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<DIV><FONT size=2 face=Arial>Media consolidation into ever larger corporate
conglomerates, and political subservience to big money guaranteed that only
those Americans intrepid enough to seek out their own sources of news know about
the degree of horror their government brought to the Iraqi people.</FONT></DIV>
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<H1 class=title>Freedom Rider: Hidden War Crimes in Iraq</H1>
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<DIV class=submitted>Wed, 04/03/2013 - 10:27 — Margaret Kimberley</DIV></DIV>
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<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=3><B>by BAR editor and senior columnist
Margaret Kimberley</B></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"> </P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT color=#280099><FONT
face=Times><FONT size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=4><B>Freedom
Rider</B></FONT></FONT><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=4>:
</FONT></FONT><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=4><B>Hidden War Crimes
in Iraq</B></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=3><B>by BAR editor and senior columnist
Margaret Kimberley</B></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in" align=center><FONT
color=#2323dc>“<FONT face=Times><FONT size=2><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=3><I>Rates of cancer, leukemia, and infant
mortality are higher in Fallujah than in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after they were
bombed with nuclear weapons in 1945.”</I></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=2>The term war criminal conjures up images
of Hitler’s henchmen or General Tojo heading for the gallows as punishment for
crimes committed against humanity during World War II. Auschwitz and the rape of
Nanking come to mind, but the references are all too often consigned to faraway
places, long ago times or foreign despots. </FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">Americans are rarely thought of in this
category, but that level of ignorance and denial is inexcusable. America exists
because of the atrocities which took place from the moment the first Europeans
arrived on this continent. It all began with the killing of millions of
indigenous people and then the ensnarement of millions of Africans into the hell
of chattel slavery. If crimes against humanity were ever committed, they were
committed here.</FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">Those crimes didn’t stop at these borders
and they weren’t all committed in centuries past. Numerous invasions and
occupations should have put this country on the war crimes map, and one of those
atrocities is ongoing but has been disappeared by the corporate media and
Republican and Democratic politicians.</FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in" align=center><FONT
color=#2323dc>“<FONT face=Times><FONT size=2><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=3><I>Only those Americans intrepid enough to
seek out their own sources of news know about the degree of horror their
government brought to the Iraqi people.</I></FONT></FONT><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT
size=3><I>”</I></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">If there is anything worse than the United
States destruction of Iraq and the killing of one million people, it is the fact
that this crime has gone largely unreported. Most Americans don’t know very much
about the invasion and occupation for the simple reason that the corporate media
didn’t tell them much of anything important about it. Media consolidation into
ever larger corporate conglomerates, and political subservience to big money
guaranteed that only those Americans intrepid enough to seek out their own
sources of news know about the degree of horror their government brought to the
Iraqi people.</FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">They don’t know that shells and missiles
made of depleted uranium have poisoned Iraq’s air and water and that it was
first used in the Gulf War of 1991. They don’t know that thousands of Iraqi
children were killed when sanctions prevented them from getting food and
medicine. They don’t know about the city of Fallujah and how it was destroyed by
United States forces in 2004. </FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">A campaign to “pacify” this city began
after U.S. military contractors were killed there in 2003. In April and then in
November of 2004 the city was decimated by a campaign meant to destroy popular
resistance. The U.S. military attacked Fallujah’s hospitals in order to prevent
the international media from seeing the carnage they had produced. Civilians
trying to flee were turned back or even killed and soldiers cut off supplies of
water and electricity. Mark77 firebombs, a variant of </FONT><FONT
color=#000080><SPAN lang=zxx><U><A
href="http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2013/03/31/the-crime-of-the-century-napalm-use-in-iraq-by-felicity-arbuthnot/"><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif">napalm</FONT></A></U></SPAN></FONT><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif">, and white phosphorus, a weapon which melts skin and
bone, were used during the attacks. All of these ghoulish concoctions are banned
by international law and so is using collective punishment against a civilian
population. </FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in" align=center><FONT
color=#2323dc>“<FONT face=Times><FONT size=2><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=3><I>The U.S. military attacked Fallujah’s
hospitals in order to prevent the international media from seeing the carnage
they had produced.”</I></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">The result of the use of depleted uranium
and other weapons is a rate of genetic damage higher than that of </FONT><FONT
color=#000080><SPAN lang=zxx><U><A
href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-war-crimes-cancer-rate-in-fallujah-worse-than-hiroshima/20241"><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif">any other population</FONT></A></U></SPAN></FONT><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"> ever studied. Rates of cancer, leukemia, and infant
mortality are higher in Fallujah than in Hiroshima and Nagasaki after they were
bombed with nuclear weapons in 1945. </FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">Babies in Fallujah are born without eyes,
or only one eye, or organs outside of their bodies, or no heads or two heads.
The </FONT><FONT color=#000080><SPAN lang=zxx><U><A
href="http://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/20/ten_years_later_us_has_left"><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif">gruesome toll</FONT></A></U></SPAN></FONT><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"> has gone on since 2005 and now nearly ten years later
continues unabated. </FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">The United States is not a signatory of
the Treaty of Rome which established the International Criminal Court. That is
not by accident. Former president George W. Bush, his vice president and all of
his foreign relations and national security team would be in the dock in the
International Criminal Court if it hadn’t been created to punish only Africans.
Bush, Cheney, Rice, Powell and company are easy targets for blame but the
denunciation must go much further. Only two members of congress, Dennis Kucinich
and Ron Paul, ever made an effort to investigate the number of civilian
fatalities in Iraq. No candidate for president or any other high office ever
raised the subject. Newspapers and television networks were eager to curry favor
with the Bush administration and never directed their embedded reporters to say
anything about the war’s toll on civilians.</FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">Now the Bush administration has been out
of power for four years. Newspaper editorial boards no longer have to worry
about them. Most combat troops have left Iraq and reporters have left with them.
What now prevents the </FONT><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><I>New York
Times</I></FONT><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"> from doing a story on the high
rate of cancers and congenital deformities in Fallujah? MSNBC is supposed to be
the Democratic Party’s cable news network. Why haven’t they covered this story?
</FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in" align=center><FONT
color=#2323dc>“<FONT face=Times><FONT size=2><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=3><I>Only two members of congress, Dennis
Kucinich and Ron Paul, ever made an effort to investigate the number of civilian
fatalities in Iraq.”</I></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">The questions are rhetorical. They won’t
do it because they support their government and powerful people more than they
support democracy or our right to know anything important. Democrats are no
better than Republicans because they acted as accessories to their crimes,
supported them outright or are committing some of their
own.</FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT face=Times><FONT
size=2><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif">There are still war criminals and they
aren’t all Congolese or Rwandans. Some of them are Americans. Some are
Republicans while others are Democrats. They are the people who leave office and
go on to make fortunes giving speeches or writing books. They are considered
respectable when they are anything but and if they are constantly allowed to go
unpunished more carnage will surely be the result. </FONT></FONT></FONT></P>
<P style="MARGIN-TOP: 0.06in; MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0in"><FONT color=#280099><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=2><I>Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider
column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a
frequently updated blog as well as at </I></FONT></FONT></FONT><A
href="http://freedomrider.blogspot.com/" target=_blank><FONT color=#0000ff><FONT
face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT
size=2><U>http://freedomrider.blogspot.com.</U></FONT></FONT></FONT></A><FONT
color=#280099><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT size=2>
</FONT></FONT></FONT><FONT color=#280099><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT
size=2><I>Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at
Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgendaReport.com</I></FONT></FONT></FONT><FONT
color=#280099><FONT face="Arial, sans-serif"><FONT
size=2>.</FONT></FONT></FONT></P></DIV></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>