Dear all,
Help defend ³The Struggle for Palestine² conference! Please
show up Saturday, October 2nd, at 8 a.m. to help defend the
conference from attack!
***********************************************************
This is an urgent message concerning "The Struggle for
Palestine: 4th Anniversary of the Intifada" conference tomorrow,
Saturday, October 2nd. The details of the conference are listed
in #2, below.
But I am writing all of you because of an article that came out
October 1, 2004, in FrontPageMagazine.com, entitled "Schools
For Jihad" by Lee Kaplan. (#1, below.)
Please read this article to get the extent of the attack that is
being waged against this conference, and against the whole
antiwar movement. Recently, at every demonstration called
against the war or in defense of the Palestinian people and
their fight for their land and their basic human rights,
a forceful group of Israeli Zionists has attempted to
disrupt the event.
Even though permits were secured by organizers for specific
areas such as Civic Center, Powell and Market, etc., Zionist
counter-demonstrators have been turning up in larger numbers
to disrupt our events. They occupy the area we have permits
for and carry out disruptive tactics such as heckling, taking
photos of demonstrators and speakers, etc. The police do
nothing. "It's still freedom of speech" they say.
At a community speakout on 24th and Mission, in solidarity
with Palestinian prisoners of war who were on a hunger strike,
a large group of Zionists attempted to surround our rally and
disrupt it with bullhorns and a giant boom box. Every one of
them had a camera and an Israeli flag and attempted to
photograph each of us and block us off from view of the
street.
At the June 30th demonstration at Union Square, a Zionist
supporter informed us that, "The Palestinians love the wall!"
Now they have termed all those who oppose the war on Iraq
and who defend the rights of Palestinians "terrorists"! They
claim we are "aiding the enemy" and thereby killing U.S. soldiers.
They are demanding that the School Board prohibit pro-Palestinian
or Antiwar groups the use of Public School facilities and more.
They will not go away on their own.
We can't allow them to disrupt this conference or any more
of our events. Please consider showing up and peacefully
supporting this conference tomorrow. It is up to us to defend
our right to freedom of speech and opinion and the public
expression of such.
While the U.S, is currently on the offensive in Iraq, Israel is
on the offensive in Palestine-lengthening the wall, bulldozing
homes, murdering and maiming children and preventing all
Palestinians from pursuing a happy and free life.
We have a right and an obligation to all of humanity to organize
opposition to these atrocities! This is not about anti-Semitism.
Many Jewish people are appalled at what is being done by Israel
in the name of all Jewish people around the world. Many are
opposed to sending $5 billion of our tax dollars to fund Israel's
murderous and larcenous rampage. Many Jewish people are part
of the antiwar and Free Palestine movements.
This is not about religion. This is about universal human rights
and freedom!
We must stand up to this attack! Show your support for peace
and solidarity. Attend this conference to demand:
FREE PALESTINE!
END ALL U.S. AID TO ISRAEL-NOT ONE MORE DIME!
END THE OCCUPATION OF IRAQ AND AFTGHANISTAN!
BRING ALL OUR TROOPS HOME NOW!
MONEY FOR HUMAN NEEDS NOT WAR!
If you can, show up tomorrow, Saturday, October 2nd,
at 8 am at Horace Mann to help defend the conference.
Yours for peace and solidarity,
Bonnie Weinstein, Bay Area United Against War
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) San Francisco Schools For Jihad
By Lee Kaplan
FrontPageMagazine.com | October 1, 2004
http://frontpagemagazine.com/
2) The Struggle for Palestine:
4th Anniversary of the Intifada
Conference:
October 2nd, 2004, beginning 9:00 a.m.
Horace Mann Middle School -
3351 23rd Street, San Francisco
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) San Francisco Schools For Jihad
By Lee Kaplan
FrontPageMagazine.com | October 1, 2004
http://frontpagemagazine.com/
The San Francisco Unified School District will host an event tomorrow
(Saturday, October 2) in support of overseas terrorist groups given by
the International Solidarity Movement and its affiliate, International
ANSWER. Taking place at Horace Mann Middle School in San FranciscoÂ’s
Mission District, the event is titled “The Struggle for Palestine: 4th
Anniversary of the Intifada.” The Intifada means the violent insurrection
started by the PLO in September, 2000 that has resulted in over 25,000
terror attacks and more than 1,000 innocent people deliberately murdered
in cold blood.
For the radical Left, this event is especially timely, since it follows
the beheadings of two American citizens in Iraq last week, a crime and
tragedy that undoubtedly will not be condemned during the proceedings at
the Horace Mann Middle School this weekend.
Overall, this event is only one example of the support for terrorism
(euphemistically called “resistance”). The fourth purpose listed for
holding the event on some of the organizersÂ’ websites is especially
intriguing. It is to garner:
Support for resistance in Palestine, and to make links with others who
are fighting against the U.S. occupation of Iraq, and against U.S.
imperialism around the world.
Can you guess what the organizers of this event mean by “fighting against
the U.S. occupation in Iraq?” They mean killing of our sons and daughters
in Iraq who are in the U.S. military. And can you guess whoÂ’s fighting
against them? The terrorists from al-Qaeda, the Ba'ath Party, Ansar
Al-Islam and any other members of the terrorist network.
The organizers of this event misrepresented themselves to the San
Francisco Unified School District by claiming their event would be an
impartial meeting of progressives to discuss the Middle East. If that
were really so, it should certainly fall under the parameters of free
speech. However, internal emails broadcasted by the organizers to their
email lists and on their websites tell another story of supporting
terrorism -- an illegal activity not covered by free speech provisions.
Simply put, this event is being staged in San Francisco with workshops
designed to train “activists” to undermine anti-terrorism efforts abroad
and to help devise ways to aid the “resistance” in Iraq that is killing
American soldiers and other Coalition forces. Some of the groups
participating also actively fundraise fungible assets that, once they
arrive overseas, can go toward financing more terrorism.
One canÂ’t really blame the Palestine Solidarity Movement (an affiliate of
the International Solidarity Movement, or ISM), and the alphabet soup of
names its proxy groups go under, for utilizing a publicly funded junior
high school to hold another series of workshops and training sessions.
After all, radicals bent on destroying Israel and attacking U.S. forces
in Iraq need a place to practice “direct action,” plot strategy and plan
fundraising. The public officials who rented the school to them for 12
hours on October 2nd, meanwhile, bear more blame for their lack of scrutiny.
The application form, filled out in the name of International ANSWER, a
group that supports North Korean communism, states the event is merely an
“Educational Forum on the Middle East.” There is no mention of
celebrating the Intifada or supporting the Iraqi Insurgency.
International ANSWER and its affiliate, the International Action Center
(IAC), advocate a communist revolution. The IAC is led by Ramsey Clark,
Saddam Hussein's defense attorney.
When the deception was pointed out to Phillip Smith, the head of the Real
Estate Department for the San Francisco Unified School District, he
claimed by email he was unable to say no to the organizers, citing
California Education Code 38130 which allows use of school facilities for
political groups.
This is erroneous, as I explained to the school districtÂ’s attorney,
Miguel Marquez. California Education Code 38130 also states, “The school
district may grant the use of the school facilities and grounds upon
certain terms and conditions deemed proper by the governing board,
subject to specified limitations, requirements, and restrictions set
forth within the law.” (Emphasis added.)
If thatÂ’s the case, the event should come under Title 18 Section 2339A of
the Federal Criminal Code and Rules and amended Sections 702 and 703
regarding aid to terrorism that extends criminal penalties to those who
engage in aiding terrorism overseas from within the United States.
Marquez claims the rights of freedom of speech are broad and that this
event in San Francisco is an “educational” event, like the organizers
claimed it is. However, he had no reply for me when I told him the event
at Horace Mann Middle School will contain workshops to deal with damaging
the Caterpillar CorporationÂ’s business in the U.S. (placing the school
district at liability also from Caterpillar), as well as other ways to
aid terrorist movements overseas as outlined for the event on multiple
websites. The Israeli army uses Caterpillar tractors to demolish the
homes of suicide bombers because those homes are used as bomb factories
or to house terrorist cells. And any other aid to those “fighting against
the US occupation in Iraq” would also fall into the category of aiding
terrorism overseas, whether by financial or material support as well as
through propaganda.
The copy of the rental agreement, filled out by a Saul Kanowitz of
International ANSWER, had no clauses in the event of misrepresentation of
events to be held on school property. Certainly, the San Francisco
Unified School District would not permit a similar event by the Ku Klux
Klan or the American Nazi Party on school grounds if such organizations
said they were holding educational discussions on American race in their
applications. In any case, the federal statues related to aiding
terrorists overseas gives the school district the right to act in a case
of clear misrepresentation by the organizers.
Kanowitz, who is gay, came to media attention when he sponsored a float
in the San Francisco Gay Pride parade equating the gay rights movement
with the Palestinian struggle to dismantle Israel. Jewish gay rights
activists in San Francisco were infuriated. Kanowitz was also active in
supporting Saddam HusseinÂ’s Iraq against the United States. Kanowitz is
hardly someone who was seeking to organize an objective educational forum
on the Middle East at Horace Mann Middle School.
Most agreements of other school districts in California regarding the
renting of school property for events all contain provisions such as this:
Persons or organizations applying for the use of school facilities shall
submit a statement of information indicating that the organization
upholds the state and federal constitutions and does not intend to use
school premises to commit unlawful acts.
The San Francisco Unified School District might consider adding such a
clause to its own rental applications.
To verify some information, I called one of the organizers of this event
listed on the Al Awda website who answered the phone saying, “ADC” (the
acronym for the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee). The ADC
claims to be an Arab civil rights group fighting discrimination against
Arabs and Muslims since 9/11. So why is it conducting events designed to
aid terrorist movements overseas, especially in Iraq?
Rayan Elamine, who identified himself as an employee of the ADC during my
telephone interview, told me the San Francisco event was organized for
people who could not make it to the bigger national conference being held
at Duke University, October 15th-17th, which will also host workshops on
how to aid the “resistance” in Iraq against U.S. soldiers and damage the
Caterpillar Corporation’s business . He also spoke of “neo-conservatives”
(Jews) in the U.S. government that are “running things.” When I asked him
to specifically condemn attacks by al-Qaeda or other terrorist groups in
Iraq, he refused to condemn such activities even after I gave him several
opportunities to do so. “We don’t make statements about occupations first
and foremost,” he said, refusing even to condemn suicide bombings that
kill both U.S. soldiers and Israelis. However, all media about this event
on the websites run by the organizers list “fighting against the
occupation” as the event’s goal. Jess Ghannam, who is also on the Board
of the ADC, is listed as another contact for the event on the Al-Awda
website.
The Duke Conference will be mimicked in San Francisco by other local
sponsors besides International ANSWER. These include the ADC, the ISM,
Al-Awda, SUSTAIN (Stop U.S. Taxpayer Support Against Israel Now), Jews
for a Free Palestine (a group that includes Jamie Spector, who was
exposed and deported from Israel due to another Front Page Magazine
article), as well as a new group called QUIT (Queers Undermining the
Occupation), no doubt led by Kanowitz. The Stalinist National Lawyers
Guild and even a current attorney from the ACLU will round out the program.
I also asked the school districtÂ’s attorney, Marquez, if the district
would require that people with dissenting views be admitted to this
“educational event” or would they be forced to sign statements supporting
the dismantling of Israel or against U.S. forces in Iraq in order to get
in. Again, he had no reply, claiming state law tied his hands.
Apparently, “freedom of speech” isn’t as broad a topic as Marquez says it
is.
On many occasions, FrontPage Magazine has exposed how our colleges, high
schools and now even junior high schools are being used by
terrorist-supporting groups.
This support of terrorism has to stop.
The San Francisco Unified School District administrators refuse to stop
their complicity with terror -- even after they learned they are giving
support to murder overseas. No doubt, the administrators were duped by
the organizers of this event. However, instead of acknowledging their
error, they claim they are preserving the very freedoms that the
organizers of this event are working to destroy.
Let San Francisco Schools Superintendent Arlene Ackerman know how you feel:
ackermana@sfusd.edu . So far her office has stonewalled any common sense
solution
to not letting this event go forward. While youÂ’re at it, contact Governor
Schwarzenegger as well: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/.
Lee Kaplan is a contributing editor to Frontpagemag.com.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
2) The Struggle for Palestine:
4th Anniversary of the Intifada
Conference:
October 2nd, 2004, beginning 9:00 a.m.
Horace Mann Middle School -
3351 23rd Street, San Francisco
9:00-9:30: Registration
9:30-11:00: Morning Plenary Session:
The Current Status of Resistance in Palestine
11:00-12:15: Workshop Session #1
Continuations of Plenary: Status of Resistance
History of Palestine, The Nekbah and the Right of Return
Iraq and Palestine: 2 Struggles, One cause
Zionism
12:15-1:30: Lunch (Catered, with Music)
1:30-2:45: Workshop Session #2
Direct Action: Skills Development
The Impact of Palestine on the US Elections
Political Prisoners, Here and in Palestine
Globalization in the Arab World
2:45-3:00: Tea/Coffee Break
3:00-4:15: Workshop Session #3
Women and Resistance
The Targets of Empire: Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti,
Iran, Philippines, and Africa
US Solidarity Groups
Repression/Occupation in the US
(patriot Act, profiling, attacks on civil liberties)
4:30-6:00 Closing Plenary
Closing Summation and the Future in Palestine
6:00-7:00: Dinner with music
Cultural Performances
for more information:
info@justiceinpalestine.net
or visit
www.justiceinpalestine.net
Friday, October 01, 2004
Thursday, September 30, 2004
BAUAW NEWSLETTER-THURSDAY, SEPTMEBER 30, 2004
1) Yes on N!
End the Occupation---Bring Our Troops Home Now!
COME OUT ON SUNDAY AND TABLE FOR PROP N !!!
Enjoy the Castro Street Fair while distributing lit for Prop N
2) The Struggle for Palestine:
4th Anniversary of the Intifada
Saturday, October 2nd, 2004
Horace Mann Middle School - 3351 23rd Street, San Francisco
3) Continued US Airstrikes in Baghdad Draw Criticism
Sadr City neighborhood is attacked for a second day.
Interim president of Iraq likens the tactics to Israeli
military actions in the Gaza Strip.
By Ashraf Khalil
BAGHDAD
Published on Wednesday, September 29, 2004
by the Los Angeles Times
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0929-24.htm
4) US bases in Iraq: sticky politics, hard math
By David R. Francis
If a new Iraq government should agree to let American
forces stay on, how many bases will the US request?
[In a message dated 9/30/04 4:26:08 AM,
rkallen@myrealbox.com writes:
from the September 30, 2004 edition]
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0930/p17s02-cogn.html
5) "On to Baghdad, back to home."
Subj: Fw: Please Forgive The Mass-Mailing!
Date: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 11:14:50 PM
From: dmg011@usadatanet.net
Please disperse this message on behalf of those who were
pushed even further last year, as the armed forces dangled
a carrot for months.
"For those of you unaware, I will be shortly on my way to Iraq
again. I write now as a plea for help on behalf of the combat
veterans forced to return to hostile areas against their will.
I am talking about the Army's policy regarding "Stop-Loss",
a procedure whereby the Army does not allow a soldier to
separate from service when his contract expires.
Effectively, we are being held hostage..."
6) Ashcroft Says Likely to Appeal U.S. Patriot Act Ruling
SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 05:54 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6375762&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
7) Car Bombs Kill 34 Children in Baghdad
By Luke Baker
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6378394&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
[What are 34 children doing near a U.S. military convoy?
Could they have been human shields? ...BW]
8) Twelve Palestinians, 3 Israelis Die in Gaza Violence
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 08:10 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6377165&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
9) The war's littlest victim
... and as the article mentions many, many Iraqi babies.
This was the cover story in today's News.
New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com
The war's littlest victim
Tuesday, September 28th, 2004
10) Forbes 400 list of richest Americans: snapshot of a
financial oligarchy
By Joseph Kay
27 September 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/sep2004/forb-s27_prn.shtml
11) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28) Updated: 01:48 PM EDT
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
12) Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Books Not Bars
13) Anti-war Activists 4 the Million Worker March-
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org
14) Books Not Bars presents:
THE WORLD PREMIERE OF
***********************************
"SYSTEM FAILURE:
VIOLENCE, ABUSE & NEGLECT IN CYA"
***********************************
Tuesday October 19th 7pm
Grand Lake Theater
3200 Grand Avenue, Oakland
15) Urgent Appeal from Gaza
Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:39:28 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Barbara Lubin"
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) Yes on N!
End the Occupation---Bring Our Troops Home Now!
COME OUT ON SUNDAY AND TABLE FOR PROP N!!!
Enjoy the Castro Street Fair while distributing lit for Prop N
The Castro Street Fair is happening this Sunday, Oct. 3rd from about
9 a.m. to 6 p.m. The Prop N campaign will be working out of two booths:
The Harvey Milk LGBT Demo Club (booth 748) and Pride at Work
(booth 750). Both will be located at the North side of Market probably
near the middle of the 2300 block (between Noe & Castro). Enter at
the Noe & Castro Gate. You should ask for a map at the gate and look
for the booth #s marked in front of each booth.
Well over 100,000 people will be there. We will be passing out
brochures about Prop N in the morning and window signs proclaiming:
End the Occupation---Bring Our Troops Home Now, Yes on N in the
afternoon.
This is one of our best opportunities before the election to bring
visibility to the campaign. We can use help for 1 or 2 hours or all
day. Wear sunblock and look for our red, black and yellow banner
With the aforementioned slogan.
Thanks, Howard Wallace - 415/861-0318
PS: Check out our web site and note our broad array of endorsers:
YesonN.net
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
2) The Struggle for Palestine:
4th Anniversary of the Intifada
October 2nd, 2004
Horace Mann Middle School - 3351 23rd Street, San Francisco
9:00-9:30: Registration
9:30-11:00: Morning Plenary Session:
The Current Status of Resistance in Palestine
11:00-12:15: Workshop Session #1
Continuations of Plenary: Status of Resistance
History of Palestine, The Nekbah and the Right of Return
Iraq and Palestine: 2 Struggles, One cause
Zionism
12:15-1:30: Lunch (Catered, with Music)
1:30-2:45: Workshop Session #2
Direct Action: Skills Development
The Impact of Palestine on the US Elections
Political Prisoners, Here and in Palestine
Globalization in the Arab World
2:45-3:00: Tea/Coffee Break
3:00-4:15: Workshop Session #3
Women and Resistance
The Targets of Empire: Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti,
Iran, Philippines, Africa
US Solidarity Groups
Repression/Occupation in the US (patriot Act, profiling,
attacks on civil liberties)
4:30-6:00 Closing Plenary
Closing Summation and the Future in Palestine
6:00-7:00: Dinner with music
Cultural Performances
for more information:
info@justiceinpalestine.net
or visit
www.justiceinpalestine.net
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
3) Continued US Airstrikes in Baghdad Draw Criticism
Sadr City neighborhood is attacked for a second day.
Interim president of Iraq likens the tactics to Israeli
military actions in the Gaza Strip.
By Ashraf Khalil
BAGHDAD
Published on Wednesday, September 29, 2004
by the Los Angeles Times
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0929-24.htm
BAGHDAD - U.S. forces launched airstrikes Tuesday on the Baghdad
neighborhood of Sadr City for the second consecutive day, and two
British soldiers were killed in an ambush in the southern city of Basra.
'COLLECTIVE PUNISHMENT"
A relative cries as a coffin carrying the body of Ahmed Abdul Muttalib
is taken for burial in Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday Sept. 29, 2004.
Muttalib died in an U.S. airstrike early on Wednesday morning and his
wife was gravely injured. (AP Photo/ Karim Kadim)
Sadr City, a Shiite Muslim-dominated area in the eastern part of the
capital, is a stronghold of the Al Mahdi militia led by radical cleric
Muqtada Sadr. Though his forces have been weakened by their
August expulsion from the southern city of Najaf after a prolonged
U.S. siege, attacks against American and Iraqi patrols have become
a daily occurrence in Sadr City, and visitors report that the streets
are dotted with bombs.
U.S. forces have launched multiple offensives targeting Shiite rebels
in the densely populated district. U.S. forces said a "precision strike"
Monday killed four insurgents, but hospital officials said 10 people,
including civilians, were killed.
Tuesday's attack injured at least three people, officials at Sadr City's
Jawader Hospital said. It was unclear whether any insurgents were
killed or injured.
In recent weeks, U.S. forces have also launched regular airstrikes
on the town of Fallouja, west of Baghdad, which is controlled by
Sunni Muslim insurgents. Although U.S. military operations
supposedly are coordinated with Iraqi leaders, the Americans'
increasing reliance on air attacks drew criticism Tuesday from
the U.S.-backed interim Iraqi president.
Drawing a parallel between U.S. tactics in Iraq and Israeli actions
in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip,
President Ghazi Ajil Yawer said the U.S. strikes were viewed by
the Iraqi people as "collective punishment" against towns and
neighborhoods.
Footage of injured and dead women and children being pulled
from bombed buildings "brings to mind Gaza," Yawer said in an
interview on CNN.
Yawer's comments echo criticism of American military tactics in
the spring, when members of the now-disbanded Iraqi Governing
Council stridently protested a Marine siege of Fallouja.
Also Tuesday, insurgents armed with machine guns and rocket-
propelled grenades launched a morning attack on a two-vehicle
British army convoy in the southern city of Basra.
Shakir Hashem, a 28-year-old auto repair shop owner, identified
the attackers as Al Mahdi militiamen. They "were setting a trap
to attack the British troops.... When the convoy passed, they
opened fire," he said.
British troops returned fire, and during the ensuing gun battle
a grenade launched by one of the attackers struck a nearby
auto shop, setting it ablaze, Hashem said. Two British soldiers
who were injured in the ambush died at a military hospital.
The U.S. military identified a soldier killed Monday by a sniper
in Balad, north of Baghdad, as Sgt. 1st Class Joselito O. Villanueva,
36, of Los Angeles.
Two other soldiers who died last week in Iraq also have been
identified. Spc. Robert Unruh, 25, of Tucson was killed Saturday
when his unit was attacked in Al Anbar province west of Baghdad.
On the same day, Spc. Clifford L. Moxley Jr., 51, a National
Guardsman based in Berwick, Penn., died of "non-combat
related injuries."
(c) 2004 Los Angeles Times
(c) Copyrighted 1997-2004
www.commondreams.org
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
4) US bases in Iraq: sticky politics, hard math
By David R. Francis
If a new Iraq government should agree to let American
forces stay on, how many bases will the US request?
[In a message dated 9/30/04 4:26:08 AM,
rkallen@myrealbox.com writes:
from the September 30, 2004 edition]
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0930/p17s02-cogn.html
One, as the United States Army currently maintains in Honduras?
Six, the number of installations it lists in the Netherlands.
Or maybe 12?
The Pentagon isn't saying.
But a dozen is the number of so-called "enduring bases" located
by John Pike, director of GlobalSecurities.org. His military affairs
website gives their names. They include, for example, Camp Victory
at the Baghdad airfield and Camp Renegade in Kirkuk. The Chicago
Tribune last March said US engineers are constructing 14 "enduring
bases," but Mr. Pike hasn't located two of them.
Note the terminology "enduring" bases. That's Pentagon-speak for
long-term encampments - not necessarily permanent, but not just
a tent on a wood platform either. It all suggests a planned indefinite
stay on Iraqi soil that will cost US taxpayers for years to come.
The actual amount depends on how many troops are stationed there
for the long term. If the US decides to reduce its forces there from the
138,000 now to, say, 50,000, and station them in bases, the costs
would run between $5 billion to $7 billion a year, estimates Gordon
Adams, director of Security Policy Studies at George Washington
University in Washington, D.C. That's two to three times as much
as the annual American subsidy to Israel. Providing protection for
Israel is one of several reasons some analysts cite for the
US invasion of Iraq.
If more troops are based in Iraq for the long haul, the cost would
be higher. US Army planners are preparing to maintain the current
level of forces in Iraq at least through 2007, The New York Times
reported this week. But no decision has been made at the political
level.
So far, the Bush administration has not publicly indicated that it
will seek permanent bases in Iraq to replace those recently given
up in Saudi Arabia, a possibility mentioned by Deputy Defense
Secretary Paul Wolfowitz before US forces moved into Iraq. The
US already has bases in Kuwait and Qatar.
At an April 2003 press conference, Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld said any suggestion that the US is planning a permanent
military presence in Iraq is "inaccurate and unfortunate." With the
presidential election weeks away, he is unlikely to alter that
pronouncement on such a politically touchy matter. Such a
move would almost certainly attract fire from Democratic
candidate John Kerry.
Nonetheless, several military experts in Washington assume Iraq's
new government will need the support of American troops - and
thus "permanent" bases - for years, perhaps decades, to come.
The US already has 890 military installations in foreign countries,
ranging from major Air Force bases to smaller installations, say
a radar facility. Perhaps bases in Iraq would enable the Pentagon
to close a few of those facilities. As part of a post-cold-war shift
in its global posture, the Defense Department has been cutting
the number of its installations in Germany, which total more than
100. Last week Mr. Rumsfeld testified about a global "rearrangement"
of US forces to the Senate Armed Forces Committee.
"Who needs Germany when we have Iraq?" asks Mr. Pike of
GlobalSecurities.org.
Building bases in Iraq has risks. Two Americans beheaded last
week were working as civil engineers constructing the Taji
military base north of Baghdad, one of the bases Pike lists as
"enduring."
The bigger risk: Polls find that at least 80 percent of Iraqis -
whatever their views on the insurgency, democracy, the removal
of Saddam Hussein, and other issues - want US armed forces to
leave their nation. Making the bases permanent could stir up
more opposition to the US occupation.
Another fear, however, is that without US bases, the various
Iraqi factions - the Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds - would fall into
civil war. In turn, this conflict could drag in Iran, Syria, and
Turkey, leading to a widespread conflict in the Middle East.
Hope of establishing a democracy in an Arab nation would fade.
To avoid these risks, an Iraq government will accept a US military
presence despite popular disapproval, Pike says. "An indefinite
American presence in Iraq is the ultimate guarantor of some
quasi-pluralistic government."
Also, withdrawal of US forces would be seen by Iraqi insurgents
as a victory, prompting them to redouble their efforts to kill
Americans, says Thomas Donnelly, a military expert at the
American Enterprise Institute in Washington.
The US can afford maintaining bases in Iraq, he argues. US defense
spending now amounts to a bit more than 4 percent of gross
domestic product, the nation's output of goods and services.
It might rise as a result of Iraq bases to 5 percent of GDP, still
less than the 6.5 percent of GDP in the cold war or the 10 percent
during the Vietnam War.
Not everyone agrees. Permanent bases in Iraq are a "disastrously
bad idea," says Jessica Mathews, president of the Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace in Washington. It reinforces
Iraqi suspicions that the US launched the war to get a hand on
Iraqi oil, control the region, and wants to maintain a puppet
government in Baghdad.
The total cost of the Iraq war has reached $125 billion to
$140 billion, estimates Mr. Adams. Reconstruction boosts the
total to as high as $175 billion. Permanent bases would keep
the tab running for years to come.
www.csmonitor.com | Copyright (c) 2004 The Christian Science
Monitor. All rights reserved.
For permission to reprint/republish this article, please email
Copyright
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
5) "On to Baghdad, back to home."
Subj: Fw: Please Forgive The Mass-Mailing!
Date: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 11:14:50 PM
From: dmg011@usadatanet.net
Please disperse this message on behalf of those who were
pushed even further last year, as the armed forces dangled
a carrot for months.
"For those of you unaware, I will be shortly on my way to Iraq
again. I write now as a plea for help on behalf of the combat
veterans forced to return to hostile areas against their will.
I am talking about the Army's policy regarding "Stop-Loss",
a procedure whereby the Army does not allow a soldier to
separate from service when his contract expires.
Effectively, we are being held hostage..."
----- Original Message -----
From: omit my name
To: Relatives
Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 12:36 PM
Subject: Please Forgive The Mass-Mailing!
My friends,
For those of you unaware, I will be shortly on my way to Iraq again.
I write now as a plea for help on behalf of the combat veterans
forced to return to hostile areas against their will. I am talking
about the Army's policy regarding "Stop-Loss", a procedure
whereby the Army does not allow a soldier to separate from
service when his contract expires. Effectively, we are being
held hostage by a policy designed to discourage soldiers from
terminating their service before war. For those of us who have
been to war, it seems unfair to send us back. We understand,
though, that these are difficult times, and we are ready to stand
against those who threaten the security of our freedom. We are
even willing to return to the combat zone, so long as the
commitment does not exceed that for which we enlisted.
Men and women of the Third Infantry Division were told
yesterday that not one of them would be permitted to
terminate their service until after a twelve month deployment
to Iraq, an area as hostile as the first days of the war in which
the division lost over a hundred American soldiers in two weeks.
This policy unfairly targets soldiers who have already served
in The War On Terror. We (myself and many unnamed others)
believe it is unethical and a disgusting, flagrant abuse of the
trust of the men and women in uniform.
We merely ask that you write a letter to your senators,
representatives, state governors, and newspapers. The public
needs to know about the atrocity that they are doing unto their
protectors. I will be busy writing form letters for you, and any
of your friends who are willing to help me. You may forward this
message to anyone you see fit. I only ask that, for my protection,
you omit my name. If you are willing to help, please write me
back with your state of residence, and I will send you a form
letter, the names of your congresspersons, and the contact
information for local, state, and federal media.
Even if you do not have the time to do anything, please remember
what is happening to us the next time you hear about Iraq in
conversation or in the news and let someone know about us.
Maybe they will carry on our plight. Thank you for your time.
Warmest regards,
omit my name
Opinions expressed in this electronic mailing do not
necessarily represent those of The United States Government,
The Department of Defense, or The Department of The Army.
All contents are sole proprietary of the author and are
protected by numerous state, federal and international laws.
Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
Half a league, half a league, half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death rode the six hundred.
Their's not to make reply, their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death rode the six hundred.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
6) Ashcroft Says Likely to Appeal U.S. Patriot Act Ruling
SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 05:54 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6375762&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands (Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General
John Ashcroft said on Thursday the Bush administration was
likely to appeal against a U.S. District Court ruling that part
of the Patriot Act was unconstitutional.
"Without knowing the specifics, I wouldn't be able to
assure you that the case would be appealed, but it is almost a
certainty that it would be appealed," Ashcroft told reporters
after meeting European Union justice and interior ministers.
"We believe the act to be completely consistent with the
United States' Constitution," he added.
On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero ruled that
surveillance powers granted to the FBI under the Patriot Act, a
cornerstone of the U.S. war on terror, were unconstitutional.
In the first decision against a surveillance portion of the
act, Marrero ruled for the American Civil Liberties Union in
its challenge against what it called "unchecked power" by the
FBI to demand secret customer records from communication
companies, such as Internet service providers or telephone
companies.
Ashcroft said the Bush administration would continue "to
use every tool" available under the constitution to fight
terrorism.
EU and U.S. officials met in the Dutch sea-side resort to
discuss how to boost the fight against terrorism, including
improved information exchange, cutting off financing and
safeguarding borders without hampering trade and travel.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
[What are 34 children doing near a U.S. military convoy?
Could they have been human shields? ...BW]
7) Car Bombs Kill 34 Children in Baghdad
By Luke Baker
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6378394&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Insurgents detonated three car bombs
near a U.S. military convoy in Baghdad Thursday, killing 41
people, 34 of them children, and wounding scores.
In two other attacks, a suicide bomber blew up his vehicle
near a U.S. checkpoint outside the capital, killing two
policemen and a U.S. soldier, and a car bomb killed four people
in the restive northern Iraq town of Tal Afar.
The Baghdad blasts coincided with crowds gathering to
celebrate the opening of a new sewage plant. It was not clear
if the event or a U.S. convoy passing nearby was the target.
The first explosion was followed by two more that struck
those who rushed to the aid of the initial victims.
Ten U.S. soldiers were wounded in the attack, two of them
seriously, the military said. Iraq's Health ministry confirmed
41 dead and 139 wounded, the vast majority children.
Instability is steadily mounting just weeks before the U.S.
presidential election in November and four months before Iraq
is due to hold its own nationwide polls. Attacks on American
troops have risen to around 80 a day from 40 a month ago.
Doctors at Yarmouk hospital struggled to treat the flood of
victims, as pools of blood formed on the floor.
One boy lay swathed in bandages on a stretcher, his severed
leg on a table beside him. Others were scarred by shrapnel,
their clothes blown off by the force of the explosion.
The attack gouged a crater in the road and wrecked a dozen
burned-out cars and a bus. U.S. troops sealed off the area with
tanks, and helicopters circled overhead.
POLICE AND SOLDIERS DEAD
Hours earlier, a suicide bomber had killed two Iraqi police
and a U.S. soldier by blowing up his car near a U.S. checkpoint
at a crowded intersection in Abu Ghraib, just west of Baghdad.
Around 60 people, including women and children, were wounded.
Another soldier was killed when a rocket hit a U.S.
logistics base near Baghdad. The confirmed deaths of the two
soldiers raised to at least 802 the number of U.S. troops
killed in action since the start of the war.
In northern Iraq, another car bomb blew up near an Iraqi
police convoy in the center of Tal Afar, a rebellious town
close to the Syrian border. Hospital officials said four
civilians had been killed and 16 wounded. Four policemen were
also hurt.
In rebel-held Falluja, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad,
U.S. forces destroyed a building they said was being used by
fighters loyal to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose group is
threatening to behead a British hostage.
The strike was the latest in a series of almost daily
attacks in Falluja intended to crush Zarqawi's network, which
has claimed responsibility for many of Iraq's bloodiest suicide
bombings and the killings of foreign captives.
Zarqawi's group beheaded Americans Eugene Armstrong and
Jack Hensley this month after U.S. forces and the Iraqi
government refused to release women prisoners.
BRITISH HOSTAGE
The group says it will also kill the Briton Kenneth Bigley,
62, who was snatched along with the American pair.
Wednesday, footage was released showing a haggard Bigley
squatting chained in a cage, pleading for his life.
In a barely audible voice, Bigley said British Prime
Minister Tony Blair was not doing enough to free him: "Tony
Blair is a liar. He doesn't care about me. I'm just one person."
Blair has said Britain will not negotiate with the
kidnappers, but told reporters on Wednesday: "They've made no
attempt to have any contact with us at all. If they did make
contact, it would be something we would immediately respond to."
Separately, a militant group said it had seized 10 people,
including two Indonesian women, working for an electronics firm
in Iraq, Al Jazeera television reported.
Lebanon said three of its nationals had been seized. It was
not clear if this was the same incident.
The U.S. military says it has sound intelligence that
Zarqawi and his followers are hiding out in Falluja, although
residents say the U.S. strikes regularly hit civilians.
U.S. marines pulled out of the city after weeks of fighting
in April that killed hundreds of Iraqis, and handed over
responsibility for security to an Iraqi force that has since
collapsed. The city is now run by insurgents.
The U.S. military says that with the help of Iraqi forces
it will retake rebel strongholds such as Falluja, Ramadi,
Samarra and the Baghdad neighborhoods of Sadr City and Haifa
Street by December so elections can go ahead as
planned a month later.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
8) Twelve Palestinians, 3 Israelis Die in Gaza Violence
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 08:10 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6377165&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
GAZA (Reuters) - Twelve Palestinians and three Israelis
were killed Thursday as tanks thrust deep into the Gaza Strip's
largest refugee camp for the first time after a rocket attack
killed two Israeli children in a border town.
In one of Gaza's bloodiest days for months, gunmen shot
dead an Israeli soldier and a woman jogger, and Israeli forces
raiding the Jabalya camp killed at least six militants plus
several civilians during fierce fighting.
The army's push into the militant stronghold in north Gaza
came after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon ordered troops
to use all means necessary to put a stop to rocket fire that
has persisted despite repeated Israeli raids and air strikes.
A Hamas rocket attack on the southern Israeli town of
Sderot Wednesday killed two Israeli children, aged 2 and 4, as
they played outside while visiting their grandparents on the
eve of the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot.
The latest spiral of violence has sent Sharon scrambling to
counter rightist critics who say his plan to withdraw troops
and settlers from occupied Gaza next year has emboldened
militants trying to give the impression that Israel is being
driven out.
Israel's army appears determined to smash militant groups
before leaving.
"The formula is clear -- blood for blood, bombardment for
bombardment," a Hamas gunman said in Jabalya, where Israeli
forces used tanks and armored bulldozers to clear a path into
the crowded camp of 100,000 inhabitants.
It was Israel's deepest and strongest thrust into Jabalya's
narrow street and alleys in four years of conflict -- a move
the army had long avoided for fear that troops and armored
would be vulnerable to militant attack.
Palestinians condemned the Israeli offensive, which
intensified early Thursday when a column of tanks entered the
camp and battled scores of armed militants.
"Israel is expanding its military operations in Gaza. This
is a dangerous indicator which will lead to failure," said
Nabil Abu Rdainah, an aide to Palestinian President Yasser
Arafat.
PALESTINIAN AMBUSHES
Under cover of fog and darkness, two gunman from Hamas --
an Islamic faction behind a campaign of suicide bombings and
sworn to Israel's destruction -- attacked an army position near
Jabalya before dawn, opening fire and launching grenades.
One soldier was killed and two wounded before troops shot
dead the militants.
Hours later, gunmen killed an Israeli woman as she went for
a morning jog on a road connecting two Jewish settlements in
northern Gaza, military sources said. Soldiers who rushed to
the scene returned fire and killed one gunman, the sources
said.
Israeli Radio said a second Israeli was also killed in the
incident. Palestinian medical sources said a 60-year-old
Palestinian was later killed by Israeli fire in the area, and a
27-year-old man was shot dead working in a nearby field.
Violence surged Wednesday when Palestinian militants
eluding an army crackdown carried out the deadly rocket attack
on Sderot, and troops killed nine Palestinians in raids in the
coastal strip and the West Bank.
Two makeshift Qassam rockets hit a residential block in the
town, close to Israel's fenced border with Gaza, killing a girl
aged 2 and a boy aged 4.
"I saw one little child without his legs. We tried to help
the other one but it was too late," said neighbor Haviv Ben
Abbo, who rushed to the scene when he heard the boom.
Thirteen other residents were injured in the town that has
borne the brunt of Qassam attacks, emergency services said.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
9) The war's littlest victim
... and as the article mentions many, many Iraqi babies.
This was the cover story in today's News.
New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com
The war's littlest victim
Tuesday, September 28th, 2004
In early September 2003, Army National Guard Spec. Gerard Darren
Matthew was sent home from Iraq, stricken by a sudden illness.
One side of Matthew's face would swell up each morning. He had
constant migraine headaches, blurred vision, blackouts and a
burning sensation whenever he urinated.
The Army transferred him to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in
Washington for further tests, but doctors there could not explain
what was wrong.
Shortly after his return, his wife, Janice, became pregnant.
On June 29, she gave birth to a baby girl, Victoria Claudette.
The baby was missing three fingers and most of her right hand.
Matthew and his wife believe Victoria's shocking deformity has
something to do with her father's illness and the war - especially
since there is no history of birth defects in either of their families.
They have seen photos of Iraqi babies born with deformities
that are eerily similar.
In June, Matthew contacted the Daily News and asked us to
arrange independent laboratory screening for his urine. This
was after The News had reported that four of seven soldiers
from another National Guard unit, the 442nd Military Police,
had tested positive for depleted uranium (DU).
The independent test of Matthew's urine found him positive for
DU - low-level radioactive waste produced in nuclear plants
during the enrichment of natural uranium.
Because it is twice as heavy as lead, DU has been used by the
Pentagon since the Persian Gulf War in certain types of "tank-buster"
shells, as well as for armor-plating in Abrams tanks.
Exposure to radioactivity has been associated in some studies
with birth defects in the children of exposed parents.
"My husband went to Iraq to fight for his country," Janice Matthew
said. "I feel the Army should take responsibility for what's happened."
The couple first learned of the baby's missing fingers during a
routine sonogram of the fetus last April at Lenox Hill Hospital.
Matthew was a truck driver in Iraq with the 719th transport unit
from Harlem. His unit moved supplies from Army bases in Kuwait
to the front lines and as far as Baghdad. On several occasions, he
says, he carried shot-up tanks and destroyed vehicle parts on his
flat-bed back to Kuwait.
After he learned of his unborn child's deformity, Matthew
immediately asked the Army to test his urine for DU. In April,
he provided a 24-hour urine sample to doctors at Fort Dix, N.J.,
where he was waiting to be deactivated.
In May, the Army granted him a 40% disability pension for his
migraine headaches and for a condition called idiopathic angioedema -
unexplained chronic swelling.
But Matthew never got the results of his Army test for DU. When
he called Fort Dix last week, five months after he was tested, he
was told there was no record of any urine specimen from him.
Thankfully, Matthew did not rely solely on the Army bureaucracy -
he went to The News.
Earlier this year, The News submitted urine samples from
Guardsmen of the 442nd to former Army doctor Asaf Durakovic
and Axel Gerdes, a geologist at Goethe University in Frankfurt,
Germany. The German lab specializes in testing for minute
quantities of uranium, a complicated procedure that costs up
to $1,000 per test.
The lab is one of approximately 50 in the world that can detect
quantities as tiny as fentograms - one part per quadrillionth.
A few months ago, The News submitted a 24-hour urine sample
from Matthew to Gerdes. As a control, we also gave the lab 24-hour
urine samples from two Daily News reporters.
The three specimens were marked only with the letters A, B and C,
so the lab could not know which sample belonged to the soldier.
After analyzing all three, Gerdes reported that only sample A -
Matthew's urine - showed clear signs of DU. It contained a total
uranium concentration that was "4 to 8 times higher" than
specimens B and C, Gerdes reported.
"Those levels indicate pretty definitively that he's been
exposed to the DU," said Leonard Dietz, a retired scientist
who invented one of the instruments for measuring uranium
isotopes.
According to Army guidelines, the total uranium concentration
Gerdes found in Matthew is within acceptable standards for
most Americans.
But Gerdes questioned the Army's standards, noting that
even minute levels of DU are cause for concern.
"While the levels of DU in Matthew's urine are low," Gerdes
said, "the DU we see in his urine could be 1,000 times higher
in concentration in the lungs."
DU is not like natural uranium, which occurs in the environment.
Natural uranium can be ingested in food and drink but gets
expelled from the body within 24 hours.
DU-contaminated dust, however, is typically breathed into
the lungs and can remain there for years, emitting constant
low-level radiation.
"I'm upset and confused," Matthew said. "I just want answers.
Are they [the Army] going to take care of my baby?"
We track soldiers' sickness
For the last five months, Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez
has chronicled the plight of soldiers who have returned from
Iraq with mysterious illnesses.
His exclusive groundbreaking investigation began with a
front-page story on April 4 that suggested depleted uranium
contamination was far more widespread than the Pentagon
would admit.
* At the request of The News, nine soldiers from a New
York Army National Guard company serving in Iraq were tested
for radiation from depleted uranium shells - and four of the
ailing G.I.s tested positive.
* The day after Gonzalez's story appeared, Army officials
rushed to test all returning members of the company, the
442nd Military Police, based in Rockland County.
* By week's end, the scandal had reverberated all the way
to Albany, as Gov. Pataki joined the list of politicians calling
for the Pentagon to do a better job of testing and treating sick
soldiers returning from the war.
* Gonzalez's exposé sparked a huge demand for testing.
By mid-April, 800 G.I.s had given the Army urine samples, and
hundreds more were waiting for appointments.
* Two weeks later, the Pentagon claimed that none of the
soldiers from the 442nd had tested positive for depleted uranium.
But The News' experts found significant problems with the
testing methods.
UNITED FOR PEACE & JUSTICE | 212-868-5545
This email list is designed for posting news articles or event
announcements of interest to UFPJ member groups.
It is not a discussion list.
To engage in online discussion of UFPJ matters, join our
discussion list by sending a blank email to
ufpj-disc-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
10) Forbes 400 list of richest Americans: snapshot of a
financial oligarchy
By Joseph Kay
27 September 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/sep2004/forb-s27_prn.shtml
The current issue of Forbes Magazine contains the publication's
annual list of the wealthiest Americans, ranked by net worth.
While one's first instinct might be to turn away in disgust from
such a flaunting of individual wealth and greed, it is instructive
to consider the figures, for they provide an important indication
of the nature of American society.
According to Forbes , "The economy's recovery may be a little
shaky, but you wouldn't know it from looking at this year's
Forbes 400. The combined net worth of the nation's wealthiest
climbed to $1 trillion, up $45 billion in 12 months. With a
$750 million admission price, 9-digit fortunes are an
endangered species here: 78 percent of the people on this
year's list are billionaires."
The richest individual remains Microsoft's Bill Gates, who has
a net worth of $48 billion. Other notables include Warren Buffet,
who is number two with $41 billion; the Walton family, which
controls Wal-Mart, with five individuals on the list, each of
whom has a net worth of $18 billion; Lawrence Ellison of Oracle,
who ranks tenth with $13.7 billion; media tycoon Rupert Murdoch,
27th with $6.9 billion; and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg,
who comes in at 24th with $5 billion.
The figure of $1 trillion marks something of a milestone, not only
because the 400 richest Americans have a combined net worth that
requires 13 digits to write out, but also because it is a return to the
sort of numbers that were last seen during the stock market boom
of 1999-2000. It was in 1999 that the $1 trillion figure was first
reached, then climbing to $1.2 trillion at the height of the boom in
2000. The figure dropped in 2001 and 2002 before climbing again
in 2003 and 2004.
The number of billionaires in the country has followed a similar
pattern. In 1996, before the stock market really took off in the
late 1990s, there were 79 individuals with a net worth of at least
$1 billion. Bill Gates, who topped the list then as now, had
a relatively paltry $18 billion. By 2000, the number of billionaires
had shot up to 298, before falling to 266 in 2001 and 228 in 2002.
The super-rich have experienced a comeback in recent years,
however, with the number of billionaires rising to 262 in 2003
and 313 in 2004.
The figure of $1 trillion, because of its enormity, is somewhat
difficult to comprehend. To put it in perspective, if the wealth
were divided into sums of $10,000, there would be 100 million
portions-enough to hand out $10,000 checks to approximately
one in three people living in the United States.
One trillion dollars is also approximately equal to the gross
domestic product of Canada ($957 billion).
California's budget deficit, which has wreaked havoc across the
state and prompted massive spending cuts affecting millions of
people, is $40 billion. But this is less than one-twentieth the net
worth of the 400 richest individuals in the country.
State budget shortfalls that have prompted similar cuts in social
programs and education throughout the country total about
$100 billion-one tenth of $1 trillion held by those on the Forbes
list. Earlier this month, the Congressional Budget Office projected
a record budget deficit for the United States in 2004 of $422 billion-an
unprecedented sum, but still less than half of the wealth of
America's most fortunate sons and daughters.
One trillion dollars is approximately the amount spent on the
military throughout the world, about half of which is spent in
the United States.
The Forbes list provides a snapshot of what can only be called
an economic oligarchy. Such staggering sums of wealth concentrated
in the hands of a tiny percentage of the population coincides with
growing poverty for tens of millions of Americans, declining living
standards and worsening economic insecurity for tens of millions
more, an intensified assault on social services, and an ongoing
decline in the basic infrastructure of the country.
The Census Bureau released figures last month reporting that
poverty rose for the third straight year in 2003. In 2003, nearly
36 million people, or 12.5 percent of the population, lived at or
below the official (and patently unrealistic) poverty level of
$18,660 for a family of four. In 2000, the number of individuals
living in poverty was 31.6 million, and the figure has consistently
risen over the past four years. The Bureau also reported that the
number of people without medical insurance in the United States
rose to 45 million in 2003.
The same week that Forbes released its list, Citizens for Tax Justice
issued a report entitled "Corporate Income Taxes in the Bush Years."
The study looked at taxes paid by the 275 companies listed on the
Fortune 500 list of America's largest corporations from 2001 to
2003 that reported profits in each of the three years.
According to the report, "Eighty-two of the 275 companies, almost
a third of the total, paid zero or less in federal income taxes in at
least one year from 2001 to 2003. In the years they paid no income
tax, these companies reported $102 billion in pretax US profits."
Instead of paying taxes, they received tax rebates of a combined
$12.6 billion. The nominal tax rate on profits for large corporations
is 35 percent, however the 275 companies combined paid an
effective tax rate of only 18.4 percent over the three years.
Corporate taxation has declined over the past three years, with the
help of legislation passed by the Bush administration. According to
the report, "corporate income taxes in fiscal 2002 and 2003 fell to
their lowest sustained share of the economy since World War II.
(Only a single year during the early Reagan administration was lower.)
From 2001 to 2003, the Commerce Department reports that pretax
corporate profits grew by 26 percent. But over that same period,
corporate income tax payments to the federal government fell by
21 percent."
Taken together, the Forbes 400 list, the Census report on poverty,
and the Citizens for Tax Justice study on corporate taxation reveal
a stark trend. The stock market crisis of 2001 evoked a response
within the ruling elite to escalate the attack on working people
and secure the staggering wealth controlled by the top 1 percent
of the population.
The war in Iraq and the growing assault on democratic rights
must be understood in this context: they are actions taken by
a ruling elite determined to safeguard, by whatever means
necessary, its social position.
The Detroit News , in a front-page article on the results of the
newspaper's own investigation, headlined "Working Poor Suffer
Under Bush Tax Cuts," reported Sunday: "The Bush administration
and Congress have scaled back programs that aid the poor to help
pay for $600 billion in tax breaks that went primarily to those who
earn more than $288,800 a year.... The affected programs-job
training, housing, higher education and an array of social services-
provide safety nets for the poor."
These statistics serve as a stark indictment of the irrationality and
anti-social character of a system based on the accumulation of
personal wealth and profit.
There will be no letup in this assault. The economic position of
American capitalism grows increasingly precarious, with a
burgeoning debt and intensifying internal social contradictions.
The response will be a continued attack on working people. Already,
nearly all of the major airlines are demanding massive pay and
benefits cuts while continuing to slash jobs.
The November election will do nothing to address these issues.
Politicians of all stripes repeat the refrain that "there is no money"
to seriously deal with the crisis in medical care, education, housing
and employment. But as the Fortune 400 list shows, there are
abundant resources. They are, however, systematically diverted
into the coffers of a tiny elite.
The Bush campaign openly speaks for the most rapacious sections
of the ruling elite. But the policies of the Bush administration
represent a continuation-compounded and intensified-of the
policies carried out by the preceding Democratic administration
of Bill Clinton, who sponsored and signed into law the measure
ending the federal welfare entitlement for the poor.
Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's campaign
proposals for health care and other social services hardly
rise to the level of token reforms, and even these would be
quickly shelved in a Kerry administration. The main plank of
the Democratic Party on domestic issues is "fiscal conservatism,"
which means the further gutting of social services in order to
place the burden of deficit reduction on the working class.
No significant piece of social reform legislation has been
introduced by either party for 40 years. The Democratic Party
long ago abandoned any suggestion of wealth redistribution
or economic equality.
No problem confronting the American people today can be
resolved without tackling the problem of social inequality
and the subordination of the needs of the people to the
financial interests of an economic oligarchy. This, in turn,
cannot be resolved without building an independent political
movement of the working class, breaking the monopoly of
the two parties of big business, and setting out to dislodge
the financial aristocracy and carry through a revolutionary
transformation of society on the basis of socialist principles.
Copyright 1998-2004
World Socialist Web Site
All rights reserved
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
11) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28) Updated: 01:48 PM EDT
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
(Sept. 28) - Fewer than two-thirds of the former soldiers being
reactivated for duty in Iraq and elsewhere have reported on time,
prompting the Army to threaten some with punishment for desertion.
The former soldiers, part of what is known as the Individual Ready
Reserve (IRR), are being recalled to fill shortages in skills needed
for the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Of the 1,662 ready reservists ordered to report to Fort Jackson,
S.C., by Sept. 22, only 1,038 had done so, the Army said Monday.
About 500 of those who failed to report have requested exemptions
on health or personal grounds.
"The numbers did not look good," said Lt. Col. Burton Masters, a
spokesman for the Army's Human Resources Command. "We are
tightening the system, reaching the people and bringing them in."
Masters said most of the requests for exemptions are likely to be
denied: "To get an exemption, it has to be a very compelling case,
such as a severe medical condition."
The figures are the first on the IRR call-up. They reflect the
challenges the Pentagon faces in trying to find enough troops
for ongoing operations and show resistance among some
service members who returned to civilian life.
The ready reserve is an infrequently used pool of former
soldiers who can be called to duty in a national emergency
or war. On June 29, the Army announced it would call 5,674
members of its IRR back to active duty this year and next.
Several of those who received recall notices have already been
declared AWOL (absent without official leave) and technically
are considered deserters. "We are not in a rush to put someone
in the AWOL category," Masters said. "We contact them and
convince them it is in their best interests to show up. If you
are a deserter, it can affect you the rest of your life."
· Army May Reduce Length of Tours
· Rumors of Draft Are Hard to Kill
· AOL Military Center
· AOL Search: Recruitment
search.jsp>
Fourteen people were listed as AWOL last week; six subsequently told
the Army they would report. Punishment for being AWOL is up to the
unit commander and can include prison time and dishonorable
discharge, said Col. Joseph Curtin, an Army spokesman.
With a force that generals say is stretched thin, the Army is
considering $1,000-a-month bonuses to ex-soldiers who
volunteer to return for overseas duty.
Ready reservists are soldiers who were honorably discharged
after finishing their active-duty tours, usually four to six years,
but remain part of the IRR for the rest of their original eight-year
commitment. The IRR call-up is the first major one in 13 years,
since 20,277 troops were ordered back for the Persian Gulf War.
09/28/2004 07:04
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
12) Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Books Not Bars
Dear Friends,
Check out this upcoming conference, put together by our
allies at the Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Sincerely,
Books Not Bars
******Please Forward Widely*******
The Death Penalty in CA: Too Flawed to Fix!
An activist and educational conference to stop the
death penalty in California
October 9-10th
UC Berkeley
For more information visit www.2flawed2fix.org
or call 510-333-7966
$5-25 sliding scale donations,
no one turned away for lack of funds
Saturday, October 9th
7:00 pm
Dwinelle Hall room 145, UC Berkeley
Opening plenary of the conference: celebrating the victories and
struggles of the movement against the death penalty. Featuring
Barbara Becnel, co-producer of the movie, "Redemption: The Stan
Tookie Williams Story." Also: musical performances, spoken word
artists, a video message from death row inmate Stan Tookie
Williams, videos and more!
Sunday, October 10th
Doors open at 10:00 am, welcome session at 11:00 am
Dwinelle Hall, UC Berkeley
Workshops on the following topics (2 sessions)
--Racism and the Criminal Injustice System
--The struggles for Stan Tookie Williams and Kevin Cooper
--Family members of death row inmates speak out
--Women on death row in California
--What's wrong with the death penalty in California?
--How they won in Illinois/Lessons for our fight
--The fight free death row prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal
4:00 closing plenary: We can end the death penalty in California
Featuring: Madison Hobley--exonerated death row inmate from
Illinois, Donna Larsen--mother of death row inmate Keith Doolin,
Robert R. Bryan -- attorney for Mumia Abu-Jamal and death
penalty expert, activists and more! Also invited: the
Reverend Jesse Jackson.
6:00 Dinner and strategy session: what's next for the anti-death
penalty movement? Come share ideas and get involved!
Sponsored by the following organizations:
Amnesty International, American Friends Service Committee,
CA People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty,
Campaign to End the Death Penalty, Death Penalty Action Team,
Death Penalty Focus, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights,
First Mennonite Church of SF, Idriss Stelley Foundation,
International Socialist Organization, LEGAI-Queer Insurrection,
Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, Out of Control,
Socialist Action
*****
Get more information about the Books Not Bars
"Alternatives for Youth" Campaign:
http://ellabakercenter.org/bnb/campaign
*****
We can't survive without the support of individuals like
you. Please take a moment to support Books Not Bars
today. Donate here:
http://www.ellabakercenter.org/donate
*****
* Not on our list-serve yet? (Maybe this message was
forwarded to you.) Sign up to get e-mail updates
directly by going this web page:
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* If you are on our list-serve, you can update your
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?p=preferences&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
* UNSUBSCRIBE here: http://www.ellabakercenter.org/lists/
?p=unsubscribe&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
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---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
13) Anti-war Activists 4 the Million Worker March-
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org
We have just 18 more days until the Million Worker March
and excitement is growing everywhere-
Keep talking to your friends, co-workers, students and
neighbors.
Get them on the bus--in your car--get them to D.C.
Start making your signs and making your plans.
**Important People's Alert:
Hotel Workers Are Calling for Support from Washington D.C.
to California--
San Francisco Workers Are Presently on a Two Week Strike
Action
Who are the hotel workers? They are some of the lowest
paid workers who clean rooms in luxury suites, carry heavy
bags, greet the guests and keep things running in some of
the largest chain hotels in the world. They are women who
are struggling to support children; and they are immigrant
and oppressed workers who face fear, harassment and
discrimination.
They want health care, decent wages and a workload that is
manageable. And they want a union contract. On the West
Coast in Los Angeles and San Francisco, hotel workers who
are represented by UNITE-HERE, have been working without a
contract since April and September respectively. The
hotel industry has refused to negotiate fairly.
In Washington D.C., 3,800 workers in 14 hotels represented
by UNITE-HERE Local 25 have voted overwhelmingly (94%) to
authorize a strike over the same issues. Community, labor
and anti-war groups are now preparing to volunteer in food
kitchens and are beginning food drives.
When we come to Washington D.C. for the Million Worker
March-let's make sure these workers have our support.
They are asking customers not to stay in any of the 14
hotels. For a list of hotels see
http://www.hotelworkersunited.org/pdf/FactsheetDC.pdf
For more information on the hotel workers and their
campaign for justice see the following websites:
http://www.hotelworkersunited.org and
http://www.hotellaboradvisor.info.org
***Momentum is building for the Million Worker March---new
organizing centers are springing up all over the country
(see http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/organizingcenters.htm)
and new endorsers are being added to the list daily
(http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/endorsers.htm).
It is more important than ever that we turn out by the
thousands to say "Jobs, Healthcare, and a Living Wage, Not
War!" on October 17. We need your help in these last two
weeks to make this happen.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
**Get the Word out!
1) download leaflets from
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/pdfdownload.htm
and take them to your school, workplace, house of worship,
union, and community organization.
2) Link to the Anti-war for the Million Worker March
Website :
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/index.htm
3) Forward this email to your email lists
**Organize transportation from your area!
We need hundreds of local organizers. Contact us about
becoming a local organizer:
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/signupantiwarorganizer.htm
**Donate!
We need help with the enormous expenses involved with this
massive mobilization of working people. You can donate
online at: http://www.peoplesrightsfund.org/
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org
October 17 Washington DC
Anyone can subscribe.
Send an email request to
AntiWar4theMillionWorkerMarch-subscribe@organizerweb.com
To unsubscribe
AntiWar4theMillionWorkerMarch-unsubscribe@organizerweb.com
Subscribing and unsubscribing can also be done on the Web at
http://www.organizerweb.com/mailman/listinfo/antiwar4themillionworkermarch
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
14) Books Not Bars presents:
THE WORLD PREMIERE OF
***********************************
"SYSTEM FAILURE:
VIOLENCE, ABUSE & NEGLECT IN CYA"
***********************************
Tuesday October 19th 7pm
Grand Lake Theater
3200 Grand Avenue, Oakland
*** please forward *** please forward widely *** please forward
Come see our new 30-minute, grassroots-driven documentary
about the California Youth Authority, produced in collaboration
with Witness (www.witness.org).
The California Youth Authority (CYA) is notorious as the most
abusive juvenile justice system in the nation. See exclusive
interviews with former wards, parents, advocates and activists
about the human rights crisis in CYA -- and about the movement
to end this crisis and revolutionize juvenile justice in California.
* A panel discussion with filmmakers, former wards and parents
will follow the screening.
* Suggested donation: $5 - $10 (no one turned away for
lack of funds)
* For more information or to request postcard flyers to be
mailed to you please contact:
bnb@ellabakercenter.org
415-951-4844 ext 230
*****
Find out about the Books Not Bars "Alternatives for Youth" Campaign:
http://ellabakercenter.org/bnb/campaign
*****
We can't survive without the support of individuals like you.
Please take a moment to support us today. Donate here:
http://www.ellabakercenter.org/donate
*****
SIGN UP: Not on our list-serve yet? (Maybe this message was
forwarded to you.) Sign up to get e-mail updates directly by
going this web page: http://ellabakercenter.org/subscribe )
UPDATE: If you are on our list-serve, you can update your
information and preferences: http://www.ellabakercenter.org/lists/
?p=preferences&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
UNSUBSCRIBE here: http://www.ellabakercenter.org/lists/
?p=unsubscribe&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
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---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
15) Urgent Appeal from Gaza
Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:39:28 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Barbara Lubin"
Dear Friends,
All of us at the Middle East Children's Alliance are again shocked and
saddened by the news coming from our friends and colleagues in Gaza. We
are alarmed to see the number of casualties, injuries, and homes
demolished increase by the hour.
We are sharing with you the latest appeal from the Union of Health Work
Committees (UHWC), an organization that provides medical services to
residents throughout the Gaza Strip.
Here's what you can do:
* Make a donation for food and medical aid by clicking the link
below. We will wire any money collected to the UHWC to help them continue
their work.
* Call the Congressional switchboard (1-800-839-5276) and ask your
representatives to take a stand against the invasions in Gaza and to stop
US Aid to Israel. Remind them that though Israel is violating
International Law and US military aid to Israel violates the US Arms Export
Control Act, the US government continues to give Israel over $5 billion in
aid each year. Tell them that as a tax payer, you do not approve of
your money being used to violate US Law or International Law.
* Call the United Nations (212-963-1234) and ask them to intervene
since these incursions are in violation of International Law and 80% of
Gazans are refugees under the protection of UNRWA.
Thank you,
Barbara Lubin
Founder and Executive Director https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/
index.php?aid=1171&rkey=9977&rdata=1148404:-1:9454549 Urgent Appeal
For the last 48 hours, the Union of Health Work Committees (UHWC),
medical facilities are in state of top emergency in the northern
governorate of Gaza Strip.
The medical teams are working continuously to cope with the increasing
no. of causalities, due to massive Israelis forces incursion to the
northern governorate especially Jabalia.
The Israeli tanks Helicopters and different Military forces are
attacking the area through four main sectors. The Israeli forces are
demolishing houses, destroying infrastructure and bulldozing trees at the
same
time they snap every moving target disregarding if being a child, women,
old man or youth.
The chicken farms and different animal farms had their share in
destruction, e.g. a chicken farm at Abed Rabuh Quarter in Jabalia has been
completely bulldozed at this morning.
Al -AwdaHospitalreceived till this moment 42 injured people, 17 of them
are under 15 years old, 8 women, in addition to 8 martyrs (most of the
injuries are due to explosive pullets). Another governmental hospital
in the same area has received tens of causalities also.
UHWC,Al-QudsMedicalCenterin Beit - Hanoun has been working 24 hours/
day to cover the expected increasing number of injuries and to offer
other emergency medical help because Beit - Hanoun has been isolated from
the rest of Gaza Strip.
Al-Assria (Al-Luhiedan) Medical Center - Jabalia refugees camp is now
at the middle of battle, the Israeli tanks and snappers are just 50
meters away from the center, all the other health and community activities
of Al-Luhiedan Community Health Center have been hanged up as it works
as a front first aid medical center.
The first aid medical teams and the ambulance service of the UHWC (138
volunteers men and women) are working day and night to rescue and
evacuate the injured people. At the same time they offer some highly needed
medical and food supplies.
UHWC teams who are doing all this call all International and human
rights organization, Red Cross, United Nations, and all those who are
seeking just peace in the area to urgently interfere to stop this massacre
against our Palestinian people. At the same time to pressure on the
Israeli government to stop its harassments against the medical teams and
civilians.
For more information, please contact Dr. Sayed Ajadbah - Executive
-director.
Union of Health Work Committees -Gaza
Related Articles:
18 residents shot dead in Jabalia, 85 shot wounded and 35 homes leveled
http://
www.imemc.org/headlines/2004/September/week4/093004/11_killed.htm Israelis
Kill 23 Palestinians in Gaza Offensive http://news.scotsman.com/
latest.cfm?id=3567511 Violence flares up in Gaza
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/
exeres/396DCFA4-0F47-41DA-BEAA-2C1C399BC9DD.htm 901 Parker Street
Berkeley, California 94710
United States
End the Occupation---Bring Our Troops Home Now!
COME OUT ON SUNDAY AND TABLE FOR PROP N !!!
Enjoy the Castro Street Fair while distributing lit for Prop N
2) The Struggle for Palestine:
4th Anniversary of the Intifada
Saturday, October 2nd, 2004
Horace Mann Middle School - 3351 23rd Street, San Francisco
3) Continued US Airstrikes in Baghdad Draw Criticism
Sadr City neighborhood is attacked for a second day.
Interim president of Iraq likens the tactics to Israeli
military actions in the Gaza Strip.
By Ashraf Khalil
BAGHDAD
Published on Wednesday, September 29, 2004
by the Los Angeles Times
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0929-24.htm
4) US bases in Iraq: sticky politics, hard math
By David R. Francis
If a new Iraq government should agree to let American
forces stay on, how many bases will the US request?
[In a message dated 9/30/04 4:26:08 AM,
rkallen@myrealbox.com writes:
from the September 30, 2004 edition]
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0930/p17s02-cogn.html
5) "On to Baghdad, back to home."
Subj: Fw: Please Forgive The Mass-Mailing!
Date: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 11:14:50 PM
From: dmg011@usadatanet.net
Please disperse this message on behalf of those who were
pushed even further last year, as the armed forces dangled
a carrot for months.
"For those of you unaware, I will be shortly on my way to Iraq
again. I write now as a plea for help on behalf of the combat
veterans forced to return to hostile areas against their will.
I am talking about the Army's policy regarding "Stop-Loss",
a procedure whereby the Army does not allow a soldier to
separate from service when his contract expires.
Effectively, we are being held hostage..."
6) Ashcroft Says Likely to Appeal U.S. Patriot Act Ruling
SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 05:54 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6375762&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
7) Car Bombs Kill 34 Children in Baghdad
By Luke Baker
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6378394&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
[What are 34 children doing near a U.S. military convoy?
Could they have been human shields? ...BW]
8) Twelve Palestinians, 3 Israelis Die in Gaza Violence
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 08:10 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6377165&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
9) The war's littlest victim
... and as the article mentions many, many Iraqi babies.
This was the cover story in today's News.
New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com
The war's littlest victim
Tuesday, September 28th, 2004
10) Forbes 400 list of richest Americans: snapshot of a
financial oligarchy
By Joseph Kay
27 September 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/sep2004/forb-s27_prn.shtml
11) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28) Updated: 01:48 PM EDT
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
12) Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Books Not Bars
13) Anti-war Activists 4 the Million Worker March-
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org
14) Books Not Bars presents:
THE WORLD PREMIERE OF
***********************************
"SYSTEM FAILURE:
VIOLENCE, ABUSE & NEGLECT IN CYA"
***********************************
Tuesday October 19th 7pm
Grand Lake Theater
3200 Grand Avenue, Oakland
15) Urgent Appeal from Gaza
Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:39:28 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Barbara Lubin"
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) Yes on N!
End the Occupation---Bring Our Troops Home Now!
COME OUT ON SUNDAY AND TABLE FOR PROP N!!!
Enjoy the Castro Street Fair while distributing lit for Prop N
The Castro Street Fair is happening this Sunday, Oct. 3rd from about
9 a.m. to 6 p.m. The Prop N campaign will be working out of two booths:
The Harvey Milk LGBT Demo Club (booth 748) and Pride at Work
(booth 750). Both will be located at the North side of Market probably
near the middle of the 2300 block (between Noe & Castro). Enter at
the Noe & Castro Gate. You should ask for a map at the gate and look
for the booth #s marked in front of each booth.
Well over 100,000 people will be there. We will be passing out
brochures about Prop N in the morning and window signs proclaiming:
End the Occupation---Bring Our Troops Home Now, Yes on N in the
afternoon.
This is one of our best opportunities before the election to bring
visibility to the campaign. We can use help for 1 or 2 hours or all
day. Wear sunblock and look for our red, black and yellow banner
With the aforementioned slogan.
Thanks, Howard Wallace - 415/861-0318
PS: Check out our web site and note our broad array of endorsers:
YesonN.net
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
2) The Struggle for Palestine:
4th Anniversary of the Intifada
October 2nd, 2004
Horace Mann Middle School - 3351 23rd Street, San Francisco
9:00-9:30: Registration
9:30-11:00: Morning Plenary Session:
The Current Status of Resistance in Palestine
11:00-12:15: Workshop Session #1
Continuations of Plenary: Status of Resistance
History of Palestine, The Nekbah and the Right of Return
Iraq and Palestine: 2 Struggles, One cause
Zionism
12:15-1:30: Lunch (Catered, with Music)
1:30-2:45: Workshop Session #2
Direct Action: Skills Development
The Impact of Palestine on the US Elections
Political Prisoners, Here and in Palestine
Globalization in the Arab World
2:45-3:00: Tea/Coffee Break
3:00-4:15: Workshop Session #3
Women and Resistance
The Targets of Empire: Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti,
Iran, Philippines, Africa
US Solidarity Groups
Repression/Occupation in the US (patriot Act, profiling,
attacks on civil liberties)
4:30-6:00 Closing Plenary
Closing Summation and the Future in Palestine
6:00-7:00: Dinner with music
Cultural Performances
for more information:
info@justiceinpalestine.net
or visit
www.justiceinpalestine.net
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
3) Continued US Airstrikes in Baghdad Draw Criticism
Sadr City neighborhood is attacked for a second day.
Interim president of Iraq likens the tactics to Israeli
military actions in the Gaza Strip.
By Ashraf Khalil
BAGHDAD
Published on Wednesday, September 29, 2004
by the Los Angeles Times
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0929-24.htm
BAGHDAD - U.S. forces launched airstrikes Tuesday on the Baghdad
neighborhood of Sadr City for the second consecutive day, and two
British soldiers were killed in an ambush in the southern city of Basra.
'COLLECTIVE PUNISHMENT"
A relative cries as a coffin carrying the body of Ahmed Abdul Muttalib
is taken for burial in Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday Sept. 29, 2004.
Muttalib died in an U.S. airstrike early on Wednesday morning and his
wife was gravely injured. (AP Photo/ Karim Kadim)
Sadr City, a Shiite Muslim-dominated area in the eastern part of the
capital, is a stronghold of the Al Mahdi militia led by radical cleric
Muqtada Sadr. Though his forces have been weakened by their
August expulsion from the southern city of Najaf after a prolonged
U.S. siege, attacks against American and Iraqi patrols have become
a daily occurrence in Sadr City, and visitors report that the streets
are dotted with bombs.
U.S. forces have launched multiple offensives targeting Shiite rebels
in the densely populated district. U.S. forces said a "precision strike"
Monday killed four insurgents, but hospital officials said 10 people,
including civilians, were killed.
Tuesday's attack injured at least three people, officials at Sadr City's
Jawader Hospital said. It was unclear whether any insurgents were
killed or injured.
In recent weeks, U.S. forces have also launched regular airstrikes
on the town of Fallouja, west of Baghdad, which is controlled by
Sunni Muslim insurgents. Although U.S. military operations
supposedly are coordinated with Iraqi leaders, the Americans'
increasing reliance on air attacks drew criticism Tuesday from
the U.S.-backed interim Iraqi president.
Drawing a parallel between U.S. tactics in Iraq and Israeli actions
in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip,
President Ghazi Ajil Yawer said the U.S. strikes were viewed by
the Iraqi people as "collective punishment" against towns and
neighborhoods.
Footage of injured and dead women and children being pulled
from bombed buildings "brings to mind Gaza," Yawer said in an
interview on CNN.
Yawer's comments echo criticism of American military tactics in
the spring, when members of the now-disbanded Iraqi Governing
Council stridently protested a Marine siege of Fallouja.
Also Tuesday, insurgents armed with machine guns and rocket-
propelled grenades launched a morning attack on a two-vehicle
British army convoy in the southern city of Basra.
Shakir Hashem, a 28-year-old auto repair shop owner, identified
the attackers as Al Mahdi militiamen. They "were setting a trap
to attack the British troops.... When the convoy passed, they
opened fire," he said.
British troops returned fire, and during the ensuing gun battle
a grenade launched by one of the attackers struck a nearby
auto shop, setting it ablaze, Hashem said. Two British soldiers
who were injured in the ambush died at a military hospital.
The U.S. military identified a soldier killed Monday by a sniper
in Balad, north of Baghdad, as Sgt. 1st Class Joselito O. Villanueva,
36, of Los Angeles.
Two other soldiers who died last week in Iraq also have been
identified. Spc. Robert Unruh, 25, of Tucson was killed Saturday
when his unit was attacked in Al Anbar province west of Baghdad.
On the same day, Spc. Clifford L. Moxley Jr., 51, a National
Guardsman based in Berwick, Penn., died of "non-combat
related injuries."
(c) 2004 Los Angeles Times
(c) Copyrighted 1997-2004
www.commondreams.org
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
4) US bases in Iraq: sticky politics, hard math
By David R. Francis
If a new Iraq government should agree to let American
forces stay on, how many bases will the US request?
[In a message dated 9/30/04 4:26:08 AM,
rkallen@myrealbox.com writes:
from the September 30, 2004 edition]
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0930/p17s02-cogn.html
One, as the United States Army currently maintains in Honduras?
Six, the number of installations it lists in the Netherlands.
Or maybe 12?
The Pentagon isn't saying.
But a dozen is the number of so-called "enduring bases" located
by John Pike, director of GlobalSecurities.org. His military affairs
website gives their names. They include, for example, Camp Victory
at the Baghdad airfield and Camp Renegade in Kirkuk. The Chicago
Tribune last March said US engineers are constructing 14 "enduring
bases," but Mr. Pike hasn't located two of them.
Note the terminology "enduring" bases. That's Pentagon-speak for
long-term encampments - not necessarily permanent, but not just
a tent on a wood platform either. It all suggests a planned indefinite
stay on Iraqi soil that will cost US taxpayers for years to come.
The actual amount depends on how many troops are stationed there
for the long term. If the US decides to reduce its forces there from the
138,000 now to, say, 50,000, and station them in bases, the costs
would run between $5 billion to $7 billion a year, estimates Gordon
Adams, director of Security Policy Studies at George Washington
University in Washington, D.C. That's two to three times as much
as the annual American subsidy to Israel. Providing protection for
Israel is one of several reasons some analysts cite for the
US invasion of Iraq.
If more troops are based in Iraq for the long haul, the cost would
be higher. US Army planners are preparing to maintain the current
level of forces in Iraq at least through 2007, The New York Times
reported this week. But no decision has been made at the political
level.
So far, the Bush administration has not publicly indicated that it
will seek permanent bases in Iraq to replace those recently given
up in Saudi Arabia, a possibility mentioned by Deputy Defense
Secretary Paul Wolfowitz before US forces moved into Iraq. The
US already has bases in Kuwait and Qatar.
At an April 2003 press conference, Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld said any suggestion that the US is planning a permanent
military presence in Iraq is "inaccurate and unfortunate." With the
presidential election weeks away, he is unlikely to alter that
pronouncement on such a politically touchy matter. Such a
move would almost certainly attract fire from Democratic
candidate John Kerry.
Nonetheless, several military experts in Washington assume Iraq's
new government will need the support of American troops - and
thus "permanent" bases - for years, perhaps decades, to come.
The US already has 890 military installations in foreign countries,
ranging from major Air Force bases to smaller installations, say
a radar facility. Perhaps bases in Iraq would enable the Pentagon
to close a few of those facilities. As part of a post-cold-war shift
in its global posture, the Defense Department has been cutting
the number of its installations in Germany, which total more than
100. Last week Mr. Rumsfeld testified about a global "rearrangement"
of US forces to the Senate Armed Forces Committee.
"Who needs Germany when we have Iraq?" asks Mr. Pike of
GlobalSecurities.org.
Building bases in Iraq has risks. Two Americans beheaded last
week were working as civil engineers constructing the Taji
military base north of Baghdad, one of the bases Pike lists as
"enduring."
The bigger risk: Polls find that at least 80 percent of Iraqis -
whatever their views on the insurgency, democracy, the removal
of Saddam Hussein, and other issues - want US armed forces to
leave their nation. Making the bases permanent could stir up
more opposition to the US occupation.
Another fear, however, is that without US bases, the various
Iraqi factions - the Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds - would fall into
civil war. In turn, this conflict could drag in Iran, Syria, and
Turkey, leading to a widespread conflict in the Middle East.
Hope of establishing a democracy in an Arab nation would fade.
To avoid these risks, an Iraq government will accept a US military
presence despite popular disapproval, Pike says. "An indefinite
American presence in Iraq is the ultimate guarantor of some
quasi-pluralistic government."
Also, withdrawal of US forces would be seen by Iraqi insurgents
as a victory, prompting them to redouble their efforts to kill
Americans, says Thomas Donnelly, a military expert at the
American Enterprise Institute in Washington.
The US can afford maintaining bases in Iraq, he argues. US defense
spending now amounts to a bit more than 4 percent of gross
domestic product, the nation's output of goods and services.
It might rise as a result of Iraq bases to 5 percent of GDP, still
less than the 6.5 percent of GDP in the cold war or the 10 percent
during the Vietnam War.
Not everyone agrees. Permanent bases in Iraq are a "disastrously
bad idea," says Jessica Mathews, president of the Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace in Washington. It reinforces
Iraqi suspicions that the US launched the war to get a hand on
Iraqi oil, control the region, and wants to maintain a puppet
government in Baghdad.
The total cost of the Iraq war has reached $125 billion to
$140 billion, estimates Mr. Adams. Reconstruction boosts the
total to as high as $175 billion. Permanent bases would keep
the tab running for years to come.
www.csmonitor.com | Copyright (c) 2004 The Christian Science
Monitor. All rights reserved.
For permission to reprint/republish this article, please email
Copyright
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
5) "On to Baghdad, back to home."
Subj: Fw: Please Forgive The Mass-Mailing!
Date: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 11:14:50 PM
From: dmg011@usadatanet.net
Please disperse this message on behalf of those who were
pushed even further last year, as the armed forces dangled
a carrot for months.
"For those of you unaware, I will be shortly on my way to Iraq
again. I write now as a plea for help on behalf of the combat
veterans forced to return to hostile areas against their will.
I am talking about the Army's policy regarding "Stop-Loss",
a procedure whereby the Army does not allow a soldier to
separate from service when his contract expires.
Effectively, we are being held hostage..."
----- Original Message -----
From: omit my name
To: Relatives
Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 12:36 PM
Subject: Please Forgive The Mass-Mailing!
My friends,
For those of you unaware, I will be shortly on my way to Iraq again.
I write now as a plea for help on behalf of the combat veterans
forced to return to hostile areas against their will. I am talking
about the Army's policy regarding "Stop-Loss", a procedure
whereby the Army does not allow a soldier to separate from
service when his contract expires. Effectively, we are being
held hostage by a policy designed to discourage soldiers from
terminating their service before war. For those of us who have
been to war, it seems unfair to send us back. We understand,
though, that these are difficult times, and we are ready to stand
against those who threaten the security of our freedom. We are
even willing to return to the combat zone, so long as the
commitment does not exceed that for which we enlisted.
Men and women of the Third Infantry Division were told
yesterday that not one of them would be permitted to
terminate their service until after a twelve month deployment
to Iraq, an area as hostile as the first days of the war in which
the division lost over a hundred American soldiers in two weeks.
This policy unfairly targets soldiers who have already served
in The War On Terror. We (myself and many unnamed others)
believe it is unethical and a disgusting, flagrant abuse of the
trust of the men and women in uniform.
We merely ask that you write a letter to your senators,
representatives, state governors, and newspapers. The public
needs to know about the atrocity that they are doing unto their
protectors. I will be busy writing form letters for you, and any
of your friends who are willing to help me. You may forward this
message to anyone you see fit. I only ask that, for my protection,
you omit my name. If you are willing to help, please write me
back with your state of residence, and I will send you a form
letter, the names of your congresspersons, and the contact
information for local, state, and federal media.
Even if you do not have the time to do anything, please remember
what is happening to us the next time you hear about Iraq in
conversation or in the news and let someone know about us.
Maybe they will carry on our plight. Thank you for your time.
Warmest regards,
omit my name
Opinions expressed in this electronic mailing do not
necessarily represent those of The United States Government,
The Department of Defense, or The Department of The Army.
All contents are sole proprietary of the author and are
protected by numerous state, federal and international laws.
Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
Half a league, half a league, half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death rode the six hundred.
Their's not to make reply, their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death rode the six hundred.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
6) Ashcroft Says Likely to Appeal U.S. Patriot Act Ruling
SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 05:54 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6375762&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands (Reuters) - U.S. Attorney General
John Ashcroft said on Thursday the Bush administration was
likely to appeal against a U.S. District Court ruling that part
of the Patriot Act was unconstitutional.
"Without knowing the specifics, I wouldn't be able to
assure you that the case would be appealed, but it is almost a
certainty that it would be appealed," Ashcroft told reporters
after meeting European Union justice and interior ministers.
"We believe the act to be completely consistent with the
United States' Constitution," he added.
On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero ruled that
surveillance powers granted to the FBI under the Patriot Act, a
cornerstone of the U.S. war on terror, were unconstitutional.
In the first decision against a surveillance portion of the
act, Marrero ruled for the American Civil Liberties Union in
its challenge against what it called "unchecked power" by the
FBI to demand secret customer records from communication
companies, such as Internet service providers or telephone
companies.
Ashcroft said the Bush administration would continue "to
use every tool" available under the constitution to fight
terrorism.
EU and U.S. officials met in the Dutch sea-side resort to
discuss how to boost the fight against terrorism, including
improved information exchange, cutting off financing and
safeguarding borders without hampering trade and travel.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
[What are 34 children doing near a U.S. military convoy?
Could they have been human shields? ...BW]
7) Car Bombs Kill 34 Children in Baghdad
By Luke Baker
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6378394&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Insurgents detonated three car bombs
near a U.S. military convoy in Baghdad Thursday, killing 41
people, 34 of them children, and wounding scores.
In two other attacks, a suicide bomber blew up his vehicle
near a U.S. checkpoint outside the capital, killing two
policemen and a U.S. soldier, and a car bomb killed four people
in the restive northern Iraq town of Tal Afar.
The Baghdad blasts coincided with crowds gathering to
celebrate the opening of a new sewage plant. It was not clear
if the event or a U.S. convoy passing nearby was the target.
The first explosion was followed by two more that struck
those who rushed to the aid of the initial victims.
Ten U.S. soldiers were wounded in the attack, two of them
seriously, the military said. Iraq's Health ministry confirmed
41 dead and 139 wounded, the vast majority children.
Instability is steadily mounting just weeks before the U.S.
presidential election in November and four months before Iraq
is due to hold its own nationwide polls. Attacks on American
troops have risen to around 80 a day from 40 a month ago.
Doctors at Yarmouk hospital struggled to treat the flood of
victims, as pools of blood formed on the floor.
One boy lay swathed in bandages on a stretcher, his severed
leg on a table beside him. Others were scarred by shrapnel,
their clothes blown off by the force of the explosion.
The attack gouged a crater in the road and wrecked a dozen
burned-out cars and a bus. U.S. troops sealed off the area with
tanks, and helicopters circled overhead.
POLICE AND SOLDIERS DEAD
Hours earlier, a suicide bomber had killed two Iraqi police
and a U.S. soldier by blowing up his car near a U.S. checkpoint
at a crowded intersection in Abu Ghraib, just west of Baghdad.
Around 60 people, including women and children, were wounded.
Another soldier was killed when a rocket hit a U.S.
logistics base near Baghdad. The confirmed deaths of the two
soldiers raised to at least 802 the number of U.S. troops
killed in action since the start of the war.
In northern Iraq, another car bomb blew up near an Iraqi
police convoy in the center of Tal Afar, a rebellious town
close to the Syrian border. Hospital officials said four
civilians had been killed and 16 wounded. Four policemen were
also hurt.
In rebel-held Falluja, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad,
U.S. forces destroyed a building they said was being used by
fighters loyal to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose group is
threatening to behead a British hostage.
The strike was the latest in a series of almost daily
attacks in Falluja intended to crush Zarqawi's network, which
has claimed responsibility for many of Iraq's bloodiest suicide
bombings and the killings of foreign captives.
Zarqawi's group beheaded Americans Eugene Armstrong and
Jack Hensley this month after U.S. forces and the Iraqi
government refused to release women prisoners.
BRITISH HOSTAGE
The group says it will also kill the Briton Kenneth Bigley,
62, who was snatched along with the American pair.
Wednesday, footage was released showing a haggard Bigley
squatting chained in a cage, pleading for his life.
In a barely audible voice, Bigley said British Prime
Minister Tony Blair was not doing enough to free him: "Tony
Blair is a liar. He doesn't care about me. I'm just one person."
Blair has said Britain will not negotiate with the
kidnappers, but told reporters on Wednesday: "They've made no
attempt to have any contact with us at all. If they did make
contact, it would be something we would immediately respond to."
Separately, a militant group said it had seized 10 people,
including two Indonesian women, working for an electronics firm
in Iraq, Al Jazeera television reported.
Lebanon said three of its nationals had been seized. It was
not clear if this was the same incident.
The U.S. military says it has sound intelligence that
Zarqawi and his followers are hiding out in Falluja, although
residents say the U.S. strikes regularly hit civilians.
U.S. marines pulled out of the city after weeks of fighting
in April that killed hundreds of Iraqis, and handed over
responsibility for security to an Iraqi force that has since
collapsed. The city is now run by insurgents.
The U.S. military says that with the help of Iraqi forces
it will retake rebel strongholds such as Falluja, Ramadi,
Samarra and the Baghdad neighborhoods of Sadr City and Haifa
Street by December so elections can go ahead as
planned a month later.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
8) Twelve Palestinians, 3 Israelis Die in Gaza Violence
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters)
Thu Sep 30, 2004 08:10 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/
newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6377165&src=eDialog/
GetContent§ion=news
GAZA (Reuters) - Twelve Palestinians and three Israelis
were killed Thursday as tanks thrust deep into the Gaza Strip's
largest refugee camp for the first time after a rocket attack
killed two Israeli children in a border town.
In one of Gaza's bloodiest days for months, gunmen shot
dead an Israeli soldier and a woman jogger, and Israeli forces
raiding the Jabalya camp killed at least six militants plus
several civilians during fierce fighting.
The army's push into the militant stronghold in north Gaza
came after Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon ordered troops
to use all means necessary to put a stop to rocket fire that
has persisted despite repeated Israeli raids and air strikes.
A Hamas rocket attack on the southern Israeli town of
Sderot Wednesday killed two Israeli children, aged 2 and 4, as
they played outside while visiting their grandparents on the
eve of the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot.
The latest spiral of violence has sent Sharon scrambling to
counter rightist critics who say his plan to withdraw troops
and settlers from occupied Gaza next year has emboldened
militants trying to give the impression that Israel is being
driven out.
Israel's army appears determined to smash militant groups
before leaving.
"The formula is clear -- blood for blood, bombardment for
bombardment," a Hamas gunman said in Jabalya, where Israeli
forces used tanks and armored bulldozers to clear a path into
the crowded camp of 100,000 inhabitants.
It was Israel's deepest and strongest thrust into Jabalya's
narrow street and alleys in four years of conflict -- a move
the army had long avoided for fear that troops and armored
would be vulnerable to militant attack.
Palestinians condemned the Israeli offensive, which
intensified early Thursday when a column of tanks entered the
camp and battled scores of armed militants.
"Israel is expanding its military operations in Gaza. This
is a dangerous indicator which will lead to failure," said
Nabil Abu Rdainah, an aide to Palestinian President Yasser
Arafat.
PALESTINIAN AMBUSHES
Under cover of fog and darkness, two gunman from Hamas --
an Islamic faction behind a campaign of suicide bombings and
sworn to Israel's destruction -- attacked an army position near
Jabalya before dawn, opening fire and launching grenades.
One soldier was killed and two wounded before troops shot
dead the militants.
Hours later, gunmen killed an Israeli woman as she went for
a morning jog on a road connecting two Jewish settlements in
northern Gaza, military sources said. Soldiers who rushed to
the scene returned fire and killed one gunman, the sources
said.
Israeli Radio said a second Israeli was also killed in the
incident. Palestinian medical sources said a 60-year-old
Palestinian was later killed by Israeli fire in the area, and a
27-year-old man was shot dead working in a nearby field.
Violence surged Wednesday when Palestinian militants
eluding an army crackdown carried out the deadly rocket attack
on Sderot, and troops killed nine Palestinians in raids in the
coastal strip and the West Bank.
Two makeshift Qassam rockets hit a residential block in the
town, close to Israel's fenced border with Gaza, killing a girl
aged 2 and a boy aged 4.
"I saw one little child without his legs. We tried to help
the other one but it was too late," said neighbor Haviv Ben
Abbo, who rushed to the scene when he heard the boom.
Thirteen other residents were injured in the town that has
borne the brunt of Qassam attacks, emergency services said.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
9) The war's littlest victim
... and as the article mentions many, many Iraqi babies.
This was the cover story in today's News.
New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com
The war's littlest victim
Tuesday, September 28th, 2004
In early September 2003, Army National Guard Spec. Gerard Darren
Matthew was sent home from Iraq, stricken by a sudden illness.
One side of Matthew's face would swell up each morning. He had
constant migraine headaches, blurred vision, blackouts and a
burning sensation whenever he urinated.
The Army transferred him to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in
Washington for further tests, but doctors there could not explain
what was wrong.
Shortly after his return, his wife, Janice, became pregnant.
On June 29, she gave birth to a baby girl, Victoria Claudette.
The baby was missing three fingers and most of her right hand.
Matthew and his wife believe Victoria's shocking deformity has
something to do with her father's illness and the war - especially
since there is no history of birth defects in either of their families.
They have seen photos of Iraqi babies born with deformities
that are eerily similar.
In June, Matthew contacted the Daily News and asked us to
arrange independent laboratory screening for his urine. This
was after The News had reported that four of seven soldiers
from another National Guard unit, the 442nd Military Police,
had tested positive for depleted uranium (DU).
The independent test of Matthew's urine found him positive for
DU - low-level radioactive waste produced in nuclear plants
during the enrichment of natural uranium.
Because it is twice as heavy as lead, DU has been used by the
Pentagon since the Persian Gulf War in certain types of "tank-buster"
shells, as well as for armor-plating in Abrams tanks.
Exposure to radioactivity has been associated in some studies
with birth defects in the children of exposed parents.
"My husband went to Iraq to fight for his country," Janice Matthew
said. "I feel the Army should take responsibility for what's happened."
The couple first learned of the baby's missing fingers during a
routine sonogram of the fetus last April at Lenox Hill Hospital.
Matthew was a truck driver in Iraq with the 719th transport unit
from Harlem. His unit moved supplies from Army bases in Kuwait
to the front lines and as far as Baghdad. On several occasions, he
says, he carried shot-up tanks and destroyed vehicle parts on his
flat-bed back to Kuwait.
After he learned of his unborn child's deformity, Matthew
immediately asked the Army to test his urine for DU. In April,
he provided a 24-hour urine sample to doctors at Fort Dix, N.J.,
where he was waiting to be deactivated.
In May, the Army granted him a 40% disability pension for his
migraine headaches and for a condition called idiopathic angioedema -
unexplained chronic swelling.
But Matthew never got the results of his Army test for DU. When
he called Fort Dix last week, five months after he was tested, he
was told there was no record of any urine specimen from him.
Thankfully, Matthew did not rely solely on the Army bureaucracy -
he went to The News.
Earlier this year, The News submitted urine samples from
Guardsmen of the 442nd to former Army doctor Asaf Durakovic
and Axel Gerdes, a geologist at Goethe University in Frankfurt,
Germany. The German lab specializes in testing for minute
quantities of uranium, a complicated procedure that costs up
to $1,000 per test.
The lab is one of approximately 50 in the world that can detect
quantities as tiny as fentograms - one part per quadrillionth.
A few months ago, The News submitted a 24-hour urine sample
from Matthew to Gerdes. As a control, we also gave the lab 24-hour
urine samples from two Daily News reporters.
The three specimens were marked only with the letters A, B and C,
so the lab could not know which sample belonged to the soldier.
After analyzing all three, Gerdes reported that only sample A -
Matthew's urine - showed clear signs of DU. It contained a total
uranium concentration that was "4 to 8 times higher" than
specimens B and C, Gerdes reported.
"Those levels indicate pretty definitively that he's been
exposed to the DU," said Leonard Dietz, a retired scientist
who invented one of the instruments for measuring uranium
isotopes.
According to Army guidelines, the total uranium concentration
Gerdes found in Matthew is within acceptable standards for
most Americans.
But Gerdes questioned the Army's standards, noting that
even minute levels of DU are cause for concern.
"While the levels of DU in Matthew's urine are low," Gerdes
said, "the DU we see in his urine could be 1,000 times higher
in concentration in the lungs."
DU is not like natural uranium, which occurs in the environment.
Natural uranium can be ingested in food and drink but gets
expelled from the body within 24 hours.
DU-contaminated dust, however, is typically breathed into
the lungs and can remain there for years, emitting constant
low-level radiation.
"I'm upset and confused," Matthew said. "I just want answers.
Are they [the Army] going to take care of my baby?"
We track soldiers' sickness
For the last five months, Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez
has chronicled the plight of soldiers who have returned from
Iraq with mysterious illnesses.
His exclusive groundbreaking investigation began with a
front-page story on April 4 that suggested depleted uranium
contamination was far more widespread than the Pentagon
would admit.
* At the request of The News, nine soldiers from a New
York Army National Guard company serving in Iraq were tested
for radiation from depleted uranium shells - and four of the
ailing G.I.s tested positive.
* The day after Gonzalez's story appeared, Army officials
rushed to test all returning members of the company, the
442nd Military Police, based in Rockland County.
* By week's end, the scandal had reverberated all the way
to Albany, as Gov. Pataki joined the list of politicians calling
for the Pentagon to do a better job of testing and treating sick
soldiers returning from the war.
* Gonzalez's exposé sparked a huge demand for testing.
By mid-April, 800 G.I.s had given the Army urine samples, and
hundreds more were waiting for appointments.
* Two weeks later, the Pentagon claimed that none of the
soldiers from the 442nd had tested positive for depleted uranium.
But The News' experts found significant problems with the
testing methods.
UNITED FOR PEACE & JUSTICE | 212-868-5545
This email list is designed for posting news articles or event
announcements of interest to UFPJ member groups.
It is not a discussion list.
To engage in online discussion of UFPJ matters, join our
discussion list by sending a blank email to
ufpj-disc-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
10) Forbes 400 list of richest Americans: snapshot of a
financial oligarchy
By Joseph Kay
27 September 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/sep2004/forb-s27_prn.shtml
The current issue of Forbes Magazine contains the publication's
annual list of the wealthiest Americans, ranked by net worth.
While one's first instinct might be to turn away in disgust from
such a flaunting of individual wealth and greed, it is instructive
to consider the figures, for they provide an important indication
of the nature of American society.
According to Forbes , "The economy's recovery may be a little
shaky, but you wouldn't know it from looking at this year's
Forbes 400. The combined net worth of the nation's wealthiest
climbed to $1 trillion, up $45 billion in 12 months. With a
$750 million admission price, 9-digit fortunes are an
endangered species here: 78 percent of the people on this
year's list are billionaires."
The richest individual remains Microsoft's Bill Gates, who has
a net worth of $48 billion. Other notables include Warren Buffet,
who is number two with $41 billion; the Walton family, which
controls Wal-Mart, with five individuals on the list, each of
whom has a net worth of $18 billion; Lawrence Ellison of Oracle,
who ranks tenth with $13.7 billion; media tycoon Rupert Murdoch,
27th with $6.9 billion; and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg,
who comes in at 24th with $5 billion.
The figure of $1 trillion marks something of a milestone, not only
because the 400 richest Americans have a combined net worth that
requires 13 digits to write out, but also because it is a return to the
sort of numbers that were last seen during the stock market boom
of 1999-2000. It was in 1999 that the $1 trillion figure was first
reached, then climbing to $1.2 trillion at the height of the boom in
2000. The figure dropped in 2001 and 2002 before climbing again
in 2003 and 2004.
The number of billionaires in the country has followed a similar
pattern. In 1996, before the stock market really took off in the
late 1990s, there were 79 individuals with a net worth of at least
$1 billion. Bill Gates, who topped the list then as now, had
a relatively paltry $18 billion. By 2000, the number of billionaires
had shot up to 298, before falling to 266 in 2001 and 228 in 2002.
The super-rich have experienced a comeback in recent years,
however, with the number of billionaires rising to 262 in 2003
and 313 in 2004.
The figure of $1 trillion, because of its enormity, is somewhat
difficult to comprehend. To put it in perspective, if the wealth
were divided into sums of $10,000, there would be 100 million
portions-enough to hand out $10,000 checks to approximately
one in three people living in the United States.
One trillion dollars is also approximately equal to the gross
domestic product of Canada ($957 billion).
California's budget deficit, which has wreaked havoc across the
state and prompted massive spending cuts affecting millions of
people, is $40 billion. But this is less than one-twentieth the net
worth of the 400 richest individuals in the country.
State budget shortfalls that have prompted similar cuts in social
programs and education throughout the country total about
$100 billion-one tenth of $1 trillion held by those on the Forbes
list. Earlier this month, the Congressional Budget Office projected
a record budget deficit for the United States in 2004 of $422 billion-an
unprecedented sum, but still less than half of the wealth of
America's most fortunate sons and daughters.
One trillion dollars is approximately the amount spent on the
military throughout the world, about half of which is spent in
the United States.
The Forbes list provides a snapshot of what can only be called
an economic oligarchy. Such staggering sums of wealth concentrated
in the hands of a tiny percentage of the population coincides with
growing poverty for tens of millions of Americans, declining living
standards and worsening economic insecurity for tens of millions
more, an intensified assault on social services, and an ongoing
decline in the basic infrastructure of the country.
The Census Bureau released figures last month reporting that
poverty rose for the third straight year in 2003. In 2003, nearly
36 million people, or 12.5 percent of the population, lived at or
below the official (and patently unrealistic) poverty level of
$18,660 for a family of four. In 2000, the number of individuals
living in poverty was 31.6 million, and the figure has consistently
risen over the past four years. The Bureau also reported that the
number of people without medical insurance in the United States
rose to 45 million in 2003.
The same week that Forbes released its list, Citizens for Tax Justice
issued a report entitled "Corporate Income Taxes in the Bush Years."
The study looked at taxes paid by the 275 companies listed on the
Fortune 500 list of America's largest corporations from 2001 to
2003 that reported profits in each of the three years.
According to the report, "Eighty-two of the 275 companies, almost
a third of the total, paid zero or less in federal income taxes in at
least one year from 2001 to 2003. In the years they paid no income
tax, these companies reported $102 billion in pretax US profits."
Instead of paying taxes, they received tax rebates of a combined
$12.6 billion. The nominal tax rate on profits for large corporations
is 35 percent, however the 275 companies combined paid an
effective tax rate of only 18.4 percent over the three years.
Corporate taxation has declined over the past three years, with the
help of legislation passed by the Bush administration. According to
the report, "corporate income taxes in fiscal 2002 and 2003 fell to
their lowest sustained share of the economy since World War II.
(Only a single year during the early Reagan administration was lower.)
From 2001 to 2003, the Commerce Department reports that pretax
corporate profits grew by 26 percent. But over that same period,
corporate income tax payments to the federal government fell by
21 percent."
Taken together, the Forbes 400 list, the Census report on poverty,
and the Citizens for Tax Justice study on corporate taxation reveal
a stark trend. The stock market crisis of 2001 evoked a response
within the ruling elite to escalate the attack on working people
and secure the staggering wealth controlled by the top 1 percent
of the population.
The war in Iraq and the growing assault on democratic rights
must be understood in this context: they are actions taken by
a ruling elite determined to safeguard, by whatever means
necessary, its social position.
The Detroit News , in a front-page article on the results of the
newspaper's own investigation, headlined "Working Poor Suffer
Under Bush Tax Cuts," reported Sunday: "The Bush administration
and Congress have scaled back programs that aid the poor to help
pay for $600 billion in tax breaks that went primarily to those who
earn more than $288,800 a year.... The affected programs-job
training, housing, higher education and an array of social services-
provide safety nets for the poor."
These statistics serve as a stark indictment of the irrationality and
anti-social character of a system based on the accumulation of
personal wealth and profit.
There will be no letup in this assault. The economic position of
American capitalism grows increasingly precarious, with a
burgeoning debt and intensifying internal social contradictions.
The response will be a continued attack on working people. Already,
nearly all of the major airlines are demanding massive pay and
benefits cuts while continuing to slash jobs.
The November election will do nothing to address these issues.
Politicians of all stripes repeat the refrain that "there is no money"
to seriously deal with the crisis in medical care, education, housing
and employment. But as the Fortune 400 list shows, there are
abundant resources. They are, however, systematically diverted
into the coffers of a tiny elite.
The Bush campaign openly speaks for the most rapacious sections
of the ruling elite. But the policies of the Bush administration
represent a continuation-compounded and intensified-of the
policies carried out by the preceding Democratic administration
of Bill Clinton, who sponsored and signed into law the measure
ending the federal welfare entitlement for the poor.
Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's campaign
proposals for health care and other social services hardly
rise to the level of token reforms, and even these would be
quickly shelved in a Kerry administration. The main plank of
the Democratic Party on domestic issues is "fiscal conservatism,"
which means the further gutting of social services in order to
place the burden of deficit reduction on the working class.
No significant piece of social reform legislation has been
introduced by either party for 40 years. The Democratic Party
long ago abandoned any suggestion of wealth redistribution
or economic equality.
No problem confronting the American people today can be
resolved without tackling the problem of social inequality
and the subordination of the needs of the people to the
financial interests of an economic oligarchy. This, in turn,
cannot be resolved without building an independent political
movement of the working class, breaking the monopoly of
the two parties of big business, and setting out to dislodge
the financial aristocracy and carry through a revolutionary
transformation of society on the basis of socialist principles.
Copyright 1998-2004
World Socialist Web Site
All rights reserved
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
11) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28) Updated: 01:48 PM EDT
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
(Sept. 28) - Fewer than two-thirds of the former soldiers being
reactivated for duty in Iraq and elsewhere have reported on time,
prompting the Army to threaten some with punishment for desertion.
The former soldiers, part of what is known as the Individual Ready
Reserve (IRR), are being recalled to fill shortages in skills needed
for the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Of the 1,662 ready reservists ordered to report to Fort Jackson,
S.C., by Sept. 22, only 1,038 had done so, the Army said Monday.
About 500 of those who failed to report have requested exemptions
on health or personal grounds.
"The numbers did not look good," said Lt. Col. Burton Masters, a
spokesman for the Army's Human Resources Command. "We are
tightening the system, reaching the people and bringing them in."
Masters said most of the requests for exemptions are likely to be
denied: "To get an exemption, it has to be a very compelling case,
such as a severe medical condition."
The figures are the first on the IRR call-up. They reflect the
challenges the Pentagon faces in trying to find enough troops
for ongoing operations and show resistance among some
service members who returned to civilian life.
The ready reserve is an infrequently used pool of former
soldiers who can be called to duty in a national emergency
or war. On June 29, the Army announced it would call 5,674
members of its IRR back to active duty this year and next.
Several of those who received recall notices have already been
declared AWOL (absent without official leave) and technically
are considered deserters. "We are not in a rush to put someone
in the AWOL category," Masters said. "We contact them and
convince them it is in their best interests to show up. If you
are a deserter, it can affect you the rest of your life."
· Army May Reduce Length of Tours
· Rumors of Draft Are Hard to Kill
· AOL Military Center
· AOL Search: Recruitment
search.jsp>
Fourteen people were listed as AWOL last week; six subsequently told
the Army they would report. Punishment for being AWOL is up to the
unit commander and can include prison time and dishonorable
discharge, said Col. Joseph Curtin, an Army spokesman.
With a force that generals say is stretched thin, the Army is
considering $1,000-a-month bonuses to ex-soldiers who
volunteer to return for overseas duty.
Ready reservists are soldiers who were honorably discharged
after finishing their active-duty tours, usually four to six years,
but remain part of the IRR for the rest of their original eight-year
commitment. The IRR call-up is the first major one in 13 years,
since 20,277 troops were ordered back for the Persian Gulf War.
09/28/2004 07:04
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
12) Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Books Not Bars
Dear Friends,
Check out this upcoming conference, put together by our
allies at the Campaign to End the Death Penalty.
Sincerely,
Books Not Bars
******Please Forward Widely*******
The Death Penalty in CA: Too Flawed to Fix!
An activist and educational conference to stop the
death penalty in California
October 9-10th
UC Berkeley
For more information visit www.2flawed2fix.org
or call 510-333-7966
$5-25 sliding scale donations,
no one turned away for lack of funds
Saturday, October 9th
7:00 pm
Dwinelle Hall room 145, UC Berkeley
Opening plenary of the conference: celebrating the victories and
struggles of the movement against the death penalty. Featuring
Barbara Becnel, co-producer of the movie, "Redemption: The Stan
Tookie Williams Story." Also: musical performances, spoken word
artists, a video message from death row inmate Stan Tookie
Williams, videos and more!
Sunday, October 10th
Doors open at 10:00 am, welcome session at 11:00 am
Dwinelle Hall, UC Berkeley
Workshops on the following topics (2 sessions)
--Racism and the Criminal Injustice System
--The struggles for Stan Tookie Williams and Kevin Cooper
--Family members of death row inmates speak out
--Women on death row in California
--What's wrong with the death penalty in California?
--How they won in Illinois/Lessons for our fight
--The fight free death row prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal
4:00 closing plenary: We can end the death penalty in California
Featuring: Madison Hobley--exonerated death row inmate from
Illinois, Donna Larsen--mother of death row inmate Keith Doolin,
Robert R. Bryan -- attorney for Mumia Abu-Jamal and death
penalty expert, activists and more! Also invited: the
Reverend Jesse Jackson.
6:00 Dinner and strategy session: what's next for the anti-death
penalty movement? Come share ideas and get involved!
Sponsored by the following organizations:
Amnesty International, American Friends Service Committee,
CA People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty,
Campaign to End the Death Penalty, Death Penalty Action Team,
Death Penalty Focus, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights,
First Mennonite Church of SF, Idriss Stelley Foundation,
International Socialist Organization, LEGAI-Queer Insurrection,
Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, Out of Control,
Socialist Action
*****
Get more information about the Books Not Bars
"Alternatives for Youth" Campaign:
http://ellabakercenter.org/bnb/campaign
*****
We can't survive without the support of individuals like
you. Please take a moment to support Books Not Bars
today. Donate here:
http://www.ellabakercenter.org/donate
*****
* Not on our list-serve yet? (Maybe this message was
forwarded to you.) Sign up to get e-mail updates
directly by going this web page:
http://ellabakercenter.org/subscribe )
* If you are on our list-serve, you can update your
information and preferences:
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?p=preferences&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
* UNSUBSCRIBE here: http://www.ellabakercenter.org/lists/
?p=unsubscribe&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
--
Powered by PHPlist, www.phplist.com --
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
13) Anti-war Activists 4 the Million Worker March-
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org
We have just 18 more days until the Million Worker March
and excitement is growing everywhere-
Keep talking to your friends, co-workers, students and
neighbors.
Get them on the bus--in your car--get them to D.C.
Start making your signs and making your plans.
**Important People's Alert:
Hotel Workers Are Calling for Support from Washington D.C.
to California--
San Francisco Workers Are Presently on a Two Week Strike
Action
Who are the hotel workers? They are some of the lowest
paid workers who clean rooms in luxury suites, carry heavy
bags, greet the guests and keep things running in some of
the largest chain hotels in the world. They are women who
are struggling to support children; and they are immigrant
and oppressed workers who face fear, harassment and
discrimination.
They want health care, decent wages and a workload that is
manageable. And they want a union contract. On the West
Coast in Los Angeles and San Francisco, hotel workers who
are represented by UNITE-HERE, have been working without a
contract since April and September respectively. The
hotel industry has refused to negotiate fairly.
In Washington D.C., 3,800 workers in 14 hotels represented
by UNITE-HERE Local 25 have voted overwhelmingly (94%) to
authorize a strike over the same issues. Community, labor
and anti-war groups are now preparing to volunteer in food
kitchens and are beginning food drives.
When we come to Washington D.C. for the Million Worker
March-let's make sure these workers have our support.
They are asking customers not to stay in any of the 14
hotels. For a list of hotels see
http://www.hotelworkersunited.org/pdf/FactsheetDC.pdf
For more information on the hotel workers and their
campaign for justice see the following websites:
http://www.hotelworkersunited.org and
http://www.hotellaboradvisor.info.org
***Momentum is building for the Million Worker March---new
organizing centers are springing up all over the country
(see http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/organizingcenters.htm)
and new endorsers are being added to the list daily
(http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/endorsers.htm).
It is more important than ever that we turn out by the
thousands to say "Jobs, Healthcare, and a Living Wage, Not
War!" on October 17. We need your help in these last two
weeks to make this happen.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
**Get the Word out!
1) download leaflets from
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/pdfdownload.htm
and take them to your school, workplace, house of worship,
union, and community organization.
2) Link to the Anti-war for the Million Worker March
Website :
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/index.htm
3) Forward this email to your email lists
**Organize transportation from your area!
We need hundreds of local organizers. Contact us about
becoming a local organizer:
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org/signupantiwarorganizer.htm
**Donate!
We need help with the enormous expenses involved with this
massive mobilization of working people. You can donate
online at: http://www.peoplesrightsfund.org/
http://antiwar4themillionworkermarch.org
October 17 Washington DC
Anyone can subscribe.
Send an email request to
AntiWar4theMillionWorkerMarch-subscribe@organizerweb.com
To unsubscribe
AntiWar4theMillionWorkerMarch-unsubscribe@organizerweb.com
Subscribing and unsubscribing can also be done on the Web at
http://www.organizerweb.com/mailman/listinfo/antiwar4themillionworkermarch
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
14) Books Not Bars presents:
THE WORLD PREMIERE OF
***********************************
"SYSTEM FAILURE:
VIOLENCE, ABUSE & NEGLECT IN CYA"
***********************************
Tuesday October 19th 7pm
Grand Lake Theater
3200 Grand Avenue, Oakland
*** please forward *** please forward widely *** please forward
Come see our new 30-minute, grassroots-driven documentary
about the California Youth Authority, produced in collaboration
with Witness (www.witness.org).
The California Youth Authority (CYA) is notorious as the most
abusive juvenile justice system in the nation. See exclusive
interviews with former wards, parents, advocates and activists
about the human rights crisis in CYA -- and about the movement
to end this crisis and revolutionize juvenile justice in California.
* A panel discussion with filmmakers, former wards and parents
will follow the screening.
* Suggested donation: $5 - $10 (no one turned away for
lack of funds)
* For more information or to request postcard flyers to be
mailed to you please contact:
bnb@ellabakercenter.org
415-951-4844 ext 230
*****
Find out about the Books Not Bars "Alternatives for Youth" Campaign:
http://ellabakercenter.org/bnb/campaign
*****
We can't survive without the support of individuals like you.
Please take a moment to support us today. Donate here:
http://www.ellabakercenter.org/donate
*****
SIGN UP: Not on our list-serve yet? (Maybe this message was
forwarded to you.) Sign up to get e-mail updates directly by
going this web page: http://ellabakercenter.org/subscribe )
UPDATE: If you are on our list-serve, you can update your
information and preferences: http://www.ellabakercenter.org/lists/
?p=preferences&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
UNSUBSCRIBE here: http://www.ellabakercenter.org/lists/
?p=unsubscribe&uid=1cbafa757fe7202cf8cf4d4af079434d
Powered by PHPlist, www.phplist.com --
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
15) Urgent Appeal from Gaza
Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:39:28 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Barbara Lubin"
Dear Friends,
All of us at the Middle East Children's Alliance are again shocked and
saddened by the news coming from our friends and colleagues in Gaza. We
are alarmed to see the number of casualties, injuries, and homes
demolished increase by the hour.
We are sharing with you the latest appeal from the Union of Health Work
Committees (UHWC), an organization that provides medical services to
residents throughout the Gaza Strip.
Here's what you can do:
* Make a donation for food and medical aid by clicking the link
below. We will wire any money collected to the UHWC to help them continue
their work.
* Call the Congressional switchboard (1-800-839-5276) and ask your
representatives to take a stand against the invasions in Gaza and to stop
US Aid to Israel. Remind them that though Israel is violating
International Law and US military aid to Israel violates the US Arms Export
Control Act, the US government continues to give Israel over $5 billion in
aid each year. Tell them that as a tax payer, you do not approve of
your money being used to violate US Law or International Law.
* Call the United Nations (212-963-1234) and ask them to intervene
since these incursions are in violation of International Law and 80% of
Gazans are refugees under the protection of UNRWA.
Thank you,
Barbara Lubin
Founder and Executive Director https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/
index.php?aid=1171&rkey=9977&rdata=1148404:-1:9454549 Urgent Appeal
For the last 48 hours, the Union of Health Work Committees (UHWC),
medical facilities are in state of top emergency in the northern
governorate of Gaza Strip.
The medical teams are working continuously to cope with the increasing
no. of causalities, due to massive Israelis forces incursion to the
northern governorate especially Jabalia.
The Israeli tanks Helicopters and different Military forces are
attacking the area through four main sectors. The Israeli forces are
demolishing houses, destroying infrastructure and bulldozing trees at the
same
time they snap every moving target disregarding if being a child, women,
old man or youth.
The chicken farms and different animal farms had their share in
destruction, e.g. a chicken farm at Abed Rabuh Quarter in Jabalia has been
completely bulldozed at this morning.
Al -AwdaHospitalreceived till this moment 42 injured people, 17 of them
are under 15 years old, 8 women, in addition to 8 martyrs (most of the
injuries are due to explosive pullets). Another governmental hospital
in the same area has received tens of causalities also.
UHWC,Al-QudsMedicalCenterin Beit - Hanoun has been working 24 hours/
day to cover the expected increasing number of injuries and to offer
other emergency medical help because Beit - Hanoun has been isolated from
the rest of Gaza Strip.
Al-Assria (Al-Luhiedan) Medical Center - Jabalia refugees camp is now
at the middle of battle, the Israeli tanks and snappers are just 50
meters away from the center, all the other health and community activities
of Al-Luhiedan Community Health Center have been hanged up as it works
as a front first aid medical center.
The first aid medical teams and the ambulance service of the UHWC (138
volunteers men and women) are working day and night to rescue and
evacuate the injured people. At the same time they offer some highly needed
medical and food supplies.
UHWC teams who are doing all this call all International and human
rights organization, Red Cross, United Nations, and all those who are
seeking just peace in the area to urgently interfere to stop this massacre
against our Palestinian people. At the same time to pressure on the
Israeli government to stop its harassments against the medical teams and
civilians.
For more information, please contact Dr. Sayed Ajadbah - Executive
-director.
Union of Health Work Committees -Gaza
Related Articles:
18 residents shot dead in Jabalia, 85 shot wounded and 35 homes leveled
http://
www.imemc.org/headlines/2004/September/week4/093004/11_killed.htm Israelis
Kill 23 Palestinians in Gaza Offensive http://news.scotsman.com/
latest.cfm?id=3567511 Violence flares up in Gaza
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/
exeres/396DCFA4-0F47-41DA-BEAA-2C1C399BC9DD.htm 901 Parker Street
Berkeley, California 94710
United States
Wednesday, September 29, 2004
Iraq Study Sees Rebels' Attacks as Widespread
Iraq Study Sees Rebels' Attacks as Widespread
By JAMES GLANZ and THOM SHANKER
BAGHDAD, Iraq
September 29, 2004
INSURGENCY
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/29/international/middleeast/29attacks.html
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Sept. 28 - Over the past
30 days, more than 2,300 attacks by
insurgents have been directed against
civilians and military targets in Iraq, in a
pattern that sprawls over nearly every
major population center outside the Kurdish
north, according to comprehensive data
compiled by a private security company with
access to military intelligence reports and
its own network of Iraqi informants.
The sweeping geographical reach of the
attacks, from Nineveh and Salahuddin
Provinces in the northwest to Babylon
and Diyala in the center and Basra in the
south, suggests a more widespread
resistance than the isolated pockets described
by Iraqi government officials.
The type of attacks ran the gamut:
car bombs, time bombs, rocket-propelled
grenades, hand grenades, small-arms
fire, mortar attacks and land mines.
"If you look at incident data and you
put incident data on the map, it's not a few
provinces, " said Adam Collins, a security
expert and the chief intelligence official in
Iraq for Special Operations Consulting-
Security Management Group Inc., a private
security company based in Las Vegas that
compiles and analyzes the data as a regular
part of its operations in Iraq.
The number of attacks has risen and fallen
over the months. Mr. Collins said the
highest numbers were in April, when there
was major fighting in Falluja, with attacks
averaging 120 a day. The average is now
about 80 a day, he said.
But it is a measure of both the fog of war
and the fact that different analysts can look
at the same numbers and come to opposite
conclusions, that others see a nation in
which most people are perfectly safe and
elections can be held with clear legitimacy.
"I have every reason to believe that the
Iraqi people are going to be able to hold
elections," said Lt. Col. William Nichols of
the Air Force, a spokesman for the
American-led coalition forces here.
Indeed, no raw compilation of statistics
on numbers of attacks can measure what is
perhaps the most important political equation
facing Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and
the American military: how much of Iraq
is under the firm control of the interim
government. That will determine the
likelihood - and quality - of elections in January.
For example, the number of attacks is not a
n accurate measure of control in Falluja;
attacks have recently dropped there, but the
town is controlled by insurgents and is
a "no go" zone for the American military
and Iraqi security forces. It is a place where
elections could not be held without dramatic
political or military intervention.
The statistics show that there have been just
under 1,000 attacks in Baghdad during
the past month; in fact, an American military
spokesman said this week that since
April, insurgents have fired nearly 3,000
mortar rounds in Baghdad alone. But those
figures do not necessarily preclude having
elections in the Iraqi capital.
Pentagon officials and military officers like
to point to a separate list of statistics to
counter the tally of attacks, including the
number of schools and clinics opened. They
cite statistics indicating that a growing
number of Iraqi security forces are trained
and fully equipped, and they note that
applicants continue to line up at recruiting
stations despite bombings of them.
But most of all, military officers argue
that despite the rise in bloody attacks during
the past 30 days, the insurgents have
yet to win a single battle.
"We have had zero tactical losses; we have
lost no battles," said one senior American
military officer. "The insurgency has had
zero tactical victories. But that is not what
this is about.
"We are at a very critical time," the officer
added. "The only way we can lose this battle
is if the American people decide we don't
want to fight anymore."
American government officials explain
that optimistic assessments about Iraq from
President Bush and Prime Minister Allawi
can be interpreted as a declaration of a
strategic goal: that, despite the attacks,
elections will be held. The comments are
meant as a balance to the insurgents'
strategy of roadside bombings and mortar
attacks and gruesome beheadings, all
meant to declare to Iraq and the world that the
country is in chaos, and that mayhem
will prevent the country from ever reaching
democratic elections.
In a joint appearance last week in the
White House Rose Garden, Mr. Bush and Dr.
Allawi painted an optimistic portrait of
the security situation in Iraq.
Dr. Allawi said that of Iraq's 18 provinces,
"14 to 15 are completely safe." He added
that the other provinces suffer "pockets of
terrorists" who inflict damage in them and
plot attacks carried out elsewhere in the
country. In other appearances, Dr. Allawi
asserted that elections could be held in
15 of the 18 provinces.
Both Mr. Bush and Dr. Allawi insisted
that Iraq would hold free elections as scheduled
in January.
"The question is not whether there are
attacks," said one Pentagon official. "Of course
there are. But what are the proper measurements
for progress?"
Statistics collected by private security
firms, which include attacks on Iraqi civilians
and private security contractors, tend to
be more comprehensive than those collected
by the military, which focuses on attacks
against foreign troops. The period covered
by Special Operations Consulting's data
represents a typical month, with its average
of 79 attacks a day falling between the
valleys during quiet periods and the peaks
during the outbreak of insurgency in April
or the battle with Moktada al-Sadr's militia
in August for control of Najaf.
During the past 30 days those attacks
totaled 283 in Nineveh, 325 in Salahuddin in
the northwest and 332 in the desert
badlands of Anbar Province in the west. In the
center of Iraq, attacks numbered 123 in
Diyala Province, 76 in Babylon and 13 in
Wasit. There was not a single province
without an attack in the 30-day period.
Still, some Iraqis share their prime
minister's optimism when it comes to the
likelihood that elections, and a closely
related census, can be carried out successfully
amid so much violence. "We are ready
to start," said Hamid Abd Muhsen, an Iraqi
education official who is supervising parts
of the census in Baghad. "I swear to God."
James Glanz reported from Baghdad for
this article and Thom Shanker from
Washington.
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
BAUAW NEWSLETTER-WEDNESDAY, SEPTMEBER 28, 2004
Castro Street Fair is Sunday, Oct. 3rd!
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
NEXT BAUAW MEETING:
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 3, 3:00 p.m.
1380 Valencia Street
(Between 24th & 25th Streets, S.F.)
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
VOTE YES ON PROP. 'N'! BRING OUR TROOPS HOME NOW!
Come to the
BRING OUR TROOPS HOME NOW COMMITTEE MEETING
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 7:00 p.m.
AFSC - First Floor
65 NINTH STREET
(1/2 block from Market St., SF)
Help get the word out about Prop. 'N'. Bring your ideas for
community outreach, media, action, and more to make sure
we win by a landslide!
No matter who wins the elections this year, the war will not
be over. This ballot initiative will set the example for cities across
the country to do the same in future elections.
Pick up material to distribute!*
PROPOSITION 'N' ON THE NOVEMBER 3
SAN FRANCISCO BALLOT DECLARES:
"It is the policy of the people of the City and County of
San Francisco that: The Federal government should take
immediate steps to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq and
bring our troops safely home now."
Visit: www.yesonn.net
* Material costs money. Already thousands of brochures have
been printed and we need more! We need posters and buttons--
we need to cover the city with YES on 'N' campaign material!
Please send a contribution to help with these costs!
Make your check payable to:
Bring Our Troops Home Now
and mail to :
David Looman, Treasurer
325 Highland Ave.
San Francisco, CA 94110
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) Israel Kills 6 Palestinians in Gaza, W.Bank Raids
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
JABALYA, Gaza Strip (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6365775&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news
2) Iraq Rebel Cities to Be Retaken in October - Minister
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 11:19 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367016
3) Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision
NEW YORK (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:07 PM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367548
4) They're burned, or blinded, or sparring with death
The story of the military hospital where there's no escaping
the horrors of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan
BY MATTHEW MCALLESTER
STAFF CORRESPONDENT
LANDSTUHL, Germany
September 27, 2004
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/health/ny-wohosp3986566sep27,0,7903420.story
5) Crude dudes
U.S. oil companies just happened to have billions
of dollars they wanted to invest in undeveloped oil reserves
LINDA MCQUAIG
Sep. 20, 2004. 09:56 AM
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Artic
le_Type1&c=Article&cid=1095545411401&call_pageid=968332188854&col=9683500607
6) ... Unless It's All Greek to Him
By Barbara Garson
September 24, 2004
http://www.miftah.org/Display.cfm?DocId=4920&CategoryId=5
7) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28)
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
8) Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival
8th Annual Event
October 2-10 & 24, 2004
San Francisco, San Jose, Berkeley
www.aff.org
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) Israel Kills 6 Palestinians in Gaza, W.Bank Raids
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
JABALYA, Gaza Strip (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6365775&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news
JABALYA, Gaza Strip (Reuters) - Israeli forces killed six Palestinians
including three teenagers on Wednesday as they thrust deep into
Gaza to quell rocket fire into Israel and raided two West Bank cities
in search of wanted militants.
Youths of 17 and 14 in a stone-throwing crowd that confronted
Israeli forces were shot dead in Gaza's Jabalya refugee camp.
Fifteen others, many of them students in school uniforms, were
taken to hospital with gunshot wounds, medics said.
Israeli troops backed by tanks also killed a 24-year-old gunman
in Jabalya, a stronghold of Islamist militants who have fired
hundreds of crude rockets into nearby Israel.
In a separate incident in central Gaza, Israeli troops shot
dead a boy of 13 and wounded four others in a crowd of
stone-throwers who approached the entrance to an isolated
Jewish settlement, according to medics.
Another Palestinian gunman was killed in an army raid into
the West Bank city of Nablus. In Jenin, a militant died when a
taxi he was in overturned while trying to elude pursuing
Israeli soldiers. A comrade was shot dead as he fled on foot.
Israeli troops also blew up the Jenin home of a high-profile
militant commander in the Fatah faction of Palestinian
President Yasser Arafat. The militant leader was
not there at the time.
Violence surged on the heels of the fourth anniversary of a
Palestinian revolt. Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie urged his people
and Israel on Tuesday to reconsider tactics that have locked
the two sides in a chronic cycle of bloodshed.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is bent on crushing
militant groups to prevent them claiming victory after a
planned evacuation of 8,000 Jewish settlers from Gaza and
a few from the 230,000 in the West Bank next year.
But Islamist militants vowed to keep fighting until Israelis
had evacuated "all of Palestine." They are dedicated
to destroying Israel as well as regaining the West Bank and
Gaza, occupied by the Jewish state in the 1967 Middle East war.
BATTLE AT REFUGEE CAMP
Israeli tanks and troops charged into north Gaza on Tuesday
night in another bid to stamp out elusive squads of Hamas
militants who launch makeshift Qassam rockets over Gaza's
fenced border into Israel almost daily.
"We begin the fifth year of the intifada (uprising) and we
will keep firing rockets and mortars, we will continue our
jihad until all of Palestine is returned," said Nizar Rayan, a
Jabalya Hamas leader brandishing an assault rifle and grenade
launcher.
"We are operating (again) in north Gaza in order to try to
stop the launching of Qassam rockets that are terrorizing
nearby Israeli communities," an Israeli army spokeswoman
said.
Israeli forces besieged Beit Hanoun, a town adjacent to
Jabalya, for a month in the summer in a hunt for rocket squads.
The incursion killed 20 Palestinians and left a trail of
destruction, but the rocket volleys soon started again. Israeli
forces spent four more days in north Gaza three weeks ago. But
again rocket salvoes resumed against the border town of Sderot.
The rockets have killed two people in four years but have
become psychologically important for militants now that Israel
has succeeded in limiting their suicide bombings inside Israel.
Critics of the raids into Gaza say Israel risks getting
sucked back into heavy fighting to stop the rockets just as it
is preparing to withdraw from the territory.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
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2) Iraq Rebel Cities to Be Retaken in October - Minister
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 11:19 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367016
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. and Iraqi forces will retake
rebel-held cities in Iraq in October, Defense Minister Hazim
al-Shalaan told Reuters on Wednesday.
"You wait and see what we are going to do. We are going to
take all these cities in October," Shalaan said.
The western cities of Falluja and Ramadi, as well as some
parts of Baghdad and the town of Samarra, north of the capital,
are effectively controlled by insurgents.
The U.S. military has previously said it will retake these
areas by the end of the year so elections can go ahead as
scheduled in January.
U.S. commanders say they are waiting until Iraqi forces are
large enough and sufficiently trained for the offensive.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
3) Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision
NEW YORK (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:07 PM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367548
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Part of the Patriot Act, a central
plank of the Bush Administration's war on terror, was ruled
unconstitutional by a federal judge on Wednesday.
U.S. District Judge Victor Marreo ruled in favor of the
American Civil Liberties Union, which challenged the power the
FBI has to demand confidential financial records from companies
as part of terrorism investigations.
The ruling was the latest blow to the Bush administration's
anti-terrorism policies.
In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that terror suspects
being held in places like Guantanamo Bay can use the American
judicial system to challenge their confinement. That ruling was
a defeat for the president's assertion of sweeping powers to
hold "enemy combatants" indefinitely after the Sept. 11, 2001,
attacks.
The ACLU sued the Department of Justice, arguing that part
of the Patriot legislation violated the constitution because it
authorizes the FBI to force disclosure of sensitive information
without adequate safeguards.
The judge agreed, stating that the provision "effectively
bars or substantially deters any judicial challenge."
Under the provision, the FBI did not have to show a judge a
compelling need for the records and it did not have to specify
any process that would allow a recipient to fight the demand
for confidential information.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
4) They're burned, or blinded, or sparring with death
The story of the military hospital where there's no escaping
the horrors of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan
BY MATTHEW MCALLESTER
STAFF CORRESPONDENT
LANDSTUHL, Germany
September 27, 2004
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/health/ny-wohosp3986566sep27,0,7903420.story
LANDSTUHL, Germany -- The medical team that accompanied
the soldier on the Thursday morning flight from Iraq had worked
the whole way to keep him alive, his body burned and lacerated
by the fire and metal of a roadside bomb.
They were low on oxygen by the time the green military ambulance
reached the front door of the hospital.
"Get me more O2," shouted out a visibly upset nurse, Maj. Pat
Bradshaw. She had been up and working for 28 hours, ferrying
the wounded out of Iraq.
"She's stressed," said Capt. George Sakakini, a physician in
charge of the team that greets the wounded. He watched from
the curbside through the early-morning drizzle, keeping an eye
on his highly trained squad of doctors, nurses and chaplains.
"Someone's trying to die on her."
Full green oxygen tank in place, its contents filtering into the
unconscious man's lungs, the team lowered the soldier on his
stretcher to the ground. His scorched face was a painter's
palette of the colors of pain: yellow, mauve, bright red.
In the intensive care unit, nurses quickly worked to make sure
his wounds were as clean as possible. An infection could kill
him. A couple of rooms over, more nurses worked on another
young soldier, also unconscious, burned and sparring with
death. Another roadside bomb victim. Dabbing gently, they
spread thick white antimicrobial cream on the raw flesh of
his forearms. Twenty percent of his body was burned.
It was an average morning at Landstuhl Regional Medical
Center, which has become the American military's museum
of pain and maiming, doubt and anger. The planes from Iraq
land every day, sometimes two or three of them.
Like his staff, who brim with frustration at what they see as
the irresponsible disinclination of the American people to
understand the costs of the war to thousands of American
soldiers, the hospital's chief surgeon feels that most Americans
have their minds on other things.
"It is my impression that they're not thinking about it a whole
lot at all," said Lt. Col. Ronald Place. As he spoke, the man who
has probably seen more of America's war wounded than anyone
since the Vietnam War sobbed as he sat at a table in his office.
First stop for injured
Nowhere is it less possible to escape the horrors of the war in
Iraq for American soldiers than Landstuhl. Nestled among the
tall trees of a forest on the outskirts of this small town in
southwestern Germany, the largest American military hospital
outside the United States is the first stop for nearly all injured
American personnel when they are flown out of Iraq or Afghanistan.
Dedicated and compassionate doctors, nurses and support staff
push aside curtains of fatigue and what the hospital's psychologists
call "vicarious trauma" to patch up and tend to soldiers before they
fly to the United States for longer-term care.
This month, politicians focused on the unwelcome tally of the
1,000th American soldier to die in Iraq. Landstuhl has its own
set of figures, numbers that flesh out the suffering occurring
on the battlefields of Iraq and in homes across the United States.
Since Sept. 11, 2001, more than 18,000 military personnel
have passed through the hospital from what staff refer to as
"down range": Iraq and Afghanistan. Of those, nearly 16,000
have come from Iraq.
Last month, 23 percent of those were casualties from combat,
slightly higher than most months; the rest had either accidental
or disease-related complaints.
Thirteen have died at the hospital.
Each day, an average of 30 to 35 patients arrive on flights
from Iraq. The most on a single day was 168.
More than 200 personnel have come in with either lost eyes
or eye injuries that could result in sight loss or blindness.
About 160 soldiers have had limbs amputated, most of them
passing through the hospital on their way home to more surgery.
And it's not just their bodies that come in needing fixing. More
than 1,400 physically fit personnel have been admitted with
mental health problems.
Then there are the Pentagon's figures that touch on all casualties
from the war in Iraq: 1,042 dead; 7,413 injured in action,
including 4,026 whose injuries have prevented them from
returning to duty. In Afghanistan, there have been 366 injuries
and 138 deaths.
One other number tells a slightly different tale, a story of
selflessness in the face of suffering: one third. That's about
how much money surgeons at Landstuhl make compared to
what they could make if they chose to work in the civilian world.
"There is nothing more rewarding than to take care of these
guys," said Place, the skin around his eyes reddening with the
tears that he failed to hold inside. "Not money, not anything."
Every day starts in the same way at Landstuhl. The staff get up
early to greet the buses and ambulances that come from nearby
Ramstein air base, where the planes from Iraq touch down as
early as 6 a.m. Most soldiers can walk off the buses, with broken
bones or noncombat illnesses. But those who come in ambulances,
like the two blast-injured soldiers, go straight to the ICU.
On Thursday morning, the 20-bed ICU was a busy, but not rushed,
place. As so often these days, the staff there were dealing with the
effects of roadside bombs rather than bullets. That means taking
care of scorched, lacerated bodies that may have less obvious
internal injuries.
Col. Earl Hecker sat outside the room where nurses were applying
the white antimicrobial cream to one of the burned soldiers.
Twenty-seven-years-old, Hecker remarked, looking at the patient's
notes. (Hospital officials were not able to get these patients' consent
to be named or photographed because of their medical conditions.)
Hecker, at 70, is a few generations older than his patient. A surgeon
who had retired from the Reserves but recently rejoined, he has
forsaken his private practice in Detroit for now to help at Landstuhl,
working past his assigned 90-day tour to stay nearly 150 days.
This experience "has changed my whole life," he said, his jovial
demeanor fading to introspection. "I'm never going to be the same."
The day before, Hecker had been taking care of an 18-year-old
soldier who, thanks to an Iraqi bullet, will forever be quadriplegic.
Hecker sat gazing through the window at the burned soldier and
thought of the kid he had sent off to the States the day before.
"Terrible, terrible, terrible," he said, staring into the distance.
"When you talk to him he cries."
A month ago, Hecker took four days off to fly home to see his
family. He needed a break. They went out for dinner at a nice
restaurant. Hecker realized during dinner that he was suddenly
seeing the world differently. He looked around at the chattering
people, eating their fine food, drinking good wine and he thought
to himself: "They have no idea what's going on here. Absolutely none."
He doesn't think people want to see it. He thinks the nation is still
scarred by Vietnam and would prefer not to see the thousands of
injured young men coming home from Iraq.
"I just want people to understand - war is bad, life is difficult,"
he said.
Maybe it was the stress, maybe it's because Hecker has no military
career to mess up by speaking out of line, but it just came out:
"George Bush is an idiot," he said, quickly saying he regretted the
comment. But then he continued, criticizing Bush as a rich kid who
hasn't seen enough of the world. "He's very rich, you'd think he'd
get some education," Hecker said.
"He's my president. I'll follow him in what he wants to do," he
continued, "but I'm here for him." Hecker leaned forward and
pointed through the glass at the unconscious soldier fighting for
his life 2 yards away.
'It's just not right'
Not all of the staff can get away with criticizing their
commander-in-chief or his decisions, but many use more
opaque ways of communicating their unease.
"It's not right," said Maj. Cathy Martin, 40, head nurse of the
ICU, when asked how she felt seeing so many soldiers pass
through her unit. She paused. "It's just not right."
She declined to elaborate on what exactly she meant.
Comments such as Hecker's about the president can lead
to severe consequences for those with careers ahead of them.
But Martin did add: "People need to vote for the right people
to be in office and they need to be empowered to influence
change."
What she did feel comfortable saying, echoing the head
surgeon, Hecker and others, was that people back home
just don't get it.
"Everyone's looking but no one's seeing," added Staff Sgt.
Royce Pittman, 32, who works with her. "I had no idea this
was going on. ... What we see every day is not normal.
There's nothing normal about this."
In private, some hospital workers said they wished they
could openly air their feelings about the war. And if reporters
could somehow quote people's facial expressions, a
number of those staff members would probably be facing
disciplinary hearings. Only one staff member interviewed
expressed solid support for the war.
"I do believe, I truly do believe that those that are fighting
and defending for liberty and freedom ... that that is a truly
worthy cause," said Maj. Kendra Whyatt, head nurse of
inpatient orthopedics.
Is it all worth it? the head surgeon was asked. "That's not
for me to say, but I'll be here for them," Place said.
The staff do talk among themselves, said Maj. Stephen Franco,
chief of the clinical health psychology service at the hospital.
He recalled one doctor's comments after attending a memorial
service for a young soldier who had died. "I wish some of the
lawmakers could attend some of these more often so they can
think a little more about their decisions," Franco recalled the
doctor telling him.
But like all the staff in the hospital, politics comes second to
healing with Franco. He has a lot of it to do.
"It's probably the biggest challenge to mental health since
Vietnam," said his boss, Col. Gary Southwell, chief of
psychology services.
Soldiers come in carrying guilt about leaving their unit behind,
haunting visions of seeing friends dying, nightmares, frayed
nerves and deep anxieties about their future, Franco said. Place
noted that for a single man facial disfigurement, for example,
can be particularly traumatizing. Who's going to want someone
with a face like this? the young men wonder.
Care taken not to sugarcoat
Franco and his colleagues - the number of psychologists
and psychiatrists has doubled since the Iraq war began,
reflecting large staff increases throughout the hospital -
make a point of visiting all new patients to see how they're doing.
"We provide assurance, look to the future," he said. "We're careful
not to sugarcoat anything."
Franco doesn't attempt quick miracle fixes for traumatized soldiers,
most of whom are flown to the United States after a few days. "When
your world is rocked like that it's not a smooth process necessarily
to get that to make sense," he said.
On Sept. 18, Army Sgt. 1st Class Larry Daniels' world was rocked.
So was his wife's.
With other men from his platoon, Daniels was standing on a bridge
over a highway near Baghdad International Airport while an Iraqi
contractor fixed a fence by the side of the road. Daniels, 37, was
waving Iraqi vehicles past the three American Humvees while the
contractor worked as quickly as possible to fix the wire fence.
An orange and white Chevy Caprice, a type of car usually driven
as a taxi in Baghdad, veered toward the soldiers. It exploded;
a suicide car bomb.
"I felt my body went up in the air," said Daniels, in his Texas
drawl. "I was upside down looking back at where the car had
been and landed on the ground. Three seconds later it hit me
what happened."
Lying on the pavement, Big Daddy Daniels, as his men call him,
had the presence of mind to keep ordering his soldiers around,
even though he couldn't move. Another unit arrived soon and
ferried the survivors to safety. Two were dead.
Two days later, Daniels was flown to Landstuhl. Both of his arms
have multiple fractures. Steel pins and thick casts keep his bones
in place. Part of his hand is missing. And as he puts it, he's got
"holes from my ankle to my ear." The doctors have taken some of
the shrapnel out. Some fragments are still there.
Wife's opinion has changed
Daniels is an experienced, professional soldier. He's been in the
Army for 17 years. His dad was a draftee in the Vietnam War. He
can trace his family's military history back to the Civil War. So
perhaps it's not surprising that he says he wishes he were still
in Iraq with his men.
His wife, Cheryl, has had enough. While the staff at Landstuhl
move the injured on, usually after five days, the families of the
wounded have to face up to the long-term consequences of the
violence in Iraq. Many are embittered.
From a military family herself, the mother of two had been changing
her mind about a lot of things even before her husband became so
badly injured that he can't do even the most basic of tasks for himself.
She supported the war and voted for Bush. Now, she says, she
wants to pull the troops out of Iraq. "I will vote for Kerry. Not
because I prefer Kerry over Bush but because I don't want Bush
back in office."
Her 12-year-old son has been saying he wants to go to West
Point. Her 8-year-old daughter wants to be a military veterinarian.
She's stopped encouraging those ambitions.
Speaking alone, without her husband, she said she knew that the
Army wasn't going to like what she had to say. Like Hecker,
she hasn't got much to lose by speaking her mind, which she
did, calmly and thoughtfully.
"I don't feel we have any business being there," she said Friday.
"I think this is an area of the world that has been fighting for
thousands of years, and I don't think our presence will change
anything. If anything, we've given them a common target to
focus on. Rather than fight each other, they're fighting us.
I don't see why my husband has to lose two soldiers or
question why he's here or see his other guys that are hurt.
The minute we pull out, things will go back to the culture
that is established."
Cheryl Daniels is looking at a tough future. She has to parent
her kids, hold down a job at Fort Hood Army base in Texas,
where the family lives, and finish the management degree she
is studying for at night. Soon her disabled husband will be home,
and she finds it hard to believe, as the doctors have told her, that
"in a year or two he's going to be back to normal. I can't see that
right now because he's got nerve damage in his arms."
She doesn't feel that her country, her military, is giving her
enough support. She had to pay her own way to Germany
and her own way back. The Army was doing almost nothing
for her, she said.
"I feel like we've paid our dues," she said. "And I'm done."
Copyright (c) 2004, Newsday, Inc.
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5) Crude dudes
U.S. oil companies just happened to have billions
of dollars they wanted to invest in undeveloped oil reserves
LINDA MCQUAIG
Sep. 20, 2004. 09:56 AM
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Artic
le_Type1&c=Article&cid=1095545411401&call_pageid=968332188854&col=9683500607
From his corner office in the heart of New York's financial district,
Fadel Gheit keeps close tabs on what goes on inside the boardrooms
of the big oil companies. An oil analyst at the prestigious Wall
Street firm Oppenheimer & Co., the fit, distinguished-looking
Gheit has been watching the oil industry closely for more than
25 years.
Selling the modern world's most indispensable commodity has
never been a bad business to be in - particularly for the small
group of companies that straddle the top of this privileged world.
But never more so than now.
"Profit-wise, things could not have been better," says Gheit,
"In the last three years, they died and went to heaven ....
They are all sitting on the largest piles of cash in their history."
But to stay rich they have to keep finding new reserves, and
that's getting tougher. Increasingly it means cutting through
permafrost or drilling deep underwater, at tremendous cost.
"The cheap oil has already been found and developed and
produced and consumed," says Gheit. "The low-hanging
fruit has already been picked."
Well, not all the low-hanging fruit has been picked.
Nestled into the heart of the area of heaviest oil concentration
in the world is Iraq, overflowing with low-hanging fruit. No
permafrost, no deep water. Just giant pools of oil, right beneath
the warm ground. This is fruit sagging so low, as it were, that it
practically touches the ground under the weight of its ripeness.
Not only does Iraq have vast quantities of easily accessible oil,
but its oil is almost untouched. "Think of Iraq as virgin territory
.... This is bigger than anything Exxon is involved in currently
.... It is the superstar of the future," says Gheit, "That's why
Iraq becomes the most sought-after real estate on the face
of the earth."
Gheit just smiles at the notion that oil wasn't a factor in the
U.S. invasion of Iraq. He compares Iraq to Russia, which also
has large undeveloped oil reserves. But Russia has nuclear
weapons. "We can't just go over and ... occupy (Russian) oil
fields," says Gheit. "It's a different ballgame." Iraq, however,
was defenceless, utterly lacking, ironically, in weapons of mass
destruction. And its location, nestled in between Saudi Arabia
and Iran, made it an ideal place for an ongoing military presence,
from which the U.S. would be able to control the entire Gulf
region. Gheit smiles again: "Think of Iraq as a military base
with a very large oil reserve underneath .... You can't ask for
better than that."
There's something almost obscene about a map that was
studied by senior Bush administration officials and a select
group of oil company executives meeting in secret in the
spring of 2001. It doesn't show the kind of detail normally
shown on maps - cities, towns, regions. Rather its detail is
all about Iraq's oil.
The southwest is neatly divided, for instance, into nine
"Exploration Blocks." Stripped of political trappings, this
map shows a naked Iraq, with only its ample natural assets
in view. It's like a supermarket meat chart, which identifies
the various parts of a slab of beef so customers can see the
most desirable cuts .... Block 1 might be the striploin,
Block 2 and Block 3 are perhaps some juicy tenderloin,
but Block 8 - ahh, that could be the filet mignon.
The map might seem crass, but it was never meant for
public consumption. It was one of the documents studied
by the ultra-secretive task force on energy, headed by
U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney, and it was only released
under court order after a long legal battle waged by the
public interest group Judicial Watch.
Another interesting task force document, also released
under court order over the opposition of the Bush administration,
was a two-page chart titled "Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfields."
It identifies 63 oil companies from 30 countries and specifies
which Iraqi oil fields each company is interested in and the
status of the company's negotiations with Saddam Hussein's
regime. Among the companies are Royal Dutch/Shell of the
Netherlands, Russia's Lukoil and France's Total Elf Aquitaine,
which was identified as being interested in the fabulous,
25-billion-barrrel Majnoon oil field. Baghdad had "agreed in
principle" to the French company's plans to develop this
succulent slab of Iraq. There goes the filet mignon into the
mouths of the French!
The documents have attracted surprisingly little attention,
despite their possible relevance to the question of Washington's
motives for its invasion of Iraq - in many ways the defining event
of the post-9/11 world but one whose purpose remains
shrouded in mystery. Even after the supposed motives for
the invasion - weapons of mass destruction and links to
Al Qaeda - have been thoroughly discredited, talk of oil
as a motive is still greeted with derision. Certainly any
suggestion that private oil interests were in any way
involved is hooted down with charges of conspiracy theory.
Yet the documents suggest that those who took part in the
Cheney task force - including senior oil company executives
- were very interested in Iraq's oil and specifically in the
danger of it falling into the hands of eager foreign oil
companies, rather than into the rightful hands of eager
U.S. oil companies.
As the documents show, prior to the U.S. invasion, foreign
oil companies were nicely positioned for future involvement
in Iraq, while the major U.S. oil companies, after years of
U.S.-Iraqi hostilities, were largely out of the picture. Indeed,
the U.S. majors would have been the big losers if U.N.
sanctions against Iraq had simply been lifted. "The U.S.
majors stand to lose if Saddam makes a deal with the U.N.
(on lifting sanctions)," noted a report by Germany's Deutsche
Bank in October 2002.
The disadvantaged position of U.S. oil companies in Saddam
Hussein's Iraq would have presumably been on the minds of
senior oil company executives when they met secretly with
Cheney and his task force in early 2001. The administration
refuses to divulge exactly who met with the task force, and
continues to fight legal challenges to force disclosure.
However a 2003 report by the General Accounting Office,
the investigative arm of Congress, concluded that the task
force relied on advice from the oil industry, whose close
ties to the Bush administration are legendary.
(George W. Bush received more money from the oil
and gas industry in 1999 and 2000 than any other U.S.
federal candidate received over the previous decade .)
The Cheney task force has been widely criticized for
recommending bigger subsidies for the energy industry,
but there's been little focus on its possible role as a venue
for consultations between Big Oil and the administration about
Iraq. One intriguing piece of evidence pointing in this direction
was a National Security Council directive, dated February
2001, instructing NSC staff to co-operate fully with the task
force. The NSC document, reported in The New Yorker
magazine, noted that the task force would be considering
the "melding" of two policy areas: "the review of operational
policies towards rogue states" and "actions regarding the
capture of new and existing oil and gas fields." This certainly
implies that the Cheney task force was considering geopolitical
questions about actions related to the capture of oil and gas
reserves in "rogue" states, including presumably Iraq.
It seems likely then that Big Oil, through the Cheney task force,
was involved in discussions with the administration about
getting control of oil in Iraq. Since Big Oil has sought to
distance itself from the administration's decision to invade
Iraq, this apparent involvement helps explain the otherwise
baffling level of secrecy surrounding the task force.
It's interesting to note that the Cheney task force deliberations
took place in the first few months after the Bush administration
came to office - the same time period during which the new
administration was secretly formulating plans for toppling
Saddam. Those early plans were not publicly disclosed, but
we know about them now due to the publication of several
insider accounts, including that of former Treasury secretary
Paul O'Neill. So, months before the attacks of 9/11, the Bush
White House was already considering toppling Saddam, and
at the same time it was also keenly studying Iraq's oil fields
and assessing how far along foreign companies were in their
negotiations with Saddam for a piece of Iraq's oil.
It's also noteworthy that one person - Dick Cheney - was
pivotal both in advancing the administration's plans for
regime change in Iraq and in formulating U.S. energy policy.
As CEO of oil services giant Halliburton Company, Cheney
had been alert to the problem of securing new sources of oil.
Speaking to the London Petroleum Institute in 1999, while still
heading Halliburton, Cheney had focused on the difficulty of
finding the 50 million extra barrels of oil per day that he said
the world would need by 2010. "Where is it going to come
from?" he asked, and then noted that "the Middle East with
two-thirds of the world's oil and the lowest cost, is still
where the prize ultimately lies."
Cheney's focus on the Middle East and its oil continued
after he became Bush's powerful vice-president. Within
weeks of the new administration taking office, Cheney
was pushing forward plans for regime change in Iraq and
also devising a new energy policy which included getting
control of oil reserves in rogue states. His central role in
these two apparently urgent initiatives is certainly suggestive
of a possible connection between the U.S. invasion of Iraq
and a desire for the country's ample oil reserves - the very
thing that is vehemently denied.
One reason that regime change in Iraq was seen as offering
significant benefits for Big Oil was that it promised to open
up a treasure chest which had long been sealed - private
ownership of Middle Eastern oil. A small group of major
international oil companies once privately owned the oil
industries of the Middle East. But that changed in the 1970s
when most Middle Eastern countries (and some elsewhere)
nationalized their oil industries. Today, state-owned
companies control the vast majority of the world's oil
resources. The major international oil companies control
a mere 4 per cent.
The majors have clearly prospered in the new era, as
developers rather than owners, but there's little doubt that
they'd prefer to regain ownership of the oil world's Garden
of Eden. "(O)ne of the goals of the oil companies and the
Western powers is to weaken and/or privatize the world's
state oil companies," observes New York-based economist
Michael Tanzer, who advises Third World governments on
energy issues.
The possibility of Iraq's oil being reopened to private ownership
- with the promise of astonishing profits - attracted considerable
interest in the run-up to the U.S. invasion. In February 2003, as
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell held the world's attention with
his dramatic efforts to make the case that Saddam posed an
imminent threat to international peace, other parts of the
U.S. government were secretly developing plans to privatize
Iraq's oil (among other assets). A confidential 100-page
contracting document, drawn up by the U.S. Agency for
International Development and the U.S. Treasury Department,
laid out a wide-ranging plan for a "Mass Privatization Program
... especially in the oil and supporting industries."
The Pentagon was also working on plans to open up Iraq's oil
sector. In the fall of 2002, months before the invasion, the
Pentagon retained Philip Carroll, a former CEO of Shell Oil
Co. in Texas, to draft a strategy for developing Iraqi oil.
Carroll's plans apparently became the basis of a proposed
scheme, which became public shortly after the war, to
redesign Iraq's oil industry along the lines of a U.S. corporation,
with a chairman, chief executive and a 15-member board of
international advisers. Carroll was chosen by Washington to
serve as chairman, but the plans were shelved after they
encountered stiff opposition inside Iraq.
Still, the prospect of privatizing Iraq's oil remained of great
interest to U.S. oil companies, according to Robert Ebel, from
the influential Washington-based Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS). Ebel, former vice-president of
a Dallas-based oil exploration company, retains close ties
to the industry. In an interview in his Washington office, Ebel
said it was up to Iraq to make its own decisions, but he made
clear that U.S. oil companies would prefer Iraq abandon its
nationalization. "We'd rather not work with national oil
companies," Ebel said bluntly, noting that the major oil
companies are prepared to invest the $35 to $40 billion
to develop Iraq's reserves in the coming years. "We're looking
for places to invest around the world. You know, along comes
Iraq, and I think a lot of oil companies would be disappointed
if Iraq were to say `we're going to do it ourselves' "
Along comes Iraq ?
How fortuitous. U.S. oil companies just happened to have
billions of dollars that they wanted to invest in undeveloped
oil reserves when Iraq presented itself, ready for invasion.
Along comes Iraq, indeed.
In the past 14 decades, we've used up roughly half of all the
oil that the planet has to offer. No, we're not about to run out
of oil. But long before the oil runs out, it reaches its production
peak . After that, extracting the remaining oil becomes
considerably more difficult and expensive.
This notion that oil production has a "peak" was first conceived
in 1956 by geophysicist M. King Hubbert. He predicted that
U.S. oil production would peak about 1970 - a notion that was
scoffed at at the time. As it turned out, Hubbert was dead on;
U.S. oil production peaked in 1970, and has been declining
ever since. Hubbert's once-radical notion is now generally
accepted.
For the world as a whole, the peak is fast approaching. Colin
Campbell, one of the world's leading geologists, estimates the
world's peak will come as soon as 2005 - next year. "There is
only so much crude oil in the world," Campbell said in a telephone
interview from his home in Ireland, "and the industry has found
about 90 per cent of it."
All this would be less serious if the world's appetite for oil were
declining in tandem. But even as the discovery of new oil fields
slows down, the world's consumption speeds up - a dilemma
Cheney highlighted in his speech to the London Petroleum
Institute in 1999. For every new barrel of oil we find, we are
consuming four already-discovered barrels, according to
Campbell. The arithmetic is not on our side.
Particularly worrisome is the arithmetic as it applies to the
U.S. With its oil production already long past peak, and yet
its oil consumption rising, the U.S. will inevitably become
more reliant on foreign oil. This is significant not just for
Americans, but for the world, since the U.S. has long
characterized its access to energy as a matter of "national
security." With its unrivalled military power, the U.S. will
insist on meeting its own voracious energy needs - and it
will be up to the rest of the world to co-operate with this
quest. Period.
Canada plays a greater role in this "keep-the-U.S.-energy
-beast-fed" scenario than many Canadians may realize.
A three-volume report prepared by a bipartisan Congressional
team and CSIS, the Washington think tank, highlights how
important Canada is in the U.S. energy picture of the future.
The report, The Geopolitics of Energy into the 21st Century ,
notes that Canada is "the single largest provider of energy
to the United States," and that "Canada is poised to expand
sharply its exports of oil to the United States in the coming
years."
Fine - as long as Canada doesn't want to change its mind
about this. Well, in fact, Canada can't change its mind
about this - a point celebrated in the report. When Canada
signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)
in 1993, we gave up our right to cut back the amount of oil
we export to the U.S. (unless we cut our own consumption
the same amount). Interestingly, Mexico, also a party to
NAFTA, refused to agree to this section, and was granted
an exemption.
The U.S. report points out that that, under NAFTA, Canada
is not allowed to reduce its exports of oil (or other energy)
to the U.S. in order to redirect them to Canadian consumers.
Redirecting Canadian oil to Canadians isn't permitted -
regardless of how great the Canadian need may be . Some
outside observers, like Colin Campbell over in Ireland, find
the situation striking. "You poor Canadians are going to be
left freezing in the dark while they're running hair dryers in
the U.S.," says Campbell. It's a situation that comforts the
U.S. senators, congressmen and think-tank analysts who
wrote the report. With obvious satisfaction, they conclude:
"There can be no more secure supplier to the United States
than Canada."
Alas, for the U.S., not every part of the world is as pliant as
Canada. Most of the world's oil is in the Middle East. And
while different oil regions will reach their production peaks
at different times, the Middle East will peak last, underlying
Cheney's point that the region is where "the prize ultimately
lies." Whoever controls the big oil reserves of the Middle
East will then be positioned to, pretty much, control the world.
But we're supposed to believe that, as the Bush administration
assessed its options just before invading Iraq in the spring of
2003, the advantages of securing vast, untapped oil fields
- in order to guarantee U.S. energy security in a world of
dwindling reserves and to enable U.S. oil companies to reap
untold riches - were far from mind. What really mattered to
those in the White House, we're told, was liberating the people
of Iraq.
Adapted from It's The Crude, Dude: War Big Oil, And The Fight
For The Planet , by Linda McQuaig, 2004. Published by
Doubleday Canada. Reproduced by arrangement with the
Publisher. All rights reserved. Toronto-based political
commentator Linda McQuaig is a past winner of a National
Newspaper Award and an Atkinson Fellowship for journalism
in public policy. Her column appears Sundays on the Star's
op-ed page.
Additional articles by Linda McQuaig
Legal Notice: Copyright Toronto Star Newspapers Limited.
All rights reserved. Distribution, transmission or republication
of any material from www.thestar.com is strictly prohibited
without the prior written permission of Toronto Star
Newspapers Limited. For information please contact us
using our webmaster form . www.thestar.com online since 1996.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
6) ... Unless It's All Greek to Him
By Barbara Garson
September 24, 2004
http://www.miftah.org/Display.cfm?DocId=4920&CategoryId=5
During a lull in the war between Athens and Sparta, the Athenians decided
to invade and occupy Sicily. Thucydides tells us in "The Peloponnesian
War" that "they were, for the most part, ignorant of the size of the
island and the numbers of its inhabitants . and they did not realize that
they were taking on a war of almost the same magnitude as their war
against the Peloponnesians."
According to Thucydides, the digression into Sicily in 416 BC - a sideshow
that involved lying exiles, hopeful contractors, politicized intelligence,
a doctrine of preemption - ultimately cost Athens everything, including
its democracy.
Nicias, the most experienced Athenian general, had not wanted to be chosen
for the command. "His view was that the city was making a mistake and, on
a slight pretext which looked reasonable, was in fact aiming at conquering
the whole of Sicily - a considerable undertaking indeed," wrote
Thucydides.
Nicias warned that it was the wrong war against the wrong enemy and that
the Athenians were ignoring their real enemies - the Spartans - while
creating new enemies elsewhere. "It is senseless to go against people who,
even if conquered, could not be controlled," he argued.
Occupying Sicily would require many soldiers, Nicias insisted, because it
meant establishing a new government among enemies. "Those who do this
[must] either become masters of the country on the very first day they
land in it, or be prepared to recognize that, if they fail to do so, they
will find hostility on every side."
The case for war, meanwhile, was made by the young general Alcibiades, who
was hoping for a quick victory in Sicily so he could move on to conquer
Carthage. Alcibiades, who'd led a dissolute youth (and who happened to own
a horse ranch, raising Olympic racers) was a battle-tested soldier, a
brilliant diplomat and a good speaker. (So much for superficial
similarities.)
Alcibiades intended to rely on dazzling technology - the Athenian armada -
instead of traditional foot soldiers. He told the Assembly he wasn't
worried about Sicilian resistance because the island's cities were filled
with people of so many different groups. "Such a crowd as this is scarcely
likely either to pay attention to one consistent policy or to join
together in concerted action.. The chances are that they will make
separate agreements with us as soon as we come forward with attractive
suggestions."
Another argument for the war was that it would pay for itself. A committee
of Sicilian exiles and Athenian experts told the Assembly that there was
enough wealth in Sicily to pay the costs of the war and occupation. "The
report was encouraging but untrue," wrote Thucydides.
Though war was constant in ancient Greece, it was still usually justified
by a threat, an insult or an incident. But the excursion against Sicily
was different, and Alcibiades announced a new, or at least normally
unstated, doctrine.
"One does not only defend oneself against a superior power when one is
attacked: One takes measures in advance to prevent the attack
materializing," he said.
When and where should this preemption doctrine be applied? Alcibiades gave
an answer of a sort. "It is not possible for us to calculate, like
housekeepers [perhaps a better translation would be "girlie men"], exactly
how much empire we want to have. The fact is that we have reached a state
where we are forced to plan new conquests and forced to hold on to what we
have got because there is danger that we ourselves may fall under the
power of others unless others are in our power."
Alcibiades' argument carried the day, but before the invasion, the
Athenian fleet sailed around seeking allies among the Hellenic colonies
near Sicily. Despite the expedition's "great preponderance of strength
over those against whom it set out," only a couple of cities joined the
coalition.
At home, few spoke out against the Sicilian operation. "There was a
passion for the enterprise which affected everyone alike," Thucydides
reports. "The result of this excessive enthusiasm of the majority was that
the few who actually were opposed to the expedition were afraid of being
thought unpatriotic if they voted against it, and therefore kept quiet."
In the face of aggressive posturing, Nicias appealed to the Assembly
members to show true courage.
"If any of you is sitting next to one of [Alcibiades'] supporters," Nicias
said, "do not allow yourself to be browbeaten or to be frightened of being
called a coward if you do not vote for war.. Our country is on the verge
of the greatest danger she has ever known. Think of her, hold up your
hands against this proposal and vote in favor of leaving the Sicilians
alone."
We don't know how many Athenians had secret reservations, but few hands
went up against the war.
In the end, the Athenians lost everything in Sicily. Their army was
defeated and their navy destroyed. Alcibiades was recalled early on;
Nicias was formally executed while thousands of Athenian prisoners were
left in an open pit, where most died.
The Sicilians didn't follow up by invading Attica; they just wanted Athens
out. But with the leader of the democracies crippled, allies left the
Athenian League. Then the real enemy, Sparta, ever patient and cautious,
closed in over the next few years. But not before Athens descended, on its
own, into a morass of oligarchic coups and self-imposed tyranny.
http://www.miftah.org
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
7) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28)
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
(Sept. 28) - Fewer than two-thirds of the former soldiers being reactivated
for duty in Iraq and elsewhere have reported on time, prompting the Army to
threaten some with punishment for desertion.
The former soldiers, part of what is known as the Individual Ready Reserve
(IRR), are being recalled to fill shortages in skills needed for the
conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Of the 1,662 ready reservists ordered to report to Fort Jackson, S.C., by
Sept. 22, only 1,038 had done so, the Army said Monday. About 500 of those
who failed to report have requested exemptions on health or personal
grounds.
"The numbers did not look good," said Lt. Col. Burton Masters, a spokesman
for the Army's Human Resources Command. "We are tightening the system,
reaching the people and bringing them in."
Masters said most of the requests for exemptions are likely to be denied:
"To get an exemption, it has to be a very compelling case, such as a severe
medical condition."
The figures are the first on the IRR call-up. They reflect the challenges
the Pentagon faces in trying to find enough troops for ongoing operations
and show resistance among some servicemembers who returned to civilian life.
The ready reserve is an infrequently used pool of former soldiers who can be
called to duty in a national emergency or war. On June 29, the Army
announced it would call 5,674 members of its IRR back to active duty this
year and next.
Several of those who received recall notices have already been declared AWOL
(absent without official leave) and technically are considered deserters.
"We are not in a rush to put someone in the AWOL category," Masters said.
"We contact them and convince them it is in their best interests to show up.
If you are a deserter, it can affect you the rest of your life."
· Army May Reduce Length of Tours
· Rumors of Draft Are Hard to Kill
· AOL Military Center
· AOL Search: Recruitment
Fourteen people were listed as AWOL last week; six subsequently told the
Army they would report. Punishment for being AWOL is up to the unit
commander and can include prison time and dishonorable discharge, said Col.
Joseph Curtin, an Army spokesman.
With a force that generals say is stretched thin, the Army is considering
$1,000-a-month bonuses to ex-soldiers who volunteer to return for overseas
duty.
Ready reservists are soldiers who were honorably discharged after finishing
their active-duty tours, usually four to six years, but remain part of the
IRR for the rest of their original eight-year commitment. The IRR call-up is
the first major one in 13 years, since 20,277 troops were ordered back for
the Persian Gulf War.
09/28/2004 07:04
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
8) Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival
8th Annual Event
October 2-10 & 24, 2004
San Francisco, San Jose, Berkeley
www.aff.org
********TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW********
ON-LINE TICKET SALES DEADLINE HAS BEEN EXTENDED TO SEPTEMBER 29th
The 8th Annual Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival, an internationally
recognized festival dedicated to providing the San Francisco Bay Area
community with a unique opportunity to screen films from and about
the Arab World - a world often misunderstood and misrepresented runs
from October 2-10 & 24th, 2004 in San Francisco, San Jose and
Berkeley.
In contrast to mass media's frequently negative portrayal of Arab
culture, the Arab Film Festival showcases in depth perspectives and
stories about and by Arabs and Arab Americans in an ever more complex
world. We aim to bridge a gap through artistic expression and share
the experience of history, humanity, love, and life in a time where
the distance between American and Arab cultures ever expands.
Please join us as we strive to bring the Bay Area community a program
that is both stunning in artistic merit and educational - a program
that brings you a magnificent perspective of the richness of the Arab
World. We work very hard to keep these channels of communication open
so that all may share in Art, its beauty, humanity and personal
expression.
Please visit the Arab Film Festival website for film schedule and
descriptions.
WWW.AFF.ORG
Middle East Children's Alliance
901 Parker Street
Berkeley, California 94710
United States
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
NEXT BAUAW MEETING:
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 3, 3:00 p.m.
1380 Valencia Street
(Between 24th & 25th Streets, S.F.)
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
VOTE YES ON PROP. 'N'! BRING OUR TROOPS HOME NOW!
Come to the
BRING OUR TROOPS HOME NOW COMMITTEE MEETING
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 7:00 p.m.
AFSC - First Floor
65 NINTH STREET
(1/2 block from Market St., SF)
Help get the word out about Prop. 'N'. Bring your ideas for
community outreach, media, action, and more to make sure
we win by a landslide!
No matter who wins the elections this year, the war will not
be over. This ballot initiative will set the example for cities across
the country to do the same in future elections.
Pick up material to distribute!*
PROPOSITION 'N' ON THE NOVEMBER 3
SAN FRANCISCO BALLOT DECLARES:
"It is the policy of the people of the City and County of
San Francisco that: The Federal government should take
immediate steps to end the U.S. occupation of Iraq and
bring our troops safely home now."
Visit: www.yesonn.net
* Material costs money. Already thousands of brochures have
been printed and we need more! We need posters and buttons--
we need to cover the city with YES on 'N' campaign material!
Please send a contribution to help with these costs!
Make your check payable to:
Bring Our Troops Home Now
and mail to :
David Looman, Treasurer
325 Highland Ave.
San Francisco, CA 94110
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) Israel Kills 6 Palestinians in Gaza, W.Bank Raids
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
JABALYA, Gaza Strip (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6365775&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news
2) Iraq Rebel Cities to Be Retaken in October - Minister
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 11:19 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367016
3) Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision
NEW YORK (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:07 PM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367548
4) They're burned, or blinded, or sparring with death
The story of the military hospital where there's no escaping
the horrors of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan
BY MATTHEW MCALLESTER
STAFF CORRESPONDENT
LANDSTUHL, Germany
September 27, 2004
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/health/ny-wohosp3986566sep27,0,7903420.story
5) Crude dudes
U.S. oil companies just happened to have billions
of dollars they wanted to invest in undeveloped oil reserves
LINDA MCQUAIG
Sep. 20, 2004. 09:56 AM
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Artic
le_Type1&c=Article&cid=1095545411401&call_pageid=968332188854&col=9683500607
6) ... Unless It's All Greek to Him
By Barbara Garson
September 24, 2004
http://www.miftah.org/Display.cfm?DocId=4920&CategoryId=5
7) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28)
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
8) Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival
8th Annual Event
October 2-10 & 24, 2004
San Francisco, San Jose, Berkeley
www.aff.org
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
1) Israel Kills 6 Palestinians in Gaza, W.Bank Raids
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
JABALYA, Gaza Strip (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 09:36 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6365775&src=eD
ialog/GetContent§ion=news
JABALYA, Gaza Strip (Reuters) - Israeli forces killed six Palestinians
including three teenagers on Wednesday as they thrust deep into
Gaza to quell rocket fire into Israel and raided two West Bank cities
in search of wanted militants.
Youths of 17 and 14 in a stone-throwing crowd that confronted
Israeli forces were shot dead in Gaza's Jabalya refugee camp.
Fifteen others, many of them students in school uniforms, were
taken to hospital with gunshot wounds, medics said.
Israeli troops backed by tanks also killed a 24-year-old gunman
in Jabalya, a stronghold of Islamist militants who have fired
hundreds of crude rockets into nearby Israel.
In a separate incident in central Gaza, Israeli troops shot
dead a boy of 13 and wounded four others in a crowd of
stone-throwers who approached the entrance to an isolated
Jewish settlement, according to medics.
Another Palestinian gunman was killed in an army raid into
the West Bank city of Nablus. In Jenin, a militant died when a
taxi he was in overturned while trying to elude pursuing
Israeli soldiers. A comrade was shot dead as he fled on foot.
Israeli troops also blew up the Jenin home of a high-profile
militant commander in the Fatah faction of Palestinian
President Yasser Arafat. The militant leader was
not there at the time.
Violence surged on the heels of the fourth anniversary of a
Palestinian revolt. Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie urged his people
and Israel on Tuesday to reconsider tactics that have locked
the two sides in a chronic cycle of bloodshed.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is bent on crushing
militant groups to prevent them claiming victory after a
planned evacuation of 8,000 Jewish settlers from Gaza and
a few from the 230,000 in the West Bank next year.
But Islamist militants vowed to keep fighting until Israelis
had evacuated "all of Palestine." They are dedicated
to destroying Israel as well as regaining the West Bank and
Gaza, occupied by the Jewish state in the 1967 Middle East war.
BATTLE AT REFUGEE CAMP
Israeli tanks and troops charged into north Gaza on Tuesday
night in another bid to stamp out elusive squads of Hamas
militants who launch makeshift Qassam rockets over Gaza's
fenced border into Israel almost daily.
"We begin the fifth year of the intifada (uprising) and we
will keep firing rockets and mortars, we will continue our
jihad until all of Palestine is returned," said Nizar Rayan, a
Jabalya Hamas leader brandishing an assault rifle and grenade
launcher.
"We are operating (again) in north Gaza in order to try to
stop the launching of Qassam rockets that are terrorizing
nearby Israeli communities," an Israeli army spokeswoman
said.
Israeli forces besieged Beit Hanoun, a town adjacent to
Jabalya, for a month in the summer in a hunt for rocket squads.
The incursion killed 20 Palestinians and left a trail of
destruction, but the rocket volleys soon started again. Israeli
forces spent four more days in north Gaza three weeks ago. But
again rocket salvoes resumed against the border town of Sderot.
The rockets have killed two people in four years but have
become psychologically important for militants now that Israel
has succeeded in limiting their suicide bombings inside Israel.
Critics of the raids into Gaza say Israel risks getting
sucked back into heavy fighting to stop the rockets just as it
is preparing to withdraw from the territory.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
2) Iraq Rebel Cities to Be Retaken in October - Minister
BAGHDAD (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 11:19 AM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367016
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. and Iraqi forces will retake
rebel-held cities in Iraq in October, Defense Minister Hazim
al-Shalaan told Reuters on Wednesday.
"You wait and see what we are going to do. We are going to
take all these cities in October," Shalaan said.
The western cities of Falluja and Ramadi, as well as some
parts of Baghdad and the town of Samarra, north of the capital,
are effectively controlled by insurgents.
The U.S. military has previously said it will retake these
areas by the end of the year so elections can go ahead as
scheduled in January.
U.S. commanders say they are waiting until Iraqi forces are
large enough and sufficiently trained for the offensive.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004.
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
3) Judge Rules Against Patriot Act Provision
NEW YORK (Reuters)
Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:07 PM ET
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6367548
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Part of the Patriot Act, a central
plank of the Bush Administration's war on terror, was ruled
unconstitutional by a federal judge on Wednesday.
U.S. District Judge Victor Marreo ruled in favor of the
American Civil Liberties Union, which challenged the power the
FBI has to demand confidential financial records from companies
as part of terrorism investigations.
The ruling was the latest blow to the Bush administration's
anti-terrorism policies.
In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that terror suspects
being held in places like Guantanamo Bay can use the American
judicial system to challenge their confinement. That ruling was
a defeat for the president's assertion of sweeping powers to
hold "enemy combatants" indefinitely after the Sept. 11, 2001,
attacks.
The ACLU sued the Department of Justice, arguing that part
of the Patriot legislation violated the constitution because it
authorizes the FBI to force disclosure of sensitive information
without adequate safeguards.
The judge agreed, stating that the provision "effectively
bars or substantially deters any judicial challenge."
Under the provision, the FBI did not have to show a judge a
compelling need for the records and it did not have to specify
any process that would allow a recipient to fight the demand
for confidential information.
(c) Copyright Reuters 2004
---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
4) They're burned, or blinded, or sparring with death
The story of the military hospital where there's no escaping
the horrors of the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan
BY MATTHEW MCALLESTER
STAFF CORRESPONDENT
LANDSTUHL, Germany
September 27, 2004
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/health/ny-wohosp3986566sep27,0,7903420.story
LANDSTUHL, Germany -- The medical team that accompanied
the soldier on the Thursday morning flight from Iraq had worked
the whole way to keep him alive, his body burned and lacerated
by the fire and metal of a roadside bomb.
They were low on oxygen by the time the green military ambulance
reached the front door of the hospital.
"Get me more O2," shouted out a visibly upset nurse, Maj. Pat
Bradshaw. She had been up and working for 28 hours, ferrying
the wounded out of Iraq.
"She's stressed," said Capt. George Sakakini, a physician in
charge of the team that greets the wounded. He watched from
the curbside through the early-morning drizzle, keeping an eye
on his highly trained squad of doctors, nurses and chaplains.
"Someone's trying to die on her."
Full green oxygen tank in place, its contents filtering into the
unconscious man's lungs, the team lowered the soldier on his
stretcher to the ground. His scorched face was a painter's
palette of the colors of pain: yellow, mauve, bright red.
In the intensive care unit, nurses quickly worked to make sure
his wounds were as clean as possible. An infection could kill
him. A couple of rooms over, more nurses worked on another
young soldier, also unconscious, burned and sparring with
death. Another roadside bomb victim. Dabbing gently, they
spread thick white antimicrobial cream on the raw flesh of
his forearms. Twenty percent of his body was burned.
It was an average morning at Landstuhl Regional Medical
Center, which has become the American military's museum
of pain and maiming, doubt and anger. The planes from Iraq
land every day, sometimes two or three of them.
Like his staff, who brim with frustration at what they see as
the irresponsible disinclination of the American people to
understand the costs of the war to thousands of American
soldiers, the hospital's chief surgeon feels that most Americans
have their minds on other things.
"It is my impression that they're not thinking about it a whole
lot at all," said Lt. Col. Ronald Place. As he spoke, the man who
has probably seen more of America's war wounded than anyone
since the Vietnam War sobbed as he sat at a table in his office.
First stop for injured
Nowhere is it less possible to escape the horrors of the war in
Iraq for American soldiers than Landstuhl. Nestled among the
tall trees of a forest on the outskirts of this small town in
southwestern Germany, the largest American military hospital
outside the United States is the first stop for nearly all injured
American personnel when they are flown out of Iraq or Afghanistan.
Dedicated and compassionate doctors, nurses and support staff
push aside curtains of fatigue and what the hospital's psychologists
call "vicarious trauma" to patch up and tend to soldiers before they
fly to the United States for longer-term care.
This month, politicians focused on the unwelcome tally of the
1,000th American soldier to die in Iraq. Landstuhl has its own
set of figures, numbers that flesh out the suffering occurring
on the battlefields of Iraq and in homes across the United States.
Since Sept. 11, 2001, more than 18,000 military personnel
have passed through the hospital from what staff refer to as
"down range": Iraq and Afghanistan. Of those, nearly 16,000
have come from Iraq.
Last month, 23 percent of those were casualties from combat,
slightly higher than most months; the rest had either accidental
or disease-related complaints.
Thirteen have died at the hospital.
Each day, an average of 30 to 35 patients arrive on flights
from Iraq. The most on a single day was 168.
More than 200 personnel have come in with either lost eyes
or eye injuries that could result in sight loss or blindness.
About 160 soldiers have had limbs amputated, most of them
passing through the hospital on their way home to more surgery.
And it's not just their bodies that come in needing fixing. More
than 1,400 physically fit personnel have been admitted with
mental health problems.
Then there are the Pentagon's figures that touch on all casualties
from the war in Iraq: 1,042 dead; 7,413 injured in action,
including 4,026 whose injuries have prevented them from
returning to duty. In Afghanistan, there have been 366 injuries
and 138 deaths.
One other number tells a slightly different tale, a story of
selflessness in the face of suffering: one third. That's about
how much money surgeons at Landstuhl make compared to
what they could make if they chose to work in the civilian world.
"There is nothing more rewarding than to take care of these
guys," said Place, the skin around his eyes reddening with the
tears that he failed to hold inside. "Not money, not anything."
Every day starts in the same way at Landstuhl. The staff get up
early to greet the buses and ambulances that come from nearby
Ramstein air base, where the planes from Iraq touch down as
early as 6 a.m. Most soldiers can walk off the buses, with broken
bones or noncombat illnesses. But those who come in ambulances,
like the two blast-injured soldiers, go straight to the ICU.
On Thursday morning, the 20-bed ICU was a busy, but not rushed,
place. As so often these days, the staff there were dealing with the
effects of roadside bombs rather than bullets. That means taking
care of scorched, lacerated bodies that may have less obvious
internal injuries.
Col. Earl Hecker sat outside the room where nurses were applying
the white antimicrobial cream to one of the burned soldiers.
Twenty-seven-years-old, Hecker remarked, looking at the patient's
notes. (Hospital officials were not able to get these patients' consent
to be named or photographed because of their medical conditions.)
Hecker, at 70, is a few generations older than his patient. A surgeon
who had retired from the Reserves but recently rejoined, he has
forsaken his private practice in Detroit for now to help at Landstuhl,
working past his assigned 90-day tour to stay nearly 150 days.
This experience "has changed my whole life," he said, his jovial
demeanor fading to introspection. "I'm never going to be the same."
The day before, Hecker had been taking care of an 18-year-old
soldier who, thanks to an Iraqi bullet, will forever be quadriplegic.
Hecker sat gazing through the window at the burned soldier and
thought of the kid he had sent off to the States the day before.
"Terrible, terrible, terrible," he said, staring into the distance.
"When you talk to him he cries."
A month ago, Hecker took four days off to fly home to see his
family. He needed a break. They went out for dinner at a nice
restaurant. Hecker realized during dinner that he was suddenly
seeing the world differently. He looked around at the chattering
people, eating their fine food, drinking good wine and he thought
to himself: "They have no idea what's going on here. Absolutely none."
He doesn't think people want to see it. He thinks the nation is still
scarred by Vietnam and would prefer not to see the thousands of
injured young men coming home from Iraq.
"I just want people to understand - war is bad, life is difficult,"
he said.
Maybe it was the stress, maybe it's because Hecker has no military
career to mess up by speaking out of line, but it just came out:
"George Bush is an idiot," he said, quickly saying he regretted the
comment. But then he continued, criticizing Bush as a rich kid who
hasn't seen enough of the world. "He's very rich, you'd think he'd
get some education," Hecker said.
"He's my president. I'll follow him in what he wants to do," he
continued, "but I'm here for him." Hecker leaned forward and
pointed through the glass at the unconscious soldier fighting for
his life 2 yards away.
'It's just not right'
Not all of the staff can get away with criticizing their
commander-in-chief or his decisions, but many use more
opaque ways of communicating their unease.
"It's not right," said Maj. Cathy Martin, 40, head nurse of the
ICU, when asked how she felt seeing so many soldiers pass
through her unit. She paused. "It's just not right."
She declined to elaborate on what exactly she meant.
Comments such as Hecker's about the president can lead
to severe consequences for those with careers ahead of them.
But Martin did add: "People need to vote for the right people
to be in office and they need to be empowered to influence
change."
What she did feel comfortable saying, echoing the head
surgeon, Hecker and others, was that people back home
just don't get it.
"Everyone's looking but no one's seeing," added Staff Sgt.
Royce Pittman, 32, who works with her. "I had no idea this
was going on. ... What we see every day is not normal.
There's nothing normal about this."
In private, some hospital workers said they wished they
could openly air their feelings about the war. And if reporters
could somehow quote people's facial expressions, a
number of those staff members would probably be facing
disciplinary hearings. Only one staff member interviewed
expressed solid support for the war.
"I do believe, I truly do believe that those that are fighting
and defending for liberty and freedom ... that that is a truly
worthy cause," said Maj. Kendra Whyatt, head nurse of
inpatient orthopedics.
Is it all worth it? the head surgeon was asked. "That's not
for me to say, but I'll be here for them," Place said.
The staff do talk among themselves, said Maj. Stephen Franco,
chief of the clinical health psychology service at the hospital.
He recalled one doctor's comments after attending a memorial
service for a young soldier who had died. "I wish some of the
lawmakers could attend some of these more often so they can
think a little more about their decisions," Franco recalled the
doctor telling him.
But like all the staff in the hospital, politics comes second to
healing with Franco. He has a lot of it to do.
"It's probably the biggest challenge to mental health since
Vietnam," said his boss, Col. Gary Southwell, chief of
psychology services.
Soldiers come in carrying guilt about leaving their unit behind,
haunting visions of seeing friends dying, nightmares, frayed
nerves and deep anxieties about their future, Franco said. Place
noted that for a single man facial disfigurement, for example,
can be particularly traumatizing. Who's going to want someone
with a face like this? the young men wonder.
Care taken not to sugarcoat
Franco and his colleagues - the number of psychologists
and psychiatrists has doubled since the Iraq war began,
reflecting large staff increases throughout the hospital -
make a point of visiting all new patients to see how they're doing.
"We provide assurance, look to the future," he said. "We're careful
not to sugarcoat anything."
Franco doesn't attempt quick miracle fixes for traumatized soldiers,
most of whom are flown to the United States after a few days. "When
your world is rocked like that it's not a smooth process necessarily
to get that to make sense," he said.
On Sept. 18, Army Sgt. 1st Class Larry Daniels' world was rocked.
So was his wife's.
With other men from his platoon, Daniels was standing on a bridge
over a highway near Baghdad International Airport while an Iraqi
contractor fixed a fence by the side of the road. Daniels, 37, was
waving Iraqi vehicles past the three American Humvees while the
contractor worked as quickly as possible to fix the wire fence.
An orange and white Chevy Caprice, a type of car usually driven
as a taxi in Baghdad, veered toward the soldiers. It exploded;
a suicide car bomb.
"I felt my body went up in the air," said Daniels, in his Texas
drawl. "I was upside down looking back at where the car had
been and landed on the ground. Three seconds later it hit me
what happened."
Lying on the pavement, Big Daddy Daniels, as his men call him,
had the presence of mind to keep ordering his soldiers around,
even though he couldn't move. Another unit arrived soon and
ferried the survivors to safety. Two were dead.
Two days later, Daniels was flown to Landstuhl. Both of his arms
have multiple fractures. Steel pins and thick casts keep his bones
in place. Part of his hand is missing. And as he puts it, he's got
"holes from my ankle to my ear." The doctors have taken some of
the shrapnel out. Some fragments are still there.
Wife's opinion has changed
Daniels is an experienced, professional soldier. He's been in the
Army for 17 years. His dad was a draftee in the Vietnam War. He
can trace his family's military history back to the Civil War. So
perhaps it's not surprising that he says he wishes he were still
in Iraq with his men.
His wife, Cheryl, has had enough. While the staff at Landstuhl
move the injured on, usually after five days, the families of the
wounded have to face up to the long-term consequences of the
violence in Iraq. Many are embittered.
From a military family herself, the mother of two had been changing
her mind about a lot of things even before her husband became so
badly injured that he can't do even the most basic of tasks for himself.
She supported the war and voted for Bush. Now, she says, she
wants to pull the troops out of Iraq. "I will vote for Kerry. Not
because I prefer Kerry over Bush but because I don't want Bush
back in office."
Her 12-year-old son has been saying he wants to go to West
Point. Her 8-year-old daughter wants to be a military veterinarian.
She's stopped encouraging those ambitions.
Speaking alone, without her husband, she said she knew that the
Army wasn't going to like what she had to say. Like Hecker,
she hasn't got much to lose by speaking her mind, which she
did, calmly and thoughtfully.
"I don't feel we have any business being there," she said Friday.
"I think this is an area of the world that has been fighting for
thousands of years, and I don't think our presence will change
anything. If anything, we've given them a common target to
focus on. Rather than fight each other, they're fighting us.
I don't see why my husband has to lose two soldiers or
question why he's here or see his other guys that are hurt.
The minute we pull out, things will go back to the culture
that is established."
Cheryl Daniels is looking at a tough future. She has to parent
her kids, hold down a job at Fort Hood Army base in Texas,
where the family lives, and finish the management degree she
is studying for at night. Soon her disabled husband will be home,
and she finds it hard to believe, as the doctors have told her, that
"in a year or two he's going to be back to normal. I can't see that
right now because he's got nerve damage in his arms."
She doesn't feel that her country, her military, is giving her
enough support. She had to pay her own way to Germany
and her own way back. The Army was doing almost nothing
for her, she said.
"I feel like we've paid our dues," she said. "And I'm done."
Copyright (c) 2004, Newsday, Inc.
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5) Crude dudes
U.S. oil companies just happened to have billions
of dollars they wanted to invest in undeveloped oil reserves
LINDA MCQUAIG
Sep. 20, 2004. 09:56 AM
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Artic
le_Type1&c=Article&cid=1095545411401&call_pageid=968332188854&col=9683500607
From his corner office in the heart of New York's financial district,
Fadel Gheit keeps close tabs on what goes on inside the boardrooms
of the big oil companies. An oil analyst at the prestigious Wall
Street firm Oppenheimer & Co., the fit, distinguished-looking
Gheit has been watching the oil industry closely for more than
25 years.
Selling the modern world's most indispensable commodity has
never been a bad business to be in - particularly for the small
group of companies that straddle the top of this privileged world.
But never more so than now.
"Profit-wise, things could not have been better," says Gheit,
"In the last three years, they died and went to heaven ....
They are all sitting on the largest piles of cash in their history."
But to stay rich they have to keep finding new reserves, and
that's getting tougher. Increasingly it means cutting through
permafrost or drilling deep underwater, at tremendous cost.
"The cheap oil has already been found and developed and
produced and consumed," says Gheit. "The low-hanging
fruit has already been picked."
Well, not all the low-hanging fruit has been picked.
Nestled into the heart of the area of heaviest oil concentration
in the world is Iraq, overflowing with low-hanging fruit. No
permafrost, no deep water. Just giant pools of oil, right beneath
the warm ground. This is fruit sagging so low, as it were, that it
practically touches the ground under the weight of its ripeness.
Not only does Iraq have vast quantities of easily accessible oil,
but its oil is almost untouched. "Think of Iraq as virgin territory
.... This is bigger than anything Exxon is involved in currently
.... It is the superstar of the future," says Gheit, "That's why
Iraq becomes the most sought-after real estate on the face
of the earth."
Gheit just smiles at the notion that oil wasn't a factor in the
U.S. invasion of Iraq. He compares Iraq to Russia, which also
has large undeveloped oil reserves. But Russia has nuclear
weapons. "We can't just go over and ... occupy (Russian) oil
fields," says Gheit. "It's a different ballgame." Iraq, however,
was defenceless, utterly lacking, ironically, in weapons of mass
destruction. And its location, nestled in between Saudi Arabia
and Iran, made it an ideal place for an ongoing military presence,
from which the U.S. would be able to control the entire Gulf
region. Gheit smiles again: "Think of Iraq as a military base
with a very large oil reserve underneath .... You can't ask for
better than that."
There's something almost obscene about a map that was
studied by senior Bush administration officials and a select
group of oil company executives meeting in secret in the
spring of 2001. It doesn't show the kind of detail normally
shown on maps - cities, towns, regions. Rather its detail is
all about Iraq's oil.
The southwest is neatly divided, for instance, into nine
"Exploration Blocks." Stripped of political trappings, this
map shows a naked Iraq, with only its ample natural assets
in view. It's like a supermarket meat chart, which identifies
the various parts of a slab of beef so customers can see the
most desirable cuts .... Block 1 might be the striploin,
Block 2 and Block 3 are perhaps some juicy tenderloin,
but Block 8 - ahh, that could be the filet mignon.
The map might seem crass, but it was never meant for
public consumption. It was one of the documents studied
by the ultra-secretive task force on energy, headed by
U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney, and it was only released
under court order after a long legal battle waged by the
public interest group Judicial Watch.
Another interesting task force document, also released
under court order over the opposition of the Bush administration,
was a two-page chart titled "Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfields."
It identifies 63 oil companies from 30 countries and specifies
which Iraqi oil fields each company is interested in and the
status of the company's negotiations with Saddam Hussein's
regime. Among the companies are Royal Dutch/Shell of the
Netherlands, Russia's Lukoil and France's Total Elf Aquitaine,
which was identified as being interested in the fabulous,
25-billion-barrrel Majnoon oil field. Baghdad had "agreed in
principle" to the French company's plans to develop this
succulent slab of Iraq. There goes the filet mignon into the
mouths of the French!
The documents have attracted surprisingly little attention,
despite their possible relevance to the question of Washington's
motives for its invasion of Iraq - in many ways the defining event
of the post-9/11 world but one whose purpose remains
shrouded in mystery. Even after the supposed motives for
the invasion - weapons of mass destruction and links to
Al Qaeda - have been thoroughly discredited, talk of oil
as a motive is still greeted with derision. Certainly any
suggestion that private oil interests were in any way
involved is hooted down with charges of conspiracy theory.
Yet the documents suggest that those who took part in the
Cheney task force - including senior oil company executives
- were very interested in Iraq's oil and specifically in the
danger of it falling into the hands of eager foreign oil
companies, rather than into the rightful hands of eager
U.S. oil companies.
As the documents show, prior to the U.S. invasion, foreign
oil companies were nicely positioned for future involvement
in Iraq, while the major U.S. oil companies, after years of
U.S.-Iraqi hostilities, were largely out of the picture. Indeed,
the U.S. majors would have been the big losers if U.N.
sanctions against Iraq had simply been lifted. "The U.S.
majors stand to lose if Saddam makes a deal with the U.N.
(on lifting sanctions)," noted a report by Germany's Deutsche
Bank in October 2002.
The disadvantaged position of U.S. oil companies in Saddam
Hussein's Iraq would have presumably been on the minds of
senior oil company executives when they met secretly with
Cheney and his task force in early 2001. The administration
refuses to divulge exactly who met with the task force, and
continues to fight legal challenges to force disclosure.
However a 2003 report by the General Accounting Office,
the investigative arm of Congress, concluded that the task
force relied on advice from the oil industry, whose close
ties to the Bush administration are legendary.
(George W. Bush received more money from the oil
and gas industry in 1999 and 2000 than any other U.S.
federal candidate received over the previous decade .)
The Cheney task force has been widely criticized for
recommending bigger subsidies for the energy industry,
but there's been little focus on its possible role as a venue
for consultations between Big Oil and the administration about
Iraq. One intriguing piece of evidence pointing in this direction
was a National Security Council directive, dated February
2001, instructing NSC staff to co-operate fully with the task
force. The NSC document, reported in The New Yorker
magazine, noted that the task force would be considering
the "melding" of two policy areas: "the review of operational
policies towards rogue states" and "actions regarding the
capture of new and existing oil and gas fields." This certainly
implies that the Cheney task force was considering geopolitical
questions about actions related to the capture of oil and gas
reserves in "rogue" states, including presumably Iraq.
It seems likely then that Big Oil, through the Cheney task force,
was involved in discussions with the administration about
getting control of oil in Iraq. Since Big Oil has sought to
distance itself from the administration's decision to invade
Iraq, this apparent involvement helps explain the otherwise
baffling level of secrecy surrounding the task force.
It's interesting to note that the Cheney task force deliberations
took place in the first few months after the Bush administration
came to office - the same time period during which the new
administration was secretly formulating plans for toppling
Saddam. Those early plans were not publicly disclosed, but
we know about them now due to the publication of several
insider accounts, including that of former Treasury secretary
Paul O'Neill. So, months before the attacks of 9/11, the Bush
White House was already considering toppling Saddam, and
at the same time it was also keenly studying Iraq's oil fields
and assessing how far along foreign companies were in their
negotiations with Saddam for a piece of Iraq's oil.
It's also noteworthy that one person - Dick Cheney - was
pivotal both in advancing the administration's plans for
regime change in Iraq and in formulating U.S. energy policy.
As CEO of oil services giant Halliburton Company, Cheney
had been alert to the problem of securing new sources of oil.
Speaking to the London Petroleum Institute in 1999, while still
heading Halliburton, Cheney had focused on the difficulty of
finding the 50 million extra barrels of oil per day that he said
the world would need by 2010. "Where is it going to come
from?" he asked, and then noted that "the Middle East with
two-thirds of the world's oil and the lowest cost, is still
where the prize ultimately lies."
Cheney's focus on the Middle East and its oil continued
after he became Bush's powerful vice-president. Within
weeks of the new administration taking office, Cheney
was pushing forward plans for regime change in Iraq and
also devising a new energy policy which included getting
control of oil reserves in rogue states. His central role in
these two apparently urgent initiatives is certainly suggestive
of a possible connection between the U.S. invasion of Iraq
and a desire for the country's ample oil reserves - the very
thing that is vehemently denied.
One reason that regime change in Iraq was seen as offering
significant benefits for Big Oil was that it promised to open
up a treasure chest which had long been sealed - private
ownership of Middle Eastern oil. A small group of major
international oil companies once privately owned the oil
industries of the Middle East. But that changed in the 1970s
when most Middle Eastern countries (and some elsewhere)
nationalized their oil industries. Today, state-owned
companies control the vast majority of the world's oil
resources. The major international oil companies control
a mere 4 per cent.
The majors have clearly prospered in the new era, as
developers rather than owners, but there's little doubt that
they'd prefer to regain ownership of the oil world's Garden
of Eden. "(O)ne of the goals of the oil companies and the
Western powers is to weaken and/or privatize the world's
state oil companies," observes New York-based economist
Michael Tanzer, who advises Third World governments on
energy issues.
The possibility of Iraq's oil being reopened to private ownership
- with the promise of astonishing profits - attracted considerable
interest in the run-up to the U.S. invasion. In February 2003, as
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell held the world's attention with
his dramatic efforts to make the case that Saddam posed an
imminent threat to international peace, other parts of the
U.S. government were secretly developing plans to privatize
Iraq's oil (among other assets). A confidential 100-page
contracting document, drawn up by the U.S. Agency for
International Development and the U.S. Treasury Department,
laid out a wide-ranging plan for a "Mass Privatization Program
... especially in the oil and supporting industries."
The Pentagon was also working on plans to open up Iraq's oil
sector. In the fall of 2002, months before the invasion, the
Pentagon retained Philip Carroll, a former CEO of Shell Oil
Co. in Texas, to draft a strategy for developing Iraqi oil.
Carroll's plans apparently became the basis of a proposed
scheme, which became public shortly after the war, to
redesign Iraq's oil industry along the lines of a U.S. corporation,
with a chairman, chief executive and a 15-member board of
international advisers. Carroll was chosen by Washington to
serve as chairman, but the plans were shelved after they
encountered stiff opposition inside Iraq.
Still, the prospect of privatizing Iraq's oil remained of great
interest to U.S. oil companies, according to Robert Ebel, from
the influential Washington-based Center for Strategic and
International Studies (CSIS). Ebel, former vice-president of
a Dallas-based oil exploration company, retains close ties
to the industry. In an interview in his Washington office, Ebel
said it was up to Iraq to make its own decisions, but he made
clear that U.S. oil companies would prefer Iraq abandon its
nationalization. "We'd rather not work with national oil
companies," Ebel said bluntly, noting that the major oil
companies are prepared to invest the $35 to $40 billion
to develop Iraq's reserves in the coming years. "We're looking
for places to invest around the world. You know, along comes
Iraq, and I think a lot of oil companies would be disappointed
if Iraq were to say `we're going to do it ourselves' "
Along comes Iraq ?
How fortuitous. U.S. oil companies just happened to have
billions of dollars that they wanted to invest in undeveloped
oil reserves when Iraq presented itself, ready for invasion.
Along comes Iraq, indeed.
In the past 14 decades, we've used up roughly half of all the
oil that the planet has to offer. No, we're not about to run out
of oil. But long before the oil runs out, it reaches its production
peak . After that, extracting the remaining oil becomes
considerably more difficult and expensive.
This notion that oil production has a "peak" was first conceived
in 1956 by geophysicist M. King Hubbert. He predicted that
U.S. oil production would peak about 1970 - a notion that was
scoffed at at the time. As it turned out, Hubbert was dead on;
U.S. oil production peaked in 1970, and has been declining
ever since. Hubbert's once-radical notion is now generally
accepted.
For the world as a whole, the peak is fast approaching. Colin
Campbell, one of the world's leading geologists, estimates the
world's peak will come as soon as 2005 - next year. "There is
only so much crude oil in the world," Campbell said in a telephone
interview from his home in Ireland, "and the industry has found
about 90 per cent of it."
All this would be less serious if the world's appetite for oil were
declining in tandem. But even as the discovery of new oil fields
slows down, the world's consumption speeds up - a dilemma
Cheney highlighted in his speech to the London Petroleum
Institute in 1999. For every new barrel of oil we find, we are
consuming four already-discovered barrels, according to
Campbell. The arithmetic is not on our side.
Particularly worrisome is the arithmetic as it applies to the
U.S. With its oil production already long past peak, and yet
its oil consumption rising, the U.S. will inevitably become
more reliant on foreign oil. This is significant not just for
Americans, but for the world, since the U.S. has long
characterized its access to energy as a matter of "national
security." With its unrivalled military power, the U.S. will
insist on meeting its own voracious energy needs - and it
will be up to the rest of the world to co-operate with this
quest. Period.
Canada plays a greater role in this "keep-the-U.S.-energy
-beast-fed" scenario than many Canadians may realize.
A three-volume report prepared by a bipartisan Congressional
team and CSIS, the Washington think tank, highlights how
important Canada is in the U.S. energy picture of the future.
The report, The Geopolitics of Energy into the 21st Century ,
notes that Canada is "the single largest provider of energy
to the United States," and that "Canada is poised to expand
sharply its exports of oil to the United States in the coming
years."
Fine - as long as Canada doesn't want to change its mind
about this. Well, in fact, Canada can't change its mind
about this - a point celebrated in the report. When Canada
signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)
in 1993, we gave up our right to cut back the amount of oil
we export to the U.S. (unless we cut our own consumption
the same amount). Interestingly, Mexico, also a party to
NAFTA, refused to agree to this section, and was granted
an exemption.
The U.S. report points out that that, under NAFTA, Canada
is not allowed to reduce its exports of oil (or other energy)
to the U.S. in order to redirect them to Canadian consumers.
Redirecting Canadian oil to Canadians isn't permitted -
regardless of how great the Canadian need may be . Some
outside observers, like Colin Campbell over in Ireland, find
the situation striking. "You poor Canadians are going to be
left freezing in the dark while they're running hair dryers in
the U.S.," says Campbell. It's a situation that comforts the
U.S. senators, congressmen and think-tank analysts who
wrote the report. With obvious satisfaction, they conclude:
"There can be no more secure supplier to the United States
than Canada."
Alas, for the U.S., not every part of the world is as pliant as
Canada. Most of the world's oil is in the Middle East. And
while different oil regions will reach their production peaks
at different times, the Middle East will peak last, underlying
Cheney's point that the region is where "the prize ultimately
lies." Whoever controls the big oil reserves of the Middle
East will then be positioned to, pretty much, control the world.
But we're supposed to believe that, as the Bush administration
assessed its options just before invading Iraq in the spring of
2003, the advantages of securing vast, untapped oil fields
- in order to guarantee U.S. energy security in a world of
dwindling reserves and to enable U.S. oil companies to reap
untold riches - were far from mind. What really mattered to
those in the White House, we're told, was liberating the people
of Iraq.
Adapted from It's The Crude, Dude: War Big Oil, And The Fight
For The Planet , by Linda McQuaig, 2004. Published by
Doubleday Canada. Reproduced by arrangement with the
Publisher. All rights reserved. Toronto-based political
commentator Linda McQuaig is a past winner of a National
Newspaper Award and an Atkinson Fellowship for journalism
in public policy. Her column appears Sundays on the Star's
op-ed page.
Additional articles by Linda McQuaig
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6) ... Unless It's All Greek to Him
By Barbara Garson
September 24, 2004
http://www.miftah.org/Display.cfm?DocId=4920&CategoryId=5
During a lull in the war between Athens and Sparta, the Athenians decided
to invade and occupy Sicily. Thucydides tells us in "The Peloponnesian
War" that "they were, for the most part, ignorant of the size of the
island and the numbers of its inhabitants . and they did not realize that
they were taking on a war of almost the same magnitude as their war
against the Peloponnesians."
According to Thucydides, the digression into Sicily in 416 BC - a sideshow
that involved lying exiles, hopeful contractors, politicized intelligence,
a doctrine of preemption - ultimately cost Athens everything, including
its democracy.
Nicias, the most experienced Athenian general, had not wanted to be chosen
for the command. "His view was that the city was making a mistake and, on
a slight pretext which looked reasonable, was in fact aiming at conquering
the whole of Sicily - a considerable undertaking indeed," wrote
Thucydides.
Nicias warned that it was the wrong war against the wrong enemy and that
the Athenians were ignoring their real enemies - the Spartans - while
creating new enemies elsewhere. "It is senseless to go against people who,
even if conquered, could not be controlled," he argued.
Occupying Sicily would require many soldiers, Nicias insisted, because it
meant establishing a new government among enemies. "Those who do this
[must] either become masters of the country on the very first day they
land in it, or be prepared to recognize that, if they fail to do so, they
will find hostility on every side."
The case for war, meanwhile, was made by the young general Alcibiades, who
was hoping for a quick victory in Sicily so he could move on to conquer
Carthage. Alcibiades, who'd led a dissolute youth (and who happened to own
a horse ranch, raising Olympic racers) was a battle-tested soldier, a
brilliant diplomat and a good speaker. (So much for superficial
similarities.)
Alcibiades intended to rely on dazzling technology - the Athenian armada -
instead of traditional foot soldiers. He told the Assembly he wasn't
worried about Sicilian resistance because the island's cities were filled
with people of so many different groups. "Such a crowd as this is scarcely
likely either to pay attention to one consistent policy or to join
together in concerted action.. The chances are that they will make
separate agreements with us as soon as we come forward with attractive
suggestions."
Another argument for the war was that it would pay for itself. A committee
of Sicilian exiles and Athenian experts told the Assembly that there was
enough wealth in Sicily to pay the costs of the war and occupation. "The
report was encouraging but untrue," wrote Thucydides.
Though war was constant in ancient Greece, it was still usually justified
by a threat, an insult or an incident. But the excursion against Sicily
was different, and Alcibiades announced a new, or at least normally
unstated, doctrine.
"One does not only defend oneself against a superior power when one is
attacked: One takes measures in advance to prevent the attack
materializing," he said.
When and where should this preemption doctrine be applied? Alcibiades gave
an answer of a sort. "It is not possible for us to calculate, like
housekeepers [perhaps a better translation would be "girlie men"], exactly
how much empire we want to have. The fact is that we have reached a state
where we are forced to plan new conquests and forced to hold on to what we
have got because there is danger that we ourselves may fall under the
power of others unless others are in our power."
Alcibiades' argument carried the day, but before the invasion, the
Athenian fleet sailed around seeking allies among the Hellenic colonies
near Sicily. Despite the expedition's "great preponderance of strength
over those against whom it set out," only a couple of cities joined the
coalition.
At home, few spoke out against the Sicilian operation. "There was a
passion for the enterprise which affected everyone alike," Thucydides
reports. "The result of this excessive enthusiasm of the majority was that
the few who actually were opposed to the expedition were afraid of being
thought unpatriotic if they voted against it, and therefore kept quiet."
In the face of aggressive posturing, Nicias appealed to the Assembly
members to show true courage.
"If any of you is sitting next to one of [Alcibiades'] supporters," Nicias
said, "do not allow yourself to be browbeaten or to be frightened of being
called a coward if you do not vote for war.. Our country is on the verge
of the greatest danger she has ever known. Think of her, hold up your
hands against this proposal and vote in favor of leaving the Sicilians
alone."
We don't know how many Athenians had secret reservations, but few hands
went up against the war.
In the end, the Athenians lost everything in Sicily. Their army was
defeated and their navy destroyed. Alcibiades was recalled early on;
Nicias was formally executed while thousands of Athenian prisoners were
left in an open pit, where most died.
The Sicilians didn't follow up by invading Attica; they just wanted Athens
out. But with the leader of the democracies crippled, allies left the
Athenian League. Then the real enemy, Sparta, ever patient and cautious,
closed in over the next few years. But not before Athens descended, on its
own, into a morass of oligarchic coups and self-imposed tyranny.
http://www.miftah.org
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7) Former Soldiers Slow to Report
500 Ready Reservists Seek Exemptions From Reactivation,
Risk AWOL Status
By Tom Squitieri, USA TODAY
(Sept. 28)
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20040928070809990037
(Sept. 28) - Fewer than two-thirds of the former soldiers being reactivated
for duty in Iraq and elsewhere have reported on time, prompting the Army to
threaten some with punishment for desertion.
The former soldiers, part of what is known as the Individual Ready Reserve
(IRR), are being recalled to fill shortages in skills needed for the
conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Of the 1,662 ready reservists ordered to report to Fort Jackson, S.C., by
Sept. 22, only 1,038 had done so, the Army said Monday. About 500 of those
who failed to report have requested exemptions on health or personal
grounds.
"The numbers did not look good," said Lt. Col. Burton Masters, a spokesman
for the Army's Human Resources Command. "We are tightening the system,
reaching the people and bringing them in."
Masters said most of the requests for exemptions are likely to be denied:
"To get an exemption, it has to be a very compelling case, such as a severe
medical condition."
The figures are the first on the IRR call-up. They reflect the challenges
the Pentagon faces in trying to find enough troops for ongoing operations
and show resistance among some servicemembers who returned to civilian life.
The ready reserve is an infrequently used pool of former soldiers who can be
called to duty in a national emergency or war. On June 29, the Army
announced it would call 5,674 members of its IRR back to active duty this
year and next.
Several of those who received recall notices have already been declared AWOL
(absent without official leave) and technically are considered deserters.
"We are not in a rush to put someone in the AWOL category," Masters said.
"We contact them and convince them it is in their best interests to show up.
If you are a deserter, it can affect you the rest of your life."
· Army May Reduce Length of Tours
· Rumors of Draft Are Hard to Kill
· AOL Military Center
· AOL Search: Recruitment
Fourteen people were listed as AWOL last week; six subsequently told the
Army they would report. Punishment for being AWOL is up to the unit
commander and can include prison time and dishonorable discharge, said Col.
Joseph Curtin, an Army spokesman.
With a force that generals say is stretched thin, the Army is considering
$1,000-a-month bonuses to ex-soldiers who volunteer to return for overseas
duty.
Ready reservists are soldiers who were honorably discharged after finishing
their active-duty tours, usually four to six years, but remain part of the
IRR for the rest of their original eight-year commitment. The IRR call-up is
the first major one in 13 years, since 20,277 troops were ordered back for
the Persian Gulf War.
09/28/2004 07:04
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8) Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival
8th Annual Event
October 2-10 & 24, 2004
San Francisco, San Jose, Berkeley
www.aff.org
********TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW********
ON-LINE TICKET SALES DEADLINE HAS BEEN EXTENDED TO SEPTEMBER 29th
The 8th Annual Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival, an internationally
recognized festival dedicated to providing the San Francisco Bay Area
community with a unique opportunity to screen films from and about
the Arab World - a world often misunderstood and misrepresented runs
from October 2-10 & 24th, 2004 in San Francisco, San Jose and
Berkeley.
In contrast to mass media's frequently negative portrayal of Arab
culture, the Arab Film Festival showcases in depth perspectives and
stories about and by Arabs and Arab Americans in an ever more complex
world. We aim to bridge a gap through artistic expression and share
the experience of history, humanity, love, and life in a time where
the distance between American and Arab cultures ever expands.
Please join us as we strive to bring the Bay Area community a program
that is both stunning in artistic merit and educational - a program
that brings you a magnificent perspective of the richness of the Arab
World. We work very hard to keep these channels of communication open
so that all may share in Art, its beauty, humanity and personal
expression.
Please visit the Arab Film Festival website for film schedule and
descriptions.
WWW.AFF.ORG
Middle East Children's Alliance
901 Parker Street
Berkeley, California 94710
United States