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Special Investigation:
Have Journalists Been Deliberately Murdered in Iraq by the US
Military?
Our new
CounterPunch newsletter, just out, Christopher Reed examines
the growing body count of journalists in Iraq and documents numerous
incidents where US troops have deliberately targeted reporters.
Charles Glass offers a
stark comparison of the uprooting of Palestians in the Galilee
during the 1948 war to the lush compensation of Israelis living
on the same land who were displaced by the war on Lebanon. Remember, we are funded
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Now
With debate raging about what the US
should do in Iraq, one thing is clear: nobody has a full solution
to the horror that the US has unleashed. Yet, this week's release
of the Iraq Study Group's (ISG) report offers some hope-not because
the ISG is calling to bring home the troops quickly (they're
not) or because their recommendations will yield justice for
Iraqis (they won't). On balance, the ISG's conclusions don't
depart much from plans emerging from the White House these days.
The value of the ISG report is that it makes it official: Bush's
Iraq policy is a failure. That may not sound like much given
the magnitude of the crisis, but sometimes a formal confirmation
of the obvious is a turning point-especially when it comes from
the heart of the Washington policy establishment. We can be hopeful
that the ISG report will be the beginning of the end of the war.
Of course, hope is not the
same as optimism: the end of the war could still be in the distant
future, in part because the ISG calls for rearranging US troops
rather than removing them. But there are other elements of the
report that we can endorse and build on, like the call for diplomacy
with Iran and Syria. As we sift through the many proposals and
counter-proposals being put forward about what to do in Iraq,
we should evaluate them not only for what they say, but also
for what they leave out. The best policy options will likely
dwell in those silences, not in the "findings" of the
ISG's recycled cold warriors, or the generals, TV pundits, or
presidential hopefuls.
Whatever steps the Bush Administration
takes next, it's crucial that they embody principles that we
wish to see driving our foreign policy. If we can reassert those
principles-even in the absence of an ideal solution-we have a
hope of eventually creating a more peaceful world.
Here are four principles that
any new US policies should reflect, along with a few examples
of what those principles might look like in practice.
1. Demonstrate accountability:
Since 2003, the US has replaced a brutal, but stable and functional
state with a brutal, unstable and totally dysfunctional puppet
state. Whatever steps the United States takes next must recognize
that after 16 years of bombings, sanctions, invasion, and occupation,
the US is largely responsible for Iraq's crisis.
. The US should pay reparations
to Iraqis whose family members have been killed and whose homes
and livelihoods have been destroyed, and to those illegally imprisoned
and tortured by US military forces.
. The US should pay to restore
Iraq's infrastructure-but not through the Bush Administration's
corrupt and ineffective "reconstruction" program. The
US should supply the funds for United Nations Agencies to oversee
and administer Iraq's reconstruction, in keeping with UN Resolution
1325, which prioritizes the role of women in reconstruction efforts.
Taking financial responsibility in these ways will not cost more
than the $194 billion Congress is likely to approve for the Iraq
war in 2007. The financial burden should be shared among members
of the "coalition of the willing," in proportion to
the number of troops each country sent to Iraq.
. A formal apology to the Iraqi
people is in order. The Iraq Study Group will never propose such
a move, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be calling for it.
When governments apologize for past injustices, they signal a
clear change of course. When people feel that their grievances
are acknowledged and redressed, conflicts can begin to be resolved.
2. Revive international cooperation:
The Bush Administration's belligerent unilateralism was a driving
force of the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. The US
must signal a turn away from that destructive trend.
. We welcome the move towards
negotiations with Iran and Syria-not despite US differences with
those countries, but because of those differences. Whether Iran
and Syria can help resolve the crisis in Iraq remains to be seen,
but it will be better to see the Bush Administration engaged
in diplomacy than in more threats of "regime change."
. Inviting Syria and Iran into
negotiations is a start, but how about negotiating about Iraq
with Iraqis? The US must talk with representatives of the "insurgency"
(who will be vastly weakened by a US withdrawal).
. The US needs to reaffirm
its commitment to international law. Bush's Iraq policy has entailed
violations of the UN Charter, the Geneva Conventions, the Hague
Convention, the Nuremburg Charter, and the UN Convention Against
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment,
just to name a few. When the world's superpower scorns the
rule of law, other countries follow suit in a dynamic that undermines
the whole framework for peaceful international relations. One
forceful way to reaffirm US commitment to international law is
to impeach and prosecute those responsible for US crimes.
. The US must recognize the
regional dimensions of the crisis and its underlying causes.
That means supporting a just resolution to the Israeli occupation
of Palestinian land-a root cause of instability and hostility
in the Middle East. 3. Respect Iraq's national sovereignty:
At its broadest, this means that the Bush Administration should
publicly renounce the arrogant fantasy of "democratizing"
the Middle East. The US has no monopoly on democracy: people
everywhere want a meaningful say in policies that affect them.
In the Middle East, a main obstacle to democracy has been US
support for repressive regimes and reactionary social movements,
like the fanatical theocrats that the US boosted to power in
Iraq.
. US planners should formally
can the idea of "federalism," a euphemism for dismantling
Iraq. Creating separate Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish enclaves would
only reinforce ethnic and sectarian divisions. The plan would
entail more ethnic cleansing because much of Iraq is still multi-religious
and multi-ethnic. It would compound Sunni poverty and resentment
by restricting Sunni political power to an area without much
oil. And it would leave the Shiite majority at the mercy of warring
and repressive Islamist militias.
. The Administration should
stop building permanent US military bases in Iraq. The 14 "enduring"
US bases (five of them the size of small cities) have been the
only successful construction projects under US occupation. Plans
to build these bases pre-date the invasion, a clear signal that
the Bush Administration intended to disregard Iraqi sovereignty
for many years to come.
. The US should agree to void
all oil contracts signed under US occupation. These "production-sharing
agreements," drafted by the State Department even before
the invasion, effectively privatize Iraqi oil. They deprive future
Iraqi governments of hundreds of billions of dollars in revenues
and promise US oil companies a rate of return 10 times higher
than the industry standard. Renouncing claims to Iraq's oil will
help quell Iraqis' suspicions that the US invasion was motivated
by a thirst for oil.
4. Promote human rights: This
should be the guiding principle of any US foreign policy.
. As the de-facto occupying
power in Iraq, the US is obligated by the Hague and Geneva Conventions
to respect, protect, and fulfill human rights. But in practice,
occupation and human rights are at odds: as the Israelis have
learned, you cannot enforce a hated occupation without committing
human rights violations.
. The nightmare scenarios that
we are warned could unfold if the US leaves-civil war, ethnic
cleansing, fundamentalist dictatorship, the establishment of
a training-ground for terrorists-have already happened on Bush's
watch. Some ask who will protect Iraqi civilians from the violence
if the US pulls out. But the question is misplaced: the US isn't
protecting them now. What the US is doing is fueling the civil
war by giving one side-the Sunni-based insurgency-its raison
d'etre, while giving the other side-the militia-infested Iraqi
security forces-money, weapons, and training. Unfortunately,
it's rarely true that things can't get worse, but it's also true
that in Iraq, the US can't make any of it better. The best thing
the US can do is leave quickly.
. The responsibility to uphold
human rights resides, above all, in government. But the Iraqi
government is a figment of Bush's imagination. It is fragmented
by nine different factions; political process is at a complete
standstill; and Prime Minister Maliki-whom Bush is propping up-is
powerless, corrupt, and murderous. Those who now control Iraq
are not able or interested in upholding human rights or finding
a just resolution to the civil war born of US occupation. The
sooner we stop pretending that Iraq has a functional government,
the sooner we can start finding workable solutions to the human
rights crisis that has gripped the country.
. One option is proposed by
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, who is calling for an international
conference to facilitate reconciliation among Iraqis. The US
should support such a process without dominating it.
. A parallel international
process should explore policies aimed at providing immediate
protection to Iraqi civilians. One proposal, heard recently
by the Congressional Progressive Caucus, involves an international
peacekeeping force drawn from the region and funded by the US
(at about two percent of the cost of maintaining the occupation
over the same period).
As a new national consensus
forms around the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, we
should seize every opportunity to promote policies that reflect
our principles. And regardless of what the Study Group or any
other Washington insiders recommend, we should continue to call
for a quick and full withdrawal of US forces from Iraq.
Yifat Susskind is communications director of MADRE, an international women's
human rights organization. She is the author of a book on US
foreign policy and women's human rights and a report on US culpability
for violence against women in Iraq, both forthcoming.
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