Gorilla’s Guides

Parenthood often consists of balancing risks. Let me remind you of some of the dangers faced by children in Iraq:

“45. Children remained victims in Iraq in many ways. Although not necessarily targeted, they are killed or maimed in sectarian-motivated attacks and in terrorist and insurgency acts. They are civilian casualties in MNF-I and Iraqi security forces-led raids against insurgents or militias, and suffer the most from other political, social and economic consequences of Iraqi’s violent daily reality. The extent of violence in areas other than the Region of Kurdistan is such that likely every child, to some degree, has been exposed to it. Children suffering disabilities have also been unable to access adequate care and education. … … …

47. In one case the body of a 12-year-old Osama was reportedly found by the Iraqi Police in a plastic bag after his family paid a ransom of some 30,000 US dollars. The boy had been sexually assaulted by the kidnappers, before being hanged by his own clothing. The police captured members of this gang who confessed of raping and killing many boys and girls before Osama. … … …

53. Additional hardship for families and children is caused by the lack of adequate places to socialize, play and learn as would be necessary for their healthy development. Many Iraqis complain of having to keep their children at home for prolonged periods of time.”

or this report of how Hani Saadoun was killed:

“12 years old – hauled off the street whipped with electric cables, violated with an electric drill, shot, body dragged through the streets.”

One of the constant themes I hear from friends still living in Iraq is the effect of the constant violence upon their children and their fury at the damage being done to their children. They have to balance between keeping their children locked up lest they fall victim to a bombing, a shooting, or worse, and the need every child has to get out and play. The photograph shows part of an increasingly common solution. These Baghdadi children are playing just outside their front door. The hand holding the gun is that of their father. Iraq is a heavily urbanised society and increasingly an arms-bearing one. A generation of children are growing up with the idea that it is necessary to be armed and to be prepared to kill. A generation of parents are buying guns – and they know who they blame for collapsing their society thereby creating the appallingly dangerous environment in which their children are growing up. They blame the Americans, the people who created that environment. It’s a good reason to hate somebody, putting your children in danger, a very good reason.

markfromireland

There’s a very short piece on the front page of Al-Sabah Al-Jadeed [Arabic Language] this morning saying that sources “close to” Nouri al-Maliki have told the paper that a major cabinet reshuffle is planned for next month. The paper says that their sources have told them that the reshuffle will involve 9 ministries including the ministries of Defense and Interior and one key economic ministry.

According to the paper the nine ministers are being replaced because they have not performed to “the minimum standard” in their work.

The paper says that the reshuffle will be announced after Maliki finishes his current round of visits to foreign capitals. The paper adds that the first cabinet change under Maliki was the resignation of the Transport minister.

markfromireland

Update: Karbala News cover it in a bit more detail citing Al Sabah Al Jadeed’s story

Secretary of State Rice reacts to the news that the Israeli Airforce has just killed the last Lebanese shoe maker.

Feel free to provide your own caption.

markfromireland

I read billmon every day I’m horrified, contemptuous, and angry, at this latest bloodbath, billmon expresses it perfectly

“I’ve felt many emotions about the Israelis before. I’ve admired them for their accomplishments — building a flourishing state out of almost nothing. I’ve hated them for their systematic dispossession of the Palestinians — even as they smugly congratulated themselves for being the Middle East’s only “democracy.” I’ve pitied them for the cruel fate history inflicted on the Jewish diaspora, respected them for their boldness and daring, honored them for their cultural and intellectual achievements. But the one thing I’ve never felt, at least up until now, is contempt.

But that is what I’m feeling now. The military and political leaders of the Jewish state are doing and saying things that go way beyond the blustering arrogance of a powerful nation at war. Not to put too fine a point on it, but they are behaving like a gang of miltaristic thugs — whose reply to any criticism or reproach is an expletive deleted and the smash of an iron fist.

[snip]

And now a proposal to turn all of southern Lebanon into a free fire zone.

This all might be considered normal military behavior for, oh say, a Bosnian Serb militia captain, circa 1991, but when the political and military leaders of an allegedly civilized state start talking this way, something big is going on, and going wrong. The dehumanization of the enemy (much of the Israeli press routinely uses the word “terrorist” to refer to any Hizbullah fighter or Palestinian militant) and the rage and humiliation at not being able to stop the rain of rockets falling on northern Israel, are combining to knock the props out from under whatever remains of Israel’s claim to be different from, and morally superior to, its enemies.

The Israeli national persona has always had a macho swagger to it (it’s part of the rationale for the state — that Jews should be able to act like “normal” masculine hyperpatriots everywhere) but what we’re seeing now is something different. It has a nasty edge of hysteria to it, a compulsive need to prove to the Arabs, and the world, that Israel still can and will stomp on anyone who gets in its way. The fact that Hizbullah is now demonstrating the limits of Israeli power — or rather, the limits on how much Jewish blood Israel is willing to spend to exercise that power — is only making matters worse. The Israeli leadership elite is starting to sound like the semen-crusted violence addicts at Little Green Footballs. Given how much real violence the generals and politicians can inflict, that’s a sobering thought, to say the least.

Combine this with an enormous sense of historic grievance (”Serbs will never be beaten again!” “The Versailles Treaty has shamed the Fatherland!”) and a gnawing fear of encirclement, and you’ve got all the ingredients for a catastrophe, of the kind that could leave the Israelis, and their American patrons, up to their necks in blood — of the innocent and the guilty alike.Combine this with an enormous sense of historic grievance (”Serbs will never be beaten again!” “The Versailles Treaty has shamed the Fatherland!”) and a gnawing fear of encirclement, and you’ve got all the ingredients for a catastrophe, of the kind that could leave the Israelis, and their American patrons, up to their necks in blood — of the innocent and the guilty alike.

[snip]

If there’s one thing that should be obvious from this God awful tragedy in the making, it’s that history has a savage sense of irony — cruel and pitiless almost beyond belief. That Israel, haven to Holocaust survivors, should find itself in this situation, and respond to it in this way, is enough to make the very walls of Jerusalem weep. As I weep now.

His posting is “A Blight Unto the Nations it’s well worth your while reading the whole thing and following his links.

I want to add one technical point. The Israeli artillery are technically superb. I’ve seen them in action repeatedly. They’re good, they’re very good, at what they do. They knew precisely where the UN observtion post was and hit it anyway. The excuse that this was a “mistake” simply won’t wash. There’s a binary solution set either:

1. The artillery officers committed an act of gross insubordination by firing on a UN post which the Israeli Prime Minister assured Kofi Annan would not be fired upon.

   or

2. They fired upon it following their orders.

They are simply too good at their job for it to have been “a mistake.”

markfromireland

Nope the people busy committing warcrimes and their American paymasters don’t want the killing to stop. This screenshot of today’s headlines on Antiwar.com says it all. You don’t even need to read the stories.

markfromireland

This is Yakim Abdula. She’s two years old. The man holding her in the first two frames of the image is her father Hassan. They live in Karrada, which as I’ve said before is a fairly upmarket part of Baghdad with relatively good security. It’s controlled by SCIRI whose leader suggested the other day that each neighbourhood form its own protection squads. SCIRI of course is the party that control the Ministry of the Interior. The Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Defense are known to be particularly heavily infiltrated with death squads.

Like all of Baghdad Karrada’s coming under increasing attack. This mornings attacks were a combined and coordinated series of;

• rocket attacks,
• followed by a mortar barrage,
• followed by car bombing.

Casualties were very heavy at least 35 people were killed at least 153 were wounded badly enough to need hospitalisation. Amongst the casualties were Yakim’s two brothers killed when a rocket hit their apartment. In the third frame of the image. Yakim is being held by her uncle. Hassan has left to go into their apartment to retrieve her two brother’s dead bodies.

markfromireland

Passers-by try to help a child injured in one of a series of coordinated mortar and bomb attacks in Karrada Baghdad this morning

markfromireland

Meet Haim Ramon. He’s Israel’s minister for justice. He used to be in the Israeli Labour Party but ditched them for Kadima when Ariel Sharon, the man the Kahan commission* found to be responsible for the mass murder of civilians at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps the last time Israel invaded Lebanon left Likud and founded Kadima. He’s generally reckoned to be very close to Israel’s Prime minister Ehud Olmert. Note Ramon’s branch of service. Like Donald Rumsfeld he’s an Air Force man in Ramon’s case he never made it beyond captain. Not a particularly impressive record. This is what he had to say today on Israeli Army Radio:

“We received yesterday in the Rome conference permission, in effect, from the world, part of it gritting its teeth and part of it granting its blessing, to continue the operation, this war, until Hezbollah’s presence is erased in Lebanon and it is disarmed,” Source

But that’s not all he this charming gentleman said, he said much more. He said that Israel had given more than enough warning to the civilians living in South Lebanon to leave and that:

“All those now in south Lebanon are terrorists who are related in some way to Hezbollah,” Source

That would of course include all those women, children, and other civilians who can’t get out of Southern Lebanon because Israel has bombed all the roads and bridges. As well as bombing refugee convoys and ambulances and UN positions of course. How long do we have to wait before we can openly call this man and his colleagues terrorists bent on mass murder of civilians? At what point does the rest of the world turn round to his American paymasters and tell them that their hands are dripping with the blood of women and children? At what point is it going to occur to the American and Israeli peoples that they are going to reap what this man has just announced they are going to sow?

At what point can we say “Israel Is A Terrorist State?” Now, we can say it now. This man has announced a terrorist campaign. He’s the minister for justice. He’s close to the prime minister. We can and should say it now.

“Israel is a terrorist state.”

markfromireland

Notes: *The Kahan commission was headed by the then President of the Israel’s Supreme Court, Yitzhak Kahan. The other two members were Supreme Court Justice Aharon Barak (who announced his resignation from the Supreme court last May) , and a reserve Major-General Yona Erfat. – MFI

I expect today to be bad. Juan Cole has saved me the trouble of giving a prècis of this article in Al-Zaman [Arabic] really you need to read whole thing, the situation in the south of the country is coming very badly unstuck for the green zone government. In particular this statement by Grand Ayatollah Bashir al-Najafi is ominous:

“We fear the coming of a day when we cannot restrain a revolution of the people, with all its unsavory consequences.”

Al-Najafi is often thought to be second most important of the four Grand Ayatollahs living in Najaf with Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani being “primus inter pares” (the fifth Grand Ayatollah Kazem al-Hairi lives in Iran.) Al-Najafi’s office would not under any circumstances have issued that statement unless the Grand Ayatollahs (who act collegially) were of the opinion that their ability to restrain their followers was slipping. Please note the scale of the attacks.

I also expect today to be dire in Baghdad.

Why do I expect today to be dire? Because yesterday night there was heavy fighting on Haifa Street. Why is Haifa Street important? Well if you look at a map of Baghdad it’s the big street pointing like a dagger right into the heart of the green zone. It’s been “pacified” oh a couple of hundred times by now. At the time of writing (just gone 11 a.m my time) the death toll in Baghdad from what seems to be a particularly well coordinated set of combined mortar/bombing attacks is at least 25 including children and rising. I wonder will the Syrians give al-Maliki political asylum again … … … maybe, if Dubya asks them really nicely. That’s if he stumps up their price for extracting his buddy Olmert from Lebanon of course … … … Oh by the way the movement of more American hostages body bag occupants soldiers ordered by the Cheney Bush administration is well underway. The Cheney Bush administration bringing an entire new meaning to the expression “charlie fox.”

markfromireland

“The role of the international force that will be sent to Lebanon following a cease-fire will be to assist the Lebanese army to deploy in the south, ensure that Hezbollah does not rebuild its positions there and ensure that quiet is maintained along the Israeli-Lebanese border, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agreed yesterday. “

From Haaretz   [Emphasis mine - mfi ]

Dear Condi and Ehud,

If you want people from civilised countries to risk their lives helping clean up the blood soaked mess that you’ve created in the Middle East there are two important ideas you need to get into your heads:

1. You need to ask us first.
2. We won’t do it if it’s just to let you get away with your latest batch of war crimes and free you up to prepare the next bloodbath.

The days of the herrenvolk are over — or had you not noticed?

Yours sincerely,

markfromireland