BEAT THE PRESS

TURNING POINT IN IRAQ?

NO NEWS IS BAD NEWS

Good Morning. Today is “G-DAY.”

It’s the tenth anniversary of the opening shots of genocide in Rwanda. Mark it well, because the world overlooked the events there when they occurred and then failed to respond to the butchery of a people. The US government and the UN were both complicit. There were many reasons behind the mass murders there including a long history of colonialism and neo-colonialism that is rarely mentioned in the media. I saw the anniversary marked on the BBC this morning — not on CNN, perhaps because it had its hands full covering Iraq (from the Pentagon, since media reports are not getting out of Falluja which has been invaded, military-style, by US marines. One American soldier dead so far but we don’t know what is happening because we are not being allowed to. See below for more).

QUESTIONS, QUESTIONS

If it’s Sunday, it must be meet the press. Must it? Come on, Tim Russert, you can shoot some sharper questions than you did at 9/11 Commission heads Kean and Hamilton. Why no question on the disappearance of all the Clinton era files? Eleven THOUSAND of them? Hadn’t you read the New York Times Op-Ed page that suggested some serious questions for the Commission when they do their meet-and-greet with Condoleezza Rice? Tim also did not correct Bush advisor Karen Hughes when she referred to outed CIA agent Valerie Plame as Valerie “Plume.” That’s right: p-l-U-m-e..

WHITE HOUSE COULD DELAY/CENSOR 911 REPORT

This was the only headline generated by the the “Meet The Press” 9/11 Interview– and it’s from from the Australian media:

“The chairman of an independent commission looking into the United States’ counter-terrorism activities prior to the September 11 attacks has warned he could not guarantee the panel’s report will be released before the presidential election because of a protracted White House vetting process.

Former New Jersey governor Thomas Kean said he was `surprised’ by the ruling but saw no way around it. `Any time you’re dealing with any kind of intelligence, even if you write a memoir after you’ve served in government, you’ve got to submit that to the same process,’ said the chairman, appearing on NBC’s `Meet the Press.’”

THE MORE THEY SAY, THE LESS THEY KNOW

Then there was the Chris Matthew show (transcript not posted at release time) and he was yakking about Iraq along with neo-con Andrew Sullivan and a crew of fellow beltway babblers who were mouthing off about what happened in Fallujah. There weren’t enough adjectives available to for them to condemn the horror–and a horror it was. They all had opinions-it was Al Qaeda, it was a minority of Iraqis in a country where most of the people love us, etc. etc. True to form, war critics and actual Iraq experts were in short supply and the level of discourse was predictably uninformed, long on emotion, and just as short on facts and knowledge. But did it ever sound authoritative! This is the just another example of why Americans remain so uninformed about events in Fallujah and most of the rest of the world.

Obviously, the spectacle of an orgy of delight over the killings of four Americans — who were not civilians but, in effect, mercenaries–is not something to justify. It was gruesome. But, maybe, just maybe, we can put the easy demonization aside for a minute and try to look at this incident in context, as part of a chronology, and as one link in an ever-lengthening chain of events.

In an environment of attack and response, of violence begetting violence and forced occupation, you have to try to analyze what is happening from a diverse range of sources. So let me try, just on the basis of the incomplete information I have. But before returning to Fallujah, as the US Marines have this morning, let’s look at a more serious development. Here’s what was apparently happening as Chris and company were having their makeup applied in the MSNBC Green Room while gulping down their Sunday morning lattes.

IT IS NOW “OFFICIAL”: TIMES REPORTS “UPRISING”

The New York Times was reporting yesterday that an “uprising” is underway. Not an incident. Not an attack here and there, but an “uprising.” And it continues today, spoiling what Walt Rodgers of CNN called “Washington’s plan.” He looked glum.

Al Jazeeera calls the Shia “the key to Iraq.” Yesterday eight more American soldiers were killed battling Shia forces. AP reported: “At least 22 Iraqis, eight U.S. troops and one Salvadoran soldier died. Sunday’s violence - along with the unrelated killings of two Marines in Anbar province - pushed the U.S. death toll to at least 610.”

This is a first and quite possibly a turning point. A long time news watcher and Network news veteran says “this is it.” Things will now truly go out of control. Think of what is going to happen very soon, probably tomorrow: the US will begin its promised offensive in Fallujah in response to the mutilations of last week. So the true absurdist nightmare — Americans trying to kill Sunnis when they — the Americans — are being killed by Shiites (along with Sunnis, of course, which has been happening all along.)

“Iraq was wracked today by its most violent civil disturbances since the occupation started, with a coordinated Shia uprising spreading across the country, from the slums of Baghdad to several cities in the south.” Now that’s the Times, always good on the what — not so good on the why was saying.

20 DEAD, HUNDREDS WOUNDED

Closer to the scene, IslamOnline.net was reporting:

“At least 20 Iraqi Shiites were killed and a hundred others wounded Sunday, April 4, when occupation troops opened fire randomly at thousands of supporters of Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr in this southern holy city in the most dangerous confrontation between the occupation and Iraq’s majority community.

The Spanish-led occupation troops fired at the marchers, who were peacefully protesting the crushing of two fellowmen by a U.S. tank on Saturday, April 3, the arrest of Sadr’s top assistant sheikh Mostafa Al-Yaqoubi and the ban on Al-Houza newspaper, the mouthpiece of Sadr, Aljazeera satellite channel reported.”

If you read that again, you will find here what is so often missing–an explanation of why the marchers were marching, a rather key fact in the chain of events that help us make sense of them. The problem is that once again we are in the news cycle where a story can be simply summed up by a body count: so many dead, so many wounded. Hundreds wounded is a lot of wounded. But still, this is accounting, not analysis.

THE VIEW FROM THE RIVERBEND: WHY BAGHDADS’S BURNING

To help us understand the texture of the events from an Iraqi perspective, let’s revisit my friend River’s blog, Baghdad Burning. Here’s the take from someone on the scene:

“There have been demonstrations by Al-Sadr’s followers in Baghdad and Najaf. In Baghdad they are gathered near the Green Zone and the Sheraton hotel by the thousands- a huge angry mob, mostly in black. In Najaf, they were just outside of the Spanish troops’ camp. The demonstration in Najaf was shot at by the soldiers and they say that at least 14 are dead and dozens are wounded…. An Iraqi friend in Diwaniya was telling me that they had to evacuate the CPA building in Najaf because it was under attack. He says there’s talk of Jihad amongst the Shi’a.

Let me make it very clear right now that I am *not* a supporter of Al-Sadr. I do not like clerics who want to turn Iraq into the next Iran or Saudi Arabia or Kuwait… but it makes me really, really angry to see these demonstrations greeted with bullets and tanks by the troops. Why allow demonstrations if you’re going to shoot at the people? The demonstrators were unarmed but angry- Al-Sadr’s newspaper was shut down recently by Bremer and Co. and his deputy is said to have been detained by the Spaniards down south (although the Spanish troops are denying it). His followers are outraged, and believe me– he has a healthy number of followers. His father was practically revered by some of the Shi’a and he apparently has inherited their respect.

Today Bremer also announced the fact that we now have an official ‘Ministry of Defense’. The irony of the situation wasn’t lost on Iraqis- the head of the occupation announcing a `Ministry of Defense.’ To defend against what? Occupation? Ha, ha… or maybe it’s to secure the borders from unwelcome foreigners carrying guns and riding tanks? …”

WHERE ARE THE REPORTERS?

That adds a dimension to the news that is mostly missing–but why is it missing? Dahr Jamail writes about that in a ZNET commentary. What he says goes beyond critiquing the Sunday chatter gang as he proceeds to indict many of the reporters on the ground.

“I recently spent nine weeks in Iraq working as a freelance independent journalist. On a daily basis, I witnessed first-hand the corporate media either mis-reporting or not reporting stories as they arose.

The signs were glaring — from the parking lot full of parked white SUVs in the middle of the day, supposedly used by the CNN and Fox news crews, to the absence of ABC, NBC, or CBS media crews at any of the sites of the news stories I was covering. Even stories that were on the front pages stateside are regularly being covered from the press room and not the field.

It’s no wonder the corporate media rarely reports on the torturing of many of the over 10,000 detained Iraqis by the US military, the constant home raids, or the infrastructure in nearly complete disrepair as we begin the second year of the occupation. For most of the corporate media tend to stick closer to their hotels, rather than where the stories are occurring and being lived every day — out amongst the Iraqi people….”

FALLUJAH REVISTED

So what, in particular, was missing from the coverage of the events in Fallujah??

First, accounts of any prior incidents that might have particularly outrged the local population. Ghazwan Al-Mukhtar, a retired Iraqi engineer was on the radio show “Democracy Now!” and said

“Two days before [this incident], the American army shot many many people, women and children, on the streets [of Falluja], and – in a bizarre shooting incident that was unjustified, killing many people.”

We never heard about that (if it is accurate).

ALIENATING THE PEOPLE

Second, what has been the modus operandi of the U.S. occupying force in that area? Again, Ghazwan Al-Mukhtar:

“Falluja has been a place where the US Army has actually used brutal force to suppress the people there, including using the F-15s, and F-16s to attack villages and place where they think the resistances are, which is unjustified to use high explosives against individuals. This resulted in many, many casualties in the province. Added to it, they have detained, for 50 or 60 days, hundreds of people on and off, which alienated the people against the American forces and the American contractors or the American security contractors, which are really a private army, uncontrollable by the US. This is part of the privatization of the war….”

SHOOT TO KILL

Third, what about these private armies like Blackwater security, which lost men in this incident? There have been reports of them using highly lethal new weapons and bullets not approved for regular military use. The Army Times reported on one such incident involving a “private” contractor:

“He hit the man in the buttocks, a wound that typically is not fatal. But this round appeared to kill the assaillant instantly. It entered his butt and completely destroyed everything in the lower left section of his stomach … everything was torn apart, Thomas said.

“Thomas, a security consultant with a private company contracted by the government, recorded the first known enemy kill using a new 5.56 controversial bullet. The bullet is so controversial that if Thomas, a former SEAL, had been on active duty, he would have been court-martialed for using it. The ammunition is “non-standard” and hasn’t passed the military’s approval process.”

FROM CHILE’S DEATH SQUADS THEY COME

And now the US is reaching out to killers from around the world like some of the men who served Chile’s vicious Pinochet regimes, Yellowtimes.org reports:

“Ex-Chilean commandos are the latest batch ofrecruited mercenaries forming a growing private military presence in Iraq.Gary Johnson, president of USA Blackwater, told the Guardian UK’s JonathonFranklin that former commandos training in North Carolina will be sent toIraq for a year and a half. Their job will be to guard oil wells fromsaboteurs.

`We scour the ends of the earth to find professionals - the Chileancommandos are very, very professional and they fit within the Blackwatersystem,’ said Johnson. The Guardian story notes that several of the 60 recruits served duringAugusto Pinochet’s brutal military government….”

For more on these so-called private armies see:

Xymphora blog
The Washington Post: “Iraqi facilities and oil pipelines”
Barry Yeoman on The New York Times Op-Ed page:“Need an Army? Just Pick Up the Phone”
From the Times “Week in Review”: “Modern Mercenaries on the Iraqi Frontier”

NOT TO BE OUTDONE

And if that’s not bad enough, guess what other country is sending musclemen? Answer: South Africa. A South African friend told me last night that South African police are quitting and signing up for more lucrative positions on the frontlines of securing Iraq.

REVENGE FOR YASSIN?

Fourth, could there be another factor beyond local resistance and unproven assertions of Al Qaeda involvement? Iraq expert Juan Cole believes there may have been. His suggestions have not been reported anywhere besides his excellent website:

“Deaths of Americans: In revenge for Sharon’s Murder of Sheikh Yassin?

There is increasing evidence that the brutal attack on the American security guards in Fallujah, and the desecration of their bodies, was the work of Islamists seeking vengeance for the Israeli murder of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. Leaflets found at the scene said the operation was in the name of Yassin. al-Hayat reports in its Friday edition that responsibility for the attack has been taken by a group called Phalanges of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. The group said the deaths were a `gift to the Palestinian people….”

I have gone on at this length about this story for one reason: truth is usually found in the details, not the images. Understanding the news requires a realization that the first stores are rarely the most accurate ones, and that often information comes out later that shows us how inaccurate much of the reporting is.

DU ANYONE?

The New York Daily News was reporting Sunday that three US soldiers have come down with radiation poisoning because of exposure to US depleted uranium weapons. Bob Nichols of Dissidentvoice.org explains how much of it was used:

“Turns out they used about 4,000,000 pounds of the stuff, give or take. That is a bunch.

Now, most people have no idea how much Four Million Pounds of anything is, much less of Uranium Dust (UD), which this stuff turns into when it is shot or exploded. Suffice it to say it is about equal to 1,333 cars that weigh three thousand pounds per car. That is a lot of cars; but, we can imagine what a parking lot with one thousand three hundred and thirty three cars is like. The point is: this was and is an industrial strength operation. It is still going on, too.”

AND NOW FOR “BALANCE” — THE GOOD NEWS BEARS

The AP reports on how Republican operatives are spinning the war right from the source:

“BAGHDAD, Iraq - Inside the marble-floored palace hall that serves as the press office of the U.S.-led coalition, Republican Party operatives lead a team of Americans who promote mostly good news about Iraq. Dan Senor, a former press secretary for Spencer Abraham, the Michigan Republican who’s now Energy Secretary, heads the office packed with former Bush campaign workers, political appointees and ex-Capitol Hill staffers.

One-third of the U.S. civilian workers in the press office have GOP ties, running an enterprise that critics see as an outpost of Bush’s re-election effort with Iraq a top concern. Senor and others inside the coalition say they follow strict guidelines that steer clear of politics….”

ERASING RACHEL’S MEMORY

Meanwhile, back in another occupied area, the Palestine Monitor reports:

“Early this week four Israeli jeeps, 16 tanks and two bulldozers invaded thehighly populated area in the Al-Salam neighborhood in the city of Rafah,along the Egyptian border of the Gaza Strip, an area constantly undercontinuous firing.

They headed straight towards Dr. Samir Nasrallah’s home, the very houseRachel Corrie died in front of a year ago while trying to prevent itsdestruction. Corrie was the 23-year-old American peace activist fromOlympia, USA, killed by an Israeli army bulldozer which ran over herwhile nonviolently trying to prevent the demolition of yet anotherPalestinian house in the city of Rafah. Corrie and other pro-Palestinianactivists based in Rafah had frequently spent the night in Nasrallah’shouse, acting as human shields against the Israeli tanks and bulldozersclearing a security zone around the border….

Locals are convinced that this targeted demolition took place as one moreattempt to erase the memory of crucial events that took place in the areaand to cover the crime of the assassination of Rachel Corrie, since theplace used to attract many journalists and members of various solidaritygroups and activists, who would visit the place and gather with the family.”

ISRAEL BLASTS BBC … AGAIN!

The Guardian reports that “The Israeli government has written to the BBC accusing its Middle East correspondent, Orla Guerin, of anti-semitism and `total identification with the goals and methods of the Palestinian terror groups’ over a report on a 16-year-old would-be suicide bomber last week.”

YOUR LETTERS

Susan Taft offers the WH press corps a new tactic:

“Danny - I’ve been saving this for later, but that quote from the Haiti filmmaker got to me. For over a year I’ve had a fantasy that at some point andfrom completely behind the scenes, White House correspondents would simplyhave no questions. That would be mutiny, of course, so what else could theydo with silence? For more subtlety, reporters called uponat WH press conferences could just pause for 5 - 10- 15 seconds before askingtheir questions (and the questions thereafter could be easy ones). It wouldbe disconcerting for the administration to `perceive’ a ghost of gossipamong the ranks, and that they would surely do if a few reporters at ScottMcLellan’s tupperware parties came but didn’t buy, in the form of a coldblock of silence before the lies begin. It’s not very nice, I know. That’swhy I thought I’d save it for a rainy day, but you seem to have a knack fortranslating the artist’s currency into activism. Don’t deny it! You’ve gotthe midas touch. keep up good work -thank you all”

Time to greet the new week. Snow showers have been promised in this part of the world on this spring morning… I had a good time holding forth at the Global Entertainment and Media Summit (GEMS). I was a keynote speaker over the weekend. The good news is how many people resonate with the Mediachannel’s message. Write to me at: dissector@mediachannel.org.