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| Remember Falluja |
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| By Orit Shohat |
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During the first two weeks of this month,
the American army committed war crimes in Falluja on a scale
unprecedented for this war. According to the relatively few media
reports of what took place there, some 600 Iraqis were killed during
these two weeks, among them some 450 elderly people, women and
children. |
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sight of decapitated children, the rows of dead women and the
shocking pictures of the soccer stadium that was turned into a
temporary grave for hundreds of the slain - all were broadcast to
the world only by the Al Jazeera network. During the operation in
Falluja, according to the organization Doctors Without Borders, U.S.
Marines even occupied the hospitals and prevented hundreds of the
wounded from receiving medical treatment. Snipers fired from the
rooftops at anyone who tried to approach.
This was a
retaliatory operation, carried out by the Marines, accompanied by
F-16 fighter planes and assault helicopters, under the code name
"Vigilant Resolve." It was revenge for the killing of four American
security guards on March 31. But while the killing of the guards,
whose bodies were dragged through the streets of the city and then
hung from a bridge, received wide media coverage, and thus prepared
hearts and minds for the military revenge, the hundreds of victims
of the American retaliation were practically a military
secret.
The only conclusion that has been drawn thus far from
the indiscriminate killing in Falluja is the expulsion of Al Jazeera
from the city. Since the start of the war, the Americans have
persecuted the network's journalists - not because they report lies,
but because they are virtually the only ones who manage to report
the truth. The Bush administration, in cooperation with the American
media, is trying to hide the sights of war from the world, and
particularly from American voters.
This week, for the first
time, the Americans permitted pictures to be published of the
coffins of dead American soldiers being sent back home. Until this
week, such pictures were forbidden. Therefore, it is no wonder
Bush's poll results are better than ever, even though the number of
Americans killed in Iraq in April has reached 115.
Is the
occupation of Iraq hindering terrorism, or inflaming it? Will the
number of dead soldiers - in contrast to the number of Iraqi victims
- prompt a reassessment? It is clear that the American war crimes
will not reach the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
Today, America sets the world's moral standards. It alone decides
who will be judged, who is a terrorist, what is legitimate
resistance to occupation, who is a religious fanatic, and who is a
legitimate target for assassination. That is how four Iraqi
children, who laughed at the sight of a dead American soldier,
merited being killed on the spot.
Ariel Sharon's government
can thus cite a great authority for its own actions, and there are
no visible limits to its plan to create a new security order in the
Gaza Strip and in the territories in general. To the Israeli
government, not crossing the red lines that America sets for its
friends is more important than resolving the conflict with the
Palestinians.
The ethical dilemmas in Israel over the
targeted killings must make the American government laugh. After
Falluja, Israel Defense Forces commanders can feel easier with their
consciences - and especially with the consciences of those who
refuse to carry out such operations. The one-ton bomb that was
dropped on an apartment building in Gaza in order to assassinate
Salah Shehadeh, which also killed 14 civilians, is almost like
throwing candy compared to the number of bombs the Americans dropped
on the houses of the residents of crowded Falluja. And there, too,
incidentally, the Marines' commander said they did their best in
order to avoid hurting civilians. "We brought to this action our
experience from World War II, Korea, Vietnam ... The operation in
Falluja will be remembered and studied for many years to come," he
said.
What can the perplexed Israeli learn from this cynical
comparison? Ariel Sharon can feel that he was simply persecuted in
the Sabra and Chatila affair. Those who like to say that "the whole
world is against us" will choose to talk about the double standards
applied to America and Israel with regard to, for instance, Israel's
destruction of the Jenin refugee camp. But anyone who has absolute,
rather than relative, moral standards can conclude that we should
not be learning from the Americans - not with regard to the
consumption of junk food, not in the area of human rights, and not
even in the area of democracy and freedom of expression.
The
practical difference ought to be obvious. America is a superpower,
which can evidently do what it pleases, and it can withdraw from the
war in Iraq whenever it wants. Israel has no place to which to
withdraw. It must remain here, in proximity to its neighbors - its
partners in the land, the climate and the fate of its children.
Therefore, every retaliation, revenge operation and assassination
that we carry out has historical consequences going far beyond those
of the cruel assault on Falluja. Operation Vigilant Resolve, in
contrast, will become no more than a footnote in American military
history - and perhaps a few Marines will even write a book about it.
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