Located 69 km west of Baghdad, the city that suffered two devastating U.S. attacks in 2004 has watched security degrade over recent months.
"Ruling powers in the city fighting to gain full control seem willing to use the security collapse to accuse each other of either conspiracy (in lawlessness) or incapability of control," Sufian Ahmed, a lawyer and human rights activist in Fallujah told IPS.
"They suddenly changed their tone from saying that the city was the safest in Iraq to claiming that al-Qaeda is a serious threat. Fallujah residents know their so-called leaders are using security threats to terrify them for their own political interests."
In the face of U.S. military claims of improved security, violence has been rising by the day this month. The city has now been placed under tight curfew while U.S. and Iraqi military forces prepare for a new offensive, according to the local Azzaman daily.
Iraqi security forces have established new checkpoints around the city and are forbidding movement of people and traffic. Pick-up trucks are roaming the city warning residents that al-Qaeda has once again infiltrated Fallujah.
Iraqi police officers insist that the situation is under control despite the "occasional incidents that take place all over Iraq."
The indications on the ground belie these claims. "The Americans and their allies transferred our leader, Colonel Fayssal al-Zoba'i from his post because they have bad plans for the city," a major in the Fallujah police force told IPS. "He has all the right to keep his post because he was the one who led us to defeat the insurgency while the Americans failed. They (the U.S. military) seem to have a plan to destroy the city again."
Iraqi police and troops from other areas are being deployed in the city in what police officials say is a build-up for a huge offensive. U.S. occupation forces are on the ready in nearby bases.
The government in Baghdad has made it clear that direct U.S. military involvement is critical for an "imminent offensive" in Fallujah, sources in the Iraqi military have been quoted as saying in Iraqi media.
The two U.S. sieges of the city during 2004 led to the destruction of approximately 75 percent of the city, thousands of civilian deaths, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people, according to the Fallujah-based Iraqi NGO Monitoring Net for Human Rights.
Some officers in the Fallujah police believe Iraqi politicians are using the threat of "terror" for election purposes, ahead of provincial elections scheduled for October.
"The resignation of Colonel Fayssal is not yet definite," another police officer, speaking on terms of anonymity, told IPS. "But I agree that the Americans and the Islamic Party are planning something bad for the city before the provincial elections."
The officer added, "We learnt that such plans could not be conducted in a quiet atmosphere, so politicians are adding gas to the fire just to make sure they win the elections. We, policemen and citizens, will be the victims as usual." Residents fear parties will use the violence to accuse one another, and perhaps sabotage the election itself.
A police spokesman told IPS that "the media is exaggerating things once more" in speaking of another military operation in the city. The spokesman declined to give his name.
Everyone IPS spoke with in the city expressed fear of an impending attack.
There are meanwhile no signs of improvement of any other kind in Fallujah. Walls now divide the city into sectarian sections, with poverty, unemployment and suffering on all sides.
(*Ali, our correspondent in Baghdad, works in close collaboration with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who travels extensively in the region.)
Unrest Surfaces in Fallujah Again
Inter Press Service
By Ali al-Fadhily and Dahr Jamail*
FALLUJAH, Jul 16 (IPS) - Security has collapsed again in Fallujah, despite U.S. military claims.
Local militias supported by U.S. forces claim to have "cleansed" the city, 70 km to the west of Baghdad, of all insurgency. But the sudden resignation of the city's chief of police, Colonel Fayssal al-Zoba'i, has appeared as one recent sign of growing unrest.
Authorities may have controlled the media better than the violence.
"Assassinations never stopped in Fallujah, but the media seems unwilling to cover the actual situation here," a human rights activist in Fallujah, speaking on terms of anonymity given the tense situation, told IPS. "The two bomb blasts that killed six policemen earlier this month and another two that killed three on the weekend seem to have terminated the silence."
People in Fallujah say they still suffer despite the relative improvement in the security situation. 'Relative' is the key word here, because the improvement is measured against two massive U.S. military operations in 2004 that killed thousands in the city, and displaced hundreds of thousands.
"Fallujah was slaughtered by the Americans when her people decided to fight, and then were suffocated when they decided to reduce the fighting against the occupiers," former intelligence officer Major Ahmed al-Alwani told IPS. "There was strong resistance against American occupation forces since May 2003, but it was the Americans who pointed their guns at the innocent civilians and their houses.
"When the American military plans failed, they decided to hire local tribal militias to do the job for them," Alwani said, referring to the 'Awakening Group' militia created by the U.S. military. "Those also failed, despite the executions and the crimes they committed against people."
Many people throughout Iraq complain of the brutality and unlawful behaviour of these Awakening Groups. Members of these groups are paid 300 dollars per month by the U.S. military.
IPS talked to Sheikh Wussam al-Hardan, known as the 'engineer' of the Awakening Forces of Anbar Province. He blamed the Islamic Party for abuses carried out against civilians in Fallujah.
"We had a very limited role in Fallujah, and the police force was in charge of all security operations there," Hardan said. "We know that all detentions and executions were committed in our name, but people of Fallujah now know that it was the Islamic Party that controlled the police force that was active since January 2007."
On Jun. 26, a suicide bomber attacked a city council meeting of local tribal sheikhs affiliated with Awakening Groups and military officials. Three Marines, two interpreters and 20 Iraqis died in the attack. Among the Iraqis killed were the mayor of nearby Karmah town and three leading sheikhs. The sons of two sheikhs and the brother of the third also died. All were members of the local Awakening Council, according to U.S. and Iraqi authorities.
"Security events take place all over Iraq and people get killed," Captain Jamal of the Fallujah police told IPS. "But we wonder why all this huge echo for two incidents in a city that exiled the U.S. marines with all their military machine."
According to a survey conducted in March for several news organisations by D3 Systems of Virginia in the U.S. and KA Research Ltd. of Istanbul, most Iraqis blame the U.S. military for the worsening security situation.
The majority of Iraqis surveyed disapproved of U.S.-backed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, most disapproved of the Iraqi government, and most felt that all occupation forces should leave Iraq immediately.
The police forces are particularly unpopular. "The police force mainly consists of young men from surrounding villages who are loyal to their tribal chiefs," Rammy al-Rawi, a university student who lives in Fallujah told IPS. "We believe it is a fight between the Islamic Party and the Awakening Groups of the tribes who are both collaborating with the Americans for money and power."
(*Ali, our correspondent in Baghdad, works in close collaboration with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who travels extensively in the region.)
He Lacks Privilege
Le Monde Diplomatique
3 July 2008
By Dahr Jamail
On June 16 I was the co-recipient of the Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism with Mohammed Omer in London. Omer is a 24 year-old Palestinian with whom I felt, and feel, honored to have shared this award. During my brief talk while accepting the award, I told the audience I could not think of anyone else I would rather share the award with. Omer’s work from his Gaza homeland has been a beacon of
humanitarian reportage; his work serves as a model of peace and attempted reconciliation with Israel for the youth in his occupied territory.
Unlike me, Omer’s journey to London to receive the award was next to impossible. When I heard the news that I was a co-recipient, I simply booked my flight from San Francisco and boarded my plane. Omer – whose home has been crushed by an Israeli bulldozer and who has seen most of his seven siblings killed or maimed by the Israeli army which occupies his homeland – struggled even to get an exit visa. The veteran journalist John Pilger, who handed us each our award, described his journey: “Getting Mohammed to London to receive his prize was a major diplomatic operation. Israel has perfidious control over Gaza's borders, and only with a Dutch embassy escort was he allowed out.”
Then, after the ceremony, came our even more different return journeys. My biggest problem was an hour’s delay for the flight back to my home country -- which last year gave Israel $2.38bn in military aid. And will again give that same amount for the coming fiscal year, along with an extra $150m. (As of July 2006 direct US aid to Israel had reached $108bn according to conservative estimates.)
Omer, on his return home last Thursday, was tortured by Israel’s security forces, Shin Bet. He was met by a Dutch official at the Allenby Bridge crossing (from Jordan to the West Bank) who was to ferry him back into Gaza. The official waited outside for Omer as he entered the Israeli building. Inside, Omer was told he was not allowed to call this embassy escort when he asked to do so; a Shin Bet officer searched his luggage and documents, and asked him for his English pounds.
Omer was surrounded by eight armed Shin Bet officers. This is how he described what happened next. “A man called Avi ordered me to take off my clothes. I had already been through an x-ray machine. I stripped down to my underwear and was
told to take off everything. When I refused, Avi put his hand on his gun. I began to cry: 'Why are you treating me this way? I am a human being.' He said, 'This is nothing compared with what you will see now.' He took his gun out, pressing it to my head and with his full body weight pinning me on my side, he forcibly removed my underwear. He then made me do a concocted sort of dance. Another man, who was laughing, said: 'Why are you bringing perfumes?' I replied: 'They are gifts for
the people I love'. He said: 'Oh, do you have love in your culture?’
"I had now been without food and water and the toilet for 12 hours and, having been made to stand, my legs buckled. I vomited and passed out. All I remember is one of them gouging, scraping and clawing with his nails at the tender flesh beneath my eyes. He scooped my head and dug his fingers in near the auditory nerves between my head and eardrum. The pain became sharper as he dug in two fingers at a time. Another man had his combat boot on my neck, pressing it into the hard floor. I lay there for over an hour. The room became a menagerie of pain, sound and terror."
Consider the fact that the Israeli Supreme Court has allowed the use of “moderate physical pressure” in the questioning of prisoners. Israel holds more than 10,000 Palestinian prisoners, many of them under administrative detention (no charges filed, detention can be renewed every six months).
Now consider the fourth Geneva Convention (1949): “(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities…shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.”
“To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons: (a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;…(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment…”
Former Dutch ambassador Jan Wijenberg said of what happened to Omer: “This is by no means an isolated incident, but part of a long-term strategy to demolish Palestinian social, economic and cultural life ... I am aware of the possibility that Mohammed Omer might be murdered by Israeli snipers or bomb attack in the near future.”
Janet McMahon, managing editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs with whom Omer files stories, just told me he is still in hospital. “He may go home, or have an operation. He's still in a lot of pain – and it’s hard for him to swallow, or to breathe deeply. He's being fed intravenously.“
As Omer’s colleague, I cannot reconcile the disparity in our experiences. How can we reconcile something that is irreconcilable in the absence of all justice?
__________
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