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When Will We Realize That It Is Murder?

By TOM MCNAMARA | CounterPunch | January 31, 2013

In his essay “A Hanging,” George Orwell recounts, in great detail, the events he witnessed leading up to the execution of a man. It is important to note that before becoming an outspoken critic of the hypocrisy of Governments, George Orwell worked for one. He was a member of the Indian Imperial Police, having served in Burma, a British colony at the time.

The condemned was a small Hindu man who, while apparently resigned to his fate, none the less had irritated the jail superintendent by the fact that he was still alive at 8:00 o’clock in the morning. “The man ought to have been dead by this time” the superintendent said irritably. The slow pace of the execution was disrupting the smooth functioning of the prison, since the other prisoners couldn’t be fed their breakfast until the sentence had been carried out.

We are given a vivid description of how the man walked awkwardly, encumbered by the chains that restrained him, but steadily, to his fate. When the execution party was about forty yards from the hangman’s gallows, Orwell tells us that a most curious thing occurred. The prisoner, in the last few remaining minutes of his life, made the slight effort to step aside as he was walking so as to avoid a puddle that was in his path.

This event shocked Orwell, who candidly reveals to us that until that moment, he had never truly realized what it meant to kill another human being. It took the insignificant act of a man not wanting to get his feet wet on the way to his own execution to make Orwell understand, for the first time in his life, “what it means to destroy a healthy, conscious man” and of the “unspeakable wrongness” involved in executing someone.

The US, as part of its “War on Terror,” a war which, conveniently enough, was undeclared and has no expiration date, has been using drones for at least a decade now. And 2013 appears to have gotten off to a spectacular start, with 7 attacks in the first 10 days of January in Pakistan alone. This compares to an average of less than one a week in 2012. One report has as many as 11 civilians being killed so far this year. This figure is, of course, being disputed by U.S. officials. Unfortunately, they declined to provide a figure of their own.

And while their use has grown, President Obama assures us that, “Drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties” and that missile launches have been “very precise precision strikes against al Qaeda and their affiliates, and we have been very careful about how it’s been applied.”

In a direct rebuke to his critics, the President argues, “There’s this perception that we’re just sending a whole bunch of strikes willy-nilly. This is a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists who are trying to go in and harm Americans.”

One would be forgiven for disagreeing.

On October 14, 2011, a 16-year-old boy, and American citizen, named Abdulrahman al-Awlaki was killed in a deliberate drone strike in Yemen (8 other people were also killed). He shared the same fate as his father, Anwar al-Awlaki, also an American citizen, who was killed in a targeted drone strike 2 weeks prior.

And the boy’s crime? According to Obama senior campaign adviser, and former White House Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs, it was to have the unfortunate luck of being born to a “radical” Muslim cleric.

In an interview with We Are Change, a self proclaimed non-partisan media organization,    Mr. Gibbs tells us that the boy “should have [had] a far more responsible father.” It is not clear if by “responsible father” Mr. Gibbs meant someone with a Nobel Peace Prize, a “kill list” and a fleet of armed attack drones at his disposal.

In defense of the dead boy, it should be noted that his father, an accused member of al-Qaeda who was allegedly plotting to blow up US airliners and poison US citizens, had an honor not given to many radical Muslim clerics.

He had the distinct pleasure of being an invited guest at the Pentagon, dining there in the days following the terrorist attacks of 9/11. This is a privilege that not even your faithful correspondent’s father has enjoyed.

But surely the killing of children (even children with horrible fathers or children who were not fortunate enough to have been born American citizens) through drone strikes is something that we can all agree is reprehensible and indefensible, isn’t it?

Not according to Mr. Joe Klein, political columnist for Time Magazine. In comments made on the MSNBC program “Morning Joe” on October 23, 2012, Mr. Klein presents us with the thought provoking question of, “Whose four year old gets killed?” He then goes on to advocate the indiscriminate killing of innocent people in the Middle East and Africa with drone attacks (Mr. Klein’s original question implies that he prefers the people killed be four year children), defending his point by stating, “What we’re doing is limiting the possibility that 4-year-olds here will get killed by indiscriminate acts of terror.”

To find a similar argument, logic or thought process, I believe, you would have to go back to one of the most morally bankrupt and reprehensible regimes in all of history.

(Author’s Note: while your faithful correspondent is neither a psychiatrist nor a psychologist, if your thoughts should ever take you to a place where you find yourself justifying the murder of innocent 4 year old children, I suggest you seek the care of a mental health professional immediately)

But all this talk of killed children is surely a moot point, isn’t it? The US government, once more, assures us that drones are used in a responsible manner, and therefore, rarely kill civilians, let alone children. Unfortunately, a study by the Brookings Institute leads us to believe the contrary. It argues that for every “insurgent” killed, there are, on average, 10 civilians killed as well. And the New American Foundation has found that the US government has the habit of repeatedly under-reporting the number of civilians killed and wounded in drone attacks. More troubling still, a study done jointly by Stanford Law School and the NYU School of Law claims that the US government, as a matter of policy, habitually under-reports the number of civilians killed and wounded in drone attacks.

The US is entering its 12th year of war in Afghanistan (longer than the Soviet Union’s campaign). A key component of US strategy in the region is targeted drone strikes. America’s drone policy has reportedly killed between 474 and 881 civilians in the region, including 176 children.

Further compounding all of this is the controversial US policy called the “double tap.” This involves striking an initial target and then, as people arrive to give aid to the original victims, following up with repeated attacks on the same site. It has been reported that, as a result of this policy, innocent bystanders and non-combatants have been intentionally killed. There are also disturbing reports that funerals have been deliberately hit by targeted drone strikes as well. In almost any other case these events would be labelled as war crimes or terrorism. But somehow, in the US, they only raise “contentious legal questions” according to the New York Times.

If we consider ourselves as being part of a just and correct society, Article 2(4) of the U.N. Charter should give us reason to pause. It expressly prohibits the threat or use of force by one state against another.

Some proponents of drone attacks have argued that Article 2(4) doesn’t apply, since these attacks are mostly being carried out on militants and insurgents in regions where the rule of law has broken down. Therefore, the phrase “state” doesn’t apply, nullifying that section of the Charter.

This argument is dubious at best. If it were China, Russia, or Iran engaging in this type of behavior closer to US shores, say in the remote regions of Central or South America, there is no doubt that the US government would be in an uproar over the legality, and the morality, of attack drones.

There is also no doubt that we would finally be able to recognize what the killing of innocent men, women and children with drones really is.

Murder.

Tom McNamara is an Assistant Professor at the ESC Rennes School of Business, France, and a Visiting Lecturer at the French National Military Academy at Saint-Cyr, Coëtquidan, France.

Sources

“A Hanging” by George Orwell, 1931

“Abdulrahman al-Awlaki’s birth certificate” The Washington Post. Accessed at:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/documents/abdulrahman-al-awlaki-birth-certificate.html

“Anwar al-Awlaki” October 19, 2012, The New York Times. Accessed at:

http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/people/a/anwar_al_awlaki/index.html

“Anwar al-Awlaki killing sparks US travel alert” October 1, 2011, BBC. Accessed at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-15140198

“CIA ‘revives attacks on rescuers’ in Pakistan” by Chris Woods, June 4th, 2012, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Accessed at:

http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/06/04/cia-revives-attacks-on-rescuers-in-pakistan/

“Critics of US drone programme angered by John Brennan’s nomination to CIA” by Paul Harris, January 10, 2013, The Guardian. Accessed at:

www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/10/critics-us-drone-brennan-cia-nomination

“Do Targeted Killings Work?” by Daniel L. Byman, Senior Fellow Foreign Policy, Saban Center for Middle East Policy, July 14, 2009, The Brookings Institute. Accessed at:

http://www.brookings.edu/research/opinions/2009/07/14-targeted-killings-byman

“Everything We Know So Far About Drone Strikes” by Cora Currier, January 11, 2013, ProPublica. Accessed at:

http://www.propublica.org/article/everything-we-know-so-far-about-drone-strikes#correx

“George Orwell” BBC History. Accessed at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/orwell_george.shtml

“Get the Data: Obama’s terror drones” by Chris Woods, February 4, 2012, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Accessed at:

http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/02/04/get-the-data-obamas-terror-drones/

“Joe Klein’s sociopathic defense of drone killings of children” by Glenn Greenwald, October 23, 2012, The Guardian. Accessed at:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/23/klein-drones-morning-joe

“Living Under Drones: Death, Injury, and Trauma to Civilians From US Drone Practices in Pakistan” the International Human Rights and Conflict Resolution Clinic (Stanford Law School) and the Global Justice Clinic (NYU School of Law), September 2012. Accessed at:

http://livingunderdrones.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Stanford_NYU_LIVING_UNDER_DRONES.pdf

“Morning Joe: Scarborough: Drone program is going to cause US problems in future” MSNBC, Accessed at:

http://video.ca.msn.com/watch/video/scarborough-drone-program-is-going-to-cause-us-problems-in-future/17yak5xn9?cpkey=2a4bc99a-0f01-4da8-8cdf-8fe4b888a3b4%257c%257c%257c%257c

“Obama Defends Drone Use” by  Carol E. Lee and Adam Entous, with a contribution from Jared Favole, January 31, 2012, The Wall Street Journal. Accessed at:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204652904577193673318589462.html

“Obama Top Adviser Robert Gibbs Justifies Murder of 16 Year Old American Citizen”  WeAreChange.org, video published October 23, 2012. Accessed at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=7MwB2znBZ1g

“Qaeda-Linked Imam Dined at Pentagon after 9/11” By Bob Orr, October 21, 2010, CBSNews /

CBS. Accessed at:

http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-6978200.html

“Robert Gibbs Says Anwar al-Awlaki’s Son, Killed By Drone Strike, Needs ‘Far More Responsible Father’” by ryan Grim, October 24, 2012, The Huffington Post. Accessed at:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/24/robert-gibbs-anwar-al-awlaki_n_2012438.html

“The Charter of the United Nations” June 26, 1945. Accessed at:

http://www.un.org/en/documents/charter/intro.shtml

“The Moral Case for Drones” by Scott Shane, July 14, 2012, The New York Times. Accessed at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/15/sunday-review/the-moral-case-for-drones.html?ref=opinion

‘The Year of the Drone: An Analysis of U.S. Drone Strikes in Pakistan, 2004-2012’ The New American Foundation. Accessed at:

http://counterterrorism.newamerica.net/drones

“U.S. airstrike that killed American teen in Yemen raises legal, ethical questions” by Craig Whitlock, October 22, 2011, The Washington Post, Accessed at:

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-10-22/world/35277515_1_awlaki-military-airstrike-al-qaeda-affiliate

“U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan on rise for 2013” by Greg Miller, January 11, 2013, The Washington Post. Accessed at:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-drone-strikes-in-pakistan-on-rise-for-2013/2013/01/10/d0a204a0-5b58-11e2-9fa9-5fbdc9530eb9_story.html

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January 31, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Progressive Hypocrite, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Iraqis push for probe into ‘terrifying acts of brutality’ by UK troops

RT | January 30, 2013

Iraqi nationals have called for a probe into alleged acts of brutality by the UK military during the Iraq war. Reports of beatings, sleep deprivation and sexual humiliation, some involving women and children, were turned over to the UK High Court.

­A group of lawyers representing 192 Iraqi citizens handed the 82-page report to the UK High Court on Tuesday, and asked for an independent inquiry into detention practices between 2003 and 2008. During the next three days of the hearing, the Court will rule whether the abuses were systematic and whether the UK Ministry of Defense (MOD) is impartial enough to head an investigation.

In addition to the 192 Iraqi nationals currently being represented in the High Court, another 800 are taking legal action against the UK military.

The MOD currently opposes an independent probe into the abuse reports, and argues that a wide-ranging public inquiry would be “premature and disproportionate.” The MOD created an official body, the Iraq Historical Allegations Team (IHAT), to examine the cases.

The lawyers representing the Iraqis have insisted that the investigation must be carried out by an independent body because the IHAT is incapable of a balanced inquiry.

“Enough is enough. There must be a public inquiry in relation to the credible and prima facie cases of human rights violations perpetrated by the British military in Iraq from 2003 to 2009,” QC Michael Fordham told reporters outside London’s High Court.

The cases of torture documented by the report handed over to the High Court describe beatings, hooding, sleep deprivation and the sexual humiliation of detainees. The report also claimed that women, the elderly and some children were among those killed in attacks on civilians.

Lawyers said that the abuse included unlawful detention, death in custody as well as threats of rape against Iraqis and their wives.

Phil Shiner, one of the lawyers representing the Iraqis, told reporters outside the High Court that there were “hundreds and hundreds” of Iraqis with “tens of thousands” of allegations of mistreatment.

“Some of the cases are truly shocking,” he said. “A 62-year-old grandmother who is led away alive, she is seen by her husband and her son alive, then found a few hours later in a British body bag very much dead, with signs of torture.”

Another case documented in the report tells of a tribal chief who was “utterly humiliated” in front of his family when soldiers broke into his home, arrested him, and then forced him to expose his genitals to his family, including the women.

“The military can’t investigate themselves, we need an independent judicial process here in London,” Shiner said.
Comprehensive steps?

MOD lawyers have assured the High Court that comprehensive steps are being taken to ensure that lessons are learned from the mistakes made in Iraq.

However, the MOD seems intent on glossing over its past failings: in December, the ministry paid over $22 million (£14 million) in compensation to hundreds of Iraqi citizens who claimed to have been illegally detained and abused by British forces posted in the country.

“In particular… a significant amount of work has already been done to ensure that MOD policies and training on tactical questioning and interrogation are lawful and fit for purpose,” MOD lawyers said.

Most of the 227 who received compensation were men who claimed to have been tortured in custody. The allegations included beatings, sleep deprivation and sexual humiliation.

January 30, 2013 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Obama’s Playbook: Still Killing Outside the Lines

By Matthew Harwood, ACLU | January 30, 2013

To hear the Obama administration tell it, through anonymous leaks to the press of course, the United States’ “targeted killing” program will soon be bound by clear and “more stringent” rules before a drone strike gets the green light. This counterterrorism “playbook,” so says the administration, will institutionalize the process for the remote-controlled killing program and keep it within the rule of law.

But that isn’t true for three reasons, Chris Anders, a senior legislative counsel at the ACLU, explained to PBS’s NewsHour on Wednesday night.  First, secret rules are inconsistent with the rule of law, which is predicated on everyone knowing the rules. Second, the Obama administration’s playbook rules will not apply to CIA drone strikes in Pakistan for at least a year if not more, according to the Post. Third, and most importantly, the rules undergirding the program, secret or not, violate the Constitution and international law.

Anders noted the Kafkaesque nature of the secrecy during the program. “To say we follow the rule of law, but we don’t even know what the rules are, and then the rules don’t apply to the biggest player is a little bit of a joke.”

Drone strikes occur frequently inside Pakistan, the only country in which the CIA is exempt from the secret rules. And contrary to the claims of CIA Director nominee John Brennan, arguably the most important cog in the remote-controlled killing machine, drone strikes do kill civilian bystanders, including children. In total, about 3,000 people, including 176 children, have been killed by over 300 drone strikes in Pakistan, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

Although we’re not at war with Pakistan, Pakistanis feel under attack from the United States. “Drones hover twenty-four hours a day over communities in northwest Pakistan, striking homes, vehicles, and public spaces without warning,” a recent report, Living Under Drones, explained. “Their presence terrorizes men, women, and children, giving rise to anxiety and psychological trauma among civilian communities.” The impact as well as the legality of these kinds of drone attacks, and the larger “targeted killing” toolkit, is now the focus of a U.N. investigation.

Nevertheless, President Obama frequently makes reference to the importance of the rule of law in guiding our national security decisions.

“We will defend our people, and uphold our values through strength of arms, and the rule of law,” he said during his inaugural speech on Monday. “We will show the courage to try and resolve our differences with other nations peacefully. Not because we are naive about the dangers we face, but because engagement can more durably lift suspicion and fear.”

Obama’s remote-controlled killing program, however, continues to instill suspicion and fear rather than lift it. It’s a dangerous legacy for a program that has become an illegal hallmark of his administration.

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January 30, 2013 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

In Mali, Forces Backed by UN, France, and Obama Slaughter Civilians

By  Alex Newman | New American | January 28, 2013

Summary executions and mass human rights abuses targeting innocent civilians in Mali are being perpetrated by soldiers loyal to the dubious Malian regime in a campaign supported by the United Nations, the new socialist French government, and the Obama administration. According to human rights groups and witnesses on the ground, the atrocities are increasing as the number of murdered victims continues to rise — eerily reminiscent of similar tragic interventions in Libya, Syria, and the Ivory Coast.

The regime ruling southern Mali out of the capital city of Bamako, which seized power in a military coup last year led by a U.S. government-trained officer, is currently attempting to recapture the northern regions of the country. The vast swath of territory in the north was declared independent last year by a group of historically oppressed nomadic Tuareg rebels armed with weapons obtained from the recent Western-backed war on Libya.

Islamic fighters with various loyalties joined the fight against the corrupt central government, too — providing a half-baked excuse for the UN, the French government, Obama, and various African despots to enter the fray on behalf of the illegitimate regime in the south. After the UN Security Council purported to “authorize” an international invasion on behalf of the coup-installed regime, forces from France openly began their military campaign earlier this month under the guise of fighting “Islamic extremism.”

Obama, the U.K. government, and a motley assortment of African tyrants — most of whom continue to be propped up with Western taxpayer money — quickly joined the battle as well. But within days of the military operation to crush rebels in the north, disturbing reports of gross human rights violations perpetrated by Western-backed forces began to emerge from across the region.

“This series of grave abuses confirms the concerns that we have been expressing for several weeks,” said President Souhayr Belhassen with the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), a Paris-based umbrella group representing more than 160 organizations around the world. “These acts of revenge together with the extreme tensions that exists between the communities constitute an explosive cocktail leading us to fear that the worst could happen, especially in the context of the reconquering the North.”

According to FIDH, which said it is “very alarmed by the increasing number of summary executions and other human rights violations committed by Malian soldiers,” an immediate investigation is needed. The umbrella organization said an independent commission should be established to assess the scope of the crimes and bring the perpetrators to justice. The group said it had already confirmed dozens of reports of extrajudicial murders in various towns, and that other reported atrocities were still being investigated.

Even in Bamako, where the corrupt regime styling itself the “government” of Mali is based, ethnic Tuaregs who have nothing to do with the secession movement in the north are being brutalized. According to reports, their homes are being invaded and plundered. Simply failing to produce valid identification documents is apparently justification enough to brutalize or even murder the victims.

“These abuses undermine the legitimacy of the operation to restore territorial integrity and must be prosecuted by the national justice, and if required, by the International Criminal Court which opened an investigation on the situation in Mali on 16 January,” FIDH Honorary President Sidiki Kaba said in a statement, urging French and Malian authorities to investigate the lawlessness and criminal terrorization of victims. […]

While the press has been largely barred from conflict areas by the French government, even establishment journalists have documented the slaughter by UN-backed forces. A Reuters reporter, for example, “saw at least six bodies in two areas of the Walirdi district of Sevare. Three of them were lying, partly covered in sand, near a bus station and showed signs of having been burned. Three more had been thrown into a nearby well.”

Witnesses who spoke to the Associated Press but asked to remain anonymous gave vivid accounts of the atrocities being perpetrated by the Malian regime, which, again, has the full force of the Obama administration, the UN, and the socialist government in France behind it. According to the sources, Malian soldiers were massacring anyone suspected of having ties to the rebels in the north.

“They gathered all the people who didn’t have national identity cards and the people they suspected of being close to the Islamists to execute them and put them in two different wells near the bus station,” one of the witnesses was quoted as saying by the AP. After being dumped in the wells, Malian troops poured gasoline on the bodies and set them ablaze, probably to conceal the evidence of their crimes.

The coup regime in Bamako has denied the accusations, saying it ordered its officers to “respect human rights.” However, French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, when asked about whether he knew of the abuses being perpetrated by the “government” his forces are supporting in Mali, said: “There’s a risk” that the atrocities are occurring, but that it was up to the Malian regime to stop it. … Full article

January 30, 2013 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

No, I Have Never Been in the Military

By Laurence M. Vance | LewRockwell.com | January 29, 2013

It happens every time I write an article about war. It happens every time I write an article about the military. It happens every time I even mention war or the military.

The question may take a variety of forms but it is really always the same: “Have you ever been in combat” “Have you ever been in the military?” “Have you ever served?”

Because I have never been in combat, been in the military, or “served,” my answer is, of course, always in the negative.

Those who ask such questions have one purpose: to discredit everything I say about the military. In their mind, it is either that I can’t possibly have sufficient knowledge of what it is like in the military to be able to criticize it or I have no right to criticize the military because I have never been in it, or both.

But rather than hang my head in shame and sheepishly acknowledge that I have never been in the military, I lift it up high and shout No, I have never been in the military. I have never experienced the “glories” of combat. I have never had the “honor” of serving. Thank God I was never in the military.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never sung filthy cadences that glorify rape and killing.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never put my family through unnecessary hardship.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never helped to carry out an evil, reckless, and interventionist U.S. foreign policy.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never destroyed a country’s industry and infrastructure that was no threat to the United States.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never enforced a UN resolution.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never killed someone that I didn’t know, who was no threat to me, my family, my city, my state, or my country.

No, I have never been in the military… I have never been a prostitute, but I know it is an immoral activity.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never experienced PTSD because I had serious doubts about the justness of what I was fighting for.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never experienced the desire to commit suicide.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never unnecessarily been in a situation where I had to kill or be killed.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never been part of an organization that was a global force for evil.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never embraced the values that are all too prevalent in the military: adultery, fornication, promiscuity, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, pornography, sodomy, divorce, sexual assault, sexual harassment, suicide.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never had to be on guard against being sexually assaulted.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never been an accomplice to murder.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never killed a civilian and called it collateral damage.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never fought a police action for the UN.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never played golf on a U.S. military base thousands of miles away in a county that could provide for its own defense.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never violated the Constitution I swore to uphold.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never urinated on a dead body.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never been all that I can be in an organization that was the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never expressed blind, unconditional obedience to someone’s orders.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never cursed like a sailor.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never fought an undeclared war.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never committed random acts of depravity and violence.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never killed civilians for sport.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never participated in state-sponsored terrorism.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never posed for photos with murdered civilians.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never tortured and humiliated prisoners.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never worn a uniform in an airport and grinned from ear to ear when a group of people cheered me as I walked by.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never stopped having independent thoughts.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never transported anyone to some secret CIA prison to undergo “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

No, I have never been in the military. I have never piloted a drone over Pakistan and killed people like I was playing a video game.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never been part of the president’s personal attack force.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never unleashed violence and civil unrest in another country.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never deprived my child of his father while I made multiple duty tours with increased deployment terms.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never fought an unjust war of aggression.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never cut off someone’s body part as a trophy.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never died in vain or for a lie.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never dropped a bomb on a wedding party.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never traveled thousands of miles from the United States to fight in a senseless foreign war.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never dwelled in one of the filthiest moral environments on the face of the earth.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never helped to keep in business the worldwide network of brothels around U.S. military bases.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never traveled the world, met interesting people, and killed them.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never told people that I was defending their freedoms when I was doing nothing of the kind.

No, I have never been in the military. I have never agreed to kill people to get money for college.

No, I have never been in the military. But when men that have been in combat, and have been in the military, and have served confirm what I say about the military and add their own criticisms of the military to it, they are not listened to either.

No, I have never been in the military. But I will continue to criticize it and persuade people to not join it. How could any thinking person do otherwise?

~

Laurence M. Vance [send him mail] writes from central Florida. He is the author of Christianity and War and Other Essays Against the Warfare State, The Revolution that Wasn’t, Rethinking the Good War, and The Quatercentenary of the King James Bible. His latest book is The War on Drugs Is a War on Freedom. Visit his website.

January 29, 2013 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

The most violent settlement in the West Bank encroaches on Asira al Qibliya

International Solidarity Movement | January 27, 2013

G

Asira al Qibliya, Occupied Palestine – According to OCHA statistics Yizhar is the most violent settlement in the whole of the West Bank with 70 recorded incidents in 2011 alone. Every week there is at least one attack by Yizhar settlers in the six affected villages.

Four months ago, settlers from Yizhar built a temporary outpost on top of a hill belonging to villagers from Urif. This continued until earlier in the week when Israeli authorities delivered maps to the village which showed that Yizhar had laid claim to 2 dunums of land. This was a massive understatement; they had in-fact seized the entire hill.

The land grab of this hillside seems to be all but complete; a shepherd who was working the land around the Yizhar outpost was recently beaten whilst tending to his sheep: the injuries he sustained were serious but not critical. In another incident, as the Palestinian owners of the land were walking along the road towards the hill this week, they were fired on by Israeli soldiers. Villagers want to challenge this latest land grab, however the law in this country is anything but just. The villagers are all too aware that if they resist they have only stones in the face of tear gas, stun grenades and the very real threat of being fired upon with live ammunition.

Harassment of the residents has also been on the rise. Currently at least once a week soldiers have been invading Asira in the middle of the night. They have been banging on villagers doors with the butts of their assault rifles, making sure people are disturbed in much the same way as has been reported in Urif as well as in Burin.

Yizhar a relatively small but very aggressive settlement in the north of the occupied West Bank. It is situated on a hill surrounded by six Palestinian villages which are all made to live in a state of constant fear.

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January 27, 2013 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Continued harrassment of the Nasser family in Madama

International Solidarity Movement | January 27, 2013

Settler attacks in Madama. Photo by Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP/Getty Images 2012

Madama, Occupied Palestine – A month after unprovoked settler and army attacks, the victim of severe violence Mamun Nasser remains in Israeli prison. The arrest of yet another member of the Nasser family shows Israeli army’s continued harassment in Madama.

On December 18th the notorious security guard charged with the protection of the illegal settlement of Yizhar, Jacob, attacked Mamun Nasser while he was tending to his flock of sheep in a hill outside the settlement. Mamun was handcuffed and beaten in front of his entire family, who desperately tried to intervene.

The Israeli army arrived on the scene, who responded by firing live ammunition on the Nasser family and others who tried to help, quickly ending their attempt to stop the vicious assault.  One round passed through Mamun’s sisters clothing narrowly missing her while another one hit his brother, Amir, in the leg. His mother told us “They wanted to kill him [Amir]. I heard the officer giving that order. He was lucky that he was only shot in his leg.” Severely beaten, Mamun was then arrested and taken away by the Israeli military into custody. One month later he remains detained in Majdou Prison.

On January 23rd at 4 pm, the Israeli army followed up the harassment by raiding the Nasser family home in Madama, arresting Mamun’s brother Amir who was still recovering from the gunshot wound he received only a month prior. This is another episode in the continued harassment of villagers surrounding Yizhar which is described as the West Bank’s most violent settlement by the United Nations.

Video taken by settlers during the incident on December 18th

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January 27, 2013 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Re-militarization gives rise to new tensions and violence in Guatemala

By Kelsey Alford-Jones | Upside Down World | January 25, 2013

On October 6, the Guatemalan army gunned down six indigenous protesters in Totonicapán and injured at least 30 more. Thousands had gathered to oppose unpopular government reforms, and while the police held their distance, the military advanced and shot into the crowd.

The event was a tragic manifestation of one of the public’s worst fears since President Pérez Molina took office in January 2012: that the Guatemalan armed forces would resort to deadly force in order to repress and silence dissent, an experience all too familiar in the nation´s collective historic memory.

Pérez Molina has made no secret of his intention to deploy the armed forces in ever-greater numbers and ever-expanding roles – the military now overwhelmingly dominates citizen security initiatives. Whether walking down Guatemala City’s central avenue, the “Sexta,” or driving on any major highway, Guatemalans are once again likely to encounter soldiers patrolling with semi-automatic rifles or checking papers at military roadblocks.

The government has opened at least five new military bases and outposts since the beginning of 2012, and has sent soldiers to fight drug cartels, to protect historic sites and nature reserves, and to back up the police during evictions and protests. Soldiers have also been deployed en masse to reduce crime in Guatemala City´s poorest neighborhoods.

Seeing soldiers on the streets may not be new in Guatemala, but under Pérez Molina, it has become symbolic of his administration’s approach to governance; and for the first time in over 15 years, current and former military personnel permeate the leadership of civilian institutions and dictate the administration’s approach to governance.

This swift re-militarization is deeply controversial, and the reasons behind it are much more complex than first meet the eye. In fact, some argue that the motivation for militarization has little to do with providing security for Guatemalan citizens – instead, it is about protecting the status quo, ensuring impunity for the armed forces and defending multinational economic investments. The US government has been eager to offer support to the Guatemalan military, despite the problematic implications.

The Military’s Past Atrocities

In1996, Otto Pérez Molina was a General in the Guatemalan military, and was one of their representatives at the peace negotiations that would put an end to the armed conflict. The Peace Accords, signed by Pérez Molina himself, emphasized the importance of strengthening civilian governance: the number of soldiers would be vastly reduced and a new, civilian, police force would be created. The Accords stipulated that the “National Civilian Police shall be under the direction of the civil authorities.” In contrast, the role of the armed forces was to “[defend] Guatemala’s sovereignty and territorial integrity; they shall have no other functions assigned to them, and their participation in other fields shall be limited to cooperative activities.”

The Accords placed limitations on the military not just to strengthen democracy, but also as a response to the atrocities the military had committed against its own people. In 1999, the UN-sponsored Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH) established that during the 36-year internal armed conflict, 200,000 people were killed, mostly civilians, including an estimated 45,000 who were forcibly disappeared. The Guatemalan state (through its military and paramilitary forces) was responsible for 93% of all human rights violations committed during the conflict, and had committed acts of genocide against the Mayan people.

The Military Creeps Back into Citizen Security Initiatives

Neither the Peace Accords nor the CEH report outlined steps to hold individual soldiers and high-level military officials accountable for the egregious war crimes committed, and many remain in positions of power to this very day. Internal reforms of military institutions were superficial at best, and government officials have been quick to re-engage the military with the justification that it is necessary to provide security to the Guatemalan public.

– In 2000, only four years after the signing of the Peace Accords, a bill was passed legalizing the military’s collaboration with the police to combat common and organized crime, as well as deforestation, kidnapping, and other crimes.

– In 2006 (under the direction of then Presidential Commissioner for Security Pérez Molina), President Berger mobilized reserve troops to maintain internal security, fight crime and distribute humanitarian aid.

– From 2007-2011 President Colom continued to expand the military’s role, reopening military bases and increasing the number of troops, while Congress created a minimum requirement for spending on the Defense Ministry’s budget.

When Pérez Molina assumed the presidency in January 2012, he became the first career military official to hold that office in 25 years. He immediately called on the army to collaborate in “neutralizing illegal armed groups by means of military power.” In September, Pérez Molina inaugurated the Maya Task Force in Zone 18 of Guatemala City, with 1,200 soldiers and 100 police. He initiated a similar operation in Zone 12 in November.

The Re-militarization of Guatemalan Institutions

The dramatic images of thousands of heavily armed soldiers in Guatemala City are shocking and troublesome, yet the re-militarization of Guatemala today isn’t simply about more soldiers on the streets. It also refers to something much less visible –an institutional culture disturbingly similar to the counter-insurgency model that dominated during the internal armed conflict.

Numerous governmental agencies are now run by former military, including the Interior Ministry and offices within the National Civilian Police and intelligence services. According to Guatemalan security analysts, upwards of 40% of security-related positions are held by former military, including many who were directly involved in the counter-insurgency campaigns; some have even been named in cases before Guatemalan courts for their role in crimes against humanity during the conflict.

Many of these policymakers, including Pérez Molina himself, hail from the generation of armed forces that was active during genocide campaigns such as Operation Sofia; a generation that participated in the extermination of entire villages, that used rape as a tool of war, and justified the use of torture and brutality in their campaigns against civilian, mostly indigenous, communities. This is the generation taught to believe that anyone who rejected existing structures of racism, economic dominance by a minority elite, and political exclusion, were “subversives”, “guerrillas,” “terrorists” and “internal enemies.”

The administration’s approach to policy-making, according to human rights groups, reflects this culture of discipline and obedience rather than democratic governance and dialogue. Any social conflict that disrupts the established order is addressed as the military has always dealt with perceived “threats” from its own citizens: intimidation, defamation, repression, and the use of force — sometimes with deadly consequences.

The tragic massacre in Totonicapán momentarily ripped through the curtain of government propaganda to expose the ever-present threat of violence. The international and diplomatic communities reacted strongly, and President Pérez Molina quickly assured the public that his administration would no longer deploy the military at protests and evictions. Only hours later, however, he had reversed his statement and later came out with a new protocol for the military’s collaboration with the police – a protocol that did not, in fact, reduce the military’s role at all.

The Military and the ‘War on Drugs’

The Guatemalan government has attempted to justify the military’s expanded presence due to the country’s high rates of violence linked to organized crime, gangs and common crime. The US has been quick to accept this argument.

“The military must provide security where the police have failed,” is an easy sell in the context of the US war on drugs andis an argument readily repeated by the US State Department. (Meanwhile, the much-needed reform of Guatemala’s police force languishes without the resources or political support to move forward).

The Department of Defense and US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) have provided ongoing support and training to the Guatemalan Armed Forces. This collaboration persists despite a decades-long Congressional ban on direct funding to the army due to the atrocities committed by the Guatemalan military against its own people, and the lack of reform within the institution.

Operation Martillo (Hammer) is the newest in a series of US-Guatemala joint operations, although it is also coordinated amongst other countries in Central America and Europe. The operation began in early 2012 and in July, President Pérez Molina signed off on an expansion of the operation. The new agreement permitted US marines and military contractors to be stationed in Guatemala for 120 days and collaborate directly on counter-narcotics missions. It granted US marines the right to be uniformed, to carry weapons, and to enjoy complete diplomatic “privileges, exemptions, and immunity.” Despite regulations requiring approval from the Guatemalan Congress, the document signed by the US and President Pérez Molina attempted to circumvent the process simply by stating: “It is understood that these activities […] do not constitute the passing of a foreign military through Guatemalan territory.”

The operation was not popular among many in civil society. “Drug trafficking in Guatemala shouldn’t be combated by the Guatemalan military, much less by the US military,” commented analyst Sandino Asturias in an interview with GHRC.

Helen Mack, executive director of the Myrna Mack Foundation and former Police Reform Commissioner, commented to the AP at the end of August: “Rural communities in Guatemala are fearful of the military being used to combat drug traffickers because the same techniques are applied that were used in (counterinsurgency) warfare. The historical memory is there and Guatemalans are fearful of that.”

There are other complications in using the military to combat organized crime. The military can’t carry out a criminal investigation, nor can it (legally) detain suspects of a crime. And while the US and Guatemalan armed forces collaborate on high-profile (often unsuccessful) attempts to capture narco-bosses, the Guatemalan Public Prosecutor’s Office has quietly had them arrested, many for extradition to the US. Furthermore, the Guatemalan military has documented ties to drug trafficking organizations and other criminal structures – the very groups they are sent to combat.

What does re-militarization achieve?

Soldiers train for battle, not to police the streets. Not surprisingly, increasing involvement of the military in police work has not only re-traumatized communities and survivors of the armed conflict, but it has also failed to reduce crime and violence in Guatemala. In fact, Sandino Asturias confirms that the homicide rate began to rise dramatically after the military reengaged in matters of internal security in 2000.

The military’s remarkable failure to address security concerns over the last 12 years doesn’t faze policy makers; in fact, the security of Guatemalan citizens doesn’t seem to be the primary concern at all.

Instead, increasing militarization has often functioned as a means to provide protection for the economic interests of transnational corporations.

The administration has constructed new military bases near existing or planned development projects such as mines, cement factories, and hydroelectric power plants. Military forces – in coordination with the police and private security guards – have consistently been mobilized to guarantee that “development” projects aren’t disrupted by local protests. This occurs despite the fact that, in the majority of cases, the government failed to consult local communities about the project and actively ignores threats, attacks, intimidation and other illegal acts committed by persons linked to the international corporations.

Public officials have instead branded those who organize against these unwanted development projects as “terrorists” and “guerrillas,” a strategy similar to the psychological warfare tactics utilized during the conflict. The government’s use of States of Siege in conflict zones has given the military free reign to terrorize indigenous families and detain “suspects.” Dozens of community leaders have been arrested on trumped up charges simply for their rejection of the administration’s development policies, giving rise to a new movement in solidarity with Guatemala’s first generation of political prisoners.

The international diplomatic community has been just as willing as the Pérez Molina administration to overlook commitments laid out in the 1996 Peace Accords – partially implemented at best – in favor of political and economic ties that promote investment, trade and “stability.”

Finally, for an entire generation of military officials and their civilian allies, the re-militarization of public institutions is not just about maintaining control, but about ensuring impunity.

As Guatemalan courts at long last – and against all odds – move forward with indictments against the military high command from the 1980s, accountability and incarceration for war crimes is suddenly a concrete possibility. The threat of judicial action has resulted in a policy of denial of the military’s involvement in war crimes and genocide, even as exhumations and court cases add to voluminous evidence against the military. An ongoing exhumation at a military base in Coban, Alta Verapaz has already unearthed over 500 bodies in mass graves, many bound, blindfolded, and showing evidence of torture.

In response, Pérez Molina has methodically dismantled public institutions that worked to promote human rights, historical clarification and justice, seeking to . During first half of 2012, the administration gutted the Peace Archives Directorate (DAP). The office had opened in 2008 to compile and analyze military (and other) archives in order to establish human rights violations committed during the internal armed conflict. Archive staff published numerous reports on the conflict and acted as expert witnesses in key human rights cases. The closure of the DAP took place as the government was further weakening the Presidential Human Rights Office (COPREDEH) and consolidating it under the Secretary of Peace, Antonio Arenales Forno, a genocide-denier and long-time ally of the military.

The administration has made repeated attempts to limit or dismiss its regional and international human rights obligations that would jeopardize members of the military. At the beginning of 2013, Pérez Molina issued a presidential decree that refused to recognize the jurisdiction of the Inter-American Court on Human Rights in cases prior to 1987, even when they are “continuing crimes” such as forced disappearance and other crimes against humanity. Public outcry by national and international human rights organizations forced Perez Molina to annul the decree. Meanwhile, the Defense Ministry further limited access to information that relates to human rights violations from the early 1980s, which, according to Guatemalan groups, should be part of the public domain.

Emboldened by the administration’s fierce pro-military stance, retired members of the military and other ultraconservative and fanatically nationalistic groups have launched their own campaigns in the press and social media, sending direct,and very public, threats to those who seek justice and defend human rights.

As Guatemala spirals back into a reality frighteningly reminiscent of the 1980s, those who have become the intentional or collateral victims of re-militarization find themselves with little support from state institutions. Nevertheless, indigenous communities, activists and other civil society organizations –despite fear of repression or retaliation –continue to denounce re-militarization in all its forms. They recognize that the way forward for Guatemala is not to be found by returning to the nefarious practices of the past.

Kelsey Alford-Jones is the Director of the Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA, a non-profit, grassroots, solidarity organization dedicated to promoting human rights in Guatemala and supporting communities and activists who face threats and violence. GHRC documents and denounces abuses, educates the international community, and advocates for policies that foster peace and justice.

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January 26, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Abuse in UK’s Iraq occupation was ‘systemic’

DW | January 24, 2013

The UK government is facing more allegations of vicious abuse in its Iraqi prisons during the occupation. Now, on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the invasion, lawyers want to prove that the abuse was systemic.

Next week, from January 29, not long before the 10th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, UK lawyer Phil Shiner will present 180 statements to a high court in London. They were gathered in Beirut by Shiner and his Public Interest Lawyers team from Iraqis detained by the British army in southern Iraq between 2003 and 2008. The testimony is shocking, both because of its volume (another 871 statements are still to come), and its sickening detail.

One civilian, known only as Khalid, said, “[A British soldier] then grabbed my penis and dragged me around the floor while holding it. He also made me squat up and down whilst naked and inserted his finger into my anus. I would have preferred to have been killed than subjected to this.”

Another prisoner, named Halim, claimed he was told: “Fuck you and fuck Islam!” by a soldier who then “opened the belt of my trousers and said ‘now jiggy jiggy’. The soldier put his boot in my chest and pulled my trousers down … The soldier put his foot on my chest … lifted me in the air and turned me on to my front.”

Not just ‘bad apples’

These are two of the dozens of descriptions, which feature hooding, sleep and sensory deprivation, mock executions, stress positions, threats of rape of detainees’ female relatives, regular beatings, and religious abuse.

Shiner intends to show that the “bad apples” defense usually peddled by governments in such cases will no longer wash. He will argue that the sheer volume of the evidence he has gathered shows that the abuse was “systemic,” and that, under the European Convention on Human Rights, a full inquiry is required.

“We’ve got the training materials, we’ve got the policy documents,” Shiner told the British Observer newspaper. “Violence was endemic to the state practices.”

Kartik Raj, UK-based campaigner for Amnesty International, agreed. “The allegations of abuse, ill-treatment, and death in custody – some of them are not allegations, they’re proven fact – are so credible and so many, that there really does need to be an independent and thorough investigation,” he told DW. “And it is something that should be looked at as a systemic issue in a systematic manner, rather than a series of individual cases where individuals have to take out a civil action against the government.”

Proving systemic abuse

The importance of proving that such cases are not isolated is shown by the injustice that followed the killing of Baha Mousa. Mousa, a 26-year-old hotel receptionist, died after just 36 hours of British custody in Basra in September 2003. A British government inquiry into the death found that he had died after having been hooded for 24 hours and severely beaten. He suffered “at least” 93 injuries, including fractured ribs and a broken nose, and died, the inquiry concluded, of a combination of lack of food and water, heat, exhaustion, fear, previous injuries, and the hooding and stress positions. Andrew Williams, a law professor who wrote the book A Very British Killing on the Baha Mousa case, concluded more simply, “He was kicked to death.”
Baha Mousa’s father Dawood Mousa arrives to give evidence to the Baha Mousa Inquiry in London, Wednesday Sept. 23, 2009. Mousa was a 26-year old Iraqi who was beaten and killed in the custody of British troops following a raid on his hotel in the southern Iraq city of Basra in September 2003.

Seven soldiers were charged for the war crime. Six were acquitted or had their charges dropped, while the seventh, Corporal Donald Payne, was discharged from the army, served a year in prison for “inhumane treatment,” while being cleared of manslaughter and perverting the course of justice. The judge, Justice Ronald McKinnon, stated that “none of those soldiers has been charged with any offence simply because there is no evidence against them as a result of a more or less obvious closing of ranks.” “A collective amnesia set in,” Williams told DW.

Thanks to the sheer number and the repetition in the new statements collected by Shiner, it seems easy to establish that there was a pattern of abuse during the British army occupation of southern Iraq. According to Williams, who also works as a researcher and legal advisor for the Public Interest Lawyers, “Under international criminal law, it’s not completely required that you have to prove beyond any doubt that a particular person was responsible for setting up a program of abuse.” Instead, Shiner will try to “establish that there is clear evidence… that people in authority knew that it was happening, and yet nothing was done to stop it.”

Training interrogators

Some of the interrogation techniques described both in the Baha Mousa inquiry and the new testimonies – including hooding, sensory deprivation, and stressing – were made illegal in Britain in the early 1970s, following a European Court of Human Rights case on the treatment of Irish prisoners.
In this undated still photo provided by The Washington Post on Friday, May 21, 2004, a hooded Iraqi detainee appears to be cuffed at the ankle chained to a door handle while being made to balance on two boxes at the Abu Ghraib prison on the outskirts of Baghdad. The Washington Post has obtained what it says are hundreds of photographs and short digital videos – as of yet unreleased – depicting U.S. soldiers physically and emotionally abusing detainees last fall in the Abu Ghraib prison.

In light of this, the training materials for British army interrogators, some of which were disclosed in the Baha Mousa inquiry, have become key evidence. But the allusions in those manuals and Powerpoint presentations are vague. “They show that there was a degree of contempt for detainees,” said Williams. “There would be comments such as, ‘Get them naked.’ There are certain indications in these materials that most people would see as abusive in themselves, but they also open the door for soldiers to take the material as a license to invent ways of treating detainees. You need to put together the pieces of a jigsaw.”

The British Ministry of Defense’s answer to all this is that any general questions about abuse were dealt with by the Baha Mousa inquiry, which resulted in 73 recommendations, as well as the ongoing work of its own internal “Iraq Historic Allegations Team.” But this, says Amnesty International’s Raj, is not enough.

“It’s clear that the Baha Mousa recommendations, including the systemic recommendations, are based on a very, very specific time frame,” he said. “I think the new issues have not been sufficiently addressed.”
British soldiers help Iraqi soldiers during the construction of a military base in Basra, southern Iraq on 13 April 2008. Iraqi security forces set up several military bases in areas which witnessed battles between Iraqi security forces and the Mahdi Army in Basra.

“The inquiry only looked at the particular systems in that particular case,” added Williams. “It couldn’t look at the investigation that took place after Baha Mousa was found dead, nor could it look at any other examples of abuse that had come to light. It couldn’t join the dots.”

‘Culture of contempt’

Once they are joined, argues Williams, these dots create an image of what he calls a “culture of contempt” during the occupation of Iraq – including not only abuse of prisoners of war and civilians, but also unlawful killings on the streets.

If the high court does rule that there will be a public inquiry, it could go beyond making recommendations to actually prescribing responsibility. “From an international criminal law position, the answer to the question ‘how high does it go?’ is that it goes to top of government,” said Williams. “But in terms of direct culpability – that’s impossible to know unless you look at individual cases. As to general governmental responsibility, one has to ask who was in power at the time, who was overseeing the way that troops were operating and the means of interrogation.”

The fact that the British government recognizes that there is a problem seems beyond doubt – in December it was reported that over £14 million (16.7 million euros) had been paid out to over 150 Iraqis in compensation for their treatment at the hands of British soldiers. “Why would they receive compensation, unless there was some legitimacy to their complaints?” asked Williams.

January 26, 2013 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The broken truce

International Solidarity Movement | January 21, 2013

Beit Lahiya, Gaza Strip, Occupied Palestine – A ceasefire was announced on 21st November, ending eight days of horrific bloodshed in Gaza. Has the delicate truce held over the past two months? It depends who you ask. Israelis or Gazans, each going about their daily lives on opposite sides of a border fence.

There has not been a single report of a rocket fired out of Gaza since 21st November. In contrast, four Palestinians have lost their lives and over 80 have been injured by Israeli forces since then. Yet these violations have received little or no coverage in the mainstream media. Palestinian civilians, whose only crime is to live in the border areas, are terrorized on a daily basis by the Israeli army. This is what everyday life under the ceasefire has meant for them.

Beit Lahiya, in the far north of the Gaza Strip is one such place. A week ago it saw the brutal murder of 20 year-old Mustafa Abu Jarad. Today, it was the site of another Israeli violation. Abdullah Marouf, 18, was in the west of Beit Lahiya, near the coast, when he was shot in the right leg by Israeli forces, fracturing both his tibia and fibula.

Abdullah Marouf in hospital. (Photo by Desde Palestina) Abdullah Marouf in hospital. (Photo by Desde Palestina)

At about 9.00 on the morning of 21st January, Abdullah was in an area approximately 250 metres from the border fence, catching birds with his two brothers. A group of five or six Palestinians they were unaquainted with were also in the vicinity, closer to the fence than they were. Abdullah had been under the impression that he would be safe, however he noticed an Israeli soldier in a watchtower on the border and others on the ground. The soldiers began firing live ammunition towards them and Abdullah was shot.

Two local farmers brought him to Kamal Adwan hospital where surgeons performed percutaneous pinning of his lower leg which had sustained damage from an entry wound and a significantly larger exit wound. He requires subsequent surgery in a couple of months to fit internal wires. His recovery is estimated to take at least 12 months.

Abdullah, who is engaged to be married, had been working with his two brothers selling scrap metal. Now they will have to support a family of nine without his help. It is unsurprising that he expressed a lack of faith in the ceasefire agreement.

One can only expect that the Palestinian resistance has also lost faith and is fast losing patience. If a response is provoked it will appear to be in a vacuum – despite this being far from the case – due to the shameful silence maintained by the international community throughout the ongoing Israeli atrocities. It is for people of conscience to protest this injustice and prevent a further escalation of Israel’s attacks on Gaza.

January 24, 2013 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

New U.S. Counterterrorism Playbook to Exclude Pakistan from Drone “Kill” Rules

By Noel Brinkerhoff | AllGov | January 23, 2013

The Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) drone campaign in Pakistan will not be bound by new counterterrorism rules that the Obama administration is finalizing.

The rules, referred to as the “playbook” by officials, are supposed to establish parameters for killing overseas threats. Once completed, the playbook will detail how names are added to assassination lists, which legal principles justify the killing of U.S. citizens, and what offices must sign off before drone strikes are carried out.

But the CIA will be exempted from the rules for at least a year. Agency leaders objected to being bound by the playbook, citing the pressing need to continue bombing Taliban and al-Qaeda targets in Pakistan before the U.S. withdraws from neighboring Afghanistan, where the drones are based.

Greg Miller of The Washington Post wrote that the drafting of “the playbook was nearly derailed late last year by disagreements among the State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon on the criteria for lethal strikes and other issues. Granting the CIA a temporary exemption for its Pakistan operations was described as a compromise that allowed officials to move forward with other parts of the playbook.”

Critics of the government assassination program view the playbook as indicative of the institutionalization of the U.S. killing policy. It is “a step in exactly the wrong direction,” Hina Shamsi, director of the American Civil Liberty Union’s National Security Project, told the Post. She called it “a further bureaucratization of the CIA’s paramilitary killing program.”

January 23, 2013 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

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