Aaron Glantz

Somebody should tell the Israeli military it’s not right to shoot reporters just because you disagree with them. At least seven media workers were injured in the first 48 hours of fighting in Lebanon – all of them hurt by the Israeli military. According to the watch-dog group Reporters Without Borders the count includes three … Continue reading “Israel: Stop Shooting Journalists”

Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld paid an unannounced visit to Baghdad today, after telling reporters the Iraqi government is not yet ready to determine the pace of U.S. troop reductions. “We haven’t gotten to that point,” he said. So much for Iraqi sovereignty. It’s perhaps no accident that Rumsfeld’s visit comes as the Iraqi Parliament … Continue reading “Iraqis Call for Timetable, America Cracks Down”

Inter Press Service (IPS) contributor Alaa Hassan was killed on his way to work last Wednesday. He was 35 years old. He is survived by his mother, four brothers, five sisters, and his wife, who is pregnant with their first child. Alaa was not killed for being a reporter. Indeed, he had only just begun … Continue reading “A Story I Never Wanted to Tell”

Humanitarian groups trying to assess the number of innocent civilians killed in Iraq are demanding the Pentagon back up its claims that fewer Iraqis are being killed by accident at U.S. military checkpoints. Last week, Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli told reporters in Baghdad the number of Iraqi civilian deaths had dropped as a result of … Continue reading “Rights Groups Urge US to Release Statistics on Iraqi Casualties”

with Alaa Hassan BAGHDAD – Basra in the south of Iraq is beginning to splinter under increasing violence and sectarian divisions. Smuggling of oil on a large scale coupled with increasing violence and the lack of basic services like water and electricity has caused increasing tensions in the city, 570km south of Baghdad. More than … Continue reading “Basra Begins to Fall Apart”

U.S. military might in South Korea is being called into question this week as villagers launched a hunger strike to protest a U.S. military base expansion that would force them from their lands. Korean authorities have arrested the head of a small village for protesting against the government’s plan to expand a giant U.S. military … Continue reading “Korean Farmers Protest U.S. Base Expansion”

With Alaa Hassan BAGHDAD – Iraqis seem divided over the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq. U.S. and Iraqi officials said he was killed along with seven allies in an air raid overnight in Baquba, 50km northeast of Baghdad. The United States had put a $25 million bounty on … Continue reading “Iraqis: Zarqawi Killing Won’t End Violence”

With Alaa Hassan BAGHDAD – An Iraqi doctor who was in Haditha during a deadly U.S. raid last year says there are many more stories like that in Haditha that are yet untold. The Pentagon admitted last week that U.S. Marines killed 24 civilians – including a 66-year-old woman and a 4-year-old boy – in … Continue reading “‘US Military Hides Many More Hadithas’”

with Alaa Hassan BAGHDAD – The Iraqi government has decided to launch its own investigation into the killing of 24 people by U.S. Marines in the western town Haditha last November. The raid came to light after a local Iraqi videotaped the killings. The tape told a story dramatically different from the bland assertion by … Continue reading “Multiply Haditha By Thousands”

Many secular Iraqis have been expressing their displeasure with the new Iraqi government that was sworn-in Saturday and introduced with much fanfare by politicians in Washington, Baghdad, and London this week. "All Iraqis know this government is totally irrelevant to the realities that they’re facing," said Houzan Mahmoud, the international representative of the left-wing Iraqi … Continue reading “Secular Iraqis Unimpressed by New Government”