on rinse.
Phyllis blathers on with a lot of "we" and she doesn't speak for the bulk of the peace movement. She'd like to but she doesn't and she needs to be blown off when she tries to present herself as a voice. She is, at her best, an analyst. Not of the US government, not of the peace mvoement. Those are not her areas. But she's not interested in her areas which is how her lengthy blather never gets around to noting Iraqis. Their wants, their needs, their issues. She can't write about Iraqis, she can't speak for the peace movement, so what's she jawboning our ears off about? Barry. President Barry Obama.
Phyllis yammer about ". . . our job is not to convince the people of this country that there is no way President Obama will end the occupation of Iraq. Our job will be to convince people that the only way President Obama will be able to overcome the powerful pro-war opposition inside and outside . . ." No one asked you. Do you get it? No one asked you. No one wants your opinion. You're allegedly an analyst. Of foreign affairs. That's what your IPS bio says, that's how you're billed when you're brought on some program. How about doing your job? Or is that too much for you? Brookings doesn't go on TV yacking about "our job." Cato or any of the right wing organizations don't do that. They offer analysis of the issues. In this case, they'd be analayzing Iraq. When you refuse to do that, when you think you can ignore your role and grab others, you make a fool out of yourself. And I'm wording that very kindly. Probably too kindly. You are a professional apologist for the do-nothings at United for Peace and Justice. There are actions taking place and Phyllis doesn't want you to know about them. Her latest crap is similar -- almost word-for-word -- to the crap she posted at United for Pathetic and Juvenile pimping their crap for April. UPFJ which will not call out Barack. It goes to the 20th Century Closet Communist panics and fears of confronting a "Black" man. Hate to break it to you, UPFJ, but unless you're going to operate in an all-White world, you're going to have to call out leaders of color.
Their cowardice on this issue was on full display at UPFJ's December 'strategy' session where the alleged peace movement 'leaders' explained they can't take on a "Black" man. So instead they proposed to 'honor' Barack via MLK. Barack isn't Black (he's bi-racial) and he's not MLK. Grow the hell up, Phyllis and quit hanging with those nut jobs at UPFJ. They're toast. Leslie Cagan is a grown woman, an elderly woman some might say, and she can't state publicly, "I am a Communist." Therefore, Leslie is a FAILURE and everyone working with her is a FRAUD or a FAILURE. There is nothing wrong with being a Communist, a Socialist, a Democrat, a Republican, what have you. There is something very wrong with being in a political closet. And it's important that we start all getting honest.
UPFJ has launched non-stop attacks on A.N.S.W.E.R. and benefitted from the fact that A.N.S.W.E.R. is seen as "Communist" (while UPFJ is not seen that way). There are Communists in A.N.S.W.E.R., there are anarchists, there are people of every political stripe. UPFJ has played the game their spiritual forebearers played during McCarthyism: Closeted Communists finger point at others. That happened repeatedly during the McCarthy witch hunt. And if you could do, for example, then what UPFJ does now, you could and did work for The Nation. But if you were upfront about who you were, as some Communists in A.N.S.W.E.R. are, the doors were closed for you and there was an effort made to point fingers at you. Those were the sacrificial lambs. And it's past time we all stopped treating Victor Navasky's Little Golden Reader version of history as accurate. It was a start. But it was as bad as any Disney take on history and refused to point to those who benefitted from the witch hunt. There is more reality on Heroes, the NBC program, currently doing a story on witch hunts, than in Naming Names when it comes to seriously exploring the hows and whos. As happened during McCarthy, the witch hunt on Heroes benefits from . . . someone in a closet. (There's also more honesty and maturity in Sara Paretsky's novel Blacklist.) The good news is that except for a 'sociologist' and Red Betty, the closet cases had no careers (or flipped to neo-con) fairly quickly. And the same will happen with today's because Barack Democrats will not stand for Leslie, Judith, Carl and all the other Communists in the closet trying to elbow their way to the front. They fear those closeted freaks will embarrass Barack. And they, Barack Democrats, grasp they can't keep holding the line. They can't keep insisting, "Oh, that evil Republican Noise Machine, trying to draw connections between Barack Obama and Communism or Socialism! It's all false!" You can't keep insisting that and allow the likes of Leslie, Carl, Judith, et al to go around as they do. I'm not talking a round-up. I am saying walls are being constructed to make sure that those elements have no access and no influence on Barack Obama. And hooray for that because these closet cases have run a tepid and wimpering peace 'movement' and they've done so because they can't admit who they are so they can't really engage in a struggle. When you're lying to your followers as well as to the press about what you are and who you are, how can you lead a damn thing? You can't. And they need to own their guilt and they need to own the blood of Iraqis which is on their hands because if you can't step up into the spotlight and say, "I'm ___ and I'm a ___" -- whatever "____" is -- you have no business attempting to be a political leader. You are corrupted before you say a single word because you have chosen to live in a closet. And the little games you play have very deadly consequences. And in a sane moment, if she's still capable of them, Naomi Wolf would agree with me. Before she went drunk on Barry Obama, she was getting ready to make that point (and does include it in her book The End of America: Letters of Warning to a Young Patriot).
This month groups such as The National Assembly to End the Wars, the ANSWER coalition, World Can't Wait and Iraq Veterans Against the War -- are taking part in a real action. Iraq Veterans Against the War explains:IVAW's Afghanistan Resolution and National Mobilization March 21st As an organization of service men and women who have served in Iraq, Afghanistan, stateside, and around the world, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War have seen the impact that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have had on the people of these occupied countries and our fellow service members and veterans, as well as the cost of the wars at home and abroad. In recognition that our struggle to withdraw troops from Iraq and demand reparations for the Iraqi people is only part of the struggle to right the wrongs being committed in our name, Iraq Veterans Against the War has voted to adopt an official resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and reparations for the Afghan people. (To read the full resolution, click here.) To that end, Iraq Veterans Against the War will be joining a national coalition which is being mobilized to march on the Pentagon, March 21st, to demand the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and further our mission and goals in solidarity with the national anti-war movement. This demonstration will be the first opportunity to show President Obama and the new administration that our struggle was not only against the Bush administration - and that we will not sit around and hope that troops are removed under his rule, but that we will demand they be removed immediately. For more information on the March 21st March on the Pentagon, and additional events being organized in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Orlando, to include transportation, meetings, and how you can get involved, please visit: www.pentagonmarch.org or www.answercoalition.org.
Back to NPR's Talk of the Nation yesterday. Thomas E. Ricks asked Lourdes whether or not she thought Iraq's government could be termed a sovereign one.
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: No. I think -- I think that even they would say that they aren't considered sovereign. I think when you have the presence of 140,000 US forces here, I don't think any government would say that it is sovereign. I think the Iraqi people certainly don't think that they are sovereign. You speak to them on the streets and they will not say that this is a sovereign country. They will say that this is a country under occupation. That said, there is now a legal framework in place and I do see the Iraqis . . . taking . . . control more and more.
Also addressed was the issue of the press coverage of Iraq and who remains and who is leaving?
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: Ah. These are very, very difficult days in Iraq because, of course, it's extremely expensive and has been, prohibitively expensive to cover this war. NPR I think spends on the order of one million dollars a year which is a lot of money for an organization like us -- security costs and everything else. And what we are seeing is a drawing down of the press corps as well. We are seeing many of the important news organizations here, the Washington Post, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, Fox News, the ones who have been here from the very beginning are now actually reducing the number of correspondents that will be covering this conflict and I think that that is a measure of the fact that there are important stories out there that deserve a lot of attention like, of course, the global finacial crisis, among others. Afghanistan, of course, is getting a lot of attention as well. and we are seeing diminished interest in what is happening here in Iraq.
Neal Conan: Tom Ricks, you were saying earlier, obviously there are still many more American troops in Iraq then there are in Afghanistan -- or even plan to go to Afghanistan -- and you were saying one of the things the soldiers were telling you, 'Does anybody still know we're here?'
Thomas E. Ricks: Yeah, that came up a lot in my last trip. Is people just wondering do people still know we're out here?" The numbers have really not come down. Even the numbers if they come down as they're planning this year. We'll still be at 132,000 troops which is roughly the average we've had there for the entire war.
The Iraq War has not ended. Liars and fools (which would include Phyllis Bennis) would have you believe that it has. But it continues and people continue dying. In Iraq today, another suicide bomber. Early this morning AP was reporting 28 dead and twenty-eight wounded. Reuters gave the same figures and noted: "A source at Yarmouk hospital, the main hospital in western Baghdad, said it had received the body of a journalist working for al-Baghdadiya, an independent television station. Another journalist with al-Iraqiya state television was wounded, he said." Alissa J. Rubin (New York Times) was reporting close to immediately and noted an eyewitness who said the bomber was "wearing a national police uniform" and that the death toll was 33 with forty-six wounded. She also added, "The bombing suggest a renewed ability by insurgents to mount more effective suicide bombings, after a long period in which such attacks were relatively few and less lethal because of heavy security precautions." Caroline Alexander (Bloomberg News) explains the bombing took place "in the Abu Ghraib municipality, 15 miles (24 kilometers) from the center of the Iraqi capital, President Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party said on its Web site. The tribal leaders and a group of soldiers were visiting a market when the bomber struck, the PUK said. Two Iraqi journalists, including one from the independent al-Baghdadiya television station, were among the dead." NDTV Arabia identifies the two journalists killed as Suhaib Adnan and Haider Hashim. A third journalist, Ibrahim al-Katib, working for Iraqi state TV, was wounded. Ennahar Online offers a recent look at attacks on journalists in Iraq. Anthony Shadid (Washington Post) explains that the tribal leaders were "attending a reconciliation conference" and "The bombing unleashed chaos in the ramshackle market that lines the street near the municipal buildings of Abu Ghraib, on Baghdad's western outskirts. In the confusion, soldiers opened fire, wounding more people, and hospital staff complained that they were overwhelmed with the flood of casualties brought to their facility." Alissa J. Rubin and Marc Santora (NYT's International Herald Tribune) note, "There is an investigation into whether the shooting after the bombing was an ambush by gunmen or undisciplined gunfire by Iraqi security forces, said Marjor General Qassim Atta, spokesman for the Baghdad security plan." Wail al-Hofath and James Hider (Times of London) state, "The attack was a clear attempt to sabotage efforts to reconcile the Iraqi people at the crucial tribal leve, which has been vital in diminishing violence over the past two years. . . . The Sunni and Shia tribal leaders were in talks aimed at alleviating the deep and lingering animosity between the communities in Iraq after years of death squads, suicide bombings and ethnic cleansing." Jamal Hashim and Gao Shan (Xinhua) report, " An Interior Ministry source told Xinhua Tuesday that up to 33 people were killed and some 46 others injured in the latest bloody suicide bombing when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden car into a crowd of tribal leaders and army officers while they were leaving the town hall" though another version the reporters were told had a suicide bomber wearing a vest (most outlets are reporting a car). Matthew Schofield (McClatchy Newspapers) quotes an unnamed eyewitness declaring, "I have seen a dog carrying human flesh, a shoulder, as another dog was eating part of a human leg covered with blood. Iraqi soldiers chased the dogs, tryign to take these parts from them. I saw a human jaw thrown on the ground, and Iraqi soldiers refusing to allow to any one to pick it up. They said it belonged to the suicide bomber."
BBC's Mike Sergeant observes, "At the weekend Maj Gen David Perkins, the coalition spokesman, said that Iraq had moved 'from a very unstable to a stable position'" and notes how, later Sunday, over 30 were killed by a suicide bomber in Baghdad. Sergeant states it's too early to tell about March and violence could dip as the month continues but notes, "Those policy makers who think that the Iraq 'problem' has somehow been 'solved' might be starting to wrry that they had, once again, been over-optimistic and guilty of simplifying a very complicated place." Rania Abouzeid (Time magazine) notes that the increase in violence (which most are tracing to Thursday's suicide bombing but Caroline Alexander notes continues the increase that February saw over January) comes as al-Maliki tries "to cobble together a semblance of pan-Iraqi political solidarity. He has made an overture of reconciliation to low-level former members of the Baath Party, which ruled Iraq under Saddam Hussein." Abouzeid reports:Still, the audacity of the attacks, coupled with their lethal effectiveness and high casualty rates, may signal the resumption of a reinvigorated insurgency that has had time to regroup. A source close to the insurgency told TIME that sleeper cells in and around the Sunni stronghold of Abu Ghraib -- site of the infamous prison now renamed the Baghdad Central Prison -- have been planning renewed attacks for months. Tuesday's strike in the marketplace was carried out by the sheik of a local extremist Takfiri mosque, a man in his 20s named Abu Taymiyeh, the source claimed. The allegation could not be independently verified.
Hazim al-Nuaimi, a political analyst, tells Waleed Ibrahim and Aseel Kami (Reuters), "These attacks raise questions about political power struggles" and he questions the rush by some to blame al Qaeda in Mesopotamia (which is only one of many groups resisting the US occupation). Regardless of responsibility (still unclear), Amanda Ruggeri (US News & World Reports) concludes, "And for Iraqis, the attacks are a reminder that, despite an increase in stability that has allowed many civilians to warily resume more normal lives, their country remains far from peaceful." Staffan de Mistura, the UN Secretary-General's Special Representative to Iraq, has termed today's bombing "a horrible crime that is deisgned to sabotage reconciliatory efforts by the Iraqi people."
China's Xinhua reports, "An American marine died in Iraq at a result of an incident that did not involve combat on Tuesday, the U.S. military said. The soldier, assigned to Multi National Force-West (MNF-W), died on Tuesday, a military statement said without providing further details about the incident." The announcement brings the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4257.
In other reported violence today . . .
Bombings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Mosul car bombing that claimed 2 lives -- a docotr and "the son of the Head of the local Judicial Council" -- and left six other people wounded and, dropping back to last night, a Mosul grenade attack on a wedding party that resulted in twelve being wounded "including women and children." Reuters notes a bombing outside of Mosul that claimed the life of 1 "young girl."
Shootings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 "woman who works in Mosul University, Department of Computer Science" was shot dead in her home in Mosul this morning.
Turning to Iraq court news. February 19th, Muntadar al-Zaidi (also spelled Muntadhar al-Zeidi) had one day in court before the judge adjourned to figure out what Bully Boy Bush was doing in Iraq. December 14th Bully Boy was in Baghdad and Muntadhar threw one shoe and then a second at George W. Muntadar exclaimed, "This is a gift from the Iraqis. This is the farewell kiss you dog" and "This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq." Muntadar was immediately attacked by Nouri al-Maliki's thugs and has been imprisoned ever since. February 19th, he had a brief (90 minute) hearing. The judge ruled they'd be back on March 12th. Camada's CBC reported he was briefly back in court today before the judge "adjourned to Thursday" -- there was time for Muntadar to be greeted with "applause and shouts of support in the courtroom and the hallway". CBS and AP also note the trial is due to resume Thursday and they report that Dargham al-Zeidi, Muntadhar's brother, was attempting to stage a demonstration at Firdous Square in Baghdad; however, police broke it up and refused to allow it to take place. Michael Howard (Guardian of Manchester) adds, "A 25-strong team of lawyers has been preparing the journalist's defence. It is led by Dhiya al-Saadi, who said he would ask for an immediate release because the law under which Zeidi is charged is not applicable in his case."
Turning to the US and starting with the White House. A friend in the administration asks that I note this White House blog post which includes, "The President and Ms. Obama salute Senator Ted Kennedy on his birthday." If Michelle Obama is now going to be billed as "Ms. Obama," more power to her. She's a grown woman and, prior to 2007, was a very strong one. It would be nice to see that side re-emerge publicy. Now we're back on the subject of her husband and while silly Phyllie Bennis can't do anything of value (but she can get it for you wholesale), Margaret Kimberley (Black Agenda Report) offers this on War Hawk Barrack Obama's 'withdrawal':
As always, the president chose his words very carefully. The parsing was so clever that it fooled many people into celebrating when there is no reason for joy. There will still be American troops in Iraq, up to 50,000 of them. "As I have long said, we will retain a transitional force to carry out three distinct functions: training, equipping, and advising Iraqi Security Forces as long as they remain non-sectarian; conducting targeted counter-terrorism missions; and protecting our ongoing civilian and military efforts within Iraq. Initially, this force will likely be made up of 25-50,000 U.S. troops."
[. . .]
The damage done by the complete capitulation of many progressives to Obama is now bearing fruit. He is able to dismiss them and his own party without suffering any political damage. He said as much in a PBS interview with Jim Lehrer.
JIM LEHRER: You're not the least bit uneasy over the fact as John McCain and John Boehner, the Republican leader of the House, have praised your plan while the Democrats are criticizing it?
BARACK OBAMA: You know, I don't - I don't make these decisions based on polls or popularity. I make the decisions based on what I think is best.
In other words, the Democrats can go to hell. He doesn;t care what they think. He doesn't have to care what they think because they gave him carte blanche to say and do anything he wanted during the campaign. McCain and Boehner are now his cheerleaders and Democrats have to be happy with whatever their leader deems to be acceptable.
Finally, Amy Goodman did her usual spin for Barack today. New rule, Afghanistan women commenting on Afghainstan? They need to be raised there. We don't need an American who went to Afghanistan (and increased her wealth) after the US invaded in 2001 passing herself off as Afghanistan. The FRAUD tosses kisses to the Taliban. That's why Pravada on the Hudson put her on the air. In the real world, Alisa Tang (Ms. magazine) writes: "There are many brave Afghan women who continue to fight for their rights. Some like Samar are vocal. Others surreptitiously push forward women's rights within a male-dominated society. There is a sense of urgency among them, because with the Taliban back in strength and potentially at the negotiating table with the government, their lives are on the line again." Elaine's "Anti-feminist Barack Obama" and Kat's "Afghanistan" covered the topic last night.
iraqthe new york timesalissa j. rubin
mike sergeant
marc santorathe washington postanthony shadid
matthew schofield
mcclatchy newspapers
james hider
npr
talk of the nation
lourdes garcia-navarro
thomas e. ricks
phyllis bennis
like maria said pazkats korner
The White House dismissed suggestions that two recent bloody attacks in Iraq were a reaction to President Barack Obama's decision to pull out most combat troops by August next year.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said security challenges remained in Iraq, but said US agreements with the Baghdad government would not have been made if they were likely to plunge Iraq back into "danger."
Gibbs was asked whether the two incidents, the latest of which was a suicide bombing on Tuesday that killed 33 people, were an encouragement to those plotting attacks or emboldened those bent on violence.
"No," said Gibbs, adding that he was not aware of any specific intelligence about such a scenario.
Let's be really clear that if today was good news in Iraq, the White House would be claiming credit as they have done before. But when it's bad news? "It has nothing to do with what Barack just said!" Nothing! Did you hear me? Nothing!
The denial becomes the actual answer. Okay, this is from Larry Everest's "'Isn't the Taliban a horror for women? So shouldn't the U.S. stay in Afghanistan?' :"
I have run into a lot of different questions (and misunderstandings) about what the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan are really all about, and will be addressing them in the pages of Revolution. Readers no doubt have—or hear—others. Send those questions to Revolution so we can learn from and address them.
Here’s the first series of questions:
1) I don’t like the U.S. invading countries, and I know that those who make these decisions have their own agenda. But the Taliban are totally brutal toward women and enshrine it in law. So even if the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan isn’t perfect and innocent people get killed, isn’t the U.S. improving things at least a little bit for women in Afghanistan?
The Taliban are a horror for Afghan (and Pakistani) women (and for all oppressed people)—but the U.S. occupation has not made things better. During the 1990s, Taliban atrocities—like stadium stonings of women for “crimes” such as adultery—sickened people across the globe. Today, in the regions that they control, the Taliban continue to attack women for going to school and threaten ( sometimes even kill) women journalists, human rights activists, artists, and athletes.
Many feminists supported the October 2001 U.S. invasion because they convinced themselves that the Bush regime cared about their views and was actually waging war, even in part, to “liberate Afghan women from abuse and oppression,” as one May 2002 letter to President Bush signed by prominent feminists put it.
Reality check. A bloody invasion and nearly eight years of occupation have NOT improved things for Afghan women. Their lives are a nightmare—not significantly different or better than under the Taliban, and in many ways worse:
Today, now, under U.S. occupation…Thousands of young girls and women are confined to their homes, kept out of school or work. “Honor killings” of women are still carried out, and disputes or debts between people are often “settled” using girls as a form of currency. Men are routinely given custody of children in divorces. Violence against women and girls rose 40 percent in 2007, and today nearly 90 percent of Afghan women suffer abuse at home. “Across Afghanistan, women are setting fire to themselves,” the Guardian reports.
Today, now, under U.S. occupation… Every 30 minutes, an Afghan woman dies during childbirth. Overall some 24,000 die each year due to diseases and during childbirth—25 times the number killed in the war. Up to 70 percent of pregnant women don’t get medical attention. 87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate; only 30 percent of girls have access to education in Afghanistan; 70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan.
And today, now, under U.S. occupation… The U.S. “liberation” of Iraq also made the situation for women worse! There are now 740,000 Iraqi widows, many who are destitute and forced into “temporary marriages”—a form of prostitution sanctioned by Islamic Sharia law. Reactionary religious laws have been more deeply enshrined in Iraqi law and governance under the new U.S.-installed regime than under Saddam Hussein. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that of Iraq’s 1.6 million internally displaced people, more than half are women or girls, who are more vulnerable to rape and other forms of sexual violence.
This is not because Bush “messed up” the war on Afghanistan (or Iraq). It is because of the essential nature of the invasion and ongoing occupation of Afghanistan—for reasons I’ll speak to in addressing the next question:
I'm not going to comment on that. If I didn't like it, I wouldn't have included it. However, many sites in the community are doing a roundtable tonight. It's ended up being a roundtable of women with sites in the community and they are addressing Afghanistan so I will say read the above article (use the link) and also look for the roundtable tonight at other sites.
Trouble in England. Terri Judd of Independent of London reports:
Islamic protesters brandishing placards hurled abuse at soldiers parading to mark their return home from Iraq yesterday.
Around 20 men yelled "terrorists" and held homemade signs denouncing the soldiers as "butchers of Basra" and "baby killers" as they marched through Luton in Bedfordshire.
Other signs described the 200 men and women from the 2nd Battalion The Royal Anglian Regiment as "Criminals, Murderers, Terrorists".
The atmosphere further deteriorated when locals waving St George's flags turned on the protesting group chanting "scum" and "no surrender to the Taliban". As the two groups yelled insults at each other, police dogs and riot vans were used to keep them apart.
Last night Bedfordshire police confirmed that two people had been arrested for public order offences.
I'm sure this will be rewritten by War Hawks in the US to insist that it was peace activists who attacked. You know how that goes.
Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Tuesday, March 10, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death, another deadly Baghdad bombing with mass fatalities, Lourdes Garcia-Navarro and Thomas E. Ricks talk Iraq realities while Phyllis Bennis sounds like a raving lunatic, and more.
Let's start with reality and then we'll turn to the nut jobs. Yesterday Thomas E. Ricks appeared on NPR's Talk of the Nation yesterday. Ricks is the author of The Gamble. Appearing with him on the show were NPR's Lourdes Garcia-Navarro (who heads NPR's Baghdad bureau) and Ghassan Adnan (Iraqi producer). Neil Conan is the host of the program.
Thomas E. Ricks: I think that Obama and the people around him are repeating the optimisim of the Bush administration. It's not a departure from Bush to say you want to get out of Iraq. George Bush didn't invade Iraq saying, "I have a great idea. Let's go get stuck in a quagmire for ten years." The original war plan had us down to 30,000 troops by September 2003. Well here we are seven years later. We have more than four times that number of troops and the new president is saying "I want to get us out of Iraq, out of fighting in Iraq by August of next year." Well just because you hang a "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" banner doesn't mean the war ends, just because you say it's a non-combat mission doesn't mean the war ends. The war ends when American troops stop dying. And I was over at the White House the day of the president's speech [Feb. 27th] and I said, "Does this mean American troops will stop dying in August of 2010?" And a military official there said, "No, it does not mean that."
[. . .]
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: I'd just like to speak to something that Thomas Ricks just said. Um, it's kind of interesting, the war ends when no US soldiers are killed here. You know, it's -- through all of this, you tend to forget the Iraqi narrative. We're talking about the Obama administration, what they think, what they believe. Of course there is a sovereign, now, Iraqi government who also has a say in what happens here and what kinds of, you know, US forces remain here and what the war will look like for them. It's not only US soldiers who die but of course Iraqi civilians, Iraqi army, Iraqi police and that also has a -- that characterizes what will happen here in the coming years and months.
Thomas E. Ricks: That's a good point. I should have said "our war ends when US troops stop dying." I think the war goes on for decades.
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: It's just -- possibly. And it's certainly a sobering thought for the Iraqis I speak to here. I do spend -- you know, when you're living in Baghdad and covering it -- I've been covering this since 2002 actually -- we have to deal with the US military and, of course, the Iraqis as well. And we -- you know, it's a balancing act. And our staff monitors six [Iraqi] papers a day, three Iraqi channels, and, of course, we go out. Now the security situation is better, I travel all over the country. Tomorrow I'm going into Anbar Province, up near Haditha. I've been pretty much everywhere now days in Iraq and that, of course, allows you to do reporting as you would in any other country, which means getting on the ground, talking to people and seeing exactly what's going on for yourself. Before we had to rely on the US military. They're the ones that had to take us places, we had to embed, we had to see things through their prism. Now that has changed dramatically and we can really go out in a way that we've never been able to since the early days of the war to see for ourselves exactly what's going on.
Neal Conan: And let me quickly follow up again on something Tom Ricks said, decades, Tom?
Thomas E. Ricks: Yeah, I think there will be people fighting and dying in Iraq for decades.
Neal Conan: And Lourdes Garcia-Navarro, do you agree with that?
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: Well, I think that may possibly be true. As I try and point out in many of my reports, I think the -- for many Americans, they believe that the war is over. I mean there's a lack of interest now that President Obama has said they will be withdrawing US forces in great numbers in the coming year -- not this year, but next year. I think people have sort of thought, 'Well, the war is over in Iraq.' But people die here every single day. There are many simmering conflicts. It might not look like the conflicts that we saw before during the sectarian violence but there are other things that are going on here that could presage many bad days to come. I don' t know, I'm not a prognosticator but certainly Iraq is not stable yet.
Thomas E. Ricks: I think it's a good point that the war has changed several times. It started as a blitzkrieg invasion, then it was a botched occupation, then it was a slow rising but durable insurgency, then it was an American counter-offensive. The war is changing again. It kind of feels like a lull right now. But just because it's changed doesn't mean it's ended and a lot of Americans have stopped paying attention because I think they wrongly think that it's over.
We'll come back to that broadcast -- including Lourdes expanding on her thoughts of the Iraqi government. And Thomas E. Ricks is scheduled to be on Tavis Smiley (PBS) tonight.
From reality to the cracked ravings of Phyllis. Phyllis Bennis would like to be the voice of something. Even she doesn't know what. And that's very clear when she churns out a bad piece like she did at ZNet. First off, Phyllis, where were you in 2008? You managed one carefully worded column questioning Barack. So when you show up today tossing around "we," you really need to just stop. In fact, your 'moral' authority is such that, frankly, you have none. You have no standing. Not on Iraq. You have no standing because you dabble. That's how you end up on CounterSpin over a year after Nancy A. Youssef (in what was her last story for Knight-Ridder -- it flipped to McClatchy the next day) broke the news about the US military keeping a list of the Iraqi deaths. You show up a year after that blabbering on about how the US must be keeping a list and why don't we know about this list and why have no reporters asked about this list. You dabble and you end up looking like a fool. Like an idiot. You have no pull, you have no authority. You need to stop thinking you can show issuing orders every three months via a (bad) Iraq article that reads as if you dashed it off while you had a load of whites on rinse.
Phyllis blathers on with a lot of "we" and she doesn't speak for the bulk of the peace movement. She'd like to but she doesn't and she needs to be blown off when she tries to present herself as a voice. She is, at her best, an analyst. Not of the US government, not of the peace mvoement. Those are not her areas. But she's not interested in her areas which is how her lengthy blather never gets around to noting Iraqis. Their wants, their needs, their issues. She can't write about Iraqis, she can't speak for the peace movement, so what's she jawboning our ears off about? Barry. President Barry Obama.
Phyllis yammer about ". . . our job is not to convince the people of this country that there is no way President Obama will end the occupation of Iraq. Our job will be to convince people that the only way President Obama will be able to overcome the powerful pro-war opposition inside and outside . . ." No one asked you. Do you get it? No one asked you. No one wants your opinion. You're allegedly an analyst. Of foreign affairs. That's what your IPS bio says, that's how you're billed when you're brought on some program. How about doing your job? Or is that too much for you? Brookings doesn't go on TV yacking about "our job." Cato or any of the right wing organizations don't do that. They offer analysis of the issues. In this case, they'd be analayzing Iraq. When you refuse to do that, when you think you can ignore your role and grab others, you make a fool out of yourself. And I'm wording that very kindly. Probably too kindly. You are a professional apologist for the do-nothings at United for Peace and Justice. There are actions taking place and Phyllis doesn't want you to know about them. Her latest crap is similar -- almost word-for-word -- to the crap she posted at United for Pathetic and Juvenile pimping their crap for April. UPFJ which will not call out Barack. It goes to the 20th Century Closet Communist panics and fears of confronting a "Black" man. Hate to break it to you, UPFJ, but unless you're going to operate in an all-White world, you're going to have to call out leaders of color.
Their cowardice on this issue was on full display at UPFJ's December 'strategy' session where the alleged peace movement 'leaders' explained they can't take on a "Black" man. So instead they proposed to 'honor' Barack via MLK. Barack isn't Black (he's bi-racial) and he's not MLK. Grow the hell up, Phyllis and quit hanging with those nut jobs at UPFJ. They're toast. Leslie Cagan is a grown woman, an elderly woman some might say, and she can't state publicly, "I am a Communist." Therefore, Leslie is a FAILURE and everyone working with her is a FRAUD or a FAILURE. There is nothing wrong with being a Communist, a Socialist, a Democrat, a Republican, what have you. There is something very wrong with being in a political closet. And it's important that we start all getting honest.
UPFJ has launched non-stop attacks on A.N.S.W.E.R. and benefitted from the fact that A.N.S.W.E.R. is seen as "Communist" (while UPFJ is not seen that way). There are Communists in A.N.S.W.E.R., there are anarchists, there are people of every political stripe. UPFJ has played the game their spiritual forebearers played during McCarthyism: Closeted Communists finger point at others. That happened repeatedly during the McCarthy witch hunt. And if you could do, for example, then what UPFJ does now, you could and did work for The Nation. But if you were upfront about who you were, as some Communists in A.N.S.W.E.R. are, the doors were closed for you and there was an effort made to point fingers at you. Those were the sacrificial lambs. And it's past time we all stopped treating Victor Navasky's Little Golden Reader version of history as accurate. It was a start. But it was as bad as any Disney take on history and refused to point to those who benefitted from the witch hunt. There is more reality on Heroes, the NBC program, currently doing a story on witch hunts, than in Naming Names when it comes to seriously exploring the hows and whos. As happened during McCarthy, the witch hunt on Heroes benefits from . . . someone in a closet. (There's also more honesty and maturity in Sara Paretsky's novel Blacklist.) The good news is that except for a 'sociologist' and Red Betty, the closet cases had no careers (or flipped to neo-con) fairly quickly. And the same will happen with today's because Barack Democrats will not stand for Leslie, Judith, Carl and all the other Communists in the closet trying to elbow their way to the front. They fear those closeted freaks will embarrass Barack. And they, Barack Democrats, grasp they can't keep holding the line. They can't keep insisting, "Oh, that evil Republican Noise Machine, trying to draw connections between Barack Obama and Communism or Socialism! It's all false!" You can't keep insisting that and allow the likes of Leslie, Carl, Judith, et al to go around as they do. I'm not talking a round-up. I am saying walls are being constructed to make sure that those elements have no access and no influence on Barack Obama. And hooray for that because these closet cases have run a tepid and wimpering peace 'movement' and they've done so because they can't admit who they are so they can't really engage in a struggle. When you're lying to your followers as well as to the press about what you are and who you are, how can you lead a damn thing? You can't. And they need to own their guilt and they need to own the blood of Iraqis which is on their hands because if you can't step up into the spotlight and say, "I'm ___ and I'm a ___" -- whatever "____" is -- you have no business attempting to be a political leader. You are corrupted before you say a single word because you have chosen to live in a closet. And the little games you play have very deadly consequences. And in a sane moment, if she's still capable of them, Naomi Wolf would agree with me. Before she went drunk on Barry Obama, she was getting ready to make that point (and does include it in her book The End of America: Letters of Warning to a Young Patriot).
This month groups such as The National Assembly to End the Wars, the ANSWER coalition, World Can't Wait and Iraq Veterans Against the War -- are taking part in a real action. Iraq Veterans Against the War explains:IVAW's Afghanistan Resolution and National Mobilization March 21st As an organization of service men and women who have served in Iraq, Afghanistan, stateside, and around the world, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War have seen the impact that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have had on the people of these occupied countries and our fellow service members and veterans, as well as the cost of the wars at home and abroad. In recognition that our struggle to withdraw troops from Iraq and demand reparations for the Iraqi people is only part of the struggle to right the wrongs being committed in our name, Iraq Veterans Against the War has voted to adopt an official resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and reparations for the Afghan people. (To read the full resolution, click here.) To that end, Iraq Veterans Against the War will be joining a national coalition which is being mobilized to march on the Pentagon, March 21st, to demand the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and further our mission and goals in solidarity with the national anti-war movement. This demonstration will be the first opportunity to show President Obama and the new administration that our struggle was not only against the Bush administration - and that we will not sit around and hope that troops are removed under his rule, but that we will demand they be removed immediately. For more information on the March 21st March on the Pentagon, and additional events being organized in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Orlando, to include transportation, meetings, and how you can get involved, please visit: www.pentagonmarch.org or www.answercoalition.org.
Back to NPR's Talk of the Nation yesterday. Thomas E. Ricks asked Lourdes whether or not she thought Iraq's government could be termed a sovereign one.
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: No. I think -- I think that even they would say that they aren't considered sovereign. I think when you have the presence of 140,000 US forces here, I don't think any government would say that it is sovereign. I think the Iraqi people certainly don't think that they are sovereign. You speak to them on the streets and they will not say that this is a sovereign country. They will say that this is a country under occupation. That said, there is now a legal framework in place and I do see the Iraqis . . . taking . . . control more and more.
Also addressed was the issue of the press coverage of Iraq and who remains and who is leaving?
Lourdes Garcia-Navarro: Ah. These are very, very difficult days in Iraq because, of course, it's extremely expensive and has been, prohibitively expensive to cover this war. NPR I think spends on the order of one million dollars a year which is a lot of money for an organization like us -- security costs and everything else. And what we are seeing is a drawing down of the press corps as well. We are seeing many of the important news organizations here, the Washington Post, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, Fox News, the ones who have been here from the very beginning are now actually reducing the number of correspondents that will be covering this conflict and I think that that is a measure of the fact that there are important stories out there that deserve a lot of attention like, of course, the global finacial crisis, among others. Afghanistan, of course, is getting a lot of attention as well. and we are seeing diminished interest in what is happening here in Iraq.
Neal Conan: Tom Ricks, you were saying earlier, obviously there are still many more American troops in Iraq then there are in Afghanistan -- or even plan to go to Afghanistan -- and you were saying one of the things the soldiers were telling you, 'Does anybody still know we're here?'
Thomas E. Ricks: Yeah, that came up a lot in my last trip. Is people just wondering do people still know we're out here?" The numbers have really not come down. Even the numbers if they come down as they're planning this year. We'll still be at 132,000 troops which is roughly the average we've had there for the entire war.
The Iraq War has not ended. Liars and fools (which would include Phyllis Bennis) would have you believe that it has. But it continues and people continue dying. In Iraq today, another suicide bomber. Early this morning AP was reporting 28 dead and twenty-eight wounded. Reuters gave the same figures and noted: "A source at Yarmouk hospital, the main hospital in western Baghdad, said it had received the body of a journalist working for al-Baghdadiya, an independent television station. Another journalist with al-Iraqiya state television was wounded, he said." Alissa J. Rubin (New York Times) was reporting close to immediately and noted an eyewitness who said the bomber was "wearing a national police uniform" and that the death toll was 33 with forty-six wounded. She also added, "The bombing suggest a renewed ability by insurgents to mount more effective suicide bombings, after a long period in which such attacks were relatively few and less lethal because of heavy security precautions." Caroline Alexander (Bloomberg News) explains the bombing took place "in the Abu Ghraib municipality, 15 miles (24 kilometers) from the center of the Iraqi capital, President Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party said on its Web site. The tribal leaders and a group of soldiers were visiting a market when the bomber struck, the PUK said. Two Iraqi journalists, including one from the independent al-Baghdadiya television station, were among the dead." NDTV Arabia identifies the two journalists killed as Suhaib Adnan and Haider Hashim. A third journalist, Ibrahim al-Katib, working for Iraqi state TV, was wounded. Ennahar Online offers a recent look at attacks on journalists in Iraq. Anthony Shadid (Washington Post) explains that the tribal leaders were "attending a reconciliation conference" and "The bombing unleashed chaos in the ramshackle market that lines the street near the municipal buildings of Abu Ghraib, on Baghdad's western outskirts. In the confusion, soldiers opened fire, wounding more people, and hospital staff complained that they were overwhelmed with the flood of casualties brought to their facility." Alissa J. Rubin and Marc Santora (NYT's International Herald Tribune) note, "There is an investigation into whether the shooting after the bombing was an ambush by gunmen or undisciplined gunfire by Iraqi security forces, said Marjor General Qassim Atta, spokesman for the Baghdad security plan." Wail al-Hofath and James Hider (Times of London) state, "The attack was a clear attempt to sabotage efforts to reconcile the Iraqi people at the crucial tribal leve, which has been vital in diminishing violence over the past two years. . . . The Sunni and Shia tribal leaders were in talks aimed at alleviating the deep and lingering animosity between the communities in Iraq after years of death squads, suicide bombings and ethnic cleansing." Jamal Hashim and Gao Shan (Xinhua) report, " An Interior Ministry source told Xinhua Tuesday that up to 33 people were killed and some 46 others injured in the latest bloody suicide bombing when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden car into a crowd of tribal leaders and army officers while they were leaving the town hall" though another version the reporters were told had a suicide bomber wearing a vest (most outlets are reporting a car). Matthew Schofield (McClatchy Newspapers) quotes an unnamed eyewitness declaring, "I have seen a dog carrying human flesh, a shoulder, as another dog was eating part of a human leg covered with blood. Iraqi soldiers chased the dogs, tryign to take these parts from them. I saw a human jaw thrown on the ground, and Iraqi soldiers refusing to allow to any one to pick it up. They said it belonged to the suicide bomber."
BBC's Mike Sergeant observes, "At the weekend Maj Gen David Perkins, the coalition spokesman, said that Iraq had moved 'from a very unstable to a stable position'" and notes how, later Sunday, over 30 were killed by a suicide bomber in Baghdad. Sergeant states it's too early to tell about March and violence could dip as the month continues but notes, "Those policy makers who think that the Iraq 'problem' has somehow been 'solved' might be starting to wrry that they had, once again, been over-optimistic and guilty of simplifying a very complicated place." Rania Abouzeid (Time magazine) notes that the increase in violence (which most are tracing to Thursday's suicide bombing but Caroline Alexander notes continues the increase that February saw over January) comes as al-Maliki tries "to cobble together a semblance of pan-Iraqi political solidarity. He has made an overture of reconciliation to low-level former members of the Baath Party, which ruled Iraq under Saddam Hussein." Abouzeid reports:Still, the audacity of the attacks, coupled with their lethal effectiveness and high casualty rates, may signal the resumption of a reinvigorated insurgency that has had time to regroup. A source close to the insurgency told TIME that sleeper cells in and around the Sunni stronghold of Abu Ghraib -- site of the infamous prison now renamed the Baghdad Central Prison -- have been planning renewed attacks for months. Tuesday's strike in the marketplace was carried out by the sheik of a local extremist Takfiri mosque, a man in his 20s named Abu Taymiyeh, the source claimed. The allegation could not be independently verified.
Hazim al-Nuaimi, a political analyst, tells Waleed Ibrahim and Aseel Kami (Reuters), "These attacks raise questions about political power struggles" and he questions the rush by some to blame al Qaeda in Mesopotamia (which is only one of many groups resisting the US occupation). Regardless of responsibility (still unclear), Amanda Ruggeri (US News & World Reports) concludes, "And for Iraqis, the attacks are a reminder that, despite an increase in stability that has allowed many civilians to warily resume more normal lives, their country remains far from peaceful." Staffan de Mistura, the UN Secretary-General's Special Representative to Iraq, has termed today's bombing "a horrible crime that is deisgned to sabotage reconciliatory efforts by the Iraqi people."
China's Xinhua reports, "An American marine died in Iraq at a result of an incident that did not involve combat on Tuesday, the U.S. military said. The soldier, assigned to Multi National Force-West (MNF-W), died on Tuesday, a military statement said without providing further details about the incident." The announcement brings the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4257.
In other reported violence today . . .
Bombings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Mosul car bombing that claimed 2 lives -- a docotr and "the son of the Head of the local Judicial Council" -- and left six other people wounded and, dropping back to last night, a Mosul grenade attack on a wedding party that resulted in twelve being wounded "including women and children." Reuters notes a bombing outside of Mosul that claimed the life of 1 "young girl."
Shootings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 "woman who works in Mosul University, Department of Computer Science" was shot dead in her home in Mosul this morning.
Turning to Iraq court news. February 19th, Muntadar al-Zaidi (also spelled Muntadhar al-Zeidi) had one day in court before the judge adjourned to figure out what Bully Boy Bush was doing in Iraq. December 14th Bully Boy was in Baghdad and Muntadhar threw one shoe and then a second at George W. Muntadar exclaimed, "This is a gift from the Iraqis. This is the farewell kiss you dog" and "This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq." Muntadar was immediately attacked by Nouri al-Maliki's thugs and has been imprisoned ever since. February 19th, he had a brief (90 minute) hearing. The judge ruled they'd be back on March 12th. Camada's CBC reported he was briefly back in court today before the judge "adjourned to Thursday" -- there was time for Muntadar to be greeted with "applause and shouts of support in the courtroom and the hallway". CBS and AP also note the trial is due to resume Thursday and they report that Dargham al-Zeidi, Muntadhar's brother, was attempting to stage a demonstration at Firdous Square in Baghdad; however, police broke it up and refused to allow it to take place. Michael Howard (Guardian of Manchester) adds, "A 25-strong team of lawyers has been preparing the journalist's defence. It is led by Dhiya al-Saadi, who said he would ask for an immediate release because the law under which Zeidi is charged is not applicable in his case."
Turning to the US and starting with the White House. A friend in the administration asks that I note this White House blog post which includes, "The President and Ms. Obama salute Senator Ted Kennedy on his birthday." If Michelle Obama is now going to be billed as "Ms. Obama," more power to her. She's a grown woman and, prior to 2007, was a very strong one. It would be nice to see that side re-emerge publicy. Now we're back on the subject of her husband and while silly Phyllie Bennis can't do anything of value (but she can get it for you wholesale), Margaret Kimberley (Black Agenda Report) offers this on War Hawk Barrack Obama's 'withdrawal':
As always, the president chose his words very carefully. The parsing was so clever that it fooled many people into celebrating when there is no reason for joy. There will still be American troops in Iraq, up to 50,000 of them. "As I have long said, we will retain a transitional force to carry out three distinct functions: training, equipping, and advising Iraqi Security Forces as long as they remain non-sectarian; conducting targeted counter-terrorism missions; and protecting our ongoing civilian and military efforts within Iraq. Initially, this force will likely be made up of 25-50,000 U.S. troops."
[. . .]
The damage done by the complete capitulation of many progressives to Obama is now bearing fruit. He is able to dismiss them and his own party without suffering any political damage. He said as much in a PBS interview with Jim Lehrer.
JIM LEHRER: You're not the least bit uneasy over the fact as John McCain and John Boehner, the Republican leader of the House, have praised your plan while the Democrats are criticizing it?
BARACK OBAMA: You know, I don't - I don't make these decisions based on polls or popularity. I make the decisions based on what I think is best.
In other words, the Democrats can go to hell. He doesn;t care what they think. He doesn't have to care what they think because they gave him carte blanche to say and do anything he wanted during the campaign. McCain and Boehner are now his cheerleaders and Democrats have to be happy with whatever their leader deems to be acceptable.
Finally, Amy Goodman did her usual spin for Barack today. New rule, Afghanistan women commenting on Afghainstan? They need to be raised there. We don't need an American who went to Afghanistan (and increased her wealth) after the US invaded in 2001 passing herself off as Afghanistan. The FRAUD tosses kisses to the Taliban. That's why Pravada on the Hudson put her on the air. In the real world, Alisa Tang (Ms. magazine) writes: "There are many brave Afghan women who continue to fight for their rights. Some like Samar are vocal. Others surreptitiously push forward women's rights within a male-dominated society. There is a sense of urgency among them, because with the Taliban back in strength and potentially at the negotiating table with the government, their lives are on the line again." Elaine's "Anti-feminist Barack Obama" and Kat's "Afghanistan" covered the topic last night.
iraqthe new york timesalissa j. rubin
mike sergeant
marc santorathe washington postanthony shadid
matthew schofield
mcclatchy newspapers
james hider
npr
talk of the nation
lourdes garcia-navarro
thomas e. ricks
phyllis bennis
like maria said pazkats korner
Monday, March 09, 2009
Isaiah, Third, Iraq
Monday, Monday. Bah - dah - Bah - da-da-dah. Man, I'm tired. My right eye is twitching, I'm so tired. I can't handle daylight savings time and I saw a report Sunday on NBC that it didn't really help with energy use so why do we still do it? Two states don't. Arizona was one of the two NBC mentioned but I forget the other one.
I'm tired and sleepy.
You know there will be days when you're so tired you can't take another step
The night will have no stars and you'll think you've gone as far as you will ever get
But you and me, walk on, walk on, walk on,
Because you can't go back now.
That's The Weepies' "Can't Go Back Now" from Hideaway. I listen to that a lot lately. It's a really cool album. And speaking of recommending music . . . Kat urges you to avoid a new release in "Kat's Korner: No Life Left On The Album." Having heard it, I join her in strongly urging you to skip the new U2 album.
Okay, this is from Kevin Gosztola's "The Thing With Obama is Yoo Get Away With Murder:"
President Barack Obama may have come into office pledging to end torture, but Obama has shown no indication that he will condemn the Nuremberg defense (“only following orders”) when used by former members of the Bush Administration who have been accused of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.
ABC News reported last week that Obama is defending John Yoo, a lawyer who wrote the “torture memo” for the Bush Administration, in California federal court against suit being brought by Jose Padilla, who claims that “Yoo’s memos on interrogation policies led to his detention and torture.”
The Obama Justice Department claims that “recourse” is “for the executive to decide, in the first instance, and for Congress to decide," in the second instance. The courts should have no role, and since the Congress did not impeach prior to Bush leaving office, Congress should probably engage in little "recourse" also.
Obama’s Justice Department similarly adopted the Bush "state secrets" argument prior to defending Yoo when it asked the court “to dismiss a case against a flight data company that aided the CIA in performing alleged acts of extraordinary rendition.”
While Obama’s Justice Department agrees to assist in the legal defense of Yoo, so-called anti-terror memos released last week show the Bush Administration had people like Yoo develop legal justification for prosecuting the “war on terror” and “ignoring the First Amendment freedoms of speech and the press and Fourth Amendment requirements for search warrants.” [See Jason Leopold’s article for more.]
The memos offered justification for the domestic deployment of military and granted the unitary executive the power to label any person an “enemy combatant” if deemed necessary even if the accused could prove he or she was not an “enemy combatant” by showing proper identification.
That's needed but depressing as hell which is why I held Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "The Feminist Barack" for after it:
Now let's talk Third and I'll be going quick because I really am sleepy. Along with Dallas, here's who wrote the edition and did the work on the weekend:
The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, and Ava,
Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,
Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,
C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,
Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),
Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,
Mike of Mikey Likes It!,
Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz,
Ruth of Ruth's Report,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ
and Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends.
And here's what was completed:
Truest statement of the week -- Chris Hedges really earned this. We were able to narrow down the nominees fairly quickly, I thought.
Truest statement of the week II -- Debra Sweet, also highly deserving.
A note to our readers -- Jim breaks down the edition. And covers a great deal.
Editorial: Ms. magazine gets punked -- I read this Sunday. It is not the editorial we worked on. Which is cool. But I was surprised when I started reading because I kept thinking, "Am I remembering wrong?" They went with this topic at the last minute due to the fact that it was getting play on the morning news. It's a really strong editorial. This is Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I. and Kat and Betty and Wally.
TV: Alessandra Stanley, far funnier than Tina Fey -- Now I just love this. Even right now, this can make me smile and perk up. :D This is funny and it deals with the economy and much, much more.
The Thomas E. Ricks Dialogue -- This is just C.I. and Jim and I really enjoyed listening to this. I thought Jim really did come out swinging (he plays Thomas E. Ricks) but C.I.'s just too grounded and too factual.
Talking Iraq -- This was fun to listen to as well. Elaine participated in this. Which is why I listened. It's Elaine, Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava, C.I., Kat, Betty and Wally. It moved quickly.
Amnesty Provincial -- We all worked on this but, honestly, I think the illustration of Barack's head was the best thing. I love the blues and red in that illustration.
The Puta Janine Jackson -- This moved quickly.
Al Distraction, Domestic Arts Czar --We note Isaiah's recent comics which have just been outstanding.
The Katrina goes to . . . -- a deserving and useful idiot! :D
ETAN offers Power Plant Information -- ETAN repost.
Friday roundtable on Iraq -- Friday roundtable moderated by Rebecca
Highlights -- Betty, Kat, Wally, Cedric, Rebecca, Marcia, Ruth, Stan, Elaine and I wrote this and picked out the highlights unless we wrote otherwise.
Okay, this strange guy married to Trina wants me to include something from Christopher Dowd's "That 'elusive' civilian toll in Iraq and other observations" (Boston Libertarian Examiner):
When it comes to a country and region that our media has next to zero presence within they have no problem using hard numbers on how many civilians have been killed.
But when it comes to the civilian death toll in Iraq the "liberal" American media incredulously claims the numbers are, gosh darn it, just too hard to figure out and that maybe "we will never know!"
Never? Wow. Let's see, for the past six years a modern record keeping US army of over 100,000 men has been in Iraq. On top of that another 100,000 private contractors from a country with a records obsessed business atmosphere have been in Iraq. On top of that thousands of media people have been in Iraq from all over the world (granted- sitting behind blast walls acting as military stenographers rather than reporters), and on top of that Iraq had its own extensive government institutions all over the country . . . but we will "never know" just how many Iraqis have been killed in this war.
Oh . . . . Ok.
But maybe I am being a little harsh. After all Iraq and Sudan are not the same conflicts. We probably know more about the civilian deaths in Sudan because nearly 200 journalists and support staff have not been killed there. Maybe we also know more about civilian deaths in Sudan because many large humanitarian groups were there . . . unlike in Iraq which has had next to no outside humanitarian groups there since 2003 and the reason for this being . . . it was too violent.
Those are some solid points and for those who didn't know, Trina's husband would be . . . my dad. :D Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Monday, March 9, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death over the weekend, Iraqi women get some media attention, Turkey and the US increase their ties, Gen Ray Odierno speaks to Martha Raddatz (ABC News) about how the US could remain in Iraq past 2011, and more.
Today wowOwow notes Dr. Nawal al-Samaari who was the Women's Affairs minister when wowOwow noted her earlier and they quote her statements to AFP yesterday in an interview explaining her resignation, "I was convinced that I could improve conditions for women, but I ran into a wall . . . the occupation, terrorism, the economy collapsing . . . all that produced an army of widows, an increase in the number of divorcees, unmarried women, women beggars. Society is falling apart and me, I was a minister in a ministry without means, without power, without offices outside Baghdad. Women's issue are not a priority for the government. But if women were helped, I think that half of the societal problems would be resolved." Sinan Salaheddin (AP) reports that al-Samaarie (another spelling the press is using) still intends to withdraw her resignation and intends to do so tomorrow, explaining "the new situation" includes "pledges for funds and support from international aid organizations. She also said more than 50 Iraqi women have offered to volunteer to implement the ministry's plans." Her AFP interview yesterday took place on International Women's Day.
Firyal, a 24-year-old widow with a young son, lost her husband when Shi'ite 'authorities' stopped him at a checkpoint in 2006. Her father tried to intervene but had a gun pointed at him. Since her husband's corpse was never found, she receives no pension from the al-Maliki government that likes to brag so about their 'deep concern' ('concern' translates to approximately $1 a day for widows). 20-year-old Zainab also can't collect the meager widow's pension because her husband was kidnapped back in 2006, "I went to the government office to register, hoping that I could get monthly salary but they didn't allow me to because my husband is neither dead or alive, sick or disabled. He was kidnapped and is considered 'missing' and there is no law addressing this. So all I can do is continue with my work [as a domestic cleaner and servant] so I can try to buy milk for my son because it is the most important thing, and also so I can buy some food for my extended family so they can eat lunch and dinner. Sometimes we have only bread and tea to eat for dinner. I can withstand anything, but the children can't." Bushara is a Shi'ite who lost her home when graffitti appeared on it advising "Shiites in the neighbourhood to get out" so she, her husband and their daughter immediately fled and they have had no help from the government despite filling out multiple applications with the Ministry of Displacement and Migration. 41-year-old Nour is a widow living "with 20 people in cramped quarters in Baghdad's Al-Sadr City" who explains, "Our drinking water is drawn by a pump which at the same time draws sewage water which we disinfect with chlorien tablets that we buy at the pharmacy. . . People in the area who can't afford the tablets have fallen ill with many serious diseases like cholera, typhoid, intestinal infections and renal infections, especially in the summer." These are some of the Iraqi women sharing their stories in a new report by Oxfam Internationl. "In Her Own Words: Iraqi women talka bout their greatest concerns and challenges" is a survey of 1,700 Iraqi women -- approximately 60% of whom say that security is their first concern, the next grouping (55%) explain that they have been direct or indirect victims of violence since the US invasion began and the same percentage states "they were displaced at least once since 2003." Other findings included almost "25% of women had no daily access to drinking women & half of those who did have daily access to water said it was not potable; 69% said access to water was worse or the same as it was in 2006 & 2007" and "40% of women with children reported that their sons and daughters were not attending school." On the latter issue, "30% of those with children said they could not reach school without security threats." We'll note this section of the 19-page report:
In early 2009, reports of improved security in Iraq, and even a return to 'normality,' began appearing in the media. Similar reports of diminished suicide bombs and other violent indiscriminate attacks emerged at the time of the initial data collection last year. However insecurity remains in many provinces including Baghdad, Kirkuk and Nineveh where small-scale attacks, assassination and kidnappings continue. Women in particular are less safe now than at any other time during the conflict or in the years before.
Beyond security, the overwhelming concern women voiced was extreme difficulty accessing basic servics such as clean water, electricity and adequate shelter despite billions of US dollars that have been spent in the effort to rehabilitate damaged or destroyed infrastructure. Availability of essentials such as water, sanitation and health care is far below national averages. Both the Iraqi organization and researcher that carried out the survey and analyzed its findings corroborated that the overall cchallenges facing women and the Iraqi population as a whole remained the same in early 2009 as they did in the second half of 2008 when the date presented in this paper was collected.
The report notes, "As compared with 2007, 40% felt their security situation was worsening in 2008, 38% said it was improving and the remainder said it had not changes; as compared with 2006; 43% said it was worse, 34% said it was better & 22% said it had not changed." Oxfam calls for a dramatic increase in investments from donor countries to rebuild Iraq's "basic and social services sectors" and notes "The women of Iraq have been caught in the grip of a silent emergency for the past six years." Reporting on Oxfam's study, Mike Sergeant (BBC News) zooms in on one widow, Nadia Hussein who lost her husband, three brothers, saw her home torched -- while she was pregnant and she miscarried, attempted to see help from her extended family only to be beaten and abused by a nephew and now considers home a women's center in Baghdad. Sergeant observes of these Iraqi war widows, "Almost everywhere you go in Baghdad, you can see them begging at traffic lights and outside mosques - dressed from head to toe in black." The UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs notes, "One in five married Iraqi women has been a victim of physical domestic violence, while one in three has been subject to emotional violence. Of the women victims of physical domestic violence, 14% were subject to violence during pregnancy." And the UN "calls for both commitment and effective practical measures to protect and promote rights of Iraqi women. Years of violence, internal conflict and wars have slowed progress towards equality for Iraqi women, and compromised their fundamental rights to education, healthcare, work and full political participation." Sunday Alissa J. Rubin (New York Times) tied it in with another study on the general population. That other study -- done by WHO and the Iraqi government -- is nonsense. We're not interested in it. Rubin notes of Oxfan's study, it found "more than three-quarters of all widows were not receiving pensions, and a third of the women surveyed had three hours or less electricity per day." [The other study was addressed Saturday and Sunday.]
Nadje Al-Ali is the co-author (with Nicola Pratt) of What Kind of Liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq. At Dissident Voice, Rose Aguilar shares her interview with Nadje. Aguilar is a host of KALW's Your Call (Aguilar spoke with Nadje and Dahr Jamail last month, click here for audio). From the interview:
Rose Aguilar: March 20 marks the six-year anniversary of the invasion. When you look back at this occupation, what comes to mind?
Nadje Al-Ali: The death toll. That's the first thing that comes to mind. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died. You have hundreds of thousands of widows. Iraq has become a nation of widows. Sixty-five percent of the population is women. You have some areas of Iraq where about 70 percent are female-headed households and there is no functioning state, so women are forced to beg. Some are forced into prostitution. Some get $100 a month to survive.
RA: What else is new about today's situation?
NA: We've never seen a situation where women were told to stay at home or forced to follow a dress code or told not to drive, which is happening in certain parts of Iraq. This is a totally new phenomenon. Last year in Basra, 133 women were killed by various Islamist groups for allegedly not being Islamic enough. This is not to say that things were wonderful under the previous regime, but one of the things that has been disturbing for me is the fact that some of the women and men I've talked to who suffered under the previous regime and under sanctions and wars, say it was better then than it is now.
Also, what I think is forgotten is the humanitarian crisis. Six years afterwards, people still don't have electricity. They need generators if they want electricity. Seventy percent of Iraqis don't have access to clean water. Eighty percent don't have access to sewage. The hospitals are in very bad shape. We haven't seen any reconstruction, really.
Iraq women are the canaries in the coalmine which is why it was always so important for the US government to ignore them and for their lapdogs in the press to do the same. Reporting on them, reporting what was happening to them, meant telling even a little bit of truth about the illegal war and that could not be allowed. John F. Burns and Dexy Filkins managed to avoid women in one report after another filed for the New York Times until the Go-Go Boys finally left the Green Zone and the country. Sabrina Tavernise, Ellen Knickmeyer and others (including many men, such as Damien Cave) were able to find Iraqi women and to tell their stories or include their thougths in their reports. But all this time later what does it really matter? Who bothers to cover Iraqi women. Friday's snapshot noted Amnesty International's new report [PDF format warning] entitled "Trapped By Violence: Women In Iraq." There have been many reports. And look at those who cashed in on the illegal war, who made their movies about it, who wrote their books about it and who lost interest. At some of their sites you might find, for example, a sexist comic featuring a doll turning 50. A doll. It's not a funny comic and, more to the point, these men never cover the Mattel doll anymore than they cover real women. But they can waste our time with their limp ravings over Barack, they just can't ever note the realities for Iraqi women. It's disgusting. And the problem is with our society. The problems with the US society allowed the White House to rank priorities and to be sure that women would fall to the bottom in Iraq. The priorities in the US allow so many 'brave' voices to avoid the issue of Iraqi women day after day damn day. It's not important to them, you understand. But they've got time to share a sexist comic about a doll. [Click here for Bob Somerby on how much space has been wasted addressing the doll. In fairness to some wasting it, if they played with the doll, they are no worse than those distracting us with sports columns outside the sports pages.] Oxfam released their report yesterday, Amnesty released their report last week, yesterday was International Women's Day. Now go check the very-beyond-middle-aged boiz and see what they're writing about. Iraqi women have been under attack non-stop since the start of the illegal war. The fact that there remains so little coverage of it in the US does not go to the very serious problems Iraq currently has -- it goes to the serious societal problems in the US which encourage and allow 'brave' voices to find diversions and distractions to 'cover.'
Yesterday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared, "Put simply, we have much less hope of addressing the complex challenges we face in this new century without the full participation of women. . . . Women still comprise the majority of the world's poor, unfed, and unschooled. Hundreds of thousands of women die in childbirth every year. They are subjected to rape as a tactic of war and exploited by traffickers globally in a billion dollar criminal business. Laws are still on the books denying women the right to own property, access credit, or make their own choices within their marriage. And honor killings, maiming, female genital mutilation, and other violent and degrading practices that target women are tolerated in too many places today. Like all people, women deserve to live free from violence and fear. To create peaceful, thriving communities, women must be equal partners. That means making key resources available to women as well as men, including the chance to work for fair wages and have access to credit; to vote, petition their governments and run for office; to know they can get healthcare when they need it, including family planning; and to send their children to school -- their sons and their daughters. Women also have a crucial role to play in establishing peace worldwide. In regions torn apart by war, it is often the women who find ways to reach across differences and discover common ground as mothers, caretakers, and grassroots advocates. One need only look to Northern Ireland, Rwanda, the Balkans, and parts of Central America to see the impact of women working in their communities to bridge divides in areas of sectarian conflict. This week, as we celebrate the accomplishments and the untapped potential of women around the world, we must remind ourselves that ensuring the rights of women and girls is not only a matter of justice. It is a matter of enhancing global peace, progress, and prosperity for generations to come. When women are afforded their basic rights, they flourish. And so do their children, families, communities, and nations."
Last week, the US State Dept honored various women with their International Women of Courage Awards and we'll note Suaad Allami: "A prominent lawyer, Suaad Allami fights against the erosion of women's rights and defends the most disadvantaged. She founded the NGO Women for Progress and the Sadr City Women's Center, which offers free medical care, literacy education, vocational training, and legislative advocacy. She has accepted a Humphrey Fellowship from the State Department for academic year 2009-2010." Among the obstacles Iraqi women face are the thugs the US installed. Liz Sly (Chicago Tribune) reported on one such thug, Sheik Ahmed Abu Risha, Saturday and quoted him 'explaining', "We are the sons of the province, and we are ready to run the province." Shakey Risha, a Mafia don put on the US payroll, is most infamous recently for threatening mass violence in Al Anbar Province if his political party was not made the winners of the provincial election there. Sly quotes Khamis Ahmeda Abtan (of Iraqi Islamic Party) stating, "People think the results were made up -- a deal with the government in Baghdad and also the Americans to satisify Abu Risha. Anbar is going to be ruled acrodding to emotions and according to affiliations of tribes. We're already seeing it. People are saying, 'We're of X tribe, so we've got to have X job.' I don't think this is good for the security of the province."
Secretary of State Clinton was in Turkey over the weekend. As noted in the February 18th snapshot, US State Dept spokesperson Gordon Duguid denied any knowledge that Turkey or Jordan was being asked to to assist with any draw down or withdrawal, not even with equipment issues. But Reuters explained last week, "Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan signalled on Wednesday Turkey would allow the US military to use its bases and ports to withdraw troops from Iraq after US President Barack Obama pledged a 2010 drawdown. The United States has not formally asked to use Turkish airbases and ports and Turkey would have to consider what kind of equipment was being transported, the routes to be used and other issues before approving any such request, Babacan told reporters before departing for a NATO meeting in Brussels." Saturday Viola Gienger (Bloomberg News) reported on Clinton's trip to Turkey, the officials she met with and observed, "The Obama administration needs Turkey to help stabilize Iraq and to mediate in Middle East conflicts involving countries and groups with limited or broken diplomatic ties with the U.S., such as Syria and Iran. Turkey, which aspires to European Union membership, also forms a vital oil and gas corridor." Saturday Clinton and Turish Foreign Minister Ali Babacn issued a joint statement where they noted "the strong bonds of alliance, solidarity and strategi partnership" between their two countries, "announced the stablishment of 'Young Turkey/Young America: A New Relationship for a New Age" to increase communication and ties between young people of each country and, in terms of Iraq, "They also welcome Turkey's deeping relations with the Government of Iraq as evidenced by high level visits as well as trilateral meetings to discuss cooperation against the PKK." Yigal Schleifer (Christian Science Monitor) notes the diplomatic mission had many items on the agenda "including the possible use of Turkish soil for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq". Meanwhile Alsumaria reports that the Turkish military is whispering about a reported deal between Baghdad and Ankara which will allow Turkey to train the Iraqi Army. Reportedly the deal was addressed on Wednesday and will be signed by President Abdula Gul when he visits Baghdad at the end of this month. Tim Reid and Michael Evans (Times of London) note that US President Barack Obama is now scheduled to visit Turkey in the coming weeks.
Saturday the US military made the latest announcement: "A U.S. Coalition forces Soldier died from injuries sustained following an attack on a patrol in the Salah Ad Din province of northern Iraq March 7. The name of the deceased is being withheld pending notification of next of kin and release by the Department of Defense." This brought the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4256.
Other violence reported over the weekend included Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reported 8 mass graves containing at least 25 corpses were discovered in Diyala Province. Yesterday a bomber killed himself outside Baghdad's police academy on Palestine Street and also killed at least 30 others with at least sixty-one left injured. Anthony Shadid (Washington Post) reports the bomber utilized a motorcycle and that, December 1st, the same police academy was bombed (fifteen people died then). BBC notes it's the deadliest attack in a month and, "Reports suggest the bomber detonated a belt of explosives as he crashed his motorbike into a line of people waiting at the side entrance to the training centre. Most of the dead were police recruits, while others were serving officers and civilians." Marc Santora (New York Times) reports that the nearby Oil Ministry had 100 workers outside protesting when the bombing took place (they were protesting wages still unpaid) and that one of the paper's employees was on "a minibus that happened to be passing the Oil Ministry. The bus shook, and the driver tried to change direction. The smell of spent explosives filled the air." He quotes the woman explaining, "Then the police began shooting randomly. There was gunfire all around. . . . First I saw one truck with two people lying in the back, and then a second with four or five. They were just lying there. Their hands were hanging limp over the tailgate, as if they were no longer conscious." Greg Miller and Usama Redha (Los Angeles Times) quote: eye witness Haidar Nouri stating, "Wheil we were standing there, I heard someone scream, 'Stop! Stop!' Then I heard two shots and I felt something throw the crowd down. I felt nothing after that. [Then]I found myself in the hospital. I saw some of my fellow recruits lost their hands and others their legs. The hospital halls are crowded with the wounded. I hoped to serve my country when I got this job and that God would bless me with money, but this is what I got." Turning to some of today's reported violence.
Bombings?
Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad sticky bombing on "the head of the Haj committee's car, Seid Jafar alMusawi" which wounded him and his son, a Baghdad roadside bombing which left two people injured, and, dropping back to last night, a Salahuddin Province roadside bombing that left four police officers injured. Reuters notes a Tikrit roadside bombing last night targeting the Governor of Salahudin Province which left five of his bodyguards injured.
Shootings?
Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 2 "Awakening" Council members shot dead in Baghdad, 2 police officers shot dead in Mosul "and one civilian was injured," three people wounded in an attack outside Mousl University, and 1 person shot dead in another Mosul attack.
Meanwhile Lara Jakes (AP) reported the US military is stating 12,000 US troops will leave Iraq by September. Is this the approximately 10,000 that will leave in all of 2009? Or is this 12,000 part of the constant resupply efforts in Iraq -- where some are rotated out and some are rotated in? Marc Santora (New York Times) reports Maj Gen David G. Perkins is the person stating the reduction (already announced) is happening and Santora says that there are currently 140,000 US troops in Iraq. 140,000? That's not what's been reported. There are thought to be 146,000 US troops on the ground in Iraq and the White House has been pushing the press to use 142,000 as the figure since Barack's Little Big Nothing Speech at Camp Lejune. Before that speech, ten days before, Julian E. Barnes and Greg Miller (Los Angeles Times) reported: "There are about 146,000 U.S. troops in Iraq." That's February 18th. The White House is pleased as punch that the domestic press immediately fell into line and began using 142,000. It's unclear whether the White House pushed or the US military decided on its own to begin using 140,000. Meanwhile Martha Raddatz and Luis Martinez (ABC News) report the top US commander in Iraq, Gen Ray Odierno is stating " that continuing the fight against insurgents in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul might lead to U.S. troops remaining in the city past a June 30, 2009 deadline for all U.S. combat troops to leave Iraqi cities, but only if the Iraqi government made such a request." In an exclusive interview to be broadcast on ABC World News Tonight this evening, Odierno explains to Raddatz that the 12,000 US troops ("combat troops and enablers")
RADDATZ: I mean, the national elections.
ODIERNO: I'm sorry. The national elections are scheduled right now for December, they could go as late as January.
RADDATZ: So, if you didn't bring out another brigade in the fall, you'd have at least 80,000 troops to move out of here from January or February through August?
ODIERNO: Yeah, I'd say about 70,000. We'd probably be at about 120,000 at that time down to 50,000 by August. But, I think we have a good plan in place to do that. And I think, again, I feel very comfortable that the window of risk is between October and February-March of 2010. And that will allow us then to do a more detailed and quick withdrawal of forces out of Iraq, because I think we will have gone through the toughest part and we'll be in a real stable stage that will enable us to do that very quickly.
RADDATZ: And would the plan be 10,000 a month, stagger it? We'll note the section discussing the US remaining in Iraq past 2011:
RADDATZ: And you believe we will be completely out of here by 2011?
ODIERNO: We will. We have signed an agreement that says we will be and I think we're on track to do that.
RADDATZ: But that could change? If the Iraqis want it to change?
ODIERNO: It's their decision. It's a decision that they have to make. But I don't see them making that decision right now.
RADDATZ: But would you still say it's conditions-based, until then?
ODIERNO: No, I think it's based on an Iraqi assessment. Again, if we stayed ... Again, our plan is to be out of here by December, 2011. That's the agreement we signed and we will meet those requirements. What, if the government of Iraq asks us, if they ask us to stay, want to renegotiate, then we'll go through renegotiation and we'll decide at that time what that means.
RADDATZ: I guess I look at other places and I look at Bosnia where we were for ten years and they weren't even shooting at each other then, and in terms of stability, being out by 2011 seems pretty rapid.
ODIERNO: Well, again, I think that's a judgment that will have to be made later on. Far from the first time Odierno has made statements about the US presence being extended. (And he's got a stronger grip on the Status Of Forces Agreement than the bulk of the press has had.) So this is a good time to note this from IVAW's Dustin Alan Parks' "I am the anti-war movement:"
You call those who refuse to fight absent Those who have the courage to resist are not absent They're knocking on your door right now Begging to be heard and exercise their rights But you refuse to allow entry to opposition Which is fine because I have this message: I found a back door... I opened my mind and used it as a key So now I am here and you can't ignore me
This month groups such as The National Assembly to End the Wars, the ANSWER coalition, World Can't Wait and Iraq Veterans Against the War -- are taking part in an action. Iraq Veterans Against the War explains:IVAW's Afghanistan Resolution and National Mobilization March 21st As an organization of service men and women who have served in Iraq, Afghanistan, stateside, and around the world, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War have seen the impact that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have had on the people of these occupied countries and our fellow service members and veterans, as well as the cost of the wars at home and abroad. In recognition that our struggle to withdraw troops from Iraq and demand reparations for the Iraqi people is only part of the struggle to right the wrongs being committed in our name, Iraq Veterans Against the War has voted to adopt an official resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and reparations for the Afghan people. (To read the full resolution, click here.) To that end, Iraq Veterans Against the War will be joining a national coalition which is being mobilized to march on the Pentagon, March 21st, to demand the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and further our mission and goals in solidarity with the national anti-war movement. This demonstration will be the first opportunity to show President Obama and the new administration that our struggle was not only against the Bush administration - and that we will not sit around and hope that troops are removed under his rule, but that we will demand they be removed immediately. For more information on the March 21st March on the Pentagon, and additional events being organized in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Orlando, to include transportation, meetings, and how you can get involved, please visit: www.pentagonmarch.org or www.answercoalition.org.
the common illsthe third estate sunday reviewlike maria said pazkats kornersex and politics and screeds and attitudetrinas kitchenthe daily jotcedrics big mixmikey likes itthomas friedman is a great manruths reportsickofitradlzoh boy it never ends
iraq
mike sergeantthe new york timesalissa j. rubin
liz slydahr jamail
tim reidmichael evansyigal schleifer
the los angeles timesgreg millerusama redhahussein kahdimmcclatchy newspapers
lara jakes
iraq veterans against the wara.n.s.w.e.r.world can't wait
julian e. barnes
the new york timesmarc santorathe washington postanthony shadidsteven lee myersmartha raddatzabc newsluis martinez
I'm tired and sleepy.
You know there will be days when you're so tired you can't take another step
The night will have no stars and you'll think you've gone as far as you will ever get
But you and me, walk on, walk on, walk on,
Because you can't go back now.
That's The Weepies' "Can't Go Back Now" from Hideaway. I listen to that a lot lately. It's a really cool album. And speaking of recommending music . . . Kat urges you to avoid a new release in "Kat's Korner: No Life Left On The Album." Having heard it, I join her in strongly urging you to skip the new U2 album.
Okay, this is from Kevin Gosztola's "The Thing With Obama is Yoo Get Away With Murder:"
President Barack Obama may have come into office pledging to end torture, but Obama has shown no indication that he will condemn the Nuremberg defense (“only following orders”) when used by former members of the Bush Administration who have been accused of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.
ABC News reported last week that Obama is defending John Yoo, a lawyer who wrote the “torture memo” for the Bush Administration, in California federal court against suit being brought by Jose Padilla, who claims that “Yoo’s memos on interrogation policies led to his detention and torture.”
The Obama Justice Department claims that “recourse” is “for the executive to decide, in the first instance, and for Congress to decide," in the second instance. The courts should have no role, and since the Congress did not impeach prior to Bush leaving office, Congress should probably engage in little "recourse" also.
Obama’s Justice Department similarly adopted the Bush "state secrets" argument prior to defending Yoo when it asked the court “to dismiss a case against a flight data company that aided the CIA in performing alleged acts of extraordinary rendition.”
While Obama’s Justice Department agrees to assist in the legal defense of Yoo, so-called anti-terror memos released last week show the Bush Administration had people like Yoo develop legal justification for prosecuting the “war on terror” and “ignoring the First Amendment freedoms of speech and the press and Fourth Amendment requirements for search warrants.” [See Jason Leopold’s article for more.]
The memos offered justification for the domestic deployment of military and granted the unitary executive the power to label any person an “enemy combatant” if deemed necessary even if the accused could prove he or she was not an “enemy combatant” by showing proper identification.
That's needed but depressing as hell which is why I held Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "The Feminist Barack" for after it:
Now let's talk Third and I'll be going quick because I really am sleepy. Along with Dallas, here's who wrote the edition and did the work on the weekend:
The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, and Ava,
Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,
Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,
C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,
Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),
Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,
Mike of Mikey Likes It!,
Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz,
Ruth of Ruth's Report,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ
and Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends.
And here's what was completed:
Truest statement of the week -- Chris Hedges really earned this. We were able to narrow down the nominees fairly quickly, I thought.
Truest statement of the week II -- Debra Sweet, also highly deserving.
A note to our readers -- Jim breaks down the edition. And covers a great deal.
Editorial: Ms. magazine gets punked -- I read this Sunday. It is not the editorial we worked on. Which is cool. But I was surprised when I started reading because I kept thinking, "Am I remembering wrong?" They went with this topic at the last minute due to the fact that it was getting play on the morning news. It's a really strong editorial. This is Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I. and Kat and Betty and Wally.
TV: Alessandra Stanley, far funnier than Tina Fey -- Now I just love this. Even right now, this can make me smile and perk up. :D This is funny and it deals with the economy and much, much more.
The Thomas E. Ricks Dialogue -- This is just C.I. and Jim and I really enjoyed listening to this. I thought Jim really did come out swinging (he plays Thomas E. Ricks) but C.I.'s just too grounded and too factual.
Talking Iraq -- This was fun to listen to as well. Elaine participated in this. Which is why I listened. It's Elaine, Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava, C.I., Kat, Betty and Wally. It moved quickly.
Amnesty Provincial -- We all worked on this but, honestly, I think the illustration of Barack's head was the best thing. I love the blues and red in that illustration.
The Puta Janine Jackson -- This moved quickly.
Al Distraction, Domestic Arts Czar --We note Isaiah's recent comics which have just been outstanding.
The Katrina goes to . . . -- a deserving and useful idiot! :D
ETAN offers Power Plant Information -- ETAN repost.
Friday roundtable on Iraq -- Friday roundtable moderated by Rebecca
Highlights -- Betty, Kat, Wally, Cedric, Rebecca, Marcia, Ruth, Stan, Elaine and I wrote this and picked out the highlights unless we wrote otherwise.
Okay, this strange guy married to Trina wants me to include something from Christopher Dowd's "That 'elusive' civilian toll in Iraq and other observations" (Boston Libertarian Examiner):
When it comes to a country and region that our media has next to zero presence within they have no problem using hard numbers on how many civilians have been killed.
But when it comes to the civilian death toll in Iraq the "liberal" American media incredulously claims the numbers are, gosh darn it, just too hard to figure out and that maybe "we will never know!"
Never? Wow. Let's see, for the past six years a modern record keeping US army of over 100,000 men has been in Iraq. On top of that another 100,000 private contractors from a country with a records obsessed business atmosphere have been in Iraq. On top of that thousands of media people have been in Iraq from all over the world (granted- sitting behind blast walls acting as military stenographers rather than reporters), and on top of that Iraq had its own extensive government institutions all over the country . . . but we will "never know" just how many Iraqis have been killed in this war.
Oh . . . . Ok.
But maybe I am being a little harsh. After all Iraq and Sudan are not the same conflicts. We probably know more about the civilian deaths in Sudan because nearly 200 journalists and support staff have not been killed there. Maybe we also know more about civilian deaths in Sudan because many large humanitarian groups were there . . . unlike in Iraq which has had next to no outside humanitarian groups there since 2003 and the reason for this being . . . it was too violent.
Those are some solid points and for those who didn't know, Trina's husband would be . . . my dad. :D Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Monday, March 9, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death over the weekend, Iraqi women get some media attention, Turkey and the US increase their ties, Gen Ray Odierno speaks to Martha Raddatz (ABC News) about how the US could remain in Iraq past 2011, and more.
Today wowOwow notes Dr. Nawal al-Samaari who was the Women's Affairs minister when wowOwow noted her earlier and they quote her statements to AFP yesterday in an interview explaining her resignation, "I was convinced that I could improve conditions for women, but I ran into a wall . . . the occupation, terrorism, the economy collapsing . . . all that produced an army of widows, an increase in the number of divorcees, unmarried women, women beggars. Society is falling apart and me, I was a minister in a ministry without means, without power, without offices outside Baghdad. Women's issue are not a priority for the government. But if women were helped, I think that half of the societal problems would be resolved." Sinan Salaheddin (AP) reports that al-Samaarie (another spelling the press is using) still intends to withdraw her resignation and intends to do so tomorrow, explaining "the new situation" includes "pledges for funds and support from international aid organizations. She also said more than 50 Iraqi women have offered to volunteer to implement the ministry's plans." Her AFP interview yesterday took place on International Women's Day.
Firyal, a 24-year-old widow with a young son, lost her husband when Shi'ite 'authorities' stopped him at a checkpoint in 2006. Her father tried to intervene but had a gun pointed at him. Since her husband's corpse was never found, she receives no pension from the al-Maliki government that likes to brag so about their 'deep concern' ('concern' translates to approximately $1 a day for widows). 20-year-old Zainab also can't collect the meager widow's pension because her husband was kidnapped back in 2006, "I went to the government office to register, hoping that I could get monthly salary but they didn't allow me to because my husband is neither dead or alive, sick or disabled. He was kidnapped and is considered 'missing' and there is no law addressing this. So all I can do is continue with my work [as a domestic cleaner and servant] so I can try to buy milk for my son because it is the most important thing, and also so I can buy some food for my extended family so they can eat lunch and dinner. Sometimes we have only bread and tea to eat for dinner. I can withstand anything, but the children can't." Bushara is a Shi'ite who lost her home when graffitti appeared on it advising "Shiites in the neighbourhood to get out" so she, her husband and their daughter immediately fled and they have had no help from the government despite filling out multiple applications with the Ministry of Displacement and Migration. 41-year-old Nour is a widow living "with 20 people in cramped quarters in Baghdad's Al-Sadr City" who explains, "Our drinking water is drawn by a pump which at the same time draws sewage water which we disinfect with chlorien tablets that we buy at the pharmacy. . . People in the area who can't afford the tablets have fallen ill with many serious diseases like cholera, typhoid, intestinal infections and renal infections, especially in the summer." These are some of the Iraqi women sharing their stories in a new report by Oxfam Internationl. "In Her Own Words: Iraqi women talka bout their greatest concerns and challenges" is a survey of 1,700 Iraqi women -- approximately 60% of whom say that security is their first concern, the next grouping (55%) explain that they have been direct or indirect victims of violence since the US invasion began and the same percentage states "they were displaced at least once since 2003." Other findings included almost "25% of women had no daily access to drinking women & half of those who did have daily access to water said it was not potable; 69% said access to water was worse or the same as it was in 2006 & 2007" and "40% of women with children reported that their sons and daughters were not attending school." On the latter issue, "30% of those with children said they could not reach school without security threats." We'll note this section of the 19-page report:
In early 2009, reports of improved security in Iraq, and even a return to 'normality,' began appearing in the media. Similar reports of diminished suicide bombs and other violent indiscriminate attacks emerged at the time of the initial data collection last year. However insecurity remains in many provinces including Baghdad, Kirkuk and Nineveh where small-scale attacks, assassination and kidnappings continue. Women in particular are less safe now than at any other time during the conflict or in the years before.
Beyond security, the overwhelming concern women voiced was extreme difficulty accessing basic servics such as clean water, electricity and adequate shelter despite billions of US dollars that have been spent in the effort to rehabilitate damaged or destroyed infrastructure. Availability of essentials such as water, sanitation and health care is far below national averages. Both the Iraqi organization and researcher that carried out the survey and analyzed its findings corroborated that the overall cchallenges facing women and the Iraqi population as a whole remained the same in early 2009 as they did in the second half of 2008 when the date presented in this paper was collected.
The report notes, "As compared with 2007, 40% felt their security situation was worsening in 2008, 38% said it was improving and the remainder said it had not changes; as compared with 2006; 43% said it was worse, 34% said it was better & 22% said it had not changed." Oxfam calls for a dramatic increase in investments from donor countries to rebuild Iraq's "basic and social services sectors" and notes "The women of Iraq have been caught in the grip of a silent emergency for the past six years." Reporting on Oxfam's study, Mike Sergeant (BBC News) zooms in on one widow, Nadia Hussein who lost her husband, three brothers, saw her home torched -- while she was pregnant and she miscarried, attempted to see help from her extended family only to be beaten and abused by a nephew and now considers home a women's center in Baghdad. Sergeant observes of these Iraqi war widows, "Almost everywhere you go in Baghdad, you can see them begging at traffic lights and outside mosques - dressed from head to toe in black." The UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs notes, "One in five married Iraqi women has been a victim of physical domestic violence, while one in three has been subject to emotional violence. Of the women victims of physical domestic violence, 14% were subject to violence during pregnancy." And the UN "calls for both commitment and effective practical measures to protect and promote rights of Iraqi women. Years of violence, internal conflict and wars have slowed progress towards equality for Iraqi women, and compromised their fundamental rights to education, healthcare, work and full political participation." Sunday Alissa J. Rubin (New York Times) tied it in with another study on the general population. That other study -- done by WHO and the Iraqi government -- is nonsense. We're not interested in it. Rubin notes of Oxfan's study, it found "more than three-quarters of all widows were not receiving pensions, and a third of the women surveyed had three hours or less electricity per day." [The other study was addressed Saturday and Sunday.]
Nadje Al-Ali is the co-author (with Nicola Pratt) of What Kind of Liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq. At Dissident Voice, Rose Aguilar shares her interview with Nadje. Aguilar is a host of KALW's Your Call (Aguilar spoke with Nadje and Dahr Jamail last month, click here for audio). From the interview:
Rose Aguilar: March 20 marks the six-year anniversary of the invasion. When you look back at this occupation, what comes to mind?
Nadje Al-Ali: The death toll. That's the first thing that comes to mind. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died. You have hundreds of thousands of widows. Iraq has become a nation of widows. Sixty-five percent of the population is women. You have some areas of Iraq where about 70 percent are female-headed households and there is no functioning state, so women are forced to beg. Some are forced into prostitution. Some get $100 a month to survive.
RA: What else is new about today's situation?
NA: We've never seen a situation where women were told to stay at home or forced to follow a dress code or told not to drive, which is happening in certain parts of Iraq. This is a totally new phenomenon. Last year in Basra, 133 women were killed by various Islamist groups for allegedly not being Islamic enough. This is not to say that things were wonderful under the previous regime, but one of the things that has been disturbing for me is the fact that some of the women and men I've talked to who suffered under the previous regime and under sanctions and wars, say it was better then than it is now.
Also, what I think is forgotten is the humanitarian crisis. Six years afterwards, people still don't have electricity. They need generators if they want electricity. Seventy percent of Iraqis don't have access to clean water. Eighty percent don't have access to sewage. The hospitals are in very bad shape. We haven't seen any reconstruction, really.
Iraq women are the canaries in the coalmine which is why it was always so important for the US government to ignore them and for their lapdogs in the press to do the same. Reporting on them, reporting what was happening to them, meant telling even a little bit of truth about the illegal war and that could not be allowed. John F. Burns and Dexy Filkins managed to avoid women in one report after another filed for the New York Times until the Go-Go Boys finally left the Green Zone and the country. Sabrina Tavernise, Ellen Knickmeyer and others (including many men, such as Damien Cave) were able to find Iraqi women and to tell their stories or include their thougths in their reports. But all this time later what does it really matter? Who bothers to cover Iraqi women. Friday's snapshot noted Amnesty International's new report [PDF format warning] entitled "Trapped By Violence: Women In Iraq." There have been many reports. And look at those who cashed in on the illegal war, who made their movies about it, who wrote their books about it and who lost interest. At some of their sites you might find, for example, a sexist comic featuring a doll turning 50. A doll. It's not a funny comic and, more to the point, these men never cover the Mattel doll anymore than they cover real women. But they can waste our time with their limp ravings over Barack, they just can't ever note the realities for Iraqi women. It's disgusting. And the problem is with our society. The problems with the US society allowed the White House to rank priorities and to be sure that women would fall to the bottom in Iraq. The priorities in the US allow so many 'brave' voices to avoid the issue of Iraqi women day after day damn day. It's not important to them, you understand. But they've got time to share a sexist comic about a doll. [Click here for Bob Somerby on how much space has been wasted addressing the doll. In fairness to some wasting it, if they played with the doll, they are no worse than those distracting us with sports columns outside the sports pages.] Oxfam released their report yesterday, Amnesty released their report last week, yesterday was International Women's Day. Now go check the very-beyond-middle-aged boiz and see what they're writing about. Iraqi women have been under attack non-stop since the start of the illegal war. The fact that there remains so little coverage of it in the US does not go to the very serious problems Iraq currently has -- it goes to the serious societal problems in the US which encourage and allow 'brave' voices to find diversions and distractions to 'cover.'
Yesterday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared, "Put simply, we have much less hope of addressing the complex challenges we face in this new century without the full participation of women. . . . Women still comprise the majority of the world's poor, unfed, and unschooled. Hundreds of thousands of women die in childbirth every year. They are subjected to rape as a tactic of war and exploited by traffickers globally in a billion dollar criminal business. Laws are still on the books denying women the right to own property, access credit, or make their own choices within their marriage. And honor killings, maiming, female genital mutilation, and other violent and degrading practices that target women are tolerated in too many places today. Like all people, women deserve to live free from violence and fear. To create peaceful, thriving communities, women must be equal partners. That means making key resources available to women as well as men, including the chance to work for fair wages and have access to credit; to vote, petition their governments and run for office; to know they can get healthcare when they need it, including family planning; and to send their children to school -- their sons and their daughters. Women also have a crucial role to play in establishing peace worldwide. In regions torn apart by war, it is often the women who find ways to reach across differences and discover common ground as mothers, caretakers, and grassroots advocates. One need only look to Northern Ireland, Rwanda, the Balkans, and parts of Central America to see the impact of women working in their communities to bridge divides in areas of sectarian conflict. This week, as we celebrate the accomplishments and the untapped potential of women around the world, we must remind ourselves that ensuring the rights of women and girls is not only a matter of justice. It is a matter of enhancing global peace, progress, and prosperity for generations to come. When women are afforded their basic rights, they flourish. And so do their children, families, communities, and nations."
Last week, the US State Dept honored various women with their International Women of Courage Awards and we'll note Suaad Allami: "A prominent lawyer, Suaad Allami fights against the erosion of women's rights and defends the most disadvantaged. She founded the NGO Women for Progress and the Sadr City Women's Center, which offers free medical care, literacy education, vocational training, and legislative advocacy. She has accepted a Humphrey Fellowship from the State Department for academic year 2009-2010." Among the obstacles Iraqi women face are the thugs the US installed. Liz Sly (Chicago Tribune) reported on one such thug, Sheik Ahmed Abu Risha, Saturday and quoted him 'explaining', "We are the sons of the province, and we are ready to run the province." Shakey Risha, a Mafia don put on the US payroll, is most infamous recently for threatening mass violence in Al Anbar Province if his political party was not made the winners of the provincial election there. Sly quotes Khamis Ahmeda Abtan (of Iraqi Islamic Party) stating, "People think the results were made up -- a deal with the government in Baghdad and also the Americans to satisify Abu Risha. Anbar is going to be ruled acrodding to emotions and according to affiliations of tribes. We're already seeing it. People are saying, 'We're of X tribe, so we've got to have X job.' I don't think this is good for the security of the province."
Secretary of State Clinton was in Turkey over the weekend. As noted in the February 18th snapshot, US State Dept spokesperson Gordon Duguid denied any knowledge that Turkey or Jordan was being asked to to assist with any draw down or withdrawal, not even with equipment issues. But Reuters explained last week, "Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan signalled on Wednesday Turkey would allow the US military to use its bases and ports to withdraw troops from Iraq after US President Barack Obama pledged a 2010 drawdown. The United States has not formally asked to use Turkish airbases and ports and Turkey would have to consider what kind of equipment was being transported, the routes to be used and other issues before approving any such request, Babacan told reporters before departing for a NATO meeting in Brussels." Saturday Viola Gienger (Bloomberg News) reported on Clinton's trip to Turkey, the officials she met with and observed, "The Obama administration needs Turkey to help stabilize Iraq and to mediate in Middle East conflicts involving countries and groups with limited or broken diplomatic ties with the U.S., such as Syria and Iran. Turkey, which aspires to European Union membership, also forms a vital oil and gas corridor." Saturday Clinton and Turish Foreign Minister Ali Babacn issued a joint statement where they noted "the strong bonds of alliance, solidarity and strategi partnership" between their two countries, "announced the stablishment of 'Young Turkey/Young America: A New Relationship for a New Age" to increase communication and ties between young people of each country and, in terms of Iraq, "They also welcome Turkey's deeping relations with the Government of Iraq as evidenced by high level visits as well as trilateral meetings to discuss cooperation against the PKK." Yigal Schleifer (Christian Science Monitor) notes the diplomatic mission had many items on the agenda "including the possible use of Turkish soil for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq". Meanwhile Alsumaria reports that the Turkish military is whispering about a reported deal between Baghdad and Ankara which will allow Turkey to train the Iraqi Army. Reportedly the deal was addressed on Wednesday and will be signed by President Abdula Gul when he visits Baghdad at the end of this month. Tim Reid and Michael Evans (Times of London) note that US President Barack Obama is now scheduled to visit Turkey in the coming weeks.
Saturday the US military made the latest announcement: "A U.S. Coalition forces Soldier died from injuries sustained following an attack on a patrol in the Salah Ad Din province of northern Iraq March 7. The name of the deceased is being withheld pending notification of next of kin and release by the Department of Defense." This brought the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4256.
Other violence reported over the weekend included Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reported 8 mass graves containing at least 25 corpses were discovered in Diyala Province. Yesterday a bomber killed himself outside Baghdad's police academy on Palestine Street and also killed at least 30 others with at least sixty-one left injured. Anthony Shadid (Washington Post) reports the bomber utilized a motorcycle and that, December 1st, the same police academy was bombed (fifteen people died then). BBC notes it's the deadliest attack in a month and, "Reports suggest the bomber detonated a belt of explosives as he crashed his motorbike into a line of people waiting at the side entrance to the training centre. Most of the dead were police recruits, while others were serving officers and civilians." Marc Santora (New York Times) reports that the nearby Oil Ministry had 100 workers outside protesting when the bombing took place (they were protesting wages still unpaid) and that one of the paper's employees was on "a minibus that happened to be passing the Oil Ministry. The bus shook, and the driver tried to change direction. The smell of spent explosives filled the air." He quotes the woman explaining, "Then the police began shooting randomly. There was gunfire all around. . . . First I saw one truck with two people lying in the back, and then a second with four or five. They were just lying there. Their hands were hanging limp over the tailgate, as if they were no longer conscious." Greg Miller and Usama Redha (Los Angeles Times) quote: eye witness Haidar Nouri stating, "Wheil we were standing there, I heard someone scream, 'Stop! Stop!' Then I heard two shots and I felt something throw the crowd down. I felt nothing after that. [Then]I found myself in the hospital. I saw some of my fellow recruits lost their hands and others their legs. The hospital halls are crowded with the wounded. I hoped to serve my country when I got this job and that God would bless me with money, but this is what I got." Turning to some of today's reported violence.
Bombings?
Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad sticky bombing on "the head of the Haj committee's car, Seid Jafar alMusawi" which wounded him and his son, a Baghdad roadside bombing which left two people injured, and, dropping back to last night, a Salahuddin Province roadside bombing that left four police officers injured. Reuters notes a Tikrit roadside bombing last night targeting the Governor of Salahudin Province which left five of his bodyguards injured.
Shootings?
Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 2 "Awakening" Council members shot dead in Baghdad, 2 police officers shot dead in Mosul "and one civilian was injured," three people wounded in an attack outside Mousl University, and 1 person shot dead in another Mosul attack.
Meanwhile Lara Jakes (AP) reported the US military is stating 12,000 US troops will leave Iraq by September. Is this the approximately 10,000 that will leave in all of 2009? Or is this 12,000 part of the constant resupply efforts in Iraq -- where some are rotated out and some are rotated in? Marc Santora (New York Times) reports Maj Gen David G. Perkins is the person stating the reduction (already announced) is happening and Santora says that there are currently 140,000 US troops in Iraq. 140,000? That's not what's been reported. There are thought to be 146,000 US troops on the ground in Iraq and the White House has been pushing the press to use 142,000 as the figure since Barack's Little Big Nothing Speech at Camp Lejune. Before that speech, ten days before, Julian E. Barnes and Greg Miller (Los Angeles Times) reported: "There are about 146,000 U.S. troops in Iraq." That's February 18th. The White House is pleased as punch that the domestic press immediately fell into line and began using 142,000. It's unclear whether the White House pushed or the US military decided on its own to begin using 140,000. Meanwhile Martha Raddatz and Luis Martinez (ABC News) report the top US commander in Iraq, Gen Ray Odierno is stating " that continuing the fight against insurgents in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul might lead to U.S. troops remaining in the city past a June 30, 2009 deadline for all U.S. combat troops to leave Iraqi cities, but only if the Iraqi government made such a request." In an exclusive interview to be broadcast on ABC World News Tonight this evening, Odierno explains to Raddatz that the 12,000 US troops ("combat troops and enablers")
RADDATZ: I mean, the national elections.
ODIERNO: I'm sorry. The national elections are scheduled right now for December, they could go as late as January.
RADDATZ: So, if you didn't bring out another brigade in the fall, you'd have at least 80,000 troops to move out of here from January or February through August?
ODIERNO: Yeah, I'd say about 70,000. We'd probably be at about 120,000 at that time down to 50,000 by August. But, I think we have a good plan in place to do that. And I think, again, I feel very comfortable that the window of risk is between October and February-March of 2010. And that will allow us then to do a more detailed and quick withdrawal of forces out of Iraq, because I think we will have gone through the toughest part and we'll be in a real stable stage that will enable us to do that very quickly.
RADDATZ: And would the plan be 10,000 a month, stagger it? We'll note the section discussing the US remaining in Iraq past 2011:
RADDATZ: And you believe we will be completely out of here by 2011?
ODIERNO: We will. We have signed an agreement that says we will be and I think we're on track to do that.
RADDATZ: But that could change? If the Iraqis want it to change?
ODIERNO: It's their decision. It's a decision that they have to make. But I don't see them making that decision right now.
RADDATZ: But would you still say it's conditions-based, until then?
ODIERNO: No, I think it's based on an Iraqi assessment. Again, if we stayed ... Again, our plan is to be out of here by December, 2011. That's the agreement we signed and we will meet those requirements. What, if the government of Iraq asks us, if they ask us to stay, want to renegotiate, then we'll go through renegotiation and we'll decide at that time what that means.
RADDATZ: I guess I look at other places and I look at Bosnia where we were for ten years and they weren't even shooting at each other then, and in terms of stability, being out by 2011 seems pretty rapid.
ODIERNO: Well, again, I think that's a judgment that will have to be made later on. Far from the first time Odierno has made statements about the US presence being extended. (And he's got a stronger grip on the Status Of Forces Agreement than the bulk of the press has had.) So this is a good time to note this from IVAW's Dustin Alan Parks' "I am the anti-war movement:"
You call those who refuse to fight absent Those who have the courage to resist are not absent They're knocking on your door right now Begging to be heard and exercise their rights But you refuse to allow entry to opposition Which is fine because I have this message: I found a back door... I opened my mind and used it as a key So now I am here and you can't ignore me
This month groups such as The National Assembly to End the Wars, the ANSWER coalition, World Can't Wait and Iraq Veterans Against the War -- are taking part in an action. Iraq Veterans Against the War explains:IVAW's Afghanistan Resolution and National Mobilization March 21st As an organization of service men and women who have served in Iraq, Afghanistan, stateside, and around the world, members of Iraq Veterans Against the War have seen the impact that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have had on the people of these occupied countries and our fellow service members and veterans, as well as the cost of the wars at home and abroad. In recognition that our struggle to withdraw troops from Iraq and demand reparations for the Iraqi people is only part of the struggle to right the wrongs being committed in our name, Iraq Veterans Against the War has voted to adopt an official resolution calling for the immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan and reparations for the Afghan people. (To read the full resolution, click here.) To that end, Iraq Veterans Against the War will be joining a national coalition which is being mobilized to march on the Pentagon, March 21st, to demand the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and further our mission and goals in solidarity with the national anti-war movement. This demonstration will be the first opportunity to show President Obama and the new administration that our struggle was not only against the Bush administration - and that we will not sit around and hope that troops are removed under his rule, but that we will demand they be removed immediately. For more information on the March 21st March on the Pentagon, and additional events being organized in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Orlando, to include transportation, meetings, and how you can get involved, please visit: www.pentagonmarch.org or www.answercoalition.org.
the common illsthe third estate sunday reviewlike maria said pazkats kornersex and politics and screeds and attitudetrinas kitchenthe daily jotcedrics big mixmikey likes itthomas friedman is a great manruths reportsickofitradlzoh boy it never ends
iraq
mike sergeantthe new york timesalissa j. rubin
liz slydahr jamail
tim reidmichael evansyigal schleifer
the los angeles timesgreg millerusama redhahussein kahdimmcclatchy newspapers
lara jakes
iraq veterans against the wara.n.s.w.e.r.world can't wait
julian e. barnes
the new york timesmarc santorathe washington postanthony shadidsteven lee myersmartha raddatzabc newsluis martinez
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)