attending a wedding party were killed Wednesday, May 19, in a U.S. airstrike. The attack, initially reported by The Associated Press (AP), overshadowed news that the first of U.S. military trials in Iraq stemming from a prisoner abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib detention facility ended with the conviction of Army Specialist Jeremy Sivits.
The 24-year old Sivits received the maximum penalty of one year in prison, reduction in rank, and a bad conduct discharge from the Army. Sivits, who worked at the Abu Ghraib prison last year as a mechanic in a military police unit, pleaded guilty to three abuse charges. Reports said the plea was part of a deal to receive leniency in exchange for his testimony against six other soldiers, who are believed to have played much bigger roles in the abuses.
Yet world media camera’s quickly turned towards the remote desert near the border with Syria, where more than 40 people, most of them women and children, were Iraqi officials said. The U.S. military said it was investigating, AP reported.
BLOODIED BODIES
The Associated Press Television News footage showed a truck containing bloodied bodies, many wrapped in blankets, piled one atop the other. Several were children, one of whom had been decapitated.
The attack reportedly occurred about 2:45 a.m. local time in a desert region near the border with Syria and Jordan, according to Lt. Col. Ziyad al-Jbouri, deputy police chief of Ramadi, the provincial capital about 250 miles (about 400 kilometers) to the east. He said between 42 and 45 people died, including 15 children and 10 women. Dr. Salah al-Ani, who works at a hospital in Ramadi, put the death toll at 45, AP said.
The area, a desolate region populated only by shepherds, is popular with smugglers, including weapons smugglers, and the U.S. military suspects militants use it as a route to slip in from Syria to fight the Americans. It is under constant surveillance by American forces.
VOLLEY OF GUNFIRE
Iraqis interviewed on the videotape said revelers had fired volleys of gunfire into the air in a traditional wedding celebration before the attack took place. American troops have sometimes mistaken celebratory gunfire for hostile fire.
"This was a wedding and the (U.S.) planes came and attacked the people at a house. Is this the democracy and freedom that (President) Bush has brought us?" said a man on the videotape, Dahham Harraj. "There was no reason."
Another man shown on the tape, who refused to give his name, said the victims were at a wedding party "and the U.S. military planes came… and started killing everyone in the house."
SECOND INCIDENT
In July 2002, Afghan officials said 48 civilians at a wedding party were killed and 117 wounded by a U.S. airstrike in Afghanistan’s Uruzgan province. An investigative report released by the U.S. Central Command said the airstrike was justified because American planes had come under fire, AP recalled.
The latest incident was expected to lead to further frustration among allies of America, including Hungary, which has urged Washington to bring Iraq under United Nations control. There is also concern that it will fuel more Islamic extremism in the area. Besides attacking American forces, Iraq’s minority Christians have also suffered as they are often see as pro-Western, BosNewsLife established.
