From: rhinoceros (rhinoceros@freemail.gr)
Date: Tue May 25 2004 - 09:41:00 MDT
This story from.... "Al-Associated Press" somehow slipped our attention.
Iraq Desert Bombing Video Shows Carnage
Associated Press, May 21, 2004
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=12&u=/ap/20040521/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_wedding_attack
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Fragments of musical instruments, tufts of women's hair, and a large blood stain are among the scenes in Associated Press Television News film of a destroyed house that survivors say U.S. planes bombed during a wedding party.
It is the first known footage from the site of Wednesday's attack, which killed up to 45 people, mostly women and children from the Bou Fahad tribe in Mogr el-Deeb, a desert village on the Syrian border.
The U.S. military has said the target was a suspected safehouse for foreign fighters from Syria and denied Friday that children were killed in the airstrikes.
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt told reporters in Baghdad that U.S. troops who reported back from the operation "told us they did not shoot women and children."
"There were a number of woman, a handful of women, I think the number was four to six, caught up in the engagement. They may have died from some of the fire that came from the aircraft," Kimmitt said.
But an Associated Press reporter in the Ramadi area, at least 275 miles east of Mogr el-Deeb, was able to identify at least 10 of the bodies as those of children.
At the Bou Fahad cemetery outside Ramadi, where the tribe is based, each of the 28 fresh graves contain one to three corpses, mostly of mothers and their young children.
Relatives said they include those of 2-year-old Kholood and 1-year-old Anoud, daughters of Amal Rikad, who was killed; of 2-year-old Raad and 1-year-old Ra'ed — whose headless body was found near his house — sons of Fatima Madhi, who was killed; of Saad, 10, Faisal, 7, Anoud, 6, Fasila, 5, Kholood, 4, and Inad, 3 — children of Mohammed and Morifa Rikad, who were killed.
There also are photo images of dead children, but it was not possible to determine if those victims were already accounted for by relatives.
In Washington, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers told Congress that "we feel at this point very confident that this was a legitimate target, probably foreign fighters" who may have ties to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian wanted for allegedly organizing attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq (news - web sites) on behalf of al-Qaida.
<snip>
"What we saw in those APTN videos were substantially inconsistent with the reports we received from the unit that conducted the operation," Kimmitt said. "We're now trying to figure out why there's an inconsistency.
<snip>
http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20040521.wedd0521/BNStory/International/
<snip>
The first bomb struck the main tent at about 2:45 a.m., the survivors said. Among those who died was Hussein al-Ali, a prominent wedding singer from Baghdad. The second bomb struck the stone house, killing everyone inside.
Survivors said shells rained down for hours.
Two helicopters landed and about 40 soldiers searched the house where the women had stayed and a second, vacant house. Soon after, the two houses were blown up — although witnesses offered differing accounts of how. Some said the houses were attacked by helicopters. Others said the Americans detonated them with explosives.
Some of the men tried to approach the Americans but were driven back by gunshots, the survivors said. The troops took money and jewellery the dead women had brought for the party, survivors said.
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