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Iraq on Fire: Widespread Violence Continues in Sunni Cities
The Failure of the Corporate Media's Coverage in Iraq
Justice DeLayed? GOP Rewrites Rules to Protect House Majority
Leader if Indicted
Remembering the 1979 Greensboro Massacre: 25 Years Later
Survivors Forming Country's First Truth and Reconciliation
Commission
Iraq on Fire: Widespread Violence Continues in Sunni
Cities
Widespread violence continues across Iraq, particularly
in Sunni areas of the county. As many as 1,600 Iraqis have
been killed in Fallujah alone, up to 800 of them civilians.
We go to Baghdad to get a report from Dahr Jamail, one of
the few independent reporters in Iraq.
Widespread violence continues across Iraq, particularly in
Sunni areas of the county.
In the town of Baji, north of Baghdad, as many as 18 Iraqis
died when a suicide bomber rammed his vehicle into a U.S.
military convoy and troops opened fire. US forces sealed off
Baji's oil refinery, which is the largest in Iraq.
In Ramadi, ten Iraqis were killed in clashes between US troops
and the Iraqi resistance. Roadside bombs also killed at least
three Iraqis in Kirkuk and Baghdad.
In Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, the provincial governor's
office came under attack, killing one of his bodyguards and
wounding four more. Violence erupted in Mosul after the US
assault on Fallujah began 10 days ago.
Meanwhile, warplanes continue to strike targets in Fallujah,
though the US maintains that most of the city is now under
their control. Mortar fire and heavy explosive rounds targeted
areas where the US believes resistance fighters are still
hiding. Residents have been trying to collect their dead between
upsurges in the fighting.
The continuing violence across Iraq and the US assault on
Fallujah have made November one of Iraq's bloodiest months.
While there is no tally of Iraqi casualties, as many as 1,600
Iraqis, 800 of them civilians were killed in a 10-day period
in Fallujah alone. The number of American soldiers killed
this month has almost reached 100, making it the second bloodiest
month for US troops since the invasion. This comes as forty-seven
Iraqi political parties, have announced that they will boycott
the planned elections in January saying continued US assaults
are an obstacle to political participation and calling the
Fallujah offensive a "genocide."
Back in Washington, White House correspondent Russel Mokhiber
asked press secretary Scott McClellan about the legality of
the Iraq invasion.
- Russel Mokhiber, White House Correspondent questioning
White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, November 17,
2004,
White House press secretary Scott McCllean responding to
Russel Mokhiber at a press briefing yesterday. We go now to
Iraq.
- Dahr Jamail, an independent journalist currently based
in Baghdad. He is one of the only independent, unembedded
journalists in Iraq right now. He publishes his reports
on a blog called DahrJamailIraq.com.
The Failure of the Corporate Media's Coverage in
Iraq
As the situation in Iraq continues to grow more bloody by
the day, we hear an address by Columbia University professor
Mahmood Mamdani discussing the corporate media's coverage
of Iraq and the U.S. assault on Fallujah.
As the situation in Iraq continues to grow more bloody by
the day, the unelected interim government of Iyad Allawi continues
its crackdown on the Iraqi media. Last week, Allawi's government
threatened media organizations that do not report on the Iraqi
governments spin on the siege of Falluja, saying reporters
must differentiate between, "innocent citizens of Fallujah
who are not targeted by the military operations and between
the terrorist groups who infiltrated the city and took its
people hostage under the pretext of resistance and jihad."
But these instructions to journalists appear to be contradicted
by the US military's own statistics. Earlier this week, the
military said that of the roughly 1,000 prisoners taken in
Fallujah, only 15 are believed to be foreigners.
The Iraqi government also warned journalists not to add patriotic
descriptions to members of the Iraqi resistance. Journalists
were told to underscore that "these military operations
did not come about until all peaceful means were attempted."
It is unclear what will happen to news organizations that
break the new guidelines. Meanwhile, stark differences continue
in how the embedded correspondents report on the siege of
Fallujah and how Arab media are covering the US offensive.
While most reports on US networks focus on what they call
the house to house fighting in Fallujah, Arab media are showing
images of bodies piled on the streets, dead children and corpses
covered by flies, decomposing. One of the few unembedded correspondents
in the city-an Arab reporter from the BBC- has described a
stench in areas of Fallujah from the dead bodies.
Earlier this week at a forum here in New York on The New
York Times coverage of US foreign policy, Professor Mahmood
Mamdani of Columbia University addressed the situation in
Fallujah. Mamdani is the author of "Good Muslim, Bad
Muslim: America, the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror."
Here is Professor Mahmood Mamdani.
- Mahmood Mamdani, Herbert Lehman Professor of Government
at the Department of Anthropology at Columbia University.
He is also the Director of the Institute of African Studies
at SIPA. He is the author of Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America,
the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror.
Justice DeLayed? GOP Rewrites Rules to Protect House
Majority Leader if Indicted
Republicans in the House of Representatives yesterday changed
their rules to allow Majority Leader Tom DeLay to keep his
post even if a grand jury indicts him. We speak with Lou DuBose,
author of The Hammer: Tom Delay, God, Money and the Rise of
the Republican Congress.
Emboldened by their success in the November 2 election, Republicans
in the House of Representatives yesterday changed their rules
to allow Majority Leader Tom DeLay to keep his post even if
a grand jury indicts him. A Texas grand jury is investigating
whether Delay committed campaign finance violations in 2002
when he helped state Republicans gain control of the Texas
State House. In September a Texas grand jury indicted three
political operatives with ties to Delay as well eight companies
who made donations to a political action committee created
with help from Delay. Yesterday's vote by GOP lawmakers was
held behind closed doors and was unrecorded. It effectively
overturns a 1993 party rule that required leaders who are
indicted to step down. DeLay told reporters yesterday he doesn't
expect to be indicted but supported the rule change.
The Republicans" defended their vote yesterday, saying
that Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle is on a
partisan witch-hunt against DeLay and that all they're doing
is taking steps to prevent Democrats from dictating the leadership
of their caucus. DeLay himself says that Earle is "trying
to criminalize politics and using the criminal code to insert
himself into politics." DeLay is also deploying a team
of Republicans to wage a PR war against the District Attorney.
New York's Peter King called Earle a "runaway prosecutor,"
while Henry Bonilla of Texas labeled him a "partisan
crackpot district attorney."
But in a recent New York Times profile of Earle, the paper
points out that during his tenure, he has prosecuted 12 Democratic
officials and 4 Republicans. Earle is quoted as saying, "The
only people I antagonize more than Republicans are Democrats."
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, of California said, "Republicans
have reached a new low. It is absolutely mind-boggling that
as their first order of business following the elections,
House Republicans have lowered the ethical standards for their
leaders."
- Lou Dubose, author of a new political biography on Tom
Delay called The Hammer: Tom Delay, God, Money and the Rise
of the Republican Congress.
Remembering the 1979 Greensboro Massacre: 25 Years
Later Survivors Forming Country's First Truth and Reconciliation
Commission
This month marks the 25th Anniversary of the Greensboro
Massacre, when forty Ku Klux Klansmen and American Nazis opened
fire on an anti-Klan demonstration in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Five people were killed. No one was convicted. We speak with
two of the survivors.
"On November 3, 1979, at the corner of Carver and Everitt
Streets, black and white demonstrators gather to march through
Greensboro, North Carolina, a legal demonstration against
the Ku Klux Klan. A caravan of Klansmen and Nazis pull up
to the protesters and open fire
"Eighty-eight seconds later, five demonstrators lie
dead and ten others wounded from the gunfire, recorded on
camera by four TV stations. Four women have lost their husbands,
three children have lost their fathers.
"After two criminal trials, not a single gunman has
spent a day in prison, although a civil trial won an unprecedented
victory for the victims: For one of the only times in US history,
a jury held local police liable for cooperating with Ku Klux
Klan in a wrongful death."
That is the introduction to the book: Through Survivors"
Eyes: From the Sixties to the Greensboro Massacre written
by one of the survivors, Sally Bermanzohn. This month marks
the 25th anniversary of the Greensboro Massacre. We will speak
with two of the survivors, but first let's go back to that
fateful day 25 years ago.
- Scenes from the Greensboro Massacre, excerpt from "Guns
of November 3rd", courtesy of Jim Waters
Images and sounds from the 1979 Greensboro Massacre from
the documentary "The Guns of November 3rd", Courtesy
of Jim Waters. This month marks the 25th anniversary of the
Greensboro Massacre. Last weekend, as many as 700 people marched
to Greensboro's City Hall following the route of the planned
1979 march. They finished the march that never began 25 years
ago.
The survivors of the Greensboro Massacre are forming the
country's first Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
- Sally Bermanzohn, one of the survivors of the Greensboro
Massacre in which her husband, Paul, was critically wounded.
She is now associate professor of politics at Brooklyn College,
CUNY, where she teaches courses on politics, race, gender,
and class. She recently wrote the book Through Survivors"
Eyes: The Sixties through the Greensboro Massacre.
- Rev. Nelson Johnson, survivor of Greenboro Masacre. He
was one of the organizers of the anti-Klan rally in 1979.
He is now the Executive Director of the Beloved
Community Center in Greensboro.
For a copy of today’s program, call 1 (800) 881 2359.
Our website is www.democracynow.org.
Our email address is mail@democracynow.org.
Democracy Now! is produced by Mike Burke, Sharif Abdel Kouddous,
Ana Nogueira, Elizabeth Press, Jeremy Scahill and Parvez Sharma.
Mike Di Filippo is our engineer.
Thanks also to Uri Galed, Angela Alston, Orlando Richards,
Simba Russeau, Johnny Sender, Rich Kim, Joe Murgio, John Randolph,
Chris Zucker, Karen Ranucci, Denis Moynihan, Eric Rweyemamu,
Jenny Filipazzo and Isis Phillips.
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