Terror in Falluja
TERROR IN FALLUJA
Once a city of 300,000 people, Falluja has been reduced to rubble and become a ghost town. The US assault on Falluja to "stabilize" Iraq has added hundreds to the toll of Iraqi dead: officially "1,400 terrorists, foreigners and Saddamists" - but there is no official count of the civilians. The US has violated the Geneva Conventions in countless ways. Relief organizations have been prevented from helping the needy. Wounded people died, prevented by US troops from getting to hospitals. Hospitals were denied access to medicines and supplies. At least one hospital has been bombed, killing doctors and patients. Hungry children sickened on filthy sewage water, while the dead were left in the streets, unburied. A US soldier was filmed shooting an injured Iraqi in cold blood.
A recent survey published in Lancet concludes that 100,000 more Iraqis died due to the US-led invasion, most from US air strikes and artillery. The report excludes the April 2004 siege of Falluja in which 800 civilian deaths were reported (according to Iraq Body Count; 300 of these women and children) as well as the recent attacks.
When the pretexts for the war - Saddam's mass-destruction weapons and Saddam's alleged support of Al Qaida - were revealed to be blatant lies, Bush's justification became "bringing democracy" to the suffering nation. But now, peaceful protesters in Iraq are arrested, beaten. Journalists are detained and threatened. Media have been warned not to cover the horrific events in Fallujah. The al-Jazeera office in Baghdad has been bombed. News organisations are advised to "stick to the government line on the US-led offensive in Fallujah" and to expound "the position of the Iraqi government, which expresses the aspirations of most Iraqis".
But the "Iraqi government" is widely considered to be an illegitimate puppet government, handpicked by the US and wholly dependent on the US armed forces for its power.
The fighters who resist the US-led occupation are not "foreign fighters" or " Saddam Hussein loyalists", but Iraqis who want their country back. Falluja has become a symbol of Iraqi resistance to alien occupiers and the US wishes to make an example of it, to deter others. The message sent by the attack on Falluja is brutally simple: if you resist us, we will destroy you.
The real terrorists are using artillery, warplanes and bombs to win Iraq and its natural resources for US and multinational firms, for power-crazed ideologues and callous billionaires.
Americans Against the War calls for:
· An end to the occupation
· Iraq for the Iraqis
· Bring the troops home
· Unconditional reparations to rebuild the country.
STOP THIS MADNESS NOW !!
