Monday, May 16, 2005

Where the World's Views of America Come into Focus


Falluja Residents Bitter Over Slow Pace of U.S. Assistance

After the city was destroyed by Coalition forces, the U.S. promised $100 million of aid. But many of Falluja's residents remain desperate for any kind of reconstruction assistance

What a novel idea, the victims actually looking for the perpetrators to pay. Will it happen? I guess the U.S. really need to find out whose behind the embezzeling of the nearly $100 million in reconstruction funds. Take a look at the following article: U.S. Officials Suspected of Embezzlement in Iraq. The U.S. government has opened a criminal inquiry into suspected embezzlement by officials who failed to account for almost $100 million they disbursed for Iraqi reconstruction projects, federal investigators said Wednesday. What will come of this?

Obama said recently on the Cliff Kelly show that since the Republicans represent the majority in congress, they will not grant them a hearing on these issues. He also said, the media told them they will not report on any of these issues unless the Democrats can get the Republican led government to grant them a hearing. It is these types of antics that show African Americans have reasons to be suspicious/paranoid of Republicans and American politics in general. It is annoying to many of us that some people have the nerves to question our abilities and rationale when it comes to U.S. politics, as if we are completely naive. This shows that we may not necessarily know all the details, but our instincts are correct when it comes to the U.S. and its politics.

What really happened to Falluja - The amoral behavior of the US military that the American media is hiding from the American people...

One of These Days - William Rivers Pitt

Excerpt

Jamail stated that the Americans have taken to using 'collective punishment' against large segments of the population to try and dampen the violence. In one instance, a road leading out of a remote farm community was blown up and blocked to punish the residents, and the only nearby gas station was machine-gunned and blasted by a tank.

The most glaring example of collective punishment took place within the city of Fallujah. You will clearly recall the events of March 31, 2004, when three mercenary contractors from Blackwater were pulled from their car, butchered, burned and hung from a bridge in that town. The American corporate news media carefully described these four repeatedly as 'American civilians, failing to note that some 30,000 highly-paid military mercenaries just like these four are operating in Iraq, beyond the laws and rules of American military justice. These mercenaries stand accused by the Iraqi populace of a variety of crimes including rape and theft.

It was a despicable and horrifying act of violence, to be sure. Yet the American populace was left with the impression, reinforced by the media, that these 'civilians' were targeted by the entire city of Fallujah. In fact, the act was committed by perhaps 50 people, and the Imams in the mosques spoke with one outraged voice against what was done to those four.

This did not matter. The collective punishment of Fallujah began days later. Civilians were targeted by snipers. Helicopters and bombers rained fire and steel indiscriminately on the city. After a while, a truce was called so the city could bury its dead, and so medical supplies could be brought in. No supplies made it into the city, but the casualties were entombed in soccer fields that were renamed 'Martyr's Graveyards.' Jamail photographed the fields of burial mounds, and translated the names on many of the headstones. A majority of those stones bore the names of women and children.

In the lull between attacks, the citizens of Fallujah flooded the streets in a massive victory celebration, unaware that the worst was yet to come. The rage they vented on the Fallujah streets was proof enough that American tactics are manufacturing resistance fighters every day.

Not long after, the second phase of the punishment of Fallujah began, this time as an aerial bombardment of the city that left thousands dead and wounded. Bodies remained unburied in the streets to bloat in the sun and be gnawed by dogs.
posted by Cynthia   Permalink| Comments(1)|

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