'Death after death, blood after blood' Killing goes on ... (Najaf)

[G_j]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4998591-103550,00.html

'Death after death, blood after blood'
Killing goes on despite claims that siege is over

Luke Harding inside the Imam Ali shrine, Najaf
Saturday August 21, 2004

The Guardian

Inside the pockmarked entrance of Najaf's Imam Ali shrine, there were no police to be seen yesterday afternoon.
Supporters of the rebel Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr loafed on carpets in the pigeon-infested courtyard. A few smoked; others dozed. A couple of young students stood next to a makeshift infirmary; parked nearby was an empty pallet covered in blood.

"We haven't given up. This is a lie by the government," said Amar Al-Khaji, a 29-year-old civil engineer from Baghdad. "As you can see, we are still here."

Only hours earlier a senior Iraqi government official had claimed that Iraqi police had secured the shrine, apparently bringing to an end the two-week standoff with Mr Sadr's militia. At least 400 Mahdi army members had been arrested, and the bloodshed had ended.

By dusk, it was apparent that this was not the case. Hundreds of unarmed supporters of the cleric were bedding down for another night in the mosque. In the rubbish-strewn alleyways around the shrine, fighters armed with Kalshnikovs sat on metal chairs.

..more..

[rfkrocks]

1. There are no words

at least we get the human perspective of what is going on but again-from the British media:cry:

[leftchick]

2. unspeakably sad.....

:cry:

<snip>
Forty six people were injured and 11 killed in the past two days of fighting, the director of Najaf's hospital, Falah Almahana, said yesterday.

A short stroll from his office was the evidence. The newly dead were stored in a makeshift truck, next to a German refrigerating unit that did not work. In it, the bodies were too numerous to count.

But it was clear the small girl with the gamine haircut and the other corpses had little to do with the battle that has been raging down the road. Three blanket-covered bodies lay nearby in the dust.

"They were walking down the street when a mortar landed on them," a morgue attendant, Abu Muhammad, explained.

Even if Iraqi troops eventually storm the shrine, or kill Mr Sadr, it seems optimistic to think his uprising will then disappear. In the town of Kufa, close to Najaf, dozens of Shia militiamen armed with rocket-propelled grenades were yesterday standing on the streets.

As night fell, the small girl's body lay unclaimed in Najaf's morgue. Next to her lay the corpse of a middle-aged woman who might have been her mother.

[ze_dscherman]

3. That number is too low

Juan Cole reports:

"Heavy fighting had continued Friday, with US air strikes and tanks firing. In a 24 hour period ending Friday, over 70 Iraqis were killed in Najaf and a similar number wounded."
www.juancole.com

Reuters reports:
"Iraq's Health Ministry said on Saturday at least 21 Iraqis had been killed and five wounded in Najaf over the past 24 hours.

The U.S. military said insurgents fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a U.S. military vehicle in southern Baghdad on Saturday, killing one soldier and wounding two others.

In a separate attack, two U.S. soldiers were killed and three wounded on Friday by a roadside bomb near the city of Samarra, some 60 miles north of Baghdad.

The attacks brought to 711 the number of U.S. troops killed in action in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion last year. One Polish soldier was killed and six wounded on Saturday when a booby-trapped car exploded next to their convoy near the town of Hilla, an army spokesman said."

http://news.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6035171&pageNumber=1

[seventhson]

4. I wonder if this is the little girl CNN filmed when they went into the ...

Mosque the other day.

There were a few children there

an incredible account is found at the Christian Science Monitor

I still say it is a bloodbath and the US and Iraqi puppets are covering it up.

"too many bodies to count" says this report.

THAT is a wretched bloodbath.

We have become the Nazis


This was BEFORE the bloodbath:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0820/p01s04-woiq.html

[seventhson]

6. the bodies were too numerous to count.

the bodies were too numerous to count.

But it was clear the small girl with the gamine haircut and the other corpses had little to do with the battle that has been raging down the road.

[tlcandie]

5. And what became of the executed militiamen? Was that false..

I've lost track of it. They were reportedly executed by Iraqi police officers after surrendering.

[Ms. Clio]

10. I remember when the first reports of the container massacre

started trickling out of Afghanistan--a very similiar situation, and it took months--years, really, for the full truth to come out.

[dArKeR]

7. Why do so many repuke Americans love death, murder, blood, torture...?

Are their lives so miserable and full of hate they want all people to suffer? How close are repukes minds to total insanity and torment?

[Barrett808]

8. Important: "The Americans are doing all the fighting"

At the moment, the Americans are doing all the fighting. The Iraqi police play merely a cameo role: a massive convoy rode towards the shrine yesterday, sirens blazing, celebrating a victory that never happened. Two minutes later it turned back.

There you have it.

[leftchick]

9. Let Us REPEAT for the TV viewers of AmeriKa....

"Important: "The Americans are doing all the fighting"!!!!