The Death of Fallujah

[ruthie]

up to 16...wonder when the count will accurate.

[Rat Faced]

2 Helicopters down now..

[hobbes]

People are dying in battle?

I've never heard of such a thing!

Will there be more?

[bryanskrantz]

first of all I don't belive they should've went to Iraq in the first place. Bush's father believed that if they did exactly what GW has done there would be civil war so he stopped sadaam's military power and his economic power. he did not want to risk the civil war thats happining now. I also belive that with this war its going to make America's foreign relations even worse. I understand he wanted saddam out of power but what I don't understand is how ANYONE can just say this is a freedom war. NOT an occupation is beyond me.

[ruthie]

We read this blog alot. Riverbend writes it, and it gives you a different perspective.
Here is an entry from her blog. the blog is called Baghdad Burning.

Saturday, November 13, 2004

Murder...
People in Falloojeh are being murdered. The stories coming back are horrifying. People being shot in cold blood in the streets and being buried under tons of concrete and iron... where is the world? Bury Arafat and hurry up and pay attention to what's happening in Iraq.

They say the people have nothing to eat. No produce is going into the city and the water has been cut off for days and days. Do you know what it's like to have no clean water??? People are drinking contaminated water and coming down with diarrhoea and other diseases. There are corpses in the street because no one can risk leaving their home to bury people. Families are burying children and parents in the gardens of their homes. WHERE IS EVERYONE???

Furthermore, where is Sistani? Why isn't he saying anything about the situation? When the South was being attacked, Sunni clerics everywhere decried the attacks. Where is Sistani now, when people are looking to him for some reaction? The silence is deafening.

We're not leaving the house lately. There was a total of 8 hours of electricity today and we've been using the generator sparingly because there is a mysterious fuel shortage... several explosions were heard in different places.

Things are deteriorating swiftly.

More on Falloojeh crisis here:

Aid agencies say Falluja "big disaster"...
Eyewitness: Smoke and Corpses...

Iraqis will never forgive this- never. It's outrageous- it's genocide and America, with the help and support of Allawi, is responsible. May whoever contributes to this see the sorrow, terror and misery of the people suffering in Falloojeh.


- posted by river @ 1:30 AM

[DanB]

I've read that blog for quite a while now too

[Biggles]

Whilst the shooting of wounded and immobile enemy is not a new a thing it does not make for edifying TV. Quite why the US Marines thought this would make good Newsreel for the embedded reporters is quite beyond me. However, it is now out there and is no doubt getting extensive re-plays on Arabic news channels.

I rather though the idea of going into Falujah was to reduce the insurgent threat not increase it.

It is also remarkable, considering there was a ring of steel around the place for weeks, how many insurgents seem to have slipped out.

I believe Rumsfeld promised that as soon as the fighting was over a huge rebuilding task would be initiated to win over the hearts and minds of the locals (and give them somewhere to live) it will be interesting to see if this happens as little has been achieved to date elsewhere.

[ruthie]

This is from swissinfo.org

U.S. stops aid convoy entering Falluja today

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - An Iraqi Red Crescent aid convoy waiting at the edge of Falluja will not be allowed to enter the city centre on
Sunday, a U.S. Marine officer says.

"They will not be allowed to cross the bridge today," Captain Adam Collier told Reuters at Falluja hospital, where the convoy is waiting to
cross the Euphrates river into the main part of the embattled Iraqi city. He cited security reasons.

The Iraqi Red Crescent sent seven trucks and ambulances to Falluja on Saturday, hoping to get food, blankets, water purification tables and
medicine to hundreds of families trapped inside the city during the past six days of fighting.

To enter the city proper, the convoy will have to pass over one of two bridges spanning the Euphrates. U.S. forces have said that those
bridges remain unsafe, even though the military has said it has taken almost full control of Falluja.

"We don't know when the bridge will be open for civilian traffic," Collier said.

Red Crescent officials, who are also trying to get aid to thousands of families who fled Falluja ahead of the offensive and are now sheltering
in nearby towns and villages, said they would wait in Falluja's hospital until they can go in.

"We will wait for permission and we will stay here tonight," Jamal al-Karbouli, the leader of the convoy, said.

Those trapped inside the city, whose population was put at about 300,000 before the offensive but has fallen to around 60,000 according to
some estimates, say they are reaching a point of desperation.

"Our situation is very hard," said one resident contacted by telephone in the central Hay al-Dubat neighbourhood. "We don't have food or
water. My seven children all have severe diarrhoea.

[hobbes]

It is a really tough situation all around.

Women and children can't leave because they would be shot by the insurgents. After all, they are their best shields.

Men cannot leave because if the insurgents don't kill them, the marines will.

Food and water could be delivered, but who do you think would get it?

[ruthie]

This is difficult to write, as I don't know where to really begin, and words cannot express what I feel in my heart...other then my heart bleeds for Iraq. Today, the news was a Marine shot a wounded Iraqi in the head. I guess Bush isn't worried since he is appointing Gonzales to the post of Attorney General...you know, the man who said the Geneva Convention was pretty much irrelevant. There are reports of dead civilians all over Fallujah, unable to be buried. Why? When people try to retrieve the bodies, they are shot at. There have been burials in yards. There have been reports of dogs eating the bodies of the dead. The US refuses to let aid trucks into Fallujah. They need food, water, and medical help, which is all being denied. In fact, the US military says there is no need for aid..there aren't any civilians in Fallujah. I guess that's because so many of them have been killed. It is incomprehensible to me that these blatant crimes are being commited against the Iraqi people.

I would like to know how the media dares to not report the truth, show pictures, film the streets strewn with the dead. Americans should see it on all the newscasts...the truth. America should be held accountable for war crimes, as many have been/are being commited.

The violence will continue, the silence will continue, the lies will continue, and the disgrace of America will never be forgotten...