H13959
Headlines : IraqHundreds Die in Baghdad
As Americans mull the gruesome execution of thirty-two victims claimed by a gun-wielding social reject in Virginia, the perpetual carnage of Iraq has taken a backseat to the pulpit-pounding of morally indignant pundits and vulturous crusaders of the “public good.” It is a testament to the institutionalized racism of the mainstream media that the manifesto of Cho Seung-Hui has received a level of reporting so disproportionate to that shown to the devastating attacks that tore through Baghdad yesterday, April 18th.
In a series of bombings ostensibly aimed at reigniting the cycle of revenge killings that have – up until now – been the only remotely positive effect of George Bush’s ‘surge’ strategy, nearly two hundred Iraqis were killed by three separate car bombings across Baghdad. These bombings will doubtless spell the end of the shaky ceasefire maintained by Moqtada al-Sadr’s Al-Mahdi Army and the U.S.-backed SCIRI deathsquads of the Badr Brigade. These truly repulsive attacks, as awful as they are in and of themselves, will usher in a wave of genocidal retribution that, in the words of an anonymous member of the Iraqi government, “will dwarf anything we have seen before.”
[Posted By Heatscore]Republished from Counterpunch
Yesterday will go down as a day of infamy for Iraqis who are repeatedly told by the US that their security is improving. Almost 200 people were killed on one of the bloodiest days of the four-year-old war, when car bombs ripped through four neighbourhoods across Baghdad, exposing the failure of the two-month-old US security plan.
In the aftermath of the blasts, American and Iraqi soldiers who rushed to the scene of the explosions were pelted with stones by angry crowds shouting: “Where is the security plan? We are not protected by this plan.”
Billowing clouds of oily black smoke rose into the sky over the Iraqi capital after four bombs tore through crowded markets and streets leaving the ground covered in charred bodies and severed limbs. “I saw dozens of dead bodies,” said a witness in Sadriyah, a mixed Shia-Kurdish neighbourhood in west Baghdad where 140 people died and 150 were injured. “ Some people were burned alive inside minibuses. Nobody could reach them after the explosion. There were pieces of flesh all over the place. Women were screaming and shouting for their loved ones who died….
Posted by Heatscore
A jaded Raskolnikov waiting in disgust for this sick society's imminent paradigm shift.
you have to wonder who makes these bombs, where they come from and how they get into the country, and especially who can afford to pay for them. the destruction they cause is unbelievable. single attacks are causing more and more damage each time. since those british agents were caught a few years ago driving a car full of explosives, i’m convinced that the coalition forces are in on this. whats for certain is that they started the trend of these massacres, maybe with just a few bombs, and now hundreds die a day. the occupiers cant escape responsibility for this strategic genocide, the longer they stay the worse it gets.
Source
In May 2005, former Iraqi exile Imad Khadduri, reported how a driver whose license had been confiscated in Baghdad was questioned for half an hour at an American military camp, informed that there were no charges against him, and then directed to the al-Khadimiya police station to retrieve his license.
The driver did leave in a hurry, but was soon alarmed with a feeling that his car was…carrying a heavy load, and he also became suspicious of a low flying helicopter that kept hovering overhead, as if trailing him. He stopped the car and … found nearly 100 kilograms of explosives hidden in the back seat…the only feasible explanation for this incident is that the car was indeed booby trapped by the Americans and intended for the al-Khadimiya Shiite district of Baghdad.
The helicopter was monitoring his movement and witnessing the anticipated ‘hideous attack by foreign elements’”. (According to Khadurri, the scenario was repeated again in Mosul, when a driver’s car broke down on the way to the police station where he was sent to reclaim his license. The mechanic he then turned to discovered the spare tire to be laden with explosives.)
In the same month, 64-year-old farmer Haj Haidar, who was taking his tomato load from Hilla to Baghdad, was stopped at an American checkpoint and had his pick-up thoroughly searched. Allowed to go on his way, his 11 year-old grandson then told him he saw one of the American soldiers placing a grey melon-sized object amidst the tomato containers.
Realizing the vehicle was his only means of work, Haidar fought his initial impulse to run and removed the object from his truck, placing it in a nearby ditch. He later learnt that it had in fact exploded, killing part of a passing shepherd’s flock of sheep.
At this point, legendary Iraqi blogger ‘Riverbend’ reported that many of the supposed suicide bombings were in fact remotely detonated car bombs or time bombs. She related how a man was arrested for allegedly having shot at a National Guardsman after huge blasts struck in west Baghdad.
But according the man’s neighbours, far from having shot anyone, he had seen “an American patrol passing through the area and pausing at the bomb site minutes before the explosion. Soon after they drove away, the bomb went off and chaos ensued. He ran out of his house screaming to the neighbors and bystanders that the Americans had either planted the bomb or seen the bomb and done nothing about it. He was promptly taken away.”
Let’s see….five times the number of victims as VT, and about five times less conversation and coverage, even here on enlightened GNN. Awesome. Shows you where even your earnest progressive’s true priorities are.
In all fairness, Snark… If we had several years of daily school shootings, each individual one wouldn’t exactly cause me to spit coffee on my screen in surprise…
32 dead from the VT shooting has received unprecedented coverage for the past week. Every day the number of innocents killed in Iraq may get a one sentence blurb on the news. Just what is the difference?
Well, it’s taken me till now to tabulate and apportion my compassion for the day. But now I’m on it.
“Just what is the difference?”
VT could happen to you, Iraq can’t.
Imagine if just once a major network went through all 100 victims of a marketplace bombing in Baghdad (assuming they could identify them), gave a short bio, number of relatives – job, aspirations….
Their Network ratings would plummet. Who would watch it?
A few hundred people watching it would do more good than 3 million watching the regular stuff.
If the people watching were apt to buy Hummers and Big Macs, you might have a chance pitching that idea to the corps…
Hence the need to imagine it.
The truth has a propensity to suck.
“A few hundred people watching it would do more good than 3 million watching the regular stuff.”
Not really, the only people who would watch it are those who already feel bad about Iraq.
Nah, there’s always a few get through the net
In all fairness, Snark… If we had several years of daily school shootings, each individual one wouldn’t exactly cause me to spit coffee on my screen in surprise
True, but this was a bad day even by Iraqi standards.
Yeah, but a good day in Iraq ain’t that comfy lately…
“five times the number of victims as VT, and about five times less conversation and coverage“
Jon Stewart brought up the differences with former Iraqi legislator Ali Allawi. If you’re interested it’s on The Daily Show website I thought it was a good interview.
Not really, the only people who would watch it are those who already feel bad about Iraq.
maybe not even them. i mean, i probably wouldn’t watch it.
Let’s see….five times the number of victims as VT, and about five times less conversation and coverage, even here on enlightened GNN. Awesome. Shows you where even your earnest progressive’s true priorities are.
yeah, but read if you read the discussion here at least a lot of it is geared toward acknowledging the absurdity of our media coverage and attitude towards victims of violence.
“if you knew how to count you’d realize that the smallest war undertaken by a reasonable tyrant would cost a thousand times more than all my eccentricities do.”
Caligula (from the play by camus) regarding his “senseless” killings within his own ranks while avoiding sending his troops to war.
there, snark, boo yaa! progressive enough for ya? its 420 and i can still drop thought provoking and apropos quotes from plays by hooty-tooty existential philosophers which accurately reflect the savage ridiculousness and insanity of our empires. im going to go get more “enlightened” now
there, snark, boo yaa! progressive enough for ya? its 420 and i can still drop thought provoking and apropos quotes from plays by hooty-tooty existential philosophers which accurately reflect the savage ridiculousness and insanity of our empires.
Heh, well served, bro.
Heh, well served, bro.
heh. i am what becomes of a scientist turned neotropical loaf. ask me to run a PCR at this point and i’ll shuffle confused and nervous around the lab, poking machines with pipets like a confused, misplaced ape… get me stoned and or drunk (or allow me to do so on my own) and i’ll spit philosophy and rant emo enviro doom…
such is the way
“ask me to run a PCR at this point and i’ll shuffle confused and nervous around the lab, poking machines with pipets like a confused, misplaced ape… get me stoned and or drunk (or allow me to do so on my own) and i’ll spit philosophy and rant emo enviro doom“
Yeah – but with oligo-design softwear, Taq supermix, and automated prep tables – literally anyone can run a decent PCR now-a-days. Your ramblings, however, are one of a kind.
Wait, what does this all have to do with Iraq? All their scientists fled the country already… damn…
i’m surprised that more people haven’t been pointing out that by estimates, the iraq war killed more civilians than Darfur…like twice as much, according the latest lanclet study..