Think what you will about the Middle East crisis, it's taken the carnage and madness in Iraq and Afghanistan off the radar for most Americans, and that has to be a HUGE relief to the Bush administration, which also must be lovin' -- make that, high-fivin' each other -- over the CNN footage today of their reawakened base constituency, those huge congregations of U.S. Christians, gathering in their churches to show their support for Israel. (
See also: "
Evangelical Christians swarm the U.S. Capitol in support of Israel.")
But, now and then the past couple weeks, I stumble across stories on Iraq, where every day an average 100 Iraqis are being killed ("Some 3,149 people were killed in June alone ... and totalled 5,818 in May and June"), where every day an average of 90 new widows are made (and reportedly some are turning to prostitution to support their children), and where women's rights are being compromised.
In Iraq, where, after his desperate family paid a $30,000 ransom to kidnappers, a
12-year-old boy's body was found in a plastic bag: "
The boy had been sexually assaulted by the kidnappers, before being hanged by his own clothing."
More news on Iraq:
- From Patrick Lang's July 21 op-ed, "The vulnerable line of supply to US troops in Iraq," for the Christian Science Monitor:
American forces in Iraq are in danger of having their line of supply cut by guerrillas. Napoleon once said that "an army travels on its stomach." By that he meant that the problem of keeping an army supplied is the prerequisite for the very existence of the force.
A 21st-century military force "burns up" a tremendous volume of expendable supplies and continuously needs repairs to equipment as well as medical treatment. Without a plentiful and dependable source of fuel, food, and ammunition, a military force falters. First it stops moving, then it begins to starve, and eventually it becomes unable to resist the enemy.
- From "100 Iraqis being killed each day, says UN," in The Independent: "In the first six months of the year the number of Iraqi civilians dying violently rose by 77 per cent."
Many Iraqis have fled the country, mostly to Jordan and Syria, to avoid the violence. Syria now has 351,000 and Jordan 450,000 of these refugees, including 40 per cent of all Iraqi professionals, according to the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants ... [...]
Medical care for the wounded is declining because so many doctors have left the country. The ministry says 106 doctors and 164 nurses have been killed.
Doctors in Baghdad hospitals complain that even the operating theatres are not safe because soldiers or militiamen will order them to stop an operation half way through.
CAPTION:
Iraqis gather around a U.S soldier visiting their refugee camp for displaced Sunnis in Baghdad July 22, 2006. Raging sectarian bloodshed has forced a sharp increase in the number of Iraqis fleeing their homes this month, the Migration Ministry said calling it a 'dangerous' rise of about 32,000 refugees in three weeks to about 162,000.
REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani (IRAQ)
- From "The morgue is full," PBS Newshour, July 20, interview of the Los Angeles Times's Borzou Daragahi:
And I was [at Baghdad's Yarmuk Hospital], sitting there when they were saying, "We can't take any more bodies. The morgue is full. We've already had too many people who've been shot dead today." The morgue had a capacity of about 100, and they were saying, "We can't take any more. Send them somewhere else." [...]
[I]t's been a very, very bloody time at this point in Iraq, starting with a couple of bombings of mosques in one particular neighborhood; followed by a massacre, really, of Sunni Arabs in that neighborhood; basically gunmen sealing off the neighborhood, going house-to-house looking for Sunnis, and taking them out and shooting them, you know; followed a sort of period of bombings and shootings; and then punctuated by a really horrific scene in the town of Mahmoudiya, just south of Baghdad, where a bunch of apparent Sunni gunmen stormed a village with high-caliber weapons and started opening fire on people, running and screaming women and children included, mowing them down in the streets, essentially.
The next morning there was a huge car bombing of a little marketplace where day-laborers were gathered. Apparently, the driver of the suicide vehicle started enticing the people over with the promise of work, saying, "I have day labor for you." They came over, and he blew up the car ... [...]
RAY SUAREZ: In the meanwhile, are people in effect voting with their feet, going to other parts of the country where they can be with people of their own communities and maybe out of the line of fire?
BORZOU DARAGAHI: Ray, it's really horrible, and I think the full extent of the problem has not yet been fully documented. But just about everywhere you go and everyone you talk to, there's talk of displacement; people moving out of the country; people moving to another neighborhood; people moving with relatives in the countryside; and, you know, people moving to tribal areas where they feel more at home than mixed parts of the country.
That's happening on a massive scale. The International Organization for Migration is trying to document it. It seems to only document the cases where people show up in camps. I think there's a lot more of that phenomenon that's hidden.
CAPTION:
An Iraqi policeman walks past bodies of civilians at a morgue in Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) northeast of Baghdad July 22, 2006. Four policemen and three civilians were killed when a roadside bomb went off in a local market in Baquba, police sources said.
REUTERS/HELMIY AL AZAWI (IRAQ)
- From "U.S. moving more troops into Baghdad," Yahoo/A.P., July 22:
The deteriorating security situation -- especially in Baghdad -- has alarmed U.S. officials, who had hoped that the new national unity government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki would be able to ease tensions so that the U.S. and its international partners could begin removing troops this year.
But the situation has gotten worse since al-Maliki took office May 20. Security is likely to top the agenda when al-Maliki visits the White House this coming week. Al-Maliki also said Saturday he will urge U.S. officials to work for a cease-fire in Lebanon, saying Israel's "hostile acts" adversely affect the entire Middle East.
The U.S. command had drawn up plans to reduce the number of U.S. combat brigades in Iraq from 14 to 12 by September. But that plan has been shelved because of the security crisis in the capital. A senior U.S. defense official said the Pentagon was moving ahead with scheduled deployments to Iraq next month and was moving one battalion to Baghdad from Kuwait. [...]
Baghdad recorded an average of 34 major bombings and shootings for the week ending July 13, the U.S. military said. That was up 40 percent from the previous period last month.
(Emphases mine.)
NOTE: On July 15, Larry Johnson posted a great piece on the Iraqi crisis: "The Collapse of Baghdad."
And Afghanistan?
Afghanistan close to anarchy, warns general (The Guardian, July 22, via Raw Story)
- Nato commander's view in stark contrast to ministers'
- Forces short of equipment and 'running out of time'
The most senior British military commander in Afghanistan yesterday described the situation in the country as "close to anarchy" with feuding foreign agencies and unethical private security companies compounding problems caused by local corruption.
The stark warning came from Lieutenant General David Richards, head of Nato's international security force in Afghanistan, who warned that western forces there were short of equipment and were "running out of time" if they were going to meet the expectations of the Afghan people.
The assumption within Nato countries had been that the environment in Afghanistan after the defeat of the Taliban in 2002 would be benign, Gen Richards said. "That is clearly not the case," he said yesterday. He referred to disputes between tribes crossing the border with Pakistan, and divisions between religious and secular factions cynically manipulated by "anarcho-warlords". ...
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A variation of this was posted at No Quarter.
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