SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
al qaeda
Trump Is Vindicating Every Warning About the Potential Misuse of War-on-Terror Powers
What we are witnessing is the war on terror in zombie form: devoid of its original life force and human drive, but more dangerous than ever, as it shuffles mindlessly forward in a search for human flesh to no end.
Oct 15, 2025
There is good news and bad news for critics of the United States’ bloated 21st century war machine. The good news: The “war on terror” is dead.
The bad news? It seems to have become a part of the walking dead—a kind of zombie war on terror that is continuing and radically expanding, even as the fears and threats that originally motivated all its excesses are seemingly vanishing from the American psyche.
Consider the following facts: Despite the public release only a few years ago of evidence showing the Saudi government’s direct complicity in the crime of September 11, 2001—the central, instigating act of terrorism that drove and justified every aspect of the “war on terror” that followed—associating with or even taking money from that same government appears to carry no stigma. The Biden administration’s efforts to pledge American lives and treasure to defend that same government elicited relatively little controversy. And this year, dozens of top US comedians, from the left-leaning Bill Burr to the right-leaning Andrew Schulz, happily took its money to help whitewash its image. The Saudi government’s expanding encroachment into US sports and entertainment in general continues only to receive an eager welcome.
Meanwhile, after spending more than a decade fighting the shadowy threat of al-Qaeda, the US government has now seemingly come to terms with the terror group’s ongoing influence in the region. It has enthusiastically gone along with the installation of an al-Qaeda-linked militant, Ahmed al-Sharaa, as the leader of Syria, whose former president Washington spent years trying to remove from power expressly because of his alleged support for terrorism—including the very al-Qaeda its new president hails from.
Trump may be the first president to use this zombie “war” for ends that it was never meant for, but history suggests he will not be the last, unless we make the collective political choice to put a lid on and roll back the radical growth of executive war-making power that has accumulated year after year since 9/11.
Sharaa swiftly had the $10 million US bounty on his head removed, the terrorist designation of the al-Qaeda offshoot he led has been revoked, and just a few weeks ago, he was given a warm welcome during the United Nations General Assembly in New York, where on one stage, former CIA Director David Petraeus acknowledged the two had been on opposite sides of the civil war in Iraq 20 years ago, in between lavishing him with praise and declaring himself a “fan.”
It’s not just al-Qaeda. The Biden administration had explored teaming up with the Taliban to fight ISIS’ branch in Afghanistan, while the Trump administration is now inching toward normalizing relations with the group, which George W. Bush once said was “threatening people everywhere by sponsoring and sheltering and supplying terrorists.”
The Taliban’s link to al-Qaeda was once upon a time the rationale for regime change and 20 years of US war in Afghanistan—which, of course, ended with the Taliban coming back into power, which Washington appears to be coming to peace with now.
Together, these stories suggest that both the American public and the Washington national security establishment have moved on from the core motivations that drove the “war on terror” for the better part of two decades. Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, the government forces behind September 11—none of it matters anymore, apparently.
And yet the “war on terror” is not just still with us, it’s expanding in radical new ways. The Trump administration has now explicitly repurposed the tactics and powers used against terrorism against a new, unrelated target: drug traffickers—launching airstrikes on private Venezuelan boats in international waters on the basis that drug smugglers are terrorists, and that their transportation of drugs constitutes “an armed attack against the United States.” This is despite widespread doubts about the legality of such strikes and concerns about the risks of this terrorist designation.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump has also continued and escalated the trend started under the Biden administration of turning the “war on terror” inward. The president is now threatening to deploy the military against what he calls the “enemy from within,” as his administration pushes to treat a variety of domestic critics, dissidents, and opposition groups as terrorist threats over their First Amendment-protected activity, and draws up secret watchlists of supposed domestic terrorists.
This is all a vindication of the many civil libertarians who warned over the past 24 years that the expansive powers claimed by President Bush and then Barack Obama would somewhere down the line be used in new, alarming ways they were never originally intended for, including to intimidate and punish political dissent. What’s absurd is that this is happening at the exact time that the threats that originally justified all of this are simply being forgotten.
What we are witnessing is the war on terror in zombie form: devoid of its original life force and human drive, but more dangerous than ever, as it shuffles mindlessly forward in a search for human flesh to no end.
Trump may be the first president to use this zombie “war” for ends that it was never meant for, but history suggests he will not be the last, unless we make the collective political choice to put a lid on and roll back the radical growth of executive war-making power that has accumulated year after year since 9/11. Until then, this zombie will stagger on.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Syria After Assad: Hope and Fear for the Future
After decades of oppression and 14 years of war, it will take much more to heal these wounds and guarantee a new era of freedom, justice, prosperity, and reconciliation.
Dec 13, 2024
Syria, known throughout history as the “crossroads of civilization,” now finds itself at a crossroads of its own. After 54 years, the Assad family’s brutal dictatorship in Syria has finally ended.
“I never thought I’d live to see this day,” said my dad, who left Aleppo as a teenager. My parents grew up there.
After Bashar al-Assad fled to Russia, elated Syrians rejoiced in the streets. Moving videos emerged of political prisoners being freed after enduring decades of torture in the regime’s notorious prisons. The whereabouts of many still remain unknown.
In addition to respecting Syria’s territorial integrity and the aspirations of its people in a future government, the U.S. should immediately lift all sanctions on Syria to help with reconstruction and economic recovery.
Assad’s fall is undeniably worth celebrating—it’s a rare unifying force for a deeply fractured country. But after decades of oppression and 14 years of war, it will take much more to heal these wounds and guarantee a new era of freedom, justice, prosperity, and reconciliation.
The popular uprising for Syrian dignity that ignited in March 2011 was violently crushed by Assad and morphed into several proxy wars involving Russia, Iran, Israel, the U.S., Turkey, and numerous armed groups, including al Qaeda-linked terrorists.
Heinous war crimes and other human rights violations were committed by all parties throughout the war, which has killed over 350,000 people. In the world’s largest forced displacement crisis, over 13 million Syrians have either fled their country or have been displaced within its borders.
The war has damaged Syria’s infrastructure while Western sanctions have further shattered Syria’s economy. Poverty is widespread, and more than half of the population currently grapples with food insecurity.
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), once allied with al Qaeda in Syria, was largely responsible for Assad’s overthrow on December 8. Designated by the U.S as a terrorist organization, HTS has its own track record of brutality in Syria. The rebel group’s leader, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, founded the Al Nusra Front, once had ties to ISIS, and still has a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head.
Jolani has since renounced his ties with al Qaeda and recently said he supports religious pluralism in Syria. But it’s reasonable to be skeptical that HTS and its allies are now truly committed to freedom, justice, and human rights for all long-suffering Syrians.
Still, foreign occupation and intervention are antithetical to a sovereign and “free” Syria.
Following Assad’s fall, Israel has launched hundreds of airstrikes and unlawfully seized more territory beyond its illegal, 57-year occupation of Syria’s Golan Heights. Whether Turkey gives up occupied land in northern Syria also remains to be seen, especially if Syrian Kurds end up forming an autonomous region within the country.
Meanwhile, the U.S. military still occupies part of Syria, including the oil fields in the northeast, and it’s unclear when the U.S. will withdraw its remaining 900 soldiers. In addition to respecting Syria’s territorial integrity and the aspirations of its people in a future government, the U.S. should immediately lift all sanctions on Syria to help with reconstruction and economic recovery.
As a Syrian American, I try to remain hopeful as I think about my relatives in Aleppo, friends in Damascus, and the generous strangers who’ve taken care of me as their own when I’ve visited. I look forward to returning to a Syria where people can finally breathe, rebuild, and live in dignity. But I also fear for the future.
Syrians have always taken pride in their rich ethnic and religious diversity. An inclusive and democratic government that guarantees the equal rights of all Syrians is essential to ensuring that the country stays unified and doesn’t plunge into sectarian chaos. It would be tragic if one authoritarian ruler is replaced by another or the country becomes balkanized into armed factions.
While much remains uncertain and immense challenges are ahead, prioritizing the immediate needs of Syrians is a logical first step. And, more than anything else, we must ensure that the Syrian people are the ones who steer the destiny of a peaceful, post-war Syria that reflects their remarkable resilience, courage, hopes, and dreams.
Keep ReadingShow Less
The West Celebrates Assad’s Fall, But What Comes Next May Be Even Worse
How can the fall of the admittedly brutal Assad regime create a “historic opportunity” for the Syrian people when the country is now under the control of jihadists?
Dec 11, 2024
The toppling of Bashar al-Assad in Syria was cheered by U.S. President Joe Biden and other major Western leaders, like French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, as it ended the reign of a brutal regime more than 13 years after Assad’s crackdown on anti-government protests ignited Syria’s civil war.
Indeed, Biden described Assad’s fall as a “historic opportunity” for the Syrian people, echoing Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the leader of the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group (HTS) that took over Syria, who said, “This victory, my brothers, is historic for the region.”
But wait. Isn’t HTS on the list of banned terrorist groups and Jolani a jihadist militant whose journey began in Iraq with links to al Qaeda and later to the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI)? So why is the West cheering for al Qaeda and its allies?
When all is said and done, forcing regime change rarely succeeds.
The European Union Agency for Asylum describes HTS as a coalition of Islamist Sunni armed groups that “frequently commit serious human rights abuses, including harassment, assassinations, kidnapping, and torture, as well as unlawful detention of civilians.” It goes on to say that “civilians have also been extorted and kidnapped for ransom” and that “the group has conducted formal military campaigns, assassinations, hostage takings, and ‘lone wolf’ operations, including suicide bombings,” while “members of religious minorities have been forced to convert to Islam and adopt Sunni customs.”
So, what is going on here? How can the fall of the admittedly brutal Assad regime create a “historic opportunity” for the Syrian people when the country is now under the control of jihadists? But we’ve been witness to this comedy drama before. From 1979 to 1989, the United States (along with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan) armed and financed the Afghan Islamist fighters known as the mujahideen who were fighting the Soviet Union. The plan from the beginning was to keep the Islamist insurgency going for as long as possible, thus sucking the Soviets into a Vietnam-style quagmire.
The Islamist fight in Afghanistan against the Soviets was “the good jihad,” according to Washington. The mujahideen were fighting for peace against an enemy of the Western world and deserved U.S. support. Of course, we know how that turned out.
The Bush administration embarked on a campaign against terrorism following the 9/11 attacks, with the first phase of the campaign focusing on “capturing or killing bin Laden, destroying his al Qaeda network in Afghanistan, and deposing the Taliban-regime.”
Undoubtedly, bombing into oblivion the Islamists in Syria if the new government, headed by Mohammed al-Bashir who has been appointed as interim prime minister, fails to lead a new path is a contingency plan that Washington has probably already considered. The job, in fact, could be given to Israel, for whom bombing is second nature. Since the fall of Assad, Israel has already carried out hundreds of airstrikes across Syria, targeting airports, naval bases, and military infrastructure. And the U.S. Central Command announced that it has struck more than 75 targets, including ISIS leaders, operatives, and camps.
Hypocrisy and duplicity, followed in the end by astonishing moral and political somersaults, are trademarks of the way Washington and its Western allies approach world affairs and conduct diplomacy. And these elements have been in full display since the start of Syria’s civil war. The Obama administration provided support to the anti-Assad forces, primarily to the Free Syrian Army forces and its affiliates, but the CIA began to support other groups as early as 2013 even though they had jihadi orientations. CIA’s covert operation against the Syrian regime, known as Timber Sycamore, was a joint effort with Saudi Arabia that had long ties with radical Islamist groups. But regime change is what Washington was after in Syria, so everything else was of secondary concern.
The fall of the Assad regime has staggering implications for security in the region, but the speed with which it collapsed suggests that, in the end, it may have been mainly internal rather than external pressures that made the difference. Syria was under imperialist attack for the past 13 years. The U.S. (along with Turkey) backed and funded mercenaries and terrorist forces against Assad’s regime, imposed economic isolation of the country through sanctions, and denied plans that would have contributed to reconstruction even though aid was desperately needed for civilians. In April 2017, the U.S. even ordered direct military action against Syria in retaliation for the alleged use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime. The Trump administration claimed to have been moved by the deaths of some 80 civilians; yet then-President Donald Trump refused to lift his ban on accepting Syrian refugees into the U.S.
But the Assad regime had created a hellish place, with 90% of Syrians living in poverty and widespread malnutrition. The country was in a vicious downward spiral. The economy had plummeted by 85% due to nearly 14 years of civil war. The inflation rate had risen to over 120% in 2024 while electricity production had dropped by 80%, with power outrages having become a common phenomenon. And the only thing that the Assad’s regime had to offer was more repression.
Still, the collapse of the regime, now celebrated throughout the Western world, raises more questions than answers. There are too many actors, both inside and outside Syria, with diverse interests and conflicting goals and aims. Assad’s regime used secularism as a tool to repress opponents, but there should be no expectations for the emergence of stable secular nationalism in Syria anytime soon. The fear that Syria will face the same fate as Afghanistan is also unfounded. The country has too many hostile factions for a dominant group like the Taliban to take complete control of the country. If anything, it is probably destined to become a failed state like Libya following the overthrow of Moammar Gadhafi in 2011 with the help of NATO, an event that was also widely celebrated by the Western leaders of the time.
Indeed, when all is said and done, forcing regime change rarely succeeds. In fact, U.S. foreign policy has been an unmitigated disaster in the post-Cold War period, creating more problems that it tried to solve. Think of the Balkans, Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Middle East.
Syria will be no different. It was a hellish place under Assad but will more likely than not end up next as another “black hole” in the lost list of U.S. "achievements" in forcing regime change.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Russia's Loss in Syria Is Not Necessarily a Win for the US
The Middle East resembles a billiard table, in which the movement of one ball is liable to send the others flying off in different directions and in turns bouncing off each other. Which way the balls fly, however, is impossible to predict.
Dec 10, 2024
The fall of the Baath state in Syria is a serious defeat for Russia (and a disaster for Iran). It would however be a grave mistake to assume that this by necessity makes it a success for the United States.
Moscow and Washington may indeed now face similar challenges in Syria.
Three issues led Russia to intervene in the Syrian civil war to save the Assad regime. First was a general desire to preserve a partner state — one of the very few remaining to Russia after the U.S. overthrow of the regimes in Iraq and Libya, which helped to prop up Moscow’s international influence. Second was a desire to retain Russia’s only naval and air bases in the Mediterranean.
Third was a deep Russian fear that an Islamist victory would lead to Syria becoming a base for terrorism against Russia and its partners in Central Asia. That anxiety was increased by the presence of numerous fighters from Chechnya and other Muslim regions of Russia in the ranks of the Islamist forces in Syria and Iraq.
Moscow’s hope of preserving a partner state has now irredeemably collapsed. As to the terrorist threat, we will have to see. Given the huge challenges it will face in rebuilding the Syrian state, it would seem insane for the new regime led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) to sponsor international terrorism; and, as part of his general strategy of disowning his Al Qaeda past, its leader, Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, has promised not to do this.
There will, however, be a question mark over HTS’s ability to control its allies, and some of its own followers. In Afghanistan, the Taliban promised not to back international terrorism when they returned to power, and have apparently kept their word. The Afghanistan-based Islamic State of Khorasan (ISK), however, continues to do so; and from some mixture of weak control over parts of Afghanistan and unwillingness to engage in new conflict, the Taliban have not been able fully to prevent this.
This leaves the issue of the Russian naval base at Tartus and air base near Latakia. The Russian squadron based at Tartus has reportedly left the port. This could be either a definitive evacuation or a precautionary move to keep them out to sea until relations with the new regime are clarified. The Russian air base is said to be surrounded by HTS forces, but has not been attacked. It is reported that there has been a deal between Moscow and HTS to guarantee the security of the bases, but, if so, this arrangement may be purely temporary.
Given the extremely complicated and uncertain nature of its relations with all Syria’s neighbors, it might make good sense for the new regime in Damascus to allow the bases to remain (perhaps in return for Russian supplies of oil and food) in order to balance its diplomatic and economic options.
This issue however is intimately tied up with that of the new regime’s policy towards Syria’s ethno-religious minorities, which generally supported the Baath regime out of fear of Sunni Islamist oppression (a fear amply justified by the savage fate of their communities in Syria and Iraq which fell to ISIS).
Where Russia’s bases are situated along the Mediterranean coast lies the heartland of Syria’s Christian and Alawite minorities. The Assad dynasty came from the Alawites, a Shia sect, and, for the past 50 years, the Baath state in Syria has been to a great extent an Alawite one. Alawite militias played a crucial role on the government side in the civil war, and inflicted numerous atrocities on their opponents.
Al-Jolani has promised that there must be no revenge for this, that minority rights will be respected, and that there will be no imposition of severe Sunni Islamist law. Even if he is sincere about these pledges, however, his followers may feel differently.
An HTS-led regime in Damascus that wishes to reassure the Alawites and Christians might see an interest in allowing the Russian bases to remain. A regime fearful of minority revolt (and outside backing for such revolt), however, would likely see the Russian bases as potential support for such rebellion.
For Russia to retain its bases against the will of the new Syrian government, and with the support of local Alawite and Christian forces, would not only require the intervention of Russian ships and aircraft but also the deployment of significant numbers of ground forces. Given the war in Ukraine, it is highly unlikely that Russia has such forces to spare.
Moreover — as with the equally rapid collapse of the U.S. proxy Afghan state — the way in which Syrian state forces melted away in the face of the HTS-led insurgent forces will hardly encourage Russia to continue the fight in Syria.
In a different form, these issues also face U.S. policy in Syria. Will Washington attempt to keep its own bases in Syria (from which it has attacked both ISIS and Baath regime targets)? Will the new regime turn a blind eye to them, or attempt to force them out?
The greatest issue of all for the U.S. to consider is the fate of the Syrian Kurds. During the Syrian civil war, with massive help from the U.S. and the semi-independent Kurdish state in northern Iraq, Syrian Kurdish forces (the Democratic Union Party or PYD) occupied a huge swath of northeastern Syria, considerably beyond their core ethnic territory. The U.S. has several bases and logistics operations in the region.
The one outside the country which appears to have been critical to HTS’s victory, and to have profited unquestionably from it, is Turkey and the Turkish government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The HTS offensive emerged from the Turkish-controlled area of northern Syria and could hardly have occurred without Turkish support. HTS’s successful use of drones strongly hints at Turkish aid.
Turkey has two core interests in Syria. The first is to establish a situation in which the three million Syrian refugees in Turkey who fled their homeland during the civil war can return home. That may now be achievable, if the new government in Damascus can establish basic peace and order and receive some international aid. Hundreds of refugees are reportedly already queuing up to cross back into Syria from Turkey.
The second Turkish interest is to reduce the power and territory of the Syrian Kurds, whom it has accused of being allied to PKK Kurdish rebels in Turkey. Simultaneously with the HTS offensive against the Baath regime, the Turkish-backed “Syrian National Army” rebels supported by Turkish airpower launched an offensive against the Kurdish PYD (officially designated by Turkey as “terrorists”), capturing the town of Manbij. This creates a situation in which proxies backed by a NATO member (though an increasingly estranged one) are attacking a U.S. proxy, without the U.S. seemingly being able to do much about it.
If Turkey pushes the new regime in Damascus to join in the attack on the Kurdish-controlled territories in northeastern Syria, this will create dilemmas for Washington akin to those facing Russia in the west. Would the Trump administration abandon its Kurdish allies, in accordance with Trump’s statement that “This is not our fight. Let it play out. Do not get involved?” Or would the demands of “credibility” compel Washington to come to their aid, even at the potential cost of triggering a deep crisis with Turkey?
The Middle East resembles a billiard table, in which the movement of one ball is liable to send the others flying off in different directions and in turns bouncing off each other. The difference is that, unlike in billiards, even the most insightful expert cannot predict in which direction the balls will move; and no outside player has been able to control them.
On the whole, the wisest approach by far would seem to be that of the Chinese, who import much of their energy from the region while determinedly avoiding intervention and taking sides in its conflicts.
For, as a Chinese diplomat said to me many years ago, “Why would we want to get involved in that mess?”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Transparency Fail as FBI Retracts Redactions in Orlando Transcripts
Government censorship of attack "only seemed to encourage speculation online, and in the political arena, that the investigators might be concealing something."
Jun 20, 2016
After coming under fierce criticism for its decision to publish redacted transcripts of the Orlando shooter's 911 calls, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) late Monday released the full transcript, which names the terrorist organizations Omar Mateen claimed allegiance to.
"Unfortunately, the unreleased portions of the transcript [...] have caused an unnecessary distraction from the hard work that the FBI and our law enforcement partners have been doing to investigate this heinous crime," the DOJ and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said in a joint press statement. "As much of this information had been previously reported, we have re-issued the complete transcript to include these references to provide the highest level of transparency possible under the circumstances."
The censored transcript read, in part:
OM: Praise be to God, and prayers as well as peace be upon the prophet of God [in Arabic]. I let you know, I'm in Orlando and I did the shootings.
OD: What's your name?
OM: My name is I pledge of allegiance to [omitted].
OD: Ok, What's your name?
OM: I pledge allegiance to [omitted] may God protect him [in Arabic], on behalf of [omitted].
The government claimed that it had censored the transcript out of sensitivity to the families and surviving victims of the June 12 attack on a Florida LGBTQ bar - the Pulse Nightclub - and also because it "did not want to provide the killer or terrorist organizations with a publicity platform for hateful propaganda."
However, the initial refusal to name the Islamic State or its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was criticized as being another form of "propaganda."
What's more, the Obama administration has refused to release the audio record of the calls--which, as The Intercept's Robert Mackey notes, "only seemed to encourage speculation online, and in the political arena, that the investigators might be concealing something."
Indeed, Mackey points out, there are already discrepancies between what's been stated about Mateen:
[B]ased on a previous description of Mateen's 911 calls given by FBI Director James Comey last week, it appears that the federal investigators continued to withhold details of a second conversation Mateen had with the 911 operator, which was not referred to at all in the government's timeline. "He made 911 calls from the club, during the attack," Comey said last week. "He called and he hung up. He called again and spoke briefly with the dispatcher, and then he hung up, and then the dispatcher called him back again and they spoke briefly. There were three total calls."
Also missing from the transcript and summary of the conversations was any mention of the fact that, as Comey also said last week, Mateen had expressed solidarity with the Tsarnaev brothers, who carried out the Boston Marathon bombings in 2013, and Moner Mohammad Abusalha, a Floridian who carried out a suicide bombing in Syria in 2014 on behalf of al Qaeda's representatives there, the Nusra Front. The FBI's Boston office revealed that Mateen had referred to the Tsarnaev brothers as his "homeboys" during one of the 911 calls, despite a lack of evidence that he had ever been in contact with them.
House Speaker Paul Ryan and other conservatives were quick to jump on the censorship as an indication that the Obama administration is trying to downplay the role of Islamist extremism in the attacks--inflaming arguments over the motive behind the hate crime.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Escalating US Air Strikes Kill Hundreds of Civilians in Mosul, Iraq
May 01, 2016
USA Today revealed on April 19th that U.S. air forces have been operating under looser rules of engagement in Iraq and Syria since last fall. The war commander, Lt Gen McFarland, now orders air strikes that are expected to kill up to 10 civilians without prior approval from U.S. Central Command, and U.S. officials acknowledge that air strikes are killing more civilians under the new rules.
U.S. officials previously claimed that air strikes in Iraq and Syria had killed as few as 26 civilians. A senior Pentagon official who is briefed daily on the air war told USA Today that was unrealistic, since air strikes that have destroyed 6,000 buildings with over 40,000 bombs and missiles have inevitably killed much higher numbers of civilians.
As the U.S. escalates its air strikes on Mosul, the largest city occupied by Islamic State, reports of hundreds of civilians killed by air strikes reveal some of the human costs of the U.S. air war and the new rules of engagement.
Award-winning Iraqi environmental scientist and Mosul native Souad Al-Azzawi (Ph.D. Colorado School of Mines) has compiled a partial list of air strikes that have killed civilians and destroyed civilian infrastructure from reports by Mosul Eye, Nineveh Reporters Network, Al Maalomah News Network, other Iraqi media and contacts in Mosul:
- Many government buildings have been destroyed. As U.S. officials told USA Today, attacks are often conducted at night to minimize civilian casualties, but they have killed security guards and civilians in neighboring buildings.
- Telephone exchanges have been systematically bombed and destroyed.
- Two large dairies were bombed, killing about 100 civilians and wounding 200 more.
- Multiple daytime air strikes on Mosul University on March 19th and 20th killed 92 civilians and wounded 135, mostly faculty, staff, families and students. Targets included the main administration building, classroom buildings, a women's dormitory and a faculty apartment building.
- 50 civilians were killed and 100 wounded by air strikes on 2 apartment buildings, Al Hadbaa and Al Khadraa.
- A mother and 4 children were killed in an air strike on a house in the Hay al Dhubat district of East Mosul on April 20th, next door to a house used by Islamic State that was undamaged.
- 22 civilians were killed in air strikes on houses in front of Mosul Medical College.
- 20 civilians were killed and 70 wounded by air strikes on the Sunni Waqif building and nearby houses and shops.
- U.S. air strikes on April 24th damaged the Rashidiya water treatment plant in West Mosul and the Yarmouk power station in East Mosul.
- The Central Bank of Mosul in Ghazi Street and several branches of Rafidain and Rasheed banks were bombed, with heavy civilian casualties, despite all cash reportedly being removed after the first bank was struck.
- Three workers were killed and 12 wounded in an air strike on the former Pepsi bottling plant.
- An air strike on a fuel depot in an industrial area ignited an inferno with 150 casualties on April 18th.
- Bombs have damaged a food warehouse, power stations and sub-stations in West Mosul, and flour mills, a pharmaceutical factory, auto repair shops and other workshops across Mosul.
- The Al Hurairah Bridge was destroyed by air strikes.
At the very least, U.S. air strikes have killed hundreds of civilians in Mosul and destroyed much of the civilian infrastructure that people depend on for their lives in already dire conditions. And yet by all accounts, this is only the beginning of the U.S.-Iraqi campaign to retake Mosul. One and one-half million civilians are trapped in the city, 30 times the UN's estimate of the number of civilians in Fallujah before the November 2004 assault that killed 4,000 to 6,000 people, mostly civilians. Meanwhile ISIL prevents civilians from evacuating the city, believing that their presence protects its forces from even heavier bombardment.
International humanitarian law strictly prohibits military attacks on civilians, civilian areas and civilian infrastructure. The presence of several thousand ISIL militants in a city of 1.5 million people does not justify indiscriminate bombing or attacks on civilian targets. As the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq warned U.S. officials in a Human Rights Report in 2007, "The presence of individual combatants among a great number of civilians does not alter the civilian nature of an area." UNICEF protested the bombing of a water treatment plant in Syria last December as "a particularly alarming example" of how "the rules of war, including those meant to protect vital civilian infrastructure, continue to be broken on a daily basis."
The fundamental contradiction of the militarized "war on terror" has always been that U.S. aggression and other war crimes only reinforce the narratives of jihadis who see themselves as a bulwark against foreign aggression and neocolonialism in the Muslim world. Meanwhile U.S. wars and covert operations against secular enemies like Hussein, Gaddafi and Assad create new zones of chaos where jihadis can thrive.
President Obama has acknowledged publicly that there is therefore "no military solution" to jihadism. But successive U.S. administrations have proven unable to resist the lure of military escalation at each new stage of this crisis, unleashing wars that have killed about two million people, plunged a dozen countries into chaos and exploded Wahhabi jihadism from its original safe havens in Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Pakistan to countries across the world.
If the U.S. and its Iraqi allies follow through with their threatened assault on Mosul, the resulting massacre will join Fallujah, Guantanamo and U.S. drone wars as a powerful catalyst for the next mutation of Wahhabi jihadism, which is likely to be more globalized and unified.
But although Al Qaeda and Islamic State have proven adept at manipulating U.S. leaders into ever-escalating cycles of violence, the jihadis cannot directly order American pilots to bomb civilians. Only our leaders can do that, making them morally and legally responsible for these crimes, just as Islamic State's leaders are responsible for theirs.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Does US-Russia Deal in Syria Spell End of 'Assad Must Go' Policy?
The United States and Russia on Monday announced that a 'cessation of hostilities' in Syria will go into effect on Saturday, February 27.
Feb 22, 2016
Suggesting that a more sober U.S. position is emerging—and cautiously hoping that bloodshed in the war-torn country may soon lessen—the United States and Russia announced on Monday that a "cessation of hostilities" in Syria will take effect on Saturday, February 27.
"If implemented and adhered to, this cessation will not only lead to a decline in violence but also continue to expand the delivery of urgently needed humanitarian supplies to besieged areas and support a political transition to a government that is responsive to the desires of the Syrian people," U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement.
The truce will apply "to those parties to the Syrian conflict that have indicated their commitment to and acceptance of its terms," the statement reads, but not to ISIS militants or those from al-Nusra, the local branch of al-Qaeda.
Middle East Eye notes that "[c]rucially, it states that opposition groups signing up to the terms will be guaranteed protection from military action by Russia, the US, and Syria."
Meanwhile, President Vladimir Putin said Russia would do "whatever is necessary" to ensure that Damascus respects the agreement, adding: "We are counting on the United States to do the same with its allies and the groups that it supports."
Indeed, the Guardian reports: "In a change to the previous aborted ceasefire, Russia and America have agreed to act as direct guarantors and monitors of the cessation of hostilities."
The Guardian continues:
Key to the agreement issued on Monday will be coordination between Washington and Moscow to set out territories that are subject to the ceasefire, and therefore must not be subject to aerial bombing by Russia, attacks by the Syrian army or the American backed opposition. In view of the intricate interweaving of the various factions, the shifting alliances and complexity of the front lines in Syria, communication between Russia and the US on the precise territory subject to a ceasefire will have to be tightly coordinated. The likelihood that either artillery fire or aerial bombardment will deliberately or inadvertently land in territory party to the ceasefire is high.
Though inherently tenuous given the volatility and complexities of the current situation, analysts have seen the prospect of a firmer U.S.-Russian agreement as the best hope for a lasting ceasefire in the war-torn country.
Moreover, Monday's developments suggest that, as investigative journalist Robert Parry put it last October, U.S. officials have "gotten off their 'Assad must go' high horses. "
The agreement announced Monday will likely require the U.S. to adjust its diplomatic strategy "to take into account the likelihood that the Nusra Front will now be substantially weakened," as Gareth Porter wrote last week.
He said, "Russian-Syrian success offers the most realistic prospect for an end to the bloodletting in Syria and would also reduce the likelihood of an eventual Al Qaeda seizure of power in Syria."
Porter continued:
The Obama administration certainly understands that fact and has already privately adjusted its diplomatic strategy to take into account the likelihood that the Nusra Front will now be substantially weakened. But it cannot acknowledge any of that publicly because such a recognition would infuriate many hardliners in Washington who still demand "regime change" in Damascus whatever the risks.
President Obama is under pressure from these domestic critics as well as from Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other GCC allies to oppose any gains by the Russians and the Assad regime as a loss for the United States. And Obama administration must continue to hide the reality that it was complicit in a strategy of arming Nusra - in part through the mechanism of arming Washington's "moderate" clients - to achieve leverage on the Syrian regime.
One-sided and poor-quality reporting from U.S. corporate media has only fueled such confusion and misinformation, veteran journalist and foreign policy expert Stephen Kinzer wrote in the Boston Globe on Friday. According to Kinzer:
Americans are being told that the virtuous course in Syria is to fight the Assad regime and its Russian and Iranian partners. We are supposed to hope that a righteous coalition of Americans, Turks, Saudis, Kurds, and the "moderate opposition" will win.
This is convoluted nonsense, but Americans cannot be blamed for believing it. We have almost no real information about the combatants, their goals, or their tactics. Much blame lies with our media for this.
The mainstream line on Syria, Kinzer wrote, seems to be: "Fight Assad, Russia, and Iran! Join our Turkish, Saudi, and Kurdish friends to support peace!"
"This is appallingly distant from reality," he concludes. "It is also likely to prolong the war and condemn more Syrians to suffering and death."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'The Time of the End is the Time of No Room'
Dec 25, 2015
Daffy Donald proposes to ban Muslims from entering the U.S., while journalist Glenn Greenwald recently reported on the frightening upsurge in attacks on Muslims. As I write these words, I listen to John Williams' score for the movie "Schindler's List." The music never fails to move me deeply. Whatever historical flaws or misrepresentations the film might have, the undeniable suffering of the Jewish people, along with millions of political dissidents and other "undesirable" human beings--the Untermenschen in Nazi parlance--is an escapable part of our history. And now, the fascists and neo-Nazis among us aim to reawaken the very same mentality that led to the unimaginable cruelty and barbarity of their predecessors during World War II.
What is particularly distressing in this recent outbreak of blind prejudice among a growing number of my fellow Americans is their apparent ignorance of our country's role in generating the humanitarian crises affecting Syria, Iraq, and other Islamic countries in North Africa and the Middle East. Were it not for our almighty benevolence and exceptional commitment to bringing democracy to the oppressed and downtrodden, innocent human beings would still be with us here on Earth, living their lives, practicing their faith, loving, and being loved. But our savage, power-driven, myopic leaders insist on carrying out their interventions, always according to God's plan or some equally demented design formulated in think tanks and board rooms and the halls of Congress with the noble goals of regime change and absolute control of energy resources firmly in mind.
As it was in Iraq, so it is now in Syria and other targets of the greatest empire that has ever disgraced the Earth, and all we share in common, like the right to life, the right to liberty, the right to freedom from foreign hubris and its many forms--from outright aggression to the "responsibility to protect." I'll say it again: Were it not for the machinations and criminal conspiracies of our damnable leaders--from Bush the First to Obama the Sun King--there would be no flood of refugees seeking solace and safety on our shores or the shores of our European brethren. Perhaps it is worth reminding ourselves, from time to time, of the words inscribed on Lady Liberty's immemorial bronze plaque:
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
Those words ring out as an abiding welcome, a sign and signal to all seeking shelter and safety, regardless of color, race or creed. It is decidedly not a "No trespassing, police take notice" sign. Nor does it say, "Irish need not apply," or "No coloreds," or for that matter, "Muslims keep out!" But Trump and his followers would have us believe our safety and security are contingent upon reverting to discrimination and the building of actual walls and other, even more, formidable barriers constructed of fear, ignorance, and bias of the most negative sort. They would have us extinguish the torch blazing in Liberty's upraised hand, close our borders, and harden our hearts against the thousands of refugees streaming from the very lands we have, in recent years, either invaded outright or where proxy forces and mercenaries have our dirty work.
And now, thanks in no small part to the violence we have inflicted or otherwise instigated upon targeted countries, the world is faced with the largest refugee crisis since World War II, when an estimated 60 million Europeans became refugees over the course of the war. Today, according to the UNHCR's annual Global Trends Report: World at War, "worldwide displacement [is] at the highest level ever recorded...the number of people forcibly displaced at the end of 2014 had risen to a staggering 59.5 million compared to 51.2 million a year earlier and 37.5 million a decade ago."
The Report further concludes that the war in Syria is now the main driver of displacement:
"Every day last year on average 42,500 [Syrians] became refugees, asylum seekers, or internally displaced, a four-fold increase in just four years." Of course, the foreign policies and misadventures of the United States is not the only reason why we are facing a refugee crisis of such magnitude.
Again, according to the UNHCR report:
"...in region after region, the number of refugees and internally displaced people is on the rise. In the past five years, at least 15 conflicts have erupted or reignited: eight in Africa...three in the Middle East (Syria, Iraq, and Yemen); one in Europe (Ukraine) and three in Asia (Kyrgyzstan, and in several areas of Myanmar and Pakistan). 'Few of these crises have been resolved and most still generate new displacement,' the report noted, adding that in 2014 only 126,800 refugees were able to return to their home countries--the lowest number in 31 years."
The Global Trends report also includes one more sobering fact: over half of the refugees in the world today are children like Aylan Kurdi, the three-year-old Syrian child who, with his older brother Galip and their mother Rehan, died when the boat they shared with other Syrian refugees capsized while trying to reach Greece and eventually Canada. In September, a heart-wrenching photo of Aylan's lifeless body on the shore of a Turkish beach made headlines around the world.
And yet, despite the outpouring of sympathy for Aylan and the saturated media coverage of his tragic death and the plight of thousands of other refugees risking their lives on dangerous ocean crossings, the root causes of the refugee crisis remain on the margins of corporate media. Instead, we must suffer daily accounts of atrocities committed by ISIS or some Al Qaeda franchise in Syria or Iraq, and listen to this or that pundit weighing in on the application of force to the job of ridding the world of Islamic fanatics. Is the U.S. blameworthy for waging a merely half-hearted air war instead of pulling out all the stops and bombing the hell out of the terrorists and their command infrastructure? Is Russia's game-changing intercession in the form of strategic bombers and cruise missiles hitting Islamic State targets putting the final nail in the coffin of the so-called Caliphate? These and comparable questions seem to be taking up much of the news and commentary regarding the wars in Syria and Iraq.
Even the Quaker Meeting I attend is not immune to the seductive lure of an ever more violent response to the violence of ISIS and its affiliates. The Sunday after the massacre in Paris, various members, some of them seasoned Quakers, rose to address the Meeting. Each, in her own way, was struggling to understand how the shooters, presumably aligned with ISIS, could have murdered so many innocent people in cold blood. Granted, most of the speakers prefaced their remarks by reminding us that, as Quakers, we are committed to nonviolence in the pursuit of peace. But others, equally appalled by the horror of what happened in Paris and the growing malignancy of extremism, confessed that in their darkest moments, they felt a military response was more than justified. The threat posed by ISIS, they said, is so great that only a powerful alliance, similar to the one that defeated Germany in World War II, could rescue humanity from extremist violence in all its manifestations.
Despite sincere expressions of grief for the latest victims, no one at the Meeting seemed willing to acknowledge our own government's role in turning the Middle East into a charnel house. The U.S., with its "coalition of the willing," is arguably the main driver of this bloodshed. And no matter which side in these bewildering conflicts has caused the greater amount of suffering, the result is the tragic displacement of millions of desperate, frightened people.
The Gospels tell the story of Mary and Joseph's journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem to register for a census. According to the traditional narrative, the couple found the Judean equivalent of "no vacancy" at whatever lodging they came to. (Some Biblical scholars question this account; they argue that, given the social mores of first-century Palestine, it's highly unlikely that a woman on the verge of giving birth would be turned away. A more credible interpretation is that a guest room in a private home was unavailable, and therefore, Mary and Joseph were taken to the "manger," a small area built into the floor of Middle Eastern homes where a peasant family's farm animals would spend the night.)
The late poet, author, mystic, and Trappist monk Thomas Merton composed in 1965 "The Time of the End Is the Time of No Room," a Christmas meditation whose musings are, I believe, as relevant today as they were those many years ago. I imagine Merton writing these words while enthralled, perhaps, by the mystery and beauty of this holiest of seasons and, more to the point, moved by the suffering and injustice he had witnessed:
Into this world, this demented inn, in which there is absolutely no room for Him at all, Christ has come uninvited. But because He cannot be at home in it, because He is out of place in it, His place is with those others for whom there is no room. His place is with those who do not belong, who are rejected by power because they are regarded as weak, those who are discredited, who are denied the status of persons, who are tortured, bombed, and exterminated. With those for whom there is no room, Christ is present in the world. He is mysteriously present in those for whom there seems to be nothing but the world at its worst ... With these He conceals Himself, In these He hides Himself, for whom there is no room.
-- Raids on the Unspeakable
A recent (and to my mind, representative) example of a belligerent and wholly inhospitable response to the plight of refugees is an illustration by a Japanese "manga" artist. She used the actual photo of a 6-year-old Syrian girl in a Lebanese camp as the basis of her drawing, which appeared on Facebook. The Japanese text that appears in the background of the drawing is intended to reveal the child's inner musings:
"I want to live a safe and clean life, have a gourmet meal, go out freely, wear pretty things and luxuriate. I want to live my life the way I want without a care in the world -- all at the expense of someone else.... I have an idea. Why don't I become a refugee?"
In my own life, I have been fortunate, or rather blessed, to have encountered quite a few "refugees." In 2009, I spent time in Amman meeting with Iraqi families and listening to the stories they told me about the circumstances that compelled them to leave Iraq or risk being killed by gunmen from one militia or another. Since then, my wife Nancy and I have developed deep, and, we hope, lasting relationships with families from the Middle East who have been resettled in neighboring towns. Most of the families are Muslim. Over the years, we have become part of each other's lives. There are no separation barriers, no walls between us. And there is always plenty of room in our homes and our hearts.
When one family's 12-year-old son was recently diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (on the same day that a photo of his school's winning soccer team appeared in the local paper), my wife and I were there to offer our support and serve as advocates for the family, especially when it came to navigating the healthcare system and surmounting language barriers. We had become so close that last spring, before this latest crisis erupted, the boy's mother invited my wife to return with her to the city of her birth to visit her ailing mother. For three weeks, Nancy was treated to traditional Middle Eastern hospitality in Muslim homes. Despite language differences, she and all the families she met could access a universal language of understanding, compassion and love. I believe this is the language we must all learn to speak if this world of ours is to have any hope of surviving and reaching its greatest, most humane potential.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Beware 'Sunni-Stan': Neocons are Back and Their 'Vision' is Darker than Ever
Dec 23, 2015
John Bolton is a tarnished character. The former United States Ambassador to the United Nations is now promoted as a scholar by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a pro-Israel lobby group.
Bolton is not a peacemaker, nor, in his defense, did he ever try to appear as if he were one. When he was appointed as the US Ambassador to the UN by George W. Bush, his stint lasted for only one year, starting in August 2005. His time in this position was marked with discord and conflict. He stole the limelight with such statements as "The (UN) Secretariat building in New York has 38 stories. If it lost ten stories, it wouldn't make a difference."
When the Iraq war failed to achieve any of its objectives, thus signaling an American retreat in the Middle East, neo-conservative politicians like Bolton retreated to their right-wing, neo-conservative institutions. Those who did not have one, established an organization of their own and began issuing press releases at random, hailing Israel at times, and chastising their President, Barack Obama, for one thing or another.
When the so-called 'Arab Spring' took place, neocons, like Bolton, saw in it an opportunity, but one that was difficult to discern. On the one hand, they understood little of the mechanisms that propelled popular actions, for they are used to operating at the highest power level with a total disconnect from the people. On the other hand, it was clear to them from the start that Obama was taking no chances by stepping back into a Middle East quagmire that was originally designed by his predecessor.
Unable to affect much change in the region, as they once envisioned under the leadership of Richard Perle and his Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the neocons mounted a strategy predicated mostly on discrediting their administration's lack of strategy.
In a sense the 'Arab Spring' invigorated the neocons, but also reminded them of their political impotence. Gone were the days of concocting foreign policies from neo-conservative think tanks such as the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), the Center for Security Policy (CSP), and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), of which, among others, Perle is an active member.
Perle is quite a cherished member of the American Enterprise Institute, where Bolton often mounts his occasional articles in mainstream US media, offering a 'vision' regarding how to take on Iran, how to reform Arab states, and how to redraw the map of the Middle East in ways that are conducive to US foreign policy interests.
The latest of such intellectual charges by Bolton was published in the New York Times on November 24. Under the title, "To Defeat ISIS, Create a Sunni State," he theorized once more, raging against "Obama's ineffective efforts" to destroy ISIS and demanding, instead, a "clear view shared by NATO allies." The main drive behind his logic is that once ISIS is destroyed, the region that the militant group designated as a 'state' should be turned into a Sunni state, which, as a working title, he called "Sunni-Stan."
Bolton's reasoning is as predictable as it is arrogant. It is predictable in the sense that, like other neocon initiatives in the past, it has no respect for the wishes of the people of the Middle East. His arguments are constructed upon the same worldview that sees conflict as an opportunity and warring nations as pawns in a larger game aimed at subduing people to achieve 'security' and 'stability' for the US and its supposed allies.
It is also arrogant for the obvious reason that he believes the world should be designed to fit the narrow, self-serving, and often violent visions of failed politicians like himself, who, alas, has access to the US's most respected newspapers.
Bolton's conceit has completely blinded him to the failures of the Bush administration and the entire collapse of the neo-conservatives intellectual discourse during and following the Iraq war. On the contrary, he is asking to repeat what went wrong in Iraq.
"As we did in Iraq with the 2006 'Anbar Awakening,' the counter-insurgency operation that dislodged Al Qaeda from its stronghold in that Iraqi province, we and our allies must empower viable Sunni leaders, including tribal authorities, who prize their existing social structure," he wrote.
Only an unreasonable person cannot appreciate how the sectarian seed that the US has sowed in Iraq, based on the recommendations of the likes of Bolton, has resulted in the disfiguring of the Iraqi nation. This massive tampering with the social, cultural, religious, and political fabric of society - by first empowering the Shia, oppressing the Sunni, then turning the Sunnis against one another, and so forth - has paved the way for unity among various Sunni groups, which ultimately formed ISIS.
It is the grand experimentations of Bolton and his peers that made ISIS the 'state' that it is today, which he is proposing to replace with yet another sectarian state, thus slicing up two Arab countries that were once the seats of the two most prominent Caliphate civilizations in history, the Abbasid and the Umayyad.
But for what purpose and at what price? If meddling at a relatively small scale has turned the Middle East into a perpetual inferno and roped in regional and international rivals into a war that seems to be in constant expansion, one can only imagine what such a large-scale reconfiguration of the region could lead to; and for what? So that Bolton can ensure the complete dismantling of the region in favor of Israel and that a buffer state can be established to block the Iranian influence in Syria and Lebanon? So that his country could gain access to more oil supplies? So, would Russia's attempt at having a stake in the future Middle East be thwarted?
Whatever it is, the neo-conservatives should never be allowed access to the Middle East discourse, and their visions, those of doom and destruction, should remain confined to their ever-mushrooming think tanks.
True, it is the perpetual war and horrific rivalries in the Middle East that have finally empowered the neocons to stage a comeback, but considering the damage that these groups have already done, one is certain that no good can come from Bolton and his clique.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Gitmo Prisoner, Hunger-Striking for Nine Years, Cleared for Release
Saudi Arabia native 'has exercised a peaceful means of protest by refusing to consume food' since 2005, says lawyer
Jun 26, 2015
A U.S. government review board said Friday that Abdul Rahman Shalabi, a prisoner who has been on a nine-year hunger strike at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has been cleared to return to his native Saudi Arabia.
Shalabi, one of the first prisoners brought to Guantanamo in January 2002, was never charged with a crime. The government said he had been a bodyguard for Osama bin Laden and had links to al Qaeda's external operations chief, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who is facing trial by military commission at Guantanamo.
The Periodic Review Board--which was established by the Obama administration in 2011 as part of the effort to close the prison at Guantanamo--said in a statement (pdf) published on its website that Shalabi could be released to take part in a Saudi government rehabilitation program for militants and would be subject to monitoring afterward.
"The Board acknowledges the detainee's past terrorist-related activities and connections," the final determination statement (pdf) reads. However, it continues, "in light of the factors and conditions of the transfer...the risk the detainee presents can be adequately mitigated. The detainee does not appear to be in contact with any extremists and his family has no known ties to extremism."
Shalabi has been on hunger strike since 2005, with his lawyer telling (pdf) the review board in April "he has exercised a peaceful means of protest by refusing to consume food and has largely cooperated with the enteral feedings he has been provided on a daily basis over the last nine years."
According to the Associated Press, the U.S. now holds 116 men at Guantanamo, including 52 cleared for transfer or release.
On Thursday, attorneys at the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed papers demanding the immediate release of another hunger-striking detainee--cleared Guantanamo prisoner Tariq Ba Odah, who has been on hunger strike for eight years to protest his continued indefinite detention and solitary conditions of confinement at the prison. According to medical experts, the military's force-feeding regimen is failing to keep him alive; Ba Odah currently weighs only approximately 75 lbs.--56 percent of his ideal body weight.
"Mr. Ba Odah has been imprisoned at Guantanamo for 13 years, and yet, despite the fact that he was cleared for release by top U.S. security agencies more than five years ago, the U.S. has refused to repatriate him to Saudi Arabia, where his family resides or resettle him in a third country," CCR stated.
"What excuse could the Obama administration possibly have to continue delaying his freedom?" asked CCR's advocacy program manager for the Guantanamo Global Justice Initiative, Aliya Hana Hussain, in a blog post on Friday. "None. It is the Defense Department's gross negligence that has Tariq on the precipice of death, holding on to the only way he has of reflecting back what Guantanamo has done to him and others."
Friday also marks the United Nations' International Day in Support of Victims of Torture.
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy