Al-Jazeerah, December 23, 2006

 

On 2 June 2006, PipeLineNews.org published an unsigned, scurrilous article entitled Questions Arise About Haditha Doctor - Wahid al-Obeidi - Central Figure In "Massacre" Case.

This article questioned the account "Dr. Wahid al-Obeidi" had given about being arrested and beaten in Haditha in October 2005. The article then said, “Wahid is associated with the pro-terrorist Brussels Tribunal, a European-based anti-American group which counts among its members Saddam's favorite film maker Scott Ritter and Saddam's defense attorney Ramsey Clark."

Pipeline News has confused and then misused their facts. The name of the Director of the Haditha Hospital is Dr. Walid al-Obeidi. Dr. Walid al-Obeidi is not a member of the BRussells Tribunal. It is Dr. Abdul Wahab Al Obeidi, member of “Freedom Voice Society for Human Rights”, who is on the advisory committee of the BRussells Tribunal.

Why is the (misnamed) Dr. Walid al-Obeidi being slandered? He saw the bullets in the bodies from the Haditha massacre, thus opening up the case against American troops.

Ridley Scott is indeed a film maker. Is PipeLineNews by any chance confusing him with Scott Ritter, who is a former UN weapons inspector and a critic of the US foreign policy in the Middle East? Ramsey Clark has recently written a statement saying that "the case for impeachment is clear beyond question.” Neither Scott Ritter nor Ramsey Clark are members of the BRussells Tribunal.

PipeLineNews has a further story, which it calls “The Haditha Misinformation Dump,” at The Contra Costa Times Watch, which they call their “side project.” This site has links to not only PipeLineNews but also the Middle East Forum, Daniel Pipes and Militant Islam Monitor.

A recent New York Times article gave details of the most recent understanding of the Haditha murders. It was reported by John M. Broder, David S. Cloud, John Kifner, Carolyn Marshall, Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker. It was written by Mr. Broder. See: Contradictions Cloud Inquiry Into 24 Iraqi Deaths

The Chiarelli report on Haditha is complete. We await the findings.

A recent US poll shows that “ nearly one in three of the respondents (32%) said they believe such an incident (Haditha) was a "common one" in that war. Some 57% called it an "isolated incident" and 11% said they are "not sure." This poll shows what a good job the US corporate media blackout and Media Dissemblers are doing in America – and also shows that, unfortunately, not enough people are reading educated, informative stories on the web.

And the BRussells Tribunal?

 

The BRussells Tribunal initiated The World Tribunal on Iraq. The final meeting of the World Tribunal, Iraq, was in Turkey in 2005. “The first task of the tribunal is to investigate the crimes committed by the US government in launching the Iraq war.”¹ The papers given in Istanbul (2005) maintained a very high quality. These papers, and the final declaration of the Jury of Conscience in Istanbul (2005), read by Arundhati Roy, Spokesperson of the Jury of Conscience, can be read here.

Who were / are some of the members of the BRussells Tribunal? In addition to many esteemed Iraqis: two former UN Assistant Secretary Generals; two Nobel Prize winners; seven internationally known writers; human rights and humanitarian lawyers, professors, scientists, journalists and others. Have a look at the full list of members.

What is the BRussells Tribunal now focusing upon? 225 health officials have been murdered in Iraq. There is a “Solidarity call with the plight of Iraqi health workers.” 190 academics have been murdered. There is a call for action to “Save Iraq’s Academics.” You can read more detail about the plight of the Iraqi academics in The Jalilli Report.

Following is the story of an incestuous group and the foundations which collude with them.

 

Noble words, like “democracy”, "liberation", “freedom”, “reform” have been emptied of their true meaning and refilled by the enemies of these concepts. Their counterfeits dominate the news. John Pilger, 'War by Media.'

The Middle East Forum is registered under the name Daniel Pipes, 1500 Walnut St. 1050, Philadelphia, PA., 19102, who is its Director. Sourcewatch has an extensive directory on Pipes. It identifies Pipes as “a neoconservative, orientalist, extreme right-wing Zionist (who) often expresses islamophobic statements.” He holds many key positions. Sourcewatch says that Pipes’ “columns have appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, Commentary, Foreign Affairs, Harper's, National Review, New Republic, Policy Review, FrontPage, Jerusalem Post and The Weekly Standard.”² One (of many) controversial articles which he wrote, Why the Japanese internment still matters, was challenged by historian Juan Cole, presently still a professor at the University of Michigan (see below).

The Middle East Forum 'Mission Statement' says: “The Middle East Forum, a think tank, works to define and promote American interests in the Middle East through research, publications, and educational outreach. The Forum's policy recommendations include fighting radical Islam (rather than terrorism), convincing the Palestinians that Israel is permanent, reducing funds going to the Middle East for energy purchases, slowing down the democratization process, and more robustly asserting U.S. interests vis-à-vis Saudi Arabia. In addition, the Forum works to improve Middle East studies in North America.”

In case the above rhetoric is not clear, here is a clear gvnews-quoted statement by Mr. Pipes which I found in the MediaChannel archives:

"West European societies are unprepared for the massive immigration of brown-skinned peoples cooking strange foods and not exactly maintaining Germanic standards of hygiene."

The Middle East Forum / Daniel Pipes publishes The Middle East Intelligence Bulletin. The MEIB Editor is, according to its website, Gary C. Gambill, who also writes for the Jamestown Foundation. This Foundation is “increasingly linked to neocon-driven institutions and leading figures, including the Center for Security Policy and Freedom House.” Two other Jamestown Foundation writers are also editors of MEIB: Thomas Patrick Carroll, and Robert G. Rabil. Rabil is an adjunct scholar (as is Daniel Pipes) at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy and assistant professor of Middle East studies in Florida Atlantic University’s Department of Political Science. Michael Rubin is also an editorial board member, whom Karen Kwiatkowski called a “minor-league neoconservative … indeed a rookie.”

The Middle East Forum also publishes The Middle East Quarterly. The editor of Middle East Quarterly since 2004 is (again) Michael Rubin. Rubin was a member of the Coalition Provisional Authority (2003-4) in Iraq and a resident scholar at the PNAC-heavy American Enterprise Institute. He denies allegations that he was a member of the Lincoln Group’s Pentagon-sponsored propaganda inside Iraq. Rubin was recently an active opponent to Juan Cole’s appointment at Yale University. Further information on Mr. Rubin can be found on Right Web.

Mr. Rubin is ALSO the editor of Campus Watch. (Daniel Pipes is also the Director and co-founder of Campus Watch.) The box at the top of the Campus Watch website says (in bold type):

"Campus Watch is the Trojan horse whose warriors are already changing the rules of the game not only in Middle East Studies but also in the US University as a whole. They threaten to undermine the very foundations of American education." Miriam Cooke, of Duke University.

The Mission Statement of Campus Watch says, “Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum, reviews and critiques Middle East studies in North America, with an aim to improving them. The project mainly addresses five problems: analytical failures, the mixing of politics with scholarship, intolerance of alternative views, apologetics, and the abuse of power over students. Campus Watch fully respects the freedom of speech of those it debates while insisting on its own freedom to comment on their words and deeds.” There is a survey of 44 ‘institutions’ (colleges / universities) and their scholars. Campus Watch is supported by unspecified ‘donations.’

There have been critics of Campus Watch, and these are answered in “Replies to our Critics,” specifically on the charge of ‘McCarthyism.’

Campus Watch publishes articles that have appeared in PipeLineNews. The unsigned attack on "Dr. Wahid" and the BRussels Tribunal appeared in PipeLineNews.

PipeLineNews is registered as pipebombnews.com. The registrant of this site is named as William Mayer, 2395 Lake Meadow Circle, Martinez, CA 94553, whilst the administrative address given is PIpeLineMedia, Inc.; William Mayer, CEO, 3217 Whipple Road, Union City, CA 94587. If one then looks up PipeLineMedia, a new address appears – 123 K Street, Washington, D.C., alongside the same administrative office address as pipebombnews.

Mr. Mayer published an article, McCarthyism — The Right's Badge of Honor (05.03), in Tysknews.³ Tysknews talks about the owner, or “His Majesty,” as being responsible for the site. “We guarantee no accuracy for our allegations and assume no responsibility.” We are not told who the owner, or ‘His Majesty,’ is. There are three links to R. Reagan sites and one to The Federalist.

Mr. Mayer has also published Some Final Thoughts on the Dubai Ports Deal in the Militant Islam Monitor.

“BR,” or Beila Rabinowitz is the registrant name for Militant Islam Monitor. The address given is a P.O. Box number in Peoria, Illinois 60612.⁴
Daniel Pipes describes what the site is about: "Militant Islam is a Utopian ideology … that attracts only a portion of Muslims, … (and) seeks to gain control of governments, and is nakedly aggressive toward all those who stand in it' (sic) way…”

Beila Rabinowitz collaborated with Mr. Mayer in two PipeLine articles which were republished in Campus-Watch.⁵

Beila Rabinowitz also collaborated with Mr. Mayer in a PipeLineNews story, "Moderate" American Islamism And Terror, Zero Degrees Of Separation (12.12.05. This story was republished on free republic.com. This “Hoo-Yah” site, which describes itself as the “Premier Conservative news Forum”, is privately owned and run by Jim Robinson from Fresno, California. The administrative, technical and billing contact is Robinson-DeFehr Consulting, also in Fresno. Their ‘Mission’ is: “pro-God, pro-life, pro-family, pro-Constitution, pro-Bill of Rights, pro-gun, pro-limited government, pro-private property rights, pro-limited taxes, pro-capitalism, pro-national defense, pro-freedom, and pro-America.” Subscribers are called ‘Freepers.’ A lively essay on Mr. Robinson’s site can be read at Flakmag.

Beila Rabinowitz’s University Of Central Florida Funding Islamist Da'wa Event (08.03.06) was also published in PipeLine News. Rabinowitz’s articles also appear on Discover the Networks (see below). Rabinowitz’s article entitled False Front, co-authored with Joe Kaufman, appeared in FrontPage.org. “Essentially,” they said of Islamic radicals, “they needed to disguise their reality” (my italics). Mr. Kaufman is Chairman of Americans Against Hate. ‘Americans Against Hate’ is “a civil rights organization and terrorism watchdog group.” Their goal is “to be an active voice against those that spread bigotry and violence.” Many articles by Mr. Kaufman can be seen at this site. Mr. Kaufman also contributes to FrontPage Magazine, the Middle East Quarterly, the Des Moines Register, and The Miami Herald. He appears on Fox News.

The FrontPageMagazine is published by David Horowitz. He is the founder of The Center for the Study of Popular Culture. The mission of this organization, according to media transparency, is to "change the leftist, anti-American, elitist culture that is dominant in the entertainment industry [and to expose] the idiocies and the viciousness of the radical leftism in universities, the media, mainstream churches, and everywhere else this modern plague is found."

Horowitz and Peter Collier (see below) "also created a project of the CSPC called the Committee on Media Integrity (COMINT), designed specifically to attack Public Television.”

Recently, according to Media Matters, David Horowitz called Ann Coulter "a national treasure" and stated that the "point" of Coulter's controversial remarks on the widows of the victims of the 9-11 terrorist attacks was "right on the mark." Coulter worked at the Scaife-funded Centre for Individual Rights. Scaife is also a funder for the Center for the Study of Popular Culture (see below).

The senior editor of Front Page is Jacob Laksin, who is also a writer for the Centre for the Study of Popular Culture.

Max Blumenthal wrote in The Demons of David Horowitz that “Since David Horowitz switched his political allegiance from the radical left to the authoritarian right, he has engaged in one embarrassingly paranoid crusade after another. Each one is designed to stifle a liberal conspiracy which exists only in the hollow canyons of his own mind.”

Horowitz also writes for NewsMax, is associated with Campus Watch, and appears on Fox News as an ‘analyst.’

Discover the Networks, which has similar witch-hunts to Campus Watch, was co-founded in 2004 by David Horowitz and Peter Collier. Collier was the founding publisher of Encounter Books. He and
Horowitz co-authored, amongst other books, The Anti-Chomsky Reader. Collier, according to Media Transparency, “now (2005) runs the Bradley-funded Encounter for Culture and Education, which publishes right wing books by people such as William Kristol.”

A ferris wheel of the ‘Networks’ topics is shown, highlighting

1) Issues:
anti-americanism, anti-semitism, globalization, Guantanamo, immigration, Iraq war, Islam and Socialist Left, Patriot Act, treason, etc. This section is essential reading in order to understand the skewed mind-set of Mr. Horowitz and his colleagues.

2) Individuals⁶:
photographs of, amongst others, show: Ramsey Clark, Ted Kennedy, Fidel Castro, N. Chomsky, George Soros, Jesse Jackson, Dan Rather, Jimmy Carter, Erica Jong, etc.⁷ Have a look.

3) Academia:
anti-semitism and left-wing bias in academia, etc.

4) Media: “Conservatives believe the mass media, predominantly television news programs, slant reports in favor of the liberal position on issues. Most Americans agree.”⁸ David Limbaugh wrote an article entitled: MSM Never Tires of Antiwar Propaganda. Glazov penned The Media's Lies About Israel.

5) Funders: “examines the immensely wealthy charitable foundations that provide financial backing for leftist groups and causes.”

Horowitz is the author of Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left, and also of The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America. “His critics have said the book is akin to a McCarthy-like smear campaign” wrote M.B. Marklein.

The above is an abbreviated summary of the large Middle East Forum network. See the full extent of the Daniel Pipes network here.

 

Who is funding these people who talk about “freedom of speech,” the “abuse of power over students” and the “intolerance of alternative views” whilst simultaneously slandering and falsely accusing reputable individuals and organizations? The hierarchy resembles the Sicilian Mafia, who ‘protect their own.’

According to Media Transparency, the following have received money. Details are given below.

The American Enterprise Institute, between 1985 - 2004 received 320 grants totaling $41,547,101. Funders included the following foundations: Lynde and Harry Bradley; Carthage; Castle Rock; Richard and Helen deVos; William Donner; Earhart; F.M. Kirby; Charles G. Koch Charitable; Phillip M. McKenna; John M. Olin; Ruth and Lovett Peters; Randolph; Smith Richardson; Sarah Scaife; William E. Simon and The Walton Family Foundation.

Middle East Forum received seven grants totaling $190,000 between 1996 – 2003 from The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation and The William H. Donner Foundation.

The Centre for Study of Popular Culture received 140 foundation grants, totaling $14,534,000 from the following foundations between 1989 and 2004: W.H. Brady; Lynde and Harry Bradley, Inc.; Gordon and Mary Cain; Castle Rock; William H. Donner; Hickory Foundation; Jacqueline Hume Foundation; John M. Olin, Inc; Randolph, Sarah Scaife (& Allegheny and Carthage); Shelby Collom Foundation.

Encounter for Culture and Education received 85 foundation grants totalling $5,640,000 from 1991 – 2003. Most of these grants were from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation. The Philip M. McKenna Foundation, Inc., the JM Foundation and the Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation gave $18,000 for Encounter Books. The W.H. Brady Foundation gave $2000 for “Project support.” The John M. Olin Foundation, Inc. gave $10,000 for “a research project on the Congress for Cultural Freedom” in 1995 and $50,000 to “support a Berlin conference on the Cold War” in 1992.

The Jamestown Foundation received grants totalling $4,431,613 between 1985 – 2004. These were from The Carthage Foundation; The Smith-Richardson Foundation; The F.M. Kirby Foundation; the Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation; The Earhart Foundation; The Armstrong Foundation; The Sarah Scaife Foundation; The William Donner Foundation.

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy received 8 grants totalling $574,509 between 1991 –2000 from the Sarah Smith Foundation and the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation.

= A total of $66,917.223.


 

The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, Inc. Lynde and Harry Bradley founded the Allen-Bradley Company, which manufactured radio and electronic components. They are the USA’s largest ‘right-wing’ donors with an extensive network. Allen-Bradley sold the company for $1.651billion to Rockwell Int., a defence and aerospace industry, and named the new company Lynne and Harry Bradley Foundation, Inc, which was run by the John M. Olin Foundation (see below). The new president worked for the Institute for Education Affairs⁹, which was started by PNAC and Philanthropy Roundtable member Irving Kristol and William Simon. Simon now heads the Olin Foundation.

Gordon and Mary Cain Foundation. Established 1988, Houston, Texas. “Cain served as a director of Texas Petrochemicals Corporation … chairman of the board of Sterling Chemicals, Inc., Vista Chemical Company, Cain Chemical, Inc., and The Sterling Group; … director for the Cato Institute.”
Not much info.

The Castle Rock Foundation. Created in 1993 from funds originating from the Coors Brewery Company. The Coors family backed ‘the Moral Majority,’ which became The Heritage Foundation.¹⁰

Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation. Started in 1970 by family who founded Amway (cleaning products). H. deVos said, "our biggest priority is to give back to Christian causes.” Bush friend.

The Earhart Foundation. Fortune from White Star Oil Company. Michigan.

Jaquelin Hume Foundation. Fortune from onions and garlic business started in 1933. Founded Citizens for America. “He helped create the highly-developed conservative infrastructure of think tanks, policy institutes, and foundations which perpetuate the right-wing revolution of the 1990s. Member of Reagan’s ‘Kitchen Cabinet.’ Today Hume’s son, William, carries on the family’s political legacy.”

F.M. Kirby Foundation. Fortune made from F.W. Woolworth, Allegheny Corporation, Investors Diversified Services & the Pittston Company. Family still involved.

Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation.¹¹ Founded Koch industries (oil & gas); Charles Koch founded the Cato Institute. David Koch co-founded Citizens for a Sound Economy (CSE).

Philip M. McKenna Foundation
No known website. Founded by Pennsylvania steel industry; made fortune in WW II.

Olin Foundation.
Financed by chemical and munitions fortune. Also funded Heritage Foundation, Manhattan Institute for Public Policy Research and other ‘conservative advocacy’ groups. Now closed.

Randolph Foundation New York. Complicated trust manoevering. President: Heather Richardson Higgins. She is also a member of the board of overseers of the Hoover Institution and the Independent Women’s Forum. Next to zero information.

Ruth and Lovett Peters Foundation
Lovett Peters founded the Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research (Boston) in 1988. Daniel Peters is Chairman of The Philanthropy Roundtable and was formerly an executive with Proctor and Gamble. Unclear where fortune was made. Little info.

Sarah Scaife Foundation includes the Allegheny & Carthage Foundations. Financed from the Mellon oil, banking and industrial fortune.

Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation, New York. Established 1962. He was chairman of the oldest and largest investment firm specializing in insurance securities. 1969 – 1975 US Ambassador to Switzerland. Was on board of Heritage Foundation. No known website.

Smith Richardson Foundation. Fortune from Vicks Vapour Rub. Westport, Connecticut.

William E. Simon, Nixon’s Treasury Secretary; was President of Olin Foundation (1992); founded, with Irving Kristol, the Institute for Educational Affairs. Director Kissinger Associates; Director Xerox. Not much info on where the original money actually came from. D. 2000. Son is now co-chairman with investments in oil and offshore drilling.

Walton Family Foundation. Fortune from Walmart, founded by Sam Walton. His wife, Helen, and daughter Alice are reportedly the two richest women in the world.

William H. Donner Foundation. First established in 1932. Donner “invested in real estate, founded the National Tin Plate Company, co-founded (with Mellon) Union Steel, and established the International Cancer Research Foundation.” The Donner family is still active.

 

Footnotes

[1] There have been many articles on the illegality of the US/UK’s war on terror in Iraq. Here is a recent one: Haditha, Bush and Nuremburg’s law.
[2] The Weekly Standard is edited by the Chairman of PNAC, William Kristol.
[3] No information on owner of Tysknews. The administrative, technical and registrant contact is David Holtzinger, 913 S. Dogwood Rd.,Walnutport, PA 18088: webmaster@tysknews.com
[4] registry data; also: Arin and Ripe IP 216.92.146.244, Pennsylvania – Pittsburg.”
[5] See: The Catholic Theological Union And The Limits Of Understanding; (28.06.04) and University of Central Florida Slated To Become Cultural Jihad Hub (10.03.06).
[6] Hilary Clinton is included in this group, which is commensurate with calling Prime Minister Blair a Labour Party spokesperson. Mr. Blair’s politics are to the‘right’ of the UK conservative party.
[7] See the American Library Association: Authors whose works have been challenged or even banned in the USA include the authors J.D. Salinger, Mark Twain, John Steinbeck, Toni Morrison. Maya Angelou, Roald Dahl, Stephen King, J.K. Rowling, Maurice Sendak, “People continue to attempt—to suppress anything that conflicts with or anyone who disagrees with their own beliefs." See the 1st Amendment of the American Constitution. See also: But Which Books Are Suspicious?
[8] See Propaganda and Haditha by Dahr Jamail.
[9] 31 grants from 1985 – 2002 totalling $1,677,293.
[10] The Heritage Foundation has received $555,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998.
[11] “In writing … papers and making … appearances, individuals associated with these organizations often conveniently decline to acknowledge the substantial funding they receive from Koch and other corporations ... By withholding such information, they are able to front as unbiased the public-minded associations promoting rigorous scientific research and economic autonomy, when, in fact, the individuals are mere mouthpieces for industries like that of the Koch brothers.” From Axis of Ideology, NCRP, 2004


 

There you have it. One brave, beleaguered Iraqi doctor in an illegally occupied war-torn country vs. the ‘perception management’ of media dissemblers, or ‘worker bees,’ who are backed by the $66+million taken from the corporate empire profits of banking, oil, gas, steel, beer, onions and garlic, electronics, chemicals, munitions, real estate, insurance, Walmart, and a drizzle of 21st century “Christianity.” The Directors and Chairpeople of these Foundations, Corporations and Institutes could well benefit from an ‘ethics training’ course alongside the soldiers and mercenaries who murder civilians.

 

 

16.12.04. TomDispatch.com Michael Massing on Iraq coverage and the election.

22.06.06. Yahoo news. ACLU seeks disclosure of Pentagon files on Haditha.

13.07.06. New York Review of Books. Letter by Daniel Pipes; reply by Michael Massing. Campus Watch.

07.07.06. CBS. An investigation into the cover-up of the alleged murder of 24 Iraqi civilians in the town of Haditha last November concludes Marine officers at every level up to and including the colonel who commanded the regiment failed to investigate inaccurate and conflicting reports of how the civilians were killed. Haditha Probe Reveals 'Red Flags.'

08.07.06. Schmitt / Cloud, NY Times. General Faults Marine Response to Iraq Killings.

10.07.06. Media transparency. Center for the Study of Popular Culture becomes David Horowitz Freedom Center

25.07.06. J. Cook, Dissident Voice. "This week I had the pleasure to appear on American radio, on the Laura Ingraham show, pitted against David Horowitz, a “Semite supremacist” who most recently made his name under the banner of Campus Watch, leading McCarthyite witch hunts against American professors who have the impertinence to suggest that maybe, just maybe, Arabs have minds and feelings like the rest of us." Five Myths that Sanction Israel’s War Crimes.

02.08.06.AP. Source: Haditha evidence implicates marines.

Inquiry Suggests Marines Excised Files on Killings.
18.08.06. D.Cloud, NY Times / uruknet.

"Fascism" Frame Set Up by Right-Wing Press
09.01.06. IPS / ICH. “The aggressive new campaign by the administration of President George W. Bush to depict U.S. foes in the Middle East as "fascists" and its domestic critics as "appeasers" owes a great deal to steadily intensifying efforts by the right-wing press over the past several months to draw the same comparison.”

Rules of engagement: What were they at Haditha?
10.10.06. R. Whittle, CS Monitor. If marines are charged with killing as many as 24 Iraqi civilians, defense lawyers will argue the soldiers followed the rules.

How the Israeli lobby uses intimidation to prevent academic freedom in the U.S.
11.11.06. Video. At Columbia, the professors in the Middle East department believe there's a civil war under way for the hearts and minds of Americans. Discussion on the watchdog, Campus Watch.
 

Haditha 'massacre' - one year on
19.11.06. D. Loyn, BBC. Women and children died in the attack in Haditha. The anniversary of the killings in Haditha - the worst single massacre of Iraqis attributed to US troops - could not have come at a worse time for the US forces, with other cases now reaching conclusions in the courts, including one that ended in a life sentence.

Marines likely to face charges in Haditha killings, congressman says
06.12.06. Financial Times. A congressman said Wednesday that about six Marines would be charged in the killing of 24 civilians, many of them women and children, last year in the Iraqi town of Haditha.

U.S., Iraqi troops seal off Haditha - residents
08.12.06. Reuters. ‘The U.S. military said troops were manning checkpoints and building a sand berm to crack down on insurgents in Haditha and in neighbouring Barwana. It said U.S. troops were protecting "the population and good citizens of Haditha".

But residents in Haditha, which is at the centre of a U.S. military investigation into the deaths of two dozen civilians in November 2005 by U.S. Marines, said electricity has been cut off and that no food is being allowed into the city, they said.’

Marine To Be Charged in Haditha Case
18.12.06. AP / Yahoo news.

U.S. military to announce Haditha charges Thursday
18.12.06. Reuters. The U.S. military plans to charge Marines in the killing of 24 civilians in Haditha, Iraq, on Thursday, according to sources familiar with the case. The November 2005 killings, which enraged Iraqis, are one of a series of cases in which U.S. service members have been accused, and some convicted, of being involved in killing Iraqi civilians. The charges in the Haditha case could include murder and are expected against at least five Marines, defense officials said.

Iraqi Girl tells of US Attack in Haditha.
30.05.06. ITV/ICH.

Iraqis: Marines in Haditha case should be tried in Iraq
21.12.06. USA Today.

Haditha Residents on Charged Marines: Let Us Have Them
22.12.06. NY Times. Dr. Waleed Al-Obeidi, 41, the director-general of Haditha hospital said: “If they plan to implement justice, then we welcome this step to refer the eight marines to the court, but we have our doubts in American justice. The verdict will be life sentences for four of them and the other four will be released, according to what we heard in the media. They blamed one soldier in the killing of a whole family, while it was carnage. The Iraqi government should have summoned those soldiers and executed them.” (cont …)

Human Rights Advocates Not Satisfied with Haditha Charges
22.12.06. A. Glantz. “"Not one of the victims' families is represented," he added. "No lawyer from the victims' families is represented. So you can see the basic idea of justice and fairness is actually not available."

Dr. Salam Ismael says many Iraqis would like to see the American soldiers brought to trial in Iraqi courts--a position shared by the country's elected prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, who has demanded an end to the immunity U.S. soldiers currently enjoy under Iraqi law.

"Why are you afraid of being ruled by the law of the country that you're supposedly trying to liberate?" he asked rhetorically. "That's the question--it's a simple question I would like to ask the American people."

International human rights groups have a different concern. They note that since the September 11th attacks five years ago, no officer above the rank of major has been charged in connection with torture or the abuse of detainees in U.S. custody.”

Four US marines charged with Iraq murders
22.12.06. S. Goldenerg, Guardian. · Eight face life sentence over Haditha killings · Court hearing follows admission of cover-up.

Haditha Investigation Finds Military Press Reports Inaccurate
22.12.06. KPBS. ‘A nine month military investigation into what actually happened in Haditha in November 2005 concludes the original military press reports on the event were not true. ‘

When the Press Dropped the Ball on Haditha
22.12.06. G. Mitchell, Editor and Publisher.

RAPID RESPONSE MEDIA ALERT: THE LIBERATED AND THE DEAD
22.12.06. Media Lens. The BBC On The Haditha Massacre


PIPELINE NEWS SHOULD APOLOGISE TO THE BRUSSELS TRIBUNAL, THE DOCTOR IN HADITHA AND TO THEIR READERS FOR THEIR MISLEADING PROPAGANDA.



This article was originally published by the BRussells Tribunal. The url is: http://www.brusselstribunal.org/HadithaDoctor.htm

The url of The Haditha Doctor and The Media Dissemblers is http://indexresearch.blogspot.com/2006/06/haditha-doctor-and-media-dissemblers.html


Sarah Meyer is a researcher living in Sussex, UK.