Iraqi resistance is inflicting more harm on the US

By Rayan Rajeh

February 2004

SOUTHAMPTON -- Before I start writing about this subject, I would like to say that it is dedicated to all the reporters that have died or are being harassed by especially the American troops in the great land of Iraq.

No one who is aware and knows how to read politics between the lines will have a problem realizing how much the American media is good at broadcasting lies rather than facts.

During the recent months, the US troops in Iraq said that they are now facing less attacks. Without going to the basic lie, which said that President Saddam Hussein was behind this, I will give definite facts and incidents proving how the Americans in Iraq hide the truth.

The biggest lie is the number of the American soldiers who died till now in Iraq. While the true figure gathered from trusted world wide media says that the number exceeded 500, the Pentagon says its only 206. Having done a research myself, the true number turned out to be more than 500.

More lies, while the American media and American policies always call for freedom of speech and a great role for journalism, no one will forget how it killed 16 reporters in Iraq alone during the last year, and all under the alibi of “By Mistake”.

Eden White, secretary of World Reporter’s Association says:  “The American general forces in Iraq don’t care and never investigated any case reported by us for them killing innocent reporters, while it made such a fuss when Wall Street’s Daniel Pearl died in Afghanistan”.

Another association, which also accused the American Investigation Department of telling lies, is the world famous Reporters Without Borders, who had some of its reporters, also killed by American troops, again by mistake.

The lies do not stop here. While it was reported by the American spokesman in Iraq that his troops are facing at least 20 attacks per day, the number of those soldiers reported dead was only a maximum of two.

 Mohammad Diya’, a reporter in the northern town of Kirkuk, says that the American Troops Center in the area was attacked during this week and all the people in the area could see the attack, but yet, the Americans never mentioned anything about it to the media.

Other incidents include the several attacks that the American forces have faced on their base in Fares Airport in Baaquba, where again the media was not allowed to attend or to report.

Another incident happened in the Abu Ghoreib area where the villagers saw an American helicopter fall down because of the resistance’s fire, but again American investigators closed the area and allowed no reporters to enter.

However the unacceptable thing is what happened with Sahib Al-Samorrai who is a reporter for the Doha-based Al-Jazeera satellite television station, who was imprisoned because he was filming a big attack on the occupying American troops in the Samorra area.

To sum it up, one must conclude that a president like American President George W. Bush, who attacked an independent country under the big lie of Weapons of Mass Destruction, and which till now they did not find, might order his government to  plant some in Iraq , in this way proving that his government was not lying. One like Bush will not find it hard hiding the truth by killing, torturing, beating and taking away the cameras of the reporters, to show to the world the only truth that America wants to show.

Rayan Rajeh is a Lebanese graduate student in Southampton, United Kingdom. He wrote this article for Alternative