A selection of excellent articles from the best Journalists gathered for your information.

From an email to Dahr Jamail: "May 27, 2007
Baghdad is a smashed city..."Below is an email I have just received from my close friend and translator Abu Talat.
While he has fled Baghdad with his family and is now a refugee in Syria, he recently had to return to Baghdad in order to try to salvage what is left of his former life (his car, belongings from his house, etc.) before returning back to Syria.
His note is instructive as to the current living conditions in the capital city of Iraq. n the Bible

The continuous destruction and killing of Iraqis (655,000 so far) by the Americans both openly and covertly through their militias is yet more evidence of the scale of the war crimes being committed by the Bush Administration and their illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq since 2003. All the excuses and lies of the Bush Administration to justify this illegal behaviour have been exposed again and again. There is no reason whatsoever for the Bush Administration to continue to impose this genocide on the Iraqi people. But Instead of leaving, Bush is spinning endless new lies to justify continuing his butchery of the innocents.

Operation Freedom From Iraqis

"Iraqis are clamoring to get out of Iraq . Two million have fled so far and nearly two million more have been displaced within the country. (That's a total of some 15 percent of the population.) Save the Children reported this month that Iraq's child-survival rate is falling faster than any other nation's. Yet for all the words President Bush has lavished on Darfur and AIDS in Africa, there has been a deadly silence from him about what's happening in the country he gave 'God's gift of freedom.' It's easy to see why," says Frank Rich.

Increasingly I am coming across articles that shows the US masquerading as terrorists and causing a terrorist act, and then blaming Iraqi terrorism. The purpose seems to be to create a chaotic situation they can use as an excuse to stay in Iraq indefinitely. It is part of the neocon plan to dominate the middle east and expand the war to neighbouring states.

Dahr Jamail's article is real news about the American genocide in Iraq. It may shock and horrify you. You may wonder what Bush and his neocons hope to achieve by their systematic, murder, torture, and imprisonments of  innocent Iraqis. This horrifying mass murder is sold by Bush's, Tony Blair's and John Howard's propaganda machines, including the mass media in the U.S., U.K. and Australia as "bringing democracy to the middle east" and that the only opponents are "terrorists etc" The media will never mention the horrific reality revealed by this fearless, on-the-spot reporter.
Would you like to help stop these outrages? There really is no end to what a seriously concerned person can do.

    "Dear Mr. Dahr, I am wondering why? Americans and coalition forces were supported by pro-Iranian Militias, like the Badr Organization! The support and help of Iraqi Shiites at first helped to somewhat stabilize and maintain the occupation. Death squads trained by the coalition forces are working day and night under cover of the Ministry of Interior, attacking innocent people: both Sunnis and Shiites!!!! In spite of knowing very well who is doing what, we still see no improvement in the security situation. On the contrary, the situation is getting worse.

The mental hospitals have many patients who believe they are in direct contact with God - that God is telling them things and instructing them to take certain actions. When they act out these heavenly delusions and take the action that they think God has instructed them to take, often it involves violence against others. The law then sees these people as a danger to themselves, family and community and has them placed in a hospital for treatment.
When a world leader like George Bush has such delusions, that involve attacking other states without any provocation or excuse, the world is seriously threatened. When the leaders' delusion is physically expressed as invasions of Afghanistan, Iraq and perhaps Iran to come, the delusions are widely believed to be based on facts, and therefore justified.

LONDON (AFP) - US President George W. Bush allegedly said God told him to invade Iraq and Afghanistan , a new BBC documentary will reveal, according to details released here.
Bush made the claim when he met Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas and then foreign minister Nabil Shaath in June 2003, the ministers told the documentary series to be broadcast in Britain later this month.
The US leader also told them he had been ordered by God to create a Palestinian state, the ministers said Friday.
Shaath, now the Palestinian information minister, said: " President Bush said to all of us: 'I'm driven with a mission from God.

• We support UN Secretary/General Kofi Annan’s statement that the US invasion of Iraq is illegal and without any justification.
  
• Therefore it was resolved that all foreign military forces cease hostilities and withdraw from Iraq immediately.
  
• That the invading nations pay reparations to the people and state of Iraq for the killing, torturing and injuring over 100,000 people (as found by the October, 2004 Lancet study) and for their destruction of Iraqi property.
  
• That the UN help rebuild and rehabilitate Iraq with major reparation payments from the invading nations.
  
• That a statement incorporating these resolutions be circulated to various governments, to the UN and to the media.

Monday April 11, 2005
7.30pm - WEA Centre - 59 Gloucester St, Chch, NZ
Members of Christchurch's Iraqi community speak out about their counrty and the American-lead occupation

But these war crimes are only a beginning. Bush has threatened to widen the war to Iran and Syria. The famous anti-war campaigner, Dr Helen Caldicott says the re-election of Bush means endless wars and the probable use of nuclear weapons as Bush pursues his imperial crusade under the camouflage of “war on terror”
Nelson Mandella calls Bush the most dangerous man in the world. This madman and his crackpot neoconservative regime must be stopped before they destroy the world

On Iraqi People, Resistance and Oil versus American bases

Israel occupies Palestine, builds an apartheid wall, kills civilians, uproots trees, and destroys homes and villages while at the same time they demand a ‘reasonable’ Palestinian leadership to negotiate with, while Sharon imposes armed violence with impunity and support from the US.
The US (with the UK tagging along) occupies Iraq illegally and under false pretences, destroys its fragile infrastructure, drives the alien civil strife wedge deep into Iraqi society and yet demands to have ‘reasonable’ representatives of the Iraqi people (with the blessings of Negroponti and his 3000 embassy staff members) to negotiate with on its own (US) terms, laws and conditions that were illegally put in place by Bremer and Feldman, as it hugs the Iraqi oil and economy.

Life under the Bombs in Iraq

There is something thoroughly inspiring when people, under the threat of death, turn out to vote in a country that has become an armed camp. The urge of a long oppressed people to take back their lives, to act, is always moving and powerful. Certainly, the Iraq vote, as presented in the media here in the U.S., has also provided a boost to the Bush administration at home at a useful moment.
When you read Dahr Jamail's account below and meet the people under the bombs, imagine what sort of an Iraq they might actually be voting for. Tom

The US selected Iyad Allawi, who served the interests of the USA for many years as a clandestine CIA agent staging explosions in Iraq, as their interim Prime Minister of Iraq.
The US empowered Allawi, who assassinated suspected "terrorists" in police custody, to rule Iraq and "authorise" the US destruction of Fallujah. Thus he is directly involved in the killing of thousands of his fellow countrymen, both ordinary men, women and children, and anyone thought to be resisting the US invader. Basically Allawi is the US mouthpiece, trying to give legitimacy to war crimes and the criminal US invasion, occupation and continuing murder of opponents. This man can in no way represent the Iraqi people.

Iyad Allawi, now the designated prime minister of Iraq, ran an exile organization intent on deposing Saddam Hussein that sent agents into Baghdad in the early 1990's to plant bombs and sabotage government facilities under the direction of the C.I.A., several former intelligence officials say.
Dr. Allawi's group, the Iraqi National Accord, used car bombs and other explosive devices... Ex-CIA officer Robert Baer, recalled that a bombing during that period "blew up a school bus; schoolchildren were killed."

Bush's various extreme actions and desire for more wars in the Middle East may be one reason why Bush is using such extraordinary cruel tactics. He is waging a war mainly on Iraqi civilians that will make people hate and resist the US . Then Bush again fools the US people by telling them that this proves the people are really terrorists and the US duty is to make war on them - any kind of foul war he chooses and forget international law.

November 9th, 2004 was Fallujah's 9/11 Tuesday. It marked the peak of three days of indiscriminate bombing of Fallujah by US forces.
Iraqi Defense Minister Hazem Al-Shaalan promised that the day would be decisive. It wasn't. It was inhumane beyond belief, almost beyond comprehension.
The bomb blitz featured weapons of mass destruction: banned napalm-type munitions, chemical poison gas and super-bombs of up to 2,000-pounds. The ground assault was indiscriminate. The target was a city where at least 60,000 civilians outnumbered rebel fighters by over thirty to one.
The US Prevented Aid Entering the City for Weeks

An exclusive, in-depth interview with journalist Dahr Jamail on what is really going on in Iraq
Newtopia: The US Corporate media consistently characterizes the Iraqi resistance as "foreign terrorists and former Ba’athist insurgents". Is this accurate?
Dahr Jamail: This is propaganda of the worst kind. Most Iraqis refer to the Iraqi Resistance as "patriots." They are people who have had family members killed, detained, tortured and humiliated by the illegal occupiers of their shattered country. Calling them "foreign terrorists" and "Ba’athist insurgents" is simply a lie.

Known as the "city of mosques" for its more than 200 mosques, Fallujah is also known for refusing to add Saddam’s name to the call for prayers from its ancient minarets. It is located on the banks of river Euphrates, the largest river in Southwest Asia. The 1700 miles long Euphrates is linked with some of the most important events in olden history.
The city of Ur, found at its mouth, was the birthplace of Abraham. On its banks stood the city of Babylon. In the past, the army of Necho was defeated on its banks by Nebuchadnezzar. Cyrus the Younger and Crassus perished after crossing it. Alexander traversed it and continued his journey eastward. Presently, George Bush’s forces are crossing and re-crossing it making its waters redder each time with the blood of Fallujah’s citizens.

"Doctors in Fallujah are reporting there are patients in the hospital there who were forced out by the Americans," says Mehdi Abdulla, a 33-year-old ambulance driver at a hospital in Baghdad. "Some doctors there told me they had a major operation going, but the soldiers took the doctors away and left the patient to die." He looks at the ground, then away to the distance.
More articles from antiwar.com

An initiative of the Brussells Tribunal
We demand that the United States face up to reality, unconditionally withdraw their troops from Iraq, and draw the necessary conclusions as to the unacceptable nature of preventive war. It is an illusion to ask that the U.S. forces remain until Iraq is pacified or stabilized, because their very presence is so hated that it constitutes the main obstacle to any sort of pacification.

.......Shooting a wounded unarmed solider is a clear breach of the Geneva Conventions. Article 3 holds that "persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat (out of combat) by sickness, wounds, detention or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely".

We condemn the unjust, immoral and brutal killing of Mrs. Margaret Hassan in Iraq. This woman was an angel of mercy, a shining light to those who needed help for decades in Iraq. She stood up to Saddam Hussein and to the U.S.military, she wanted only to help the people of her adopted country.
We also do not believe any Muslims did this. There is an dictum in the Qur'an which forbids the killing of women; also, the killing of hostages. Also, Muslims and Iraqis had nothing to gain by killing this innocent, God-like, saint of a woman.

It is Bush and Blair, not the Iraqi resistance, who fear free elections
George Bush and Tony Blair have apparently concluded that they can crush the Iraqi people's will to resist occupation and legitimise a puppet regime next January by occupying Falluja. Maybe they imagine they can emulate the British forces that terrorised Iraqi Kurdistan in the 1920s by obliterating recalcitrant villages.     "The Guardian"

.....A medical dispensary in the city centre was bombed earlier.
I don't know what has happened to the doctors and patients who were there.
It was last place you could get medical attention because the big hospital on the outskirts of Falluja was captured by the Americans on Monday. ......

Iraq is probably already lost, says former military-policy planner Mike Turner.
But there are still some smart strategies for Kerry to adopt.
One of the great mysteries of this election is the inability of John Kerry to challenge George W. Bush on his national-security credentials and to hold his administration accountable for its monumental failure in Iraq. These two issues remain the soft underbelly of the Bush campaign. That the Kerry campaign hasn't effectively exploited them is disheartening. That he's allowed Bush to actually spin them into strengths is mind-boggling. Since the American people seem to be buying the GOP's reality-TV version of events in Iraq, let's take a hard look at the military realities.

Three years after September 11, President George W Bush's crusade is a failure. "War on terror" is a meaningless myth: you
can't combat a supple attack machine like al-Qaeda with shock and awe. What should have been a long, meticulous police operation was turned by Bush - instigated by his foreign policy adviser, God - into an illegal, preemptive attack on a nation that had nothing to do with terror.
This policy has actually increased terror attacks around the world. Last year in Cairo, on the eve of the invasion of Iraq, Sheikh Yamani, a man who knows one or two things about Arabs, violence and oil, said the invasion would produce "one hundred bin Ladens". They are here, and they have no one else but Bush to thank.

1,000 US deaths after Bush announced victory over Iraq, he continues his phoney barbarous war and bombing. Bush has become a war criminal, violating the US constitution, many International Laws, the Nuremberg Charter and the UN Charter.
He has created a tissue of lies to justify an illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, and continued slaughter of Iraqis. The following article on US bombing of Falluja is an example of US barbarity.

Up to six Iraqis have been killed and 24 others injured in US air strikes that have rocked the town of Falluja.
In the first attack late on Tuesday, US jets fired several missiles on Falluja, killing four people and wounding 11 others. A hospital spokesman said that a child and an elderly man were among the dead.

Bush, Blair and Howard nuclear gambled with our world, when they "willfully made war and promoted international dissension". Their completely phoney war on Iraq, justified by lies, was followed with a series of war crimes, including more lies, bombing, looting, killing, imprisoning and torturing. It was, and still is, camouflaged by a PR-Psywar campaign, reported by a cowed and co-operative mass media. As recommended by historian H. G. Wells, these "politicians" will be "in the dock" at:

So what's actually happening to Iraq's women? American journalist Lila Rajiva's 7-27-04 OW essay reports that the USA's government-media complex has been steadfastly refusing to investigate beyond the tip of the evidentiary iceberg, or it would have discovered these two barely-submerged facts: (1) that the rape and abduction of Iraqi women has, in fact, skyrocketed in "postwar" Iraq; and (2) that Iraqi women prisoners are, in fact, being raped, abused, and tortured inside the USA's military prisons.

The 1988 gassing of Kurds in the village of Halabja has stood as the most oft-repeated charge against deposed president Saddam Hussein, yet even as Hussein stood before a US-established Iraqi court July 1, Iraqi doctors and ailing survivors told The Chicago Tribune that Halabja's plight was ignored during the period of official US occupation.
"This town has been totally destroyed in terms of the people's health physically and psychologically," Dr. Fouad Baban, an Iraqi surgeon and academic, told the Tribune. "Nothing has been done to help these people -- not by the Americans, not by the international community and not by the Kurdish regional government."

The 1988 gassing of Kurds in the village of Halabja has stood as the most oft-repeated charge against deposed president Saddam Hussein, yet even as Hussein stood before a US-established Iraqi court July 1, Iraqi doctors and ailing survivors told The Chicago Tribune that Halabja's plight was ignored during the period of official US occupation.
"This town has been totally destroyed in terms of the people's health physically and psychologically," Dr. Fouad Baban, an Iraqi surgeon and academic, told the Tribune. "Nothing has been done to help these people -- not by the Americans, not by the international community and not by the Kurdish regional government."

Despite promises of over $1 billion in US funding, hospital patients in Iraq continue to suffer ongoing hardship. Problems plaguing Iraqi hospitals fifteen months into what has been a brutal, bloody occupation range from ongoing medicine and equipment shortages to an overall lack of proper medical infrastructure.
"We are getting less medical supplies now than we were during the sanctions," said Dr. Namin Rashid, the Chief Resident Doctor at Yarmouk Hospital. "Paul Bremer came here and talked a lot at the beginning of the occupation, but nothing has changed," Rashid added, referring to the recently departed civilian administrator of the Coalition Provision Authority.

The authors urge that George W. Bush, Tony Blair, John Howard committed war crimes, referred to Paragraph 1 (c), Article 5 of "Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court"(hereinafter "Rome Statute") and must be indicted.

The father of orphans and the defender of widows
is God in his holy dwelling.
God gives a home to the forsaken;
he leads forth prisoners to prosperity.
Psalm 67: 6-7
http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/052404.htm    Contrast this verse with the actions of Bush and Sharon.

A 'jury of conscience' declared Sunday after scores of witnesses testified before a 'World Tribunal on Iraq' that "the U.S. government is guilty of committing a war of aggression against Iraq." It also held the United States guilty of committing war crimes.

>>> The text below comes from MSNBC's posting here. The Memory Hole has made a FOIA request for this report. For some of the photos that triggered this investigation, see "Photos of Iraqis Being Abused by US Personnel."

Is the Commander In Chief capable of the Job or does he just not doesn't give a damm.
If he is such a great leader, how do the troups dare to act in this way.
How could not know. He is Bush, he has access to all information.
He should not be running the biggest bully country in the world.

.......The war is a stupid, unjust and criminal war. It is a quagmire from which no immediate escape seems possible. Many more Americans are going to die so that American ''democracy and freedom'' can be imposed on the Iraqis -- whether they want them or not. Many more Iraqis will die, too. Americans who support the war share in its criminality.

The last month of US aggression in Iraq has inspired what can only be described as a mutiny: waves of soldiers, workers and politicians under the command of the US occupation authority suddenly refusing to follow orders and abandoning their posts. First Spain announced that it would withdraw its troops, then Honduras, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and Kazakhstan. South Korean and Bulgarian troops were pulled back to their bases, while New Zealand is withdrawing its engineers. El Salvador, Norway, the Netherlands and Thailand will likely be next.

...As resistance attacks continued to increase in the city against the occupiers, so did the retaliation by the military. And so it has grown to bring us to the current siege of Fallujah where hundreds of women, children, elderly and unarmed men have been slain by soldiers, along with some mujahedeen.

Why Bush is spending so much on nuclear weapons.
The budget is busted; American soldiers need more armor; they're running out of supplies. Yet the Department of Energy is spending an astonishing $6.5 billion on nuclear weapons this year, and President Bush is requesting $6.8 billion more for next year and a total of $30 billion over the following four years. This does not include his much-cherished missile-defense program, by the way. This is simply for the maintenance, modernization, development, and production of nuclear bombs and warheads.

"I find it very depressing when I see my own Minister saying he's feeling sad for the American people, but ignores the Iraqi people who are being killed, who are being dragged from their homes."

The truth of what's happening in Falluja has to get out.
.......I'm outraged. We're trying to get to a woman who's giving birth without any medical attention, without electricity, in a city under siege, in a clearly marked ambulance, and you're shooting at us. How dare you?
How dare you?