Subject: ON THE EVE OF ANOTHER IMPERIALIST MASSACRE? : FROM THE CENTER
FOR THE ADVANCED STUDY OF AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS
AND SOCIAL MOVEMENTS,
Dear Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA,
Tonight we received the following BLOG from Dahr Jamail's email Iraq Dispatches. Modern technology
has made this genre of "l'histoire immédiate" a force in the lives of all citizens. It
forces choices upon every conscious individual :
either to remain silent and thereby collaborate with criminal class of
Resistance to war crimes and crimes against humanity, like resistance to daily
authoritarian abuse, takes on a variety of forms and occasionally demonstrates
stunning originality. At its best, it achieves the breath-taking beauty of good
poetry, which can never be successfully duplicated. But without fail, effective
resistance must always be based on clear understandings, which require a stable
mind and a refined degree of self-knowledge.
In social history, these are the qualities we look for in the scientific study
of past events, in determining the causes and effects which surround these
events.
We welcome the communications from contemporary actors like Dahr
Jamail, who are living on the center stage of world
history. Their knowledge and brave testimony can only serve to strengthen our
understanding of world events, and subsequently our understanding of who we
are.
We can ignore this information, I believe, only at great peril to ourselves,
and to the society in which we live.
Sincerely,
Francis Feeley
Professor of American Studies
Director of Research
Université Stendhal
http://dimension.ucsd.edu/CEIMSA-IN-EXILE/
___________________________________
To: Francis.Feeley@u-grenoble3.fr
Date:
From: iraq_dispatches@dahrjamailiraq.com
Subject: Iraq Dispatches: Carnage and Martial Law
** Dahr Jamail's Iraq
Dispatches **
I've posted a new weblog. Here is the link to it and
the full text follows :
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/archives/dispatches/000106.php#more
Carnage and Martial Law
“The marines that
have been killed over the last 5 months have been killed by a faceless enemy.
The enemy there has a face, and it’s called Satan, and it lives in Falluja.”
These are the words of US Marine Colonel Gary Brandl,
as he speaks of the imminent attack on Falluja. Who
says this isn’t a holy war?
This is a longer blog, but stay with it-I am giving
quick run down of the major events of each of the past three days
here…some of this I imagine most folks in the US don’t know about
if they don’t read past the headlines. I’ll end this with real time
events…
At the closest
Also on Friday, a gas pipeline near
On Saturday, four car bombs have killed 40 people, ten of whom were Iraqi
Police and wounded at least 62 in the city of
An Iraqi health official said that 23 people, including nine policemen, were
killed and 40 wounded, in the first of three bomb explosions against Iraqi
Police.
The second car bomb detonated while rescue workers were assisting victims of
the first blast. A third bomb struck a
The fourth blast occurred at
Witnesses claimed that US troops opened fired sporadically in the city center
after they were attacked, injuring civilians and destroying cars.
Resistance fighters in
The US and British governments, along with the US-installed Iraqi interim
government have rejected an appeal made by Kofi Annan, the Secretary General of the UN, who warned that
attacking Falluja would jeopardize the elections slated
for January in Iraq.
Ignoring his warning, US warplanes, AC-130 gunships and artillery continued to pound Falluja Saturday.
One of the targets that was razed to the ground was
Over in Ramadi, 20
Also in Ramadi, a suicide car bomb detonated outside
a
Here in
Before I get to the carnage of today, let me interject something…
The Japanese man who was beheaded a couple of weeks ago whose body was found
wrapped in an American flag…turns out that while he was portrayed as a
“backpacker” in the mainstream media, was actually a freelance videographer. I spoke with a friend in
Gunfire is a daily reality here in
Which brings us to today.
50 people today have already been killed in
Out in Haditha 200 resistance fighters, using
RPG’s and mortars, stormed a police station, killing 23 IP’s
execution style-they took them out of station and shot them after they tied
their hands behind their backs. There were three simultaneous attacks on police
stations there and Haqlaniyah.
A suicide car bomber has killed three Americans on the deadly airport road,
which is also referred to as “RPG alley.”
Folks in
Of course there are the usual pounding explosions of bombs throughout the day,
and loads of Apaches flying low overhead about the city.
Keep in mind, all of the aforementioned has occurred, and the
Here’s some more news for you. Amidst all of the bloodshed, the Iraqi
Government announced martial law for all of
Abu Talat called because he was supposed to meet me
tonight, but he can’t get out of Al-Adhamiya
because it has been sealed by the military and Humvees
are in the main square and roaming the streets.
“I cannot reach you tonight Dahr, we are under
martial law,” he says on the phone, “Like that means
anything…the invaders have always done whatever they wish to us. But now
we are all trapped. This is the justice here.”
My friend Salam, while visiting me today says of the
martial law, “So now any policeman can shoot me anytime he wants. This
happened before, but now it is even more legal. But this won’t give the
government any power. They were already powerless. Let them put on any law they
want, it doesn’t matter.”
I asked him how he can live like this. He says, “The hard part is living
like this everyday. You don’t go near the windows, don’t do what
you want, don’t go anywhere unless you have good reason, be careful
driving, watch the roads, it’s very tense all the time now. And there is
no hope of it getting better. I want to get married, but I think I better wait.
But wait for what?”
He continues…
“My mom tells me to save money for the future, and I keep telling her
that I’m a dead man. I’m going to die here, so what’s the
use? I try to get her ready for it…but she can’t get used to the
thought.”