-Caveat Lector- <A HREF="">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.

Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html <A HREF="">Archives of [EMAIL PROTECTED]</A>

http://archive.jab.org/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ <A HREF="">ctrl</A> ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]

To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Om

--- Begin Message ---
-Caveat Lector-

Missile Strike Shatters a House, and a Family Attack on
Neighborhood Evokes Anger at U.S.

By Anthony Shadid

Washington Post Foreign Service

Washington Post <www.washingtonpost.com>

March 25, 2003

BAGHDAD, March 24 -- Breakfast was simple, but late.
Days of bombing had left the Khalil family sleepless.
When a respite arrived at noon today, a moment of ease
in an uneasy time, they sat down, picking anxiously at
boiled eggs, tomatoes and bread.

Nine-year-old Shahid told stories, and her 12-year-old
brother, Ahmed, laughed. The older family members, with
harrowing memories of bombings in the 1991 Persian Gulf
War, sat uneasily, their silence an eloquent testament
to worry.

Then a whisper sounded, ever so slight. In seconds, the
house was shattered by a cruise missile, the family
said. Um Aqeel, the mother of five children, and her
daughter-in-law, Sahar, were killed. Two sons and a
daughter were wounded.

Hours later, weary and angry, Aqeel, the oldest son,
looked out at his bandaged siblings laying dazed in
their hospital beds.

"There are no soldiers in my home, there's no gun in my
home!" he shouted. "How can God accept this?"

In five days of bombing, the United States and Britain
have hurled hundreds of cruise missiles and bombs at
Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. For the most part,
their precision is stunning, carving out craters in the
domes of presidential palaces and gaping holes in the
sides of fearsome intelligence headquarters that dot
the capital. Even by the official Iraqi count, hundreds
of civilians have been wounded but only a handful
killed, despite a furious assault that has left the
capital jittery and afraid.

But the arithmetic of war makes mistakes inevitable --
blasts gutted the student union at Mustansiriya
University on Sunday and a cluster of homes in the
Qadisiya neighborhood last week. Adhimiya, a working-
class quarter, may have witnessed another mistake, a
snapshot of the horrors of war and the scenes of
resentment and revenge that lay in their wake.

In a warren of narrow alleys, perched uncomfortably
beside a trench of burning oil that cloaked the
neighborhood in a blinding, black haze, at least three
houses were destroyed by the blast, which blew out the
windows of others in an arc around the detonation.
Cream-colored brick and cinder blocks were strewn
across the muddy street. Rubble poured forth from a
crater that left the homes resembling an archaeological
dig. Nearby rested the artifacts of domesticity -- a
mattress spring, a brown scarf and a green plastic
bowl.

Residents insisted no military or government site was
nearby, and none was visible from the limited vantage
point of the street. Journalists were accompanied by
government escorts to the hospital where the wounded
received treatment.

Neighbors said that at the sound of the blast and the
smell of smoke, they rushed into the houses, pushing
aside furniture and rubble to search for those buried
by it. Dirt particles were suspended in the air. Five
minutes later, sirens announced the arrival of
ambulances, which took the four dead and 27 wounded to
Noman Hospital.

At the hospital, the head of 14-year-old Ali, another
son in the Khalil family, was wrapped in a bandage. He
stared blankly at the ceiling. His sister, Shahid, lay
motionless. Her fingernails were painted in sparkles
and ringed by dried blood.

The face of his brother Ahmed was still bloodied. A
bandage sat like a helmet on his forehead.

"We trust in God, what can we do?" Ahmed said softly,
curled in a fetal position. "I'm safe and alive. That's
most important."

A doctor, Abdullah Abed Ali, leaned over to a visitor.
He whispered, out of earshot of Ahmed.

"He doesn't know that his mother has died," he said,
shaking his head.

Relatives ran into the hospital ward. Their eyes were
red. Aqeel, the oldest brother whose wife's body was in
the morgue, rested his head on the shoulder of one. He
started sobbing. "It fell on us," he said, his voice
cracking. "It fell on us."

In Adhimiya, militiamen and civil defense workers in
red helmets picked through the rubble, searching for
70-year-old Khowla Abdel-Fattah. Workers shoveled dirt
to the side, and a bulldozer carted away brick and
concrete. Sewage from broken pipes poured into the
street, lapping at the rubble. Without saying a word,
as a baby cried nearby, neighbors passed around
gnarled, fused pieces of metal they said were left by
the blast of the missile.

Neighbors lined up to watch the workers dig clumsily
through the rubble, now a makeshift grave. There were
no chants for President Saddam Hussein, as there are in
so many officially sanctioned public gatherings. There
were no cries of "God is greatest." There was only
silence, the shock of the devastation.

As the bulldozer crashed through another crumbling wall
of his house, Abdel-Fattah's brother, Thamir Sheikhly,
cried out.

"Bush is cursed!" he shouted. "This is a civilian
building, a civilian building, 100 percent. There are
no weapons of mass destruction. He wants to destroy the
people. Maybe God will destroy him."

For a moment, he was quiet, then spoke again. "We'll
have our revenge with Bush."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/articles/A21501-2003Mar24.html

© 2003 The Washington Post Company



__________________________________________________________________
Try AOL and get 1045 hours FREE for 45 days!
http://free.aol.com/tryaolfree/index.adp?375380

Get AOL Instant Messenger 5.1 for FREE! Download Now!
http://aim.aol.com/aimnew/Aim/register.adp?promos=380455


portside (the left side in nautical parlance) is a
news, discussion and debate service of the Committees
of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism. It
aims to provide varied material of interest to people
on the left.

Post            : mail to '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
Subscribe       : mail to '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
Unsubscribe     : mail to '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
List owner      : [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Web address     : <http://www.yahoogroups.com/group/portside>
Digest mode     : visit Web site


Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/



<A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A>
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic
screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please!  These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.

Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html
 <A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]</A>

http://archive.jab.org/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
 <A HREF="http://archive.jab.org/[EMAIL PROTECTED]/">ctrl</A>
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]

To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Om

--- End Message ---

Reply via email to