Senator Dick Durbin (D. IL) held his subcommittee hearing on the effects the drone strikes are having in areas like Yeman and Pakistan on Tuesday. Here's a summary:
http://www.rollingstone.com/...
Farea al-Muslimi, a Yemeni activist and journalist whose village was bombed last week, was one of six witnesses who testified before a Senate subcommittee on Tuesday afternoon about the effects and consequences of the Obama administration's drone and killing program in Yemen, Pakistan and elsewhere. The other witnesses included lawyers, journalists and former members of the military, many of whom were bothered by the program's secrecy. Despite recent pledges by President Obama to increase transparency in how the government kills those it suspects of terrorism, the White House declined to send a representative to the hearing – the first on this topic in the Senate. The administration also failed to appear before a similar House panel in February.
The most significant aspect of the hearing, held by the Senate Judiciary's subcommittee on the Constitution, was al-Muslimi's testimony – a rare first-hand account of the destruction that the killing program wreaks on the areas targeted by the United States. He described a recent strike on his village that killed five suspected members of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), but also "terrified the region's poor farmers."
Al-Muslimi argued that the purported target of the strike, Hamid al-Radmi, who allegedly had ties to AQAP, was a well-known figure who could have easily been apprehended. "The Yemeni government could easily have found and arrested him," al-Muslimi said in his opening remarks. "Even the local government could have captured him if the U.S. had told them to do so." - Rolling Stone Magazine, 4/24/13
Senator Durbin chastised the Obama Administration for not participating in the Senate hearing:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
The Obama administration failed to participate in the Senate's first hearing Tuesday on the use of drones for targeted killings, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said.
"I am disappointed that the administration declined to provide witnesses to testify at today’s hearings," Durbin said at the hearing, held before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights.
Durbin, who heads the subcommittee, said "more transparency is needed to maintain the support of the American people and the international community." He called on the White House to provide further details on the assessment of "its legal authority to engage in targeted killings and the internal checks and balances involved in U.S. drone strikes."
The administration's refusal to participate comes just a few months after President Barack Obama pledged greater transparency on his targeted killing program during his 2013 State of the Union address. - Huffington Post, 4/23/13
At the hearing, al-Muslimi stated that the drone attacks are causing anti-American sentiment:
http://www.theverge.com/...
"The drone strike and its impact tore my heart, much as the tragic bombings in Boston last week tore your hearts and also mine," said Muslimi to the bipartisan panel of US Senators, which included committee chair Dick Durbin (D-IL), Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Al Franken (D-MN). The strike killed six people including its intended target, Hamid Radman al Manea, a local man suspected to have ties with Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Penninsula (AQAP). Muslimi was not an eyewitness to the strike, but he claims that the man was well-known around his home town and could have easily been arrested by local authorities — seemingly at odds with the US government's legal position that drone strikes are only justified when capture is "unfeasible."
"I was torn between the great country that I know and love and the drone above my head that could not differentiate between me and some AQAP militant," Muslimi continued, recalling his time going to school in America. "That feeling, multiplied by the highest number mathematicians have, gripped me when my village was droned just days ago. It is the worst feeling I have ever had."
Muslimi described his experience living in America as having changed his life, and has spoke highly of the US to his fellow Yemenis ever since his return. "Now, however, when they think of America, they think of the terror they feel from the drones that hover over their heads, ready to fire missiles at any time," he said, describing the anger he has seen play into the hands of terrorist recruiters. "What the violent militants previously failed to achieve, one drone strike accomplished in an instant... This is not an isolated instance. Drone strikes are the face of America to many Yemenis." - The Verge, 4/24/13
al-Muslimi wasn't the only one to testify before the subcommittee:
http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/...
Alongside al-Muslimi, the committee heard from the Pentagon’s former number two General James Cartwright, from constitutional lawyers, and from the casualty-counting organisation New America Foundation.
Witnesses all expressed reservations about the current drone programme, and several voiced concerns at the prospect of other nations embarking on targeted killing programmes of their own.
Retired US Air Force colonel Martha McSally said oversight of targeted killing needed to be ‘tightened up’ and added: ‘There has been, I think, way too much vagueness and lack of clarity even in the information that’s come out of the chain of command relating to their legal argument and their strategy on that matter.’
But drones allowed more ‘oversight and precision’, and were more efficient than capture missions, she added, which could also risk civilian lives and took longer.
General Cartwright, the former deputy Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the committee, chaired by Senator Dick Durbin, that he feared the US had ‘ceded the moral authority’ through its use of drones, while law professor Rosa Brooks warned the ‘squishy’ definition of what constitutes official armed combat meant the US’s justification for targeted killing was ‘infinitely malleable’.
The hearing follows a row between Congress and the government over the government’s initial refusal to reveal its legal justifications for targeted killing to members of the Intelligence committee, even though the committee is responsible for overseeing the CIA’s activities. The issue threatened to dominate Brennan’s nomination hearings as CIA director. Durbin indicated in yesterday’s session that further government hearings are a possibility. - The Bureau Of Investigative Journalism, 4/24/13
While Durbin stated that more drone hearings might be scheduled in the upcoming future, al-Muslimi has vowed to continue his fight against drones:
http://www.independent.co.uk/...
Farea Al-Muslimi stole the show when he appeared at a hearing in Washington this week on the fall-out from American drone strikes. But while he has welcomed the attention, he conceded that his campaign to force a re-examination of the use of unmanned aircraft has barely begun.
“Everyone was telling me that I should celebrate. I told them I am not celebrating. The battle is not over; this is just the first step,” Mr Muslimi, 23, told The Independent in a telephone interview from Washington where on Tuesday he told a Senate sub-committee that his own village of Wessab, south of the Yemeni capital of Sanaa, had been devastated by a US drone days earlier. - The Independent, 4/24/13
And I just found out that the White House wants to meet with al-Muslimi:
http://www.dailynewscrunch.com/...
Powerful Americans are beginning to listen to Farea al-Muslimi, a 23-year old, California-educated Yemeni who wants to stop the drone strikes in his country. on Friday, al-Muslimi will meet with White House officials to tell them what he told a Senate subcommittee yesterday: CIA and military drone strikes are strengthening al-Qaidas Yemeni affiliate and making average Yemenis hate America.
He will meet with a working-level expert on Yemen policy, a White House official confirms, declining to provide the name of the official or the time of the meeting. It was a taboo, al-Muslimi says, like if youre talking in a conservative society about sex. - Daily News Crunch, 4/24/13
If you want to learn more about drone technology and how to get active in the movement to monitor and regulate drones, check out Drone Watch:
http://droneswatch.org/
And please contact Senator Durbin and demand that not only more drone hearings be conducted but action be taken in the House and Senate do more about drone strikes:
(202) 224-2152