ANTI-AMERICAN HATE RISING
U.S. CREDIBILITY FREE FALLING
" 'Why are people attacking the Americans? Because of
the Palestinian issue, the Americans' policy of supporting
Israel, the sanctions,' he said, referring to the
U.N. economic sanctions imposed after the first gulf war. "
MID-EAST REALITIES - MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington - 2 December 2003: It's not possible any longer to believe either the American President or the American military. There have been so many lies and distortions that the presumption is now against the veracity of anything the Americans say, not to mention what they actually do. And this basic rule applies to American diplomacy as well. Colin Powell may smile a better smile; but he is a major part of the deception team. Be the subject 'weapons of mass destruction', al-Qaida, or the 'peace process'...the presumption of lies and deception now hangs over everything the U.S. government, and those associated with it, says and does...with still growing and ominous implications for the future.
US Kills Many More Iraqi Civilians...Claiming Otherwise
Iraqis dispute claim of 54 killed
Townspeople say only 9 died, mostly noncombatants
Vivienne Walt, Chronicle Foreign Service
Tuesday, December 2, 2003
Samarra, Iraq -- U.S. commanders said Monday they had killed up to 54 insurgents in the fiercest battle since Saddam Hussein's government fell nearly eight months ago, but townspeople disputed that claim, saying only about nine Iraqis were killed in the battle Sunday, most of them noncombatants.
Military officials said the simultaneous attacks against two convoys of Bradley fighting vehicles in this city about 70 miles north of Baghdad were a highly synchronized operation involving heavy munitions and requiring precise knowledge of the American convoys' schedules.
"This was a coordinated effort,'' said Col. Frederick Rudesheim, commander of the 4th Infantry Division's 3rd Brigade, whose tanks drove into two ambushes as they escorted trucks carrying large amounts of the new Iraqi currency to branches of the Radifan Bank on opposite ends of town. He said 30 to 40 insurgents attacked each convoy. "There was a concerted effort by the enemy to deal a significant blow to coalition forces," Rudesheim added.
But with Samarra's hospital still filled with casualties, residents told a starkly different story. In a mix of rage and grief, residents lashed out at the brigade's soldiers for firing randomly into crowded market areas in the center of the city, killing civilians, including two Iranians believed to be pilgrims visiting a Shiite mosque in town.
"All the people in town today are asking for revenge," said Majid Fadel al-Samarai, 50, an emergency-room worker at the Samarra General Hospital who said he counted nine dead people at the hospital on Sunday. "They want to kill the Americans like they killed our civilians. Give me a gun, and I will also fight."
Rudesheim told reporters Americans shot only at those who had fired on soldiers. He said the military had calculated deaths "as best as we could," using reports from field commanders immediately after the firefights. Each death was cross-checked with a second soldier, said Capt. Andrew Deponai of the 3rd Brigade's Combat Team.
Residents said American soldiers showed little regard for the safety of civilians during the gunbattle.
"I saw a man running across the street to get his small son, who was stuck in the middle," said Abdul Satar, 47, who owns a bakery a block from one of the two banks to which the convoys had driven. "So the Americans shot the man," he said.
In a house on the outskirts of Samarra, Abir Mohammed Al-Khayat, 28, said a rocket hit the minibus in which she and several others had commuted from their jobs at a local pharmaceuticals factory. "There were about 20 of us, men and women," she said, cradling her arm, injured by shrapnel, in a sling.
At the hospital, several patients said they were injured when a shell, apparently fired from an attack helicopter, struck a mosque at about 5 p.m., when residents were converging for evening prayers.
In the corner bed of one ward lay Ali al-Tashi, a 9-year-old boy who had gone to the mosque Sunday night to pray with his father. Heavily bandaged, the boy sobbed in pain and confusion. His older brother, Grimian, 17, clutched his hand and tried to comfort him.
"He still does not know that our father has been killed," Grimian said. "All our brothers and sisters and our mother have gone up north, to Irbil, to bury him."
In the hospital's morgue, two people killed by bullets lay on metal shelves: a rail-thin man who seemed to be in his 60s, and a middle-aged woman dressed in a black religious robe. Hospital staffers said they found Iranian passports on the two bodies. Many Iranian pilgrims visit the shrine of Mahdi, an imam revered by Shiite Muslims, in the city.
But Samarra is now dominated by Sunni Muslims and is a longtime stronghold of Hussein supporters.
U.S. military officers said Sunday that all those killed were members of Fedayeen Saddam, the most ruthless fighting force Hussein possessed before the war. By Monday, however, they said that was no longer clear.
"We have not established a definitive link between these enemy and a specific organization," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt told reporters in Baghdad. He said some were wearing black uniforms, suggesting Fedayeen membership.
Still, anti-American feeling runs strong in Samarra. Near the site of Sunday's battle, Salem al-Rathmani, sported an olive-green Iraqi army uniform and officer's winter jacket - garb not seen since the U.S. victory in April -- and denounced the U.S. presence in terms that evoked prewar rhetoric.
"Why are people attacking the Americans? Because of the Palestinian issue, the Americans' policy of supporting Israel, the sanctions," he said, referring to the U.N. economic sanctions imposed after the first gulf war.
The crowd around al-Rathmani, who said he was a businessman in "construction and tourism,'' listened quietly until he mentioned dragnets conducted by U.S. soldiers in Samarra. The Americans took 80 prisoners last week, members of the crowd shouted, and even captured local leaders of the Islamic Labor Party, which is represented on the Iraqi Governing Council. "Why are they capturing a lot of people without real charges?" they demanded.
On Monday, American forces leveled trees on the median of the highway in an attempt to clear hiding places from which insurgents could attack convoys. Rudesheim said two previous currency deliveries had been attacked, so the soldiers were prepared for the ambush. He gave no further information on the earlier attacks.
Soldiers from the ambushed convoys said the fighters lay in wait as the tanks entered the city and moved through the narrow streets toward the banks. With checkered headscarves covering their faces, they waited on rooftops and in alleyways, armed with rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and Kalashnikov rifles. As the convoys reached their destinations at the same moment, two separate battles erupted.
"There were people on the roofs, sneaking around corners with RPGs (rocket-propelled grenades), mortars, firing in all directions," said Sgt. 1st Class Alvin Ware, 34, of Harker Heights, Texas. "They were coming in from the alleyways, firing AK-47s. I haven't seen anything like this since I served in the gulf war in 1991."
Deponai, of the brigade's Combat Team, described the fight as "touch-and-go for a while." In the end, however, he said, "We had overwhelming firepower on our tanks."
Sunday's battle was a bloody end to the deadliest month since U.S. forces invaded Iraq on March 20. At least 104 soldiers were killed in November, including 79 Americans.
Insurgents struck again Monday, killing a U.S. soldier in an attack on a convoy near Habbaniya, 50 miles west of Baghdad.
The violence last month also took a toll on other members of the U.S.-led coalition, both military and civilian, and Iraqi allies. At least 16 Italians, seven Spaniards, two Japanese and two South Koreans were killed in the past few weeks, and about 32 Iraqi police, judges and local council members were killed.
Chronicle staff writer Robert Collier contributed to this report.
URL: sfgate.com/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2003/12/02/IRAQ.TMP
------------------------------------------------------------------------
To receive MER regularly and free click here
------------------------------------------------------------------------
To receive MER free and easy email MERList@MiddleEast.Org with subject SUBSCRIBE
Comment on this and other MER Articles in the MER FORUM
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 2003 Mid-East Realities, All rights reserved To unsubscribe from MER |
