Falluja a humanitarian crisis, aid workers say

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/BAK053516.htm

FALLUJA, Iraq, Nov 10 (Reuters) - Fighting in Falluja has created a humanitarian disaster in which innocent people are dying because medical help cannot reach them, aid workers in Iraq said on Wednesday.

In one case, a pregnant woman and her child died in a refugee camp west of the city after the mother unexpectedly aborted and no doctors were on hand, Firdoos al-Ubadi, an official from the Iraqi Red Crescent Society, told Reuters.

In another case, a young boy died from a snake bite that would normally have been easily treatable, she said.

"From a humanitarian point of view it's a disaster, there's no other way to describe it. And if we don't do something about it soon, it's going to spread to other cities," she said.

more

[XanaDUer]

1. Disgusting...

Where are the fetus fanatics about this?

[StClone]

2. American Justice

Those kids and women should not have attacked us on 9-11.

[madrchsod]

3. war crimes but

no nation on earth will dare challenge the imperial stormtroopers and their master.

[VegasWolf]

4. Yes, no one challenged Rome either, until ...

[Politicub]

5. The first thing we bombed there was a hospital

How can anyone be surprised at this?

[liberalmuse]

6. Remember when...

America used to send help to those places experiencing a humanitarian crisis? Now we cause them. God help this country. We are doomed.

[DELUSIONAL]

7. we are doomed as long as bush is in the WH and long after he

is pried out of the WH.

I don't expect him to leave after the next 4 years -- if all the efforts to prove the vote FRAUD fail and the GOP again runs out the cold.

Meanwhile -- in two years with more voting districts buying more of the e-vote machines -- more GOP are elected so that a Constitutional Amendment is passed granting bush his dearest wish -- Prez for life.

[UpInArms]

8. related aritcle: Iraq under 60-day emergency rule

http://miva.jacksonsun.com/miva/cgi-bin/miva?NEWS/news_storyV2.mv+link=200411086656921

excerpt:

Dr. Salih al-Issawi, the head of Fallujah's main hospital, said he had asked U.S. officers to allow doctors and ambulances go inside the main part of the city to help the wounded but they refused. There was no confirmation from the Americans.

''The American troops' attempt to take over the hospital was not right because they thought that they would halt medical assistance to the resistance,'' he said by telephone to a reporter inside the city. ''But they did not realize that the hospital does not belong to anybody, especially the resistance.''

<snip>

Sgt. Maj. Carlton W. Kent, the top enlisted Marine in Iraq, told troops the coming battle of Fallujah would be ''no different'' than the historic fights at Inchon in Korea, the flag-raising victory at Iwo Jima, or the bloody assault to dislodge North Vietnamese from the ancient citadel of Hue they seized in the 1968 Tet Offensive.

''You're all in the process of making history,'' Kent told a crowd of some 2,500 Marines. ''This is another Hue city in the making. I have no doubt, if we do get the word, that each and every one of you is going to do what you have always done - kick some butt.''

...more at link...



BILAL HUSSEIN/The Associated Press - A boy recovers in a Fallujah, Iraq, hospital after a U.S. airstrike on Saturday in Fallujah, which killed his father and wounded his brother, said hospital officials. U.S. jets pounded Fallujah early Saturday in the heaviest airstrikes in six months, including five 500-pound bombs dropped on insurgent targets.

[Briar]

9. I bet the Christian Bush voters

read this and laugh out loud. Pay back! Praise the Lord!

[agarrett1]

12. Not in the least

Look, Christians - including myself - will not rejoice at some one else's misery. I'll certainly add my prayers to what I'm sure are many others, that the fighting end soon, and that few people are hurt.

On the other hand, I'm getting tired of every action being the fore-runner of a humanitarian disaster. We heard this before Afghanistan - millions of refugees during the harsh Afghan winters. We heard it again before the attack on Iraq - I think it was the millions of refugees again. We heard it against Israel in Jenin, only to have it disproved later.

Our military doesn't massacre people. They try to minimize civilian casualties - but that is minimize, not eliminate. There will be some civilian deaths (actually, they'll all be civilian deaths, since I don't believe the insurrection qualifies as military). But let's hold off on the humanitarian disaster for a bit this time.

Drew Garrett

[ElectroPrincess]

13. Said like a person who doesn't know about military

operations and the untoward consequences of collateral damage when, far too often, our precision bombs are ... well NOT so precise.

I'm a left wing Christian Catholic and say the following with humbleness: If we don't stop this unnecessary bloodshed, there will be HELL to pay.

[agarrett1]

14. I do know a bit about the military

I served as an officer in the Air Force during the first Gulf War. I believe I know something about military operations. I'm also well aware of the limits, both theoretical and in practice, of our weaponry. Of course there will be collateral damage.

We do all we can to minimize it, but as I'd said earlier, there will be some. Insisting on perfection is another way of saying no military action - by all means make that case, but please do so openly. Remember also, that by making your current argument (no operations in cities, where likelihood of civilian damage is high) priveleges those tactics that best take advantage of civilians for cover. It makes for very nasty decisions on our part, and I will join you in wishing they were not necessary.

[UpInArms]

15. no offense intended here, but I really

dislike your use of this term:

Of course there will be collateral damage.

Just say "Of course there will be civilian deaths.

People are not "collateral" - collateral is buildings and infrastructure. When you "nice" it up with words like that, I find it offensive and dishonest.

BTW, Welcome to DU, agarrett1!

[llmart]

17. Wrong.

When you say "we do all we can to minimize it" you are dead wrong! Doing "all we can" is to not invade a country that has done nothing to us in the first place and never asked us to be there. Pure and simple. So don't try to rationalize what the military does.

[ElectroPrincess]

10. Send in C.A.R.E. Now!!! Oh ... nevermind /dark sarcasm off

[hatrack]

11. You didn't hear? We're setting aside $90 Million to rebuild!

That'll make everything better!! Of course, it's up from $74 million yesterday, and I'm not quite sure who's going to actually do the rebuilding, what with all those car bombs and IEDs and such, and I'm not sure just what the population of Fallujah is projected to be by the end of January . . .

But we're rebuilding Fallujah! Just as soon as we blow the shit out of it, we'll rebuild it! USA! USA! USA! USA!

[UpInArms]

16. use to, when GDub messed up, he hit up his daddy and his

daddy's friends to bail him out of it. Now it's just the weary AmerKin taxpayer.

:sigh: