Saturday, August 03, 2024

2 US troops die in Iraq, another school targeted in Gaza

The US military remains in Iraq -- all these years after the 2003 US-led invasion.  And as long as they remain there, we can expect news like this.





Michelle Rotuno-Johnson (PATCH) reports:


The U.S Army is investigating after two Georgia National Guard soldiers died Wednesday, in unrelated non-combat incidents during their deployments in Iraq.

The Army said there is no evidence of foul play in the deaths of Spc. Travis Jordan Pameni of Douglasville and Spc. Owen James Elliott of Twin City, both 23.

Pameni died in Baghdad after an incident in another location, the Army said. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment, based in Lawrenceville; that unit began a mission at an undisclosed location in the Middle East in April.


Last week's shooting of an Iraqi woman in the Green Zone by someone in the US Embassy (see "Iraq: Was the wife of MP Abdul Amir al-Ghazali sho...," Monday's "Iraq snapshot" and Thursday,s "Iraq snapshot") have increased calls for US troops to leave Iraq.  PRESS TV reports today:


A senior Iraqi lawmaker and head of a top anti-terror organization says Baghdad has set a timetable for the expulsion of the US occupation forces from the Arab country.

Hadi al-Amiri, head of the Fatah (Conquest) Alliance in Iraq’s parliament and leader of the Badr Organization, made the announcement in an interview with Al-Ahad TV on Saturday.

Pointing to the presence of foreign troops, including Americans, in Iraq, Amiri said, “The decision to withdraw these forces from Iraq is an irreversible decision and we will soon release a timetable for that.”

The senior parliamentarian also said the issue of Gaza has become a “criterion for differentiating truth from falsehood,” adding that Iraq’s position on Gaza is clear and in support of the Islamic resistance.


Gaza?  


Sharon Zhang (TRUTHOUT) notes:


In just the last 10 months of its genocide, Israel has damaged or destroyed nearly 9 out of 10 schools in Gaza, the UN has reported.

According to assessments by the UN-backed Global Education Cluster, almost 85 percent of school buildings in Gaza have been directly hit or damaged, as the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) highlighted on Friday.

“Some of these schools will need full reconstruction. The war is destroying the present and the future of Palestinian children,” the agency wrote, calling for a ceasefire.

This is an astonishing proportion of school buildings in Gaza, and is emblematic of Israel’s campaign to destroy all sense of structure and community for Palestinian children — in addition to blowing off their limbs, orphaning them, and killing them through bombs, bullets, disease and starvation.

School has been suspended throughout the genocide, meaning that Gaza’s 1.1 million children haven’t gone to school in nearly a year, severely hampering their development amid a time of extreme trauma. The UNRWA announced this week that it is launching a “back to learning” program this week in Gaza that will raise awareness of unexploded ordnance, among other things; but children’s development has been so violently disrupted in the region that this will likely only be a bandaid on the crisis.


The assault on schools continued.  Nidal Al-Mughrabi and Ali Sawafta (REUTERS) note, "An Israeli airstrike on a school sheltering displaced persons in Gaza City killed at least 15 Palestinians on Saturday, hours after two strikes in the occupied West Bank killed nine militants including a local Hamas commander, Hamas said."  CNN's Kareem Khadder, Ibrahim Dahman, Lauren Izso and Eyad Kourdi note that the death toll increased to 17 and that "at least 63" people were left wounded.  They write, "Footage obtained by CNN revealed a grim aftermath, showing the bodies of residents and injured children at the site."   THE NATIONAL adds, "Earlier on Saturday, Israeli bombing killed six people in a house in the southern area of Rafah and two others in Gaza city, Gaza health officials said."


Thursday's snapshot noted that the Israeli government murdered journalists Ismail al-Ghoul and Rami al-Rifi.  On Friday's DEMOCRACY NOW!, Amy Goodman noted:


In Doha, Al Jazeera journalists gathered at the media network’s headquarters to condemn Israel’s targeted killing of their colleagues Ismail al-Ghoul and Rami al-Rifi while they were reporting in Gaza Wednesday. Al Jazeera refuted Israeli claims that it targeted al-Ghoul because he was a Hamas operative. Al Jazeera said the claim “highlights Israel’s long history of fabrications and false evidence used to cover up its heinous crimes.”


Reporters Without Borders issued the following statement on the murders:


An Israeli strike killed Al Jazeera journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and photographer Rami al-Rifi on 31 July while they were on assignment in the north of Gaza. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) expresses outrage over this latest attack and calls for increased international pressure on the Israeli government to immediately halt its forces’ massacre of journalists.

Al Jazeera journalists Ismail al-Ghoul and Rami al-Rifi were reporting live from the al-Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza city, shortly before an Israeli strike hit their car, killing them both. Footage published by their colleague Anas al-Sharif shortly after the strike at around 4PM on 31 July shows both reporters killed inside an isolated white car in the middle of an empty street, visibly damaged by a direct strike. Al-Sharif said both reporters were found decapitated. They were wearing their press vests, according to RSF’s information.

A statement by the Al Jazeera Media Network called the killings a “targeted assassination” by Israeli forces and pledged to “pursue all legal actions to prosecute the perpetrators of these crimes.” According to the media outlet, the two reporters had contacted their news desk 15 minutes before the deadly strike. During the call, they reported on another nearby attack and were advised to leave the area. Ismail al-Ghoul, one of Gaza’s most recognisable reporters, had already been arrested by Israeli forces in al-Shifa hospital on 18 March and released 12 hours later.

Al-Ghoul and al-Rifi were on assignment along with other reporters in the al-Shatti refugee camp, near the house of Hamas political leader Ismail Haneya. They were covering the aftermath of Haneya’s assassination in Iran the night before. The Israeli army did not comment on the strike that killed the two reporters, but constantly denies targeting journalists in Gaza. According to RSF’s information, however, more than 120 journalists have been killed by Israeli forces in the strip since 7 October 2023. At least 29 of them have been killed in circumstances that point to intentional targeting, in violation of international law. RSF has filed three complaints with the International Criminal Court (ICC) since then, calling on the court to investigate these war crimes against journalists as a matter of urgent priority.  

“We are appalled by this violent attack on two prominent Al Jazeera journalists – the latest incident in nearly 10 months of crimes against journalists in Gaza, where more than 120 journalists have now lost their lives. RSF urges the Israeli government to immediately commit to ending the violence against journalists that continues to be mercilessly committed by Israeli Defence Forces, constituting flagrant examples of war crimes. We also call for increased international pressure to ensure journalists still working in Gaza are able to safely do their jobs, and to secure justice for the far too many already killed. This massacre must stop now.

Rebecca Vincent
RSF’s Director of Campaigns

With the killing of al-Ghoul and al-Rifi, the number of Al Jazeera journalists killed in Gaza rises to five, all targeted by direct strikes according to RSF’s information. Journalist Hamza al-Dahdouh – the son of Wael al-Dahdouh, Al Jazeera’s bureau chief in Gaza – and his colleague Moustafa Thuraya – were killed by a targeted Israeli strike at the start of January. A month later, Wael al-Dahdouh was himself injured by  that killed Al Jazeera cameraman Samer Abu Daqqa. 

These deadly attacks against Al Jazeera personnel coincided with a steady defamation campaign by Israeli authorities, which accused Al Jazeera of being a “spokesperson for Hamas” that “threatens the Israeli military,” and which resulted in a temporary ban of the broadcaster enforced in Israel and Palestine. The ban was renewed for 45 days on 5 May, then for another 45 days on 9 June. RSF has repeatedly warned that the campaign against Al Jazeera, as well as the relentless conflation of journalism with “terrorism,” endangers reporters and threatens the right to information everywhere.


Gaza remains under assault. Day 302 of  the assault in the wave that began in October.  Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion.  The ongoing campaign in Gaza by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction.  But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge for the propaganda outlets:  How to justify it?  Fortunately for Israel, the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence."   CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund."  ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them."  NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll. The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza."  The slaughter continues.  It has displaced over 1 million people per the US Congressional Research Service.  Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide."   The death toll of Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher.  United Nations Women noted, "More than 1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza -- have been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse."   THE NATIONAL notes, "The Gaza Health Ministry on Saturday said that at least 39,550 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli military offensive on Gaza since October 7.  It said that 91,128 people have been injured in the war." Months ago,  AP  noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing."  February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000 Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of their former home."  February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe Lazzarini Tweeted:

  



April 11th, Sharon Zhang (TRUTHOUT) reported, "In addition to the over 34,000 Palestinians who have been counted as killed in Israel’s genocidal assault so far, there are 13,000 Palestinians in Gaza who are missing, a humanitarian aid group has estimated, either buried in rubble or mass graves or disappeared into Israeli prisons.  In a report released Thursday, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said that the estimate is based on initial reports and that the actual number of people missing is likely even higher."
 

As for the area itself?  Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are still standing, but most are battered shells."  Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second World War."  August 2nd, Sharon Zhang (TRUTHOUT) noted, "Israel has bombed schools at a higher rate than other buildings in Gaza, suggesting that the Israeli military is deliberately destroying Gaza’s school system. A UN assessment released this week found that 63 percent of buildings in Gaza have been damaged — a staggering proportion in itself, but one much smaller than the damage done to schools."  August 2nd also saw Jake Johnson (COMMON DREAMS) quote Dr  Mohammed Salha addressing the food issue, "Malnutrition is widespread, specifically in the northern Gaza Strip.  For over five months, no vegetables, fruit, or meat have been brought into the northern Gaza Strip'."


Sonali Kolhatkar (ZNET) offers:


What will it take to end Israel’s genocide in Gaza? That’s the question confounding people of conscience all over the world since last October. After Israeli citizens, tax-paying residents of the United States have the most leverage over the perpetrators of genocide given that the U.S. is Israel’s biggest weapons supplier. What if our taxes were spent on the things we need rather than on the deadly weapons Israel is thirsting for?

For months, a majority of the U.S. public has disapproved of Israel’s relentless mass killings. College students organized dramatic encampments to demand divestment from Israel. Protesters confronted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his recent visit.

Yet, President Joe Biden has done little beyond paying lip service to address the public rage over Israel’s murderous assault. Now, his proxy, Vice President Kamala Harris, faces a similar calculus in running for the presidency: pull back U.S. weapons from fueling genocide, as United Nations experts have urged, or risk losing voters in a critical election.


Politics?  No, not tonight.  I've spent the day making the case for why Josh Shapiro should not be the vice presidential candidate.  I've done that over and over including to one person on Kamala's assessment team (who that is should be obvious to community members and anyone who does regular drive-bys).  There's a good chance that Ava and I may try to grab that topic and toss it in a different direction.  I took a shower before I started writing this entry and while showering thought, "Oh, this is the way to get the point across."  So we may grab that topic for THIRD.



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