[UrukNet] - [Daily Information from Occupied Iraq] - [newsletter 29 Apr 2006 - Part One]

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Time to Dump the UN
Mike Whitney
... How can ElBaradei support a process that penalizes countries that
follow the rules when neighboring Israel has secretly stockpiled 200
nuclear warheads and is threatening to attack Iran without any evidence of
wrongdoing and without approval of the international community? This is
madness. And, why hasn’t ElBaradei condemned Bush’s "dirty bombs" in Iraq
which have poisoned the land and groundwater with toxic depleted uranium
(DU) creating an enduring legacy of thyroid cancer,! birth defects and
other malignant sarcoma? Nuclear weapons are being used in Iraq. It is
ElBaradei’s job to stop it. Hugo Chavez was right a few months ago when he
said that the United Nations had outlived its usefulness and was only
serving the interests of the powerful nations...

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GI Special 4D28 - I Want To Come Home - April 28, 2006
Thomas F. Barton
Michael J. Stanley Jr. marked his 20th birthday on March 25, the same day
he lost part of his right leg in Iraq. The Hazleton man told his family he
heard the click before an improvised explosive device tore into his body
near Ramadi. The last thing he remembered was yelling for help and a medic
cutting off his pants leg, his aunt, Jan Fontana, said. She talked to him
two days before his unit came under heavy fire and he told her that he
want! ed to come home, she said. "They hate us over here. I’m in the worst
possible place you can be in this country," he told her. "I want to come
home." In the cruel twists of war, Stanley got his wish...

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You need to decide which side you are really on Mr Sloboda
William Bowles, I'n'I
Dear Mr Sloboda, I've just read your interview on the Newsnight Website and
I consider your remarks gratuitous and extremely misleading not to mention
insulting to the folks at Medialens and to the individuals you mention. In
part, you say: "They are a pressure group that use aggressive and
emotionally destructive tactics. On the belief that the gravity of the
issues they're dealing with justify that, and also on the belief that !
that's somehow effective." I'd like to know what you base this comment on?
Can you give examples? I follow the Medialens analyses very closely and
find them polite and precise (excessively so given the gravity of the
issues). Your comments about Medialens and the left are nothing more than a
hatchet job which can only serve the interests of the British government...

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Paras in Iraq
Lenin's tomb
I missed this from a couple of days ago: British paratroopers secretly
operating in support of the SAS in Iraq are using American uniforms,
weapons and vehicles as part of their cover, The Daily Telegraph has
learned. Although John Reid, the Defence Secretary, only announced this
week that the Special Forces Support Group (SFSG) had become operational, a
company of more than 100 paratroopers has been working for six months in
Baghdad. They have reportedly become so successful that A! merican special
forces have called on their help (...) The paras have a curious record in
the archives of British counterinsurgency. Initially formed during World
War II to be dropped behind enemy lines and "set Europe ablaze", as Winston
Churchill had it, they became a straightforward hardcore commando unit used
in imperial operations, in Malaya, Borneo, Aden and the Suez. They have a
reputation for swift, brutal and direct aggression that is not to be
expected from other units, and appear to regard themselves as vastly
superior to the much-hyped SAS...

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Osama, Abu, and Ayman: al-CIA-Duh Telethon
Kurt Nimmo
First it was Osama bin Laden, then Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and now Ayman
al-Zawahiri. In the span of a week, these three al-CIA-duh heavyweights
(two from beyond the grave) have issued communiqués. "Al-Qaeda in Iraq
alone has carried out 800 martyrdom operations in three years, besides the
victories of the other mujahidin. And this is what has broken the back of
America in Iraq," al-Zawahiri, or somebody we are expected believe is
al-Zawahiri, said in a videotap! e released this evening. Ayman al-Zawahiri
made this latest tape—or somebody in the basement of the CIA building
did—from the wilds of Pakistan, Afghanistan, or from his prison cell in
Iran (on February 18, 2002, the Guardian reported al-Zawahiri was
imprisoned in the Evin prison in Iran). Of course, the Iraqi resistance is
responsible for breaking the back of the occupation, not al-CIA-duh, the
spook league of patsies and useful idiots...

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The Pentagon's New Spies
ROBERT DREYFUSS, Rolling Stone
Last October, before the public learned that president Bush had secretly
ordered the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans without a
court order, the Pentagon approached the Senate intelligence committee with
an unprecedented request. Military officials wanted the authority to spy on
U.S. citizens on American soil, without identifying themselves, in order to
collect intelligence about about terrorist threats. The plan was so
sweeping, according ! to congressional sources who reviewed it, that it
would have permitted operatives from the Defense Intelligence Agency to spy
on dissidents by posing as peace activists and infiltrating anti-war
meetings (...) In fact, however, the Pentagon has already assembled a
nationwide domestic spying machine that goes far beyond the National
Security Agency's warrantless surveillance of telephone and e-mail traffic
(...) So far, the military's efforts at domestic spying have caught few, if
any, terrorists. But the Pentagon has tracked the activities of anti-war
activists across the country who have staged peaceful demonstrations
against military bases and defense contractors such as Halliburton...

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Hamas’ Impossible Mission
Ramzy Baroud
It should be established by now that most Western governments are the least
interested in honoring the decided democratic choice of the Palestinian
people, which elevated to power a movement that is branded 'terrorist’ by
Israel, thus by much of the Western hemisphere, Since facts and common
sense are of little concern to those who hastily decided to withhold badly
needed funds to support the battered economy of the Occupied Territories,
there would be no need to once again ! marvel at the rhetorical
inconsistencies of the Bush Administration and of the European Union...

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An Interview with Camilo Meija
War and Immigrants Rights: "It's the Same System Behind Both Injustices"
ERIC RUDER
Camilo Meija was the first U.S. soldier to be jailed for refusing to
redeploy to Iraq. Since his release in February 2005, Camilo has organized
tirelessly against the war in Iraq, taking part in last month's Latino
march for peace from Tijuana, Mexico, to San Francisco, as well as the
antiwar march along the Gulf Coast from Mobile, Ala., to New Orleans...

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Lies surround first death of an Australian soldier in Iraq
James Cogan, WSWS
The Howard government’s dishonesty and arrogance has been epitomised by its
treatment of Private Jacob Kovco, the first Australian soldier to be killed
while serving in Iraq. After lying about the circumstances of Kovco’s
death, Australian authorities handed his corpse over to a private
contractor in Kuwait, which then transported another man’s body to
Australia for burial. The mantra of "support the troops" is continually
flung in the f! ace of opponents of the Iraq war to intimidate them into
silence. But the government’s attitude to Jacob Kovco and his family
demonstrates the reality of its indifference and contempt towards the fate
of the soldiers it has deployed in Iraq...

<http://www.uruknet.info/?s1=1&p=22948&s2=01>Read the full article / Leggi
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Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Thursday, 27 April 2006
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board,
the Free Arab Voice. http://www.freearabvoice.org
In a dispatch posted at 6:10pm Makkah time Thursday afternoon, Mafkarat
al-Islam reported that a short while earlier US warplanes had begun an
extensive air offensive against the city of ar-Ramadi. US aircraft have
been rocketing homes, farms, and former government buildings in the course
of the raids. The ar-Ramadi corresponden! t for Mafkarat al-Islam reported
that more than 10 US F-16 and F-18 fighter bombers had stormed into the
skies over the city and begun attacking people’s houses in the western and
southern parts of the city. As of the time of reporting, the American
aircraft had blown up nine homes, among them houses belonging to the al-Bu
Kharbit, one of the largest tribes in ar-Ramadi with a reputation of
loyalty to the Iraqi Resistance...

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After Abu Ghraib, Impunity
Jim Lobe
Two years after the abuse by U.S. soldiers of detainees at Abu Ghraib
prison in Iraq first came to light, accountability for what turns out to
have been a widespread pattern of mistreatment at several detention sites,
including torture and at least eight homicides, remains elusive, according
to a new report released by three major human rights groups Wednesday. "By
the Numbers: Findings of the Detainee Abuse and Accountability Project"
says that at least 330 credible cases of a! buse involving 600 U.S.
personnel and 460 alleged victims have been reported in Afghanistan, Iraq
and at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, since late
2001. So far, however, only 40 troops—almost all of them low-ranking
enlisted personnel—have been given prison terms. Of these, 30 were
sentenced to less than one year's confinement, even in cases involving
serious abuse, such as the beating deaths of two detainees at the detention
facility at Bagram airbase in Afghanistan...

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Love Sick: Annals of Liberation
Chris Floyd
...Dating is a dangerous game in Baghdad. Ali Ilhiam knows that holding
hands with his teenage girlfriend could cost him a beating — or worse —
from militant extremists. "Boys can’t be seen walking and laughing with
their girlfriends any more in the new Baghdad," the 21-year-old university
student said, glancing over his shoulder to make sure that he was not being
watched. Friends of his have been dragged from their cars, imprisoned and
threatened with death by self-app! ointed moral guardians for daring to
link arms with their girlfriends in public (...) Mr Ilhiam recalled that
holding hands with a girl was permissible under the regime of Saddam
Hussein (...) "Girls don’t walk the streets alone any more," [said Ali
Athra, 24]. "We used to shop, go dancing, have parties, until a few months
after the downfall of Saddam, and bit by bit, every day, we feel more
repressed."...

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Mission Accomplished: A look back at the media's fawning coverage of Bush's
premature declaration of victory in Iraq
Media Matters for America
On May 1, 2003, President Bush landed on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham
Lincoln aboard an S-3B Viking jet, emerged from the aircraft in full flight
gear, and proceeded to "press[] flesh," as The Washington Post put it, as
he shook hands and hugged crew members in front of the cameras. Later that
day, Bush delivered a nationally televised speech from the deck of the
Abrah! am Lincoln in which he declared that "[m]ajor combat operations in
Iraq have ended," all the while standing under a banner reading: "Mission
Accomplished." Despite lingering questions over the continued violence in
Iraq, the failure to locate weapons of mass destruction, and the
whereabouts of Saddam Hussein, as well as evidence that Bush may have
shirked his responsibilities in the Texas Air National Guard (TANG) during
the Vietnam War, the print and televised media fawned over Bush's "grand
entrance" and the image of Bush as the "jet pilot" and the "Fighter Dog."..

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Hideous Kinky: Moral Nullity as Normality in Pentagon Plans
Chris Floyd
Imagine growing up in a family where every day, father raped daughter,
mother tortured son, brother abused brother, sister stole from sister, and
the whole family murdered neighbors, friends and passing strangers. Imagine
the underlying assumptions about life that you would adopt without question
in such an atmosphere, how normal the most hideous depravity would seem. If
some outsider chanced to ask you about your family's latest activities, !
you would spew out perversions as calmly and unthinkingly as a man giving
directions to the post office. This state of unwitting confession to
monstrous crime has been the default mode of the American Establishment for
many years now...

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How Many US Troops are Really in Iraq?
How Much is the War in Iraq Costing?
WINSLOW T. WHEELER
...Public estimates of the number of troops deployed for Iraq do not always
include those performing support in Kuwait and elsewhere in the region. CRS
estimates total troop deployments for Operation Iraqi Freedom in September
2005 to be 260,000. Average per troop costs for Iraq are between $355,000
and $360,000 per individual, per year; this dollar amount has been
increasing since 2003...


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Going to War with the Morons you have
Mike Whitney
..The problem with Rumsfeld runs deeper than his failure to stabilize Iraq.
His "Strangelovian" ideas of military transformation have no place in a
democracy. His efforts to convert the military into a martial-force for
private industry have eroded America’s moral standing in the world and put
allies and enemies on alert. We can see now that Guantanamo, Bagram, and
Abu Ghraib are not anomalies, but vital gears in a global war machine
controlled from Washington ! (...) There’s no doubt that Rumsfeld’s
malignant strategy encompasses the American "homeland" as well. It was
Rumsfeld who pushed the Posse Comitatus law towards extinction by setting
up NorthCom, a military command post within the United States. This creates
the possibility that future military operations will target the American
people, a threat which was anticipated by the founding fathers...

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DAILY WAR NEWS FOR FRIDAY, April 28, 2006
Today In Iraq
U.S. soldier killed in roadside bombing north of Baghdad, the U.S. military
said Friday, as April became the deadliest month for U.S. forces in Iraq
this year. The U.S. soldier died about 7:15 p.m. Thursday when his vehicle
was hit by a roadside bomb north of Baghdad, the military said. That
brought the American death toll for the month to at least 67, according to
an Associated Press count. April's death toll is the highest monthly figure
so far this year. ! Two mortars or rockets fired Friday at the Green Zone.
One landed inside but failed to detonate, and the other exploded nearby on
the other side of the Tigris River, the U.S. military said. No casualties
were immediately reported. Roadside bomb goes off close to Iraqi special
forces patrol, killing one soldier and wounding three others. Police said
the attack took place in al-Amil neighbourhood of western Baghdad. Corpses
of two middle-aged Iraqi men found in a neighborhood of western Baghdad.
The men were handcuffed, blindfolded and bullet-ridden...

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Media Lens Response to BBC Interview With IBC's John Sloboda
Media Lens
...John Sloboda says IBC's job is "reading press reports" which "requires
nothing other than care and literacy". But IBC does far more than that. In
his interview, Sloboda, for example, immediately proceeds to pass judgement
on the Lancet report - a scientific study conducted by some of the world's
leading professional epidemiologists and published in one of the premier
science journals after a rigorous peer-review process. And yet Sloboda's !
university website describes him as "internationally known for his work on
the psychology of music" (...) We asked IBC why these and other elementary
suggestions made by leading experts in the field have been ignored - IBC
have refused to respond. Sloboda argues that "Some critics of the Lancet
study have said it's like a drunk throwing a dart at a dartboard." But
credible experts in the field have said nothing of the sort...

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Baath Party Statement
The Leader birthday anniversary is a further occasion to intensify the
combat, in order to liberate Iraq, and to fulfill our oath, and hold on to
our choice!
The Arab Baath Socialist Party
On the twenty-eighth of this month, Baathists and honorable people in Iraq
and in the glorious Arab Nation celebrate the birth anniversary of the
comrade leader Saddam Hussein, the secretary general of the Arab Baath
Socialist Party, the Secretary of Iraq Leadership (may the Lord safeguard
him a! nd deliver him from the hands of his enemies) while the masses of
our people in Iraq, under the Baath leadership, are enduring one of the
greatest epics of heroism and honor in the glorious Arab and Islamic
history to liberate Iraq from US -Zionist colonialist invasion which came
to Iraq to make it a starting point to redraw the Arab homeland identity
and borders and use to impose a bloodthirsty dictatorship on the whole
world...

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Death Toll for Americans in Iraq Is Highest in 5 Months
Sabrina Tavernise, NYTimes
The military announced the death of one American soldier on Friday,
bringing the death toll so far in April to 69, the highest in five months.
The monthly figure disrupted a trend of steadily falling American
fatalities that had begun in November. The bulk of American deaths in April
occurred in Baghdad and in the insurgent-controlled western province of
Anbar, according to Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, an independent group
that ! compiles casualty figures based on information provided by the
American military...

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Is the Zarqawi video a hoax?
Joseph Cannon
...If you're well-read in the lore of intelligence operations, you may have
come across accounts of faked videos involving look-a-like actors. I will
discuss one notorious example in a future post. For now, let us note in
passing that we do have one confirmed incident of a faked beheading video
put together by a young hoaxer named Benjamin Vanderford, who seems to have
operated out of bizarre personal motives. If a mere civilian can create
such a thing, a military psycho! logical operations unit could surely do a
more professional job. All of which means that we have good reason to ask:
Is the man in the new video Zarqawi?...

<http://www.uruknet.info/?s1=1&p=22931&s2=01>Read the full article / Leggi
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