- FALLUJAH (IPS) -- Iraqis in the volatile al-Anbar province
west of Baghdad are reporting regular killings carried out by U.S. forces
that many believe are part of a 'genocidal' strategy.
-
- Since the mysterious explosion at the Shia al-Askari
shrine in Samara in February last year, more than 100 Iraqis have been
killed daily on average, without any forceful action by the Iraqi government
and the U.S. military to stop the killings.
-
- U.S. troops and Iraqi security forces working with them
are also executing people seized during home raids and other operations,
residents say.
- "Seventeen young men were found executed after they
were arrested by U.S. troops and Fallujah police," 40-year-old Yassen
of Fallujah told IPS. "My two sons have been detained by police, and
I am terrified that they will have the same fate. They are only 17 and
18 years old."
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- Residents of Fallujah say the local police detention
centre holds hundreds of men, who have had no legal representation.
-
- Others are killed by random fire that has long become
routine for U.S. and Iraqi soldiers. Sa'ad, a 25-year-old from the al-Thubbat
area of western Fallujah was killed in such firing.
-
- "The poor guy kept running home every time he saw
U.S. soldiers," a man from his neighbourhood, speaking on condition
of anonymity, told IPS. "He used to say: Go inside or the Americans
will kill you." Sa'ad is said by neighbours to have developed a mental
disability.
-
- He was recently shot and killed by U.S. soldiers when
they opened fire after their patrol was struck by a roadside bomb.
-
- Last week, U.S. military fire severely damaged the highest
minaret in Fallujah after three soldiers were killed in an attack. What
was seen as reprisal fire on the minaret has angered residents.
-
- "They hate us because we are Muslims, and no one
can argue with that any more," 65- year-old Abu Fayssal who witnessed
the event told IPS. "They say they are fighting al- Qeada but they
are only capable of killing our sons with their genocidal campaign and
destroying our mosques."
- Others believe occupation forces have another sinister
strategy.
-
- "It is our people killing each other now as planned
by the Americans," Abdul Sattar, a 45- year-old lawyer and human rights
activist in Fallujah told IPS. "They recruited Saddam's security men
to control the situation by well-known methods like hanging people by their
legs and electrifying them in order to get information. Now they are executing
them without trial."
-
- IPS has obtained photographs of an elderly man who residents
say was executed last month by U.S. soldiers.
-
- "Last month was full of horrifying events,"
a retired police officer from Fallujah told IPS. "Three men were executed
by American soldiers in the al-Bu Issa tribal area just outside Fallujah.
One of them was 70 years old and known as a very good man, and the others
were his relatives. They were asleep when the raid was conducted."
-
- Another three men from the same tribe were executed similarly
in ar-Rutba town near the Jordanian border. Their tribe did not carry out
the usual burial ceremony for fear that more people would be killed. Instead,
a cousin performed a religious ceremony in Amman in Jordan.
-
- "Seven people were executed in al-Qa'im recently,
at the Syrian border," Khalid Haleem told IPS on telephone from al-Qa'im.
"They were gathering at a friend's place for dinner when Americans
surrounded the house, with armoured vehicles with helicopters covering
them from the air. Those killed were good men and we believe the Americans
were misinformed."
-
- Adding to the violence are U.S.-backed Shia militias
which regularly raid Sunni areas under the eyes of the U.S. and Iraqi army.
Residents of Fallujah, Ramadi, and especially Baghdad have regularly reported
to IPS over the last two years that Shia militiamen are allowed through
U.S. military cordons into Sunni neighbourhoods to conduct raids.
-
- Last month, residents report, more than 100 men aged
20 to 40 were executed by Shia militias in Iskandariya 40 km south of Baghdad
and Tal Afar 350 km northwest of the capital. Another 50 were detained
by the Iraqi Army's fifth division, that many believe is the biggest death
squad in the country.
-
- A U.S. military spokesperson in Baghdad told IPS that
their troops "use caution and care when conducting home raids"
and "in no way support Shi'ite death squads and militias."
-
- In the face of the U.S.-backed violence, most Iraqis
now openly support attacks against occupation forces.
-
- "The genocidal Americans are paying for all that,"
a young man from Fallujah told IPS. "They seem to be in need of another
lesson by the lions of Fallujah and Anbar." He was referring to the
intensive resistance attacks in and around Fallujah that have killed dozens
of U.S. and Iraqi soldiers this month.
-
- According to the U.S. military, at least 1,194 U.S. soldiers
have died in al-Anbar province since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March
2003. The number is far higher than in any other province in Iraq.
-
- (*Ali, our correspondent in Baghdad, works in close collaboration
with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who travels
extensively in the region)
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