(no subject)
i'd have to give Dahr Jamail serious props. this is a journalist with some serious BALLS out there doing what needs to be done - getting the truth out from the front lines out to the rest of the world. he has been in Iraq risking his life for many months getting some independent reporting done, interviewing hundreds of people and taking shocking and undeniable photographs. of the war crimes reported to have taken place, the worst of which i think have been perpetrated on the residents of Falluja (which was once a city with intact buildings, running water & electricity, people, you know - things like that).
Wednesday at his presentation here in the belly of the beast, i took some notes:
flechettes - small nails shot out of various guns/weapons, or dropped out of planes by the U.S. military
used to kill and injure countless men women & children
cluster bombs used on civilians! Iraqi doctors & others interviewed insisted that cluster bombs have been used against the population..hard to deny when you see the patients.
military cover-ups of what could only be chemical weapons (i'm thinking it may be cover-ups of the continued use of uranium munitions, if not chem. weapons) in Falluja - the military shot out water towers (a good way to test for use of chemical weapons is by examining the water supply), used bulldozers to remove soil, and many hospitals were instructed by the military to refuse patients from falluja, etc.
heavy sustained machine gun fire on demonstrations, and on a celebration with families present!!!
majority of Mosques in Falluja damaged (most buildings were)
*the video of falluja is NOT pretty! and it had to go through a burglary, theft, & return with a "we're watching you" threat just to get here! it was taken by Marc Manning at conceptionmedia.net..he was in California & the video & cameras were stolen and returned by a guy who threatened him & told him he was being watched. (BTW i don't think that video's on the website).
there are about 325,000 refugees from falluja living in military-controlled camps. anyone who seeks to return to the city has to have their retina scanned, fingerprints, and ID card. although, few have much left to come home to.
*Dahr pointed out the outrageous inconsistencies with the media's portrayal of so many things about Iraq & this war, but especially with the hyping up of this notion that falluja was a "hotbed" of insurgency, crime and lawlessness. actually, tribal councils(?) set up local government in the city, with a mayor and everything, and succeeded in stopping the crime and looting - falluja was in fact the opposite of what the corporate media here portrayed it as - they had managed to have the city peaceful & law-abiding, before the attacks on the residents and the major destruction of the city. Also, the people killed riding in a military vehicle in falluja were not civilians, NGO workers, whatever as the U.S. media screamed bloody murder about..they were contractors hired to work with the military on military bases). our press is out of fucking control - so many distortions and just flat out lies.
Bectel has been paid an enormous sum of taxpayers' money to do "next to nothing" in Iraq. some water treatment facilities visited by Jamail had no reconstruction done, he said that often the answer was "bectel who?"
-showed a picture of the water source for an Iraqi village - literally a hole in the ground. the pipe just shoots the water into the hole, & of course people are getting diseases from unsanitary water.
gas shortage - 5 or 6 mile long lines of cars, wrapping around streets and back again, just to pump some gas. the gas shortage of course has effected the economy-in-shambles at large, raising prices all around - there's even a black market of gas exploding.
electricity - in Baghdad, there is electricity 5 or 6 hours a day only. in the rest of the country, more like 3 hours a day.
HOSPITALS - this is a nightmare. because of the security situation, many of the highly trained doctors & specialists have left, leaving unqualified doctors to try to take their place. hospitals are trying to operate without vital medicines, adequate equipment, adequate facilities for the number of wounded & dead, and qualified doctors.
*the U.S. military has shot ambulance drivers and opened fire on ambulances carrying patients, and in other cases, not allowed doctors/ambulances to transport patients to the hospitals they needed.
the elections -
as you probably know, none of the candidates' names were listed..people were expected to vote for people they didn't even know. people were expected to vote while under illegal occupation by a foreign government. people were expected to go out on foot (since roadblocks and lockdowns were set up everywhere) and risk getting blown up by resistance fighters (or U.S. returning fire) just to vote for candidates whose identity they had no idea about.
think the U.S. is going to simply withdraw its forces and end the occupation when the elected body meets?
hah. i don't think so.
every government ministry in Iraq has a U.S. advisor with a mandatory 5-year term.
the installed interim prime minister Allawi (sp?) is hated throughout Iraq, for being a handpicked puppet of Washington whose qualifications include working with the CIA, etc. etc.
an organization (look it up on the web, i didn't catch the name) recently came out with a good, very conservative estimate of dead civilians killed in Iraq as part of this war & occupation -> 98,000
-and that is way below what many there in the country and who have gone there estimate.
anyway, there are some serious holes in my notes, so if you're interested visit his web log (the address was in my last post).
************************
as a journalism major, this guy is inspiring..i don't think i'll ever have the guts to do something as risky as this. that is what REAL journalism is. he and the other independent, unembedded reporters in Iraq are doing amazing work.
Wednesday at his presentation here in the belly of the beast, i took some notes:
flechettes - small nails shot out of various guns/weapons, or dropped out of planes by the U.S. military
used to kill and injure countless men women & children
cluster bombs used on civilians! Iraqi doctors & others interviewed insisted that cluster bombs have been used against the population..hard to deny when you see the patients.
military cover-ups of what could only be chemical weapons (i'm thinking it may be cover-ups of the continued use of uranium munitions, if not chem. weapons) in Falluja - the military shot out water towers (a good way to test for use of chemical weapons is by examining the water supply), used bulldozers to remove soil, and many hospitals were instructed by the military to refuse patients from falluja, etc.
heavy sustained machine gun fire on demonstrations, and on a celebration with families present!!!
majority of Mosques in Falluja damaged (most buildings were)
*the video of falluja is NOT pretty! and it had to go through a burglary, theft, & return with a "we're watching you" threat just to get here! it was taken by Marc Manning at conceptionmedia.net..he was in California & the video & cameras were stolen and returned by a guy who threatened him & told him he was being watched. (BTW i don't think that video's on the website).
there are about 325,000 refugees from falluja living in military-controlled camps. anyone who seeks to return to the city has to have their retina scanned, fingerprints, and ID card. although, few have much left to come home to.
*Dahr pointed out the outrageous inconsistencies with the media's portrayal of so many things about Iraq & this war, but especially with the hyping up of this notion that falluja was a "hotbed" of insurgency, crime and lawlessness. actually, tribal councils(?) set up local government in the city, with a mayor and everything, and succeeded in stopping the crime and looting - falluja was in fact the opposite of what the corporate media here portrayed it as - they had managed to have the city peaceful & law-abiding, before the attacks on the residents and the major destruction of the city. Also, the people killed riding in a military vehicle in falluja were not civilians, NGO workers, whatever as the U.S. media screamed bloody murder about..they were contractors hired to work with the military on military bases). our press is out of fucking control - so many distortions and just flat out lies.
Bectel has been paid an enormous sum of taxpayers' money to do "next to nothing" in Iraq. some water treatment facilities visited by Jamail had no reconstruction done, he said that often the answer was "bectel who?"
-showed a picture of the water source for an Iraqi village - literally a hole in the ground. the pipe just shoots the water into the hole, & of course people are getting diseases from unsanitary water.
gas shortage - 5 or 6 mile long lines of cars, wrapping around streets and back again, just to pump some gas. the gas shortage of course has effected the economy-in-shambles at large, raising prices all around - there's even a black market of gas exploding.
electricity - in Baghdad, there is electricity 5 or 6 hours a day only. in the rest of the country, more like 3 hours a day.
HOSPITALS - this is a nightmare. because of the security situation, many of the highly trained doctors & specialists have left, leaving unqualified doctors to try to take their place. hospitals are trying to operate without vital medicines, adequate equipment, adequate facilities for the number of wounded & dead, and qualified doctors.
*the U.S. military has shot ambulance drivers and opened fire on ambulances carrying patients, and in other cases, not allowed doctors/ambulances to transport patients to the hospitals they needed.
the elections -
as you probably know, none of the candidates' names were listed..people were expected to vote for people they didn't even know. people were expected to vote while under illegal occupation by a foreign government. people were expected to go out on foot (since roadblocks and lockdowns were set up everywhere) and risk getting blown up by resistance fighters (or U.S. returning fire) just to vote for candidates whose identity they had no idea about.
think the U.S. is going to simply withdraw its forces and end the occupation when the elected body meets?
hah. i don't think so.
every government ministry in Iraq has a U.S. advisor with a mandatory 5-year term.
the installed interim prime minister Allawi (sp?) is hated throughout Iraq, for being a handpicked puppet of Washington whose qualifications include working with the CIA, etc. etc.
an organization (look it up on the web, i didn't catch the name) recently came out with a good, very conservative estimate of dead civilians killed in Iraq as part of this war & occupation -> 98,000
-and that is way below what many there in the country and who have gone there estimate.
anyway, there are some serious holes in my notes, so if you're interested visit his web log (the address was in my last post).
************************
as a journalism major, this guy is inspiring..i don't think i'll ever have the guts to do something as risky as this. that is what REAL journalism is. he and the other independent, unembedded reporters in Iraq are doing amazing work.