Falluja report: more mass graves, dead bodies, scavengers, and continued fighting

Residents of a village neighbouring Falluja have told Aljazeera that they helped bury the bodies of 73 women and children who were burnt to death by a US bombing attack.

"We buried them here, but we could not identify them because they were charred by the use of napalm bombs used by the Americans," said one resident of Saqlawiya in footage aired on Aljazeera on Sunday.

There have been no reports of the US military using napalm in Falluja and no independent verification of the claims.

The resident told Aljazeera all the bodies were buried in a single grave.

Late last week, US troops in Falluja called on some residents who had fled the fighting to return and help bury the dead.

However, according to other residents who managed to flee the fighting after US forces entered the city, hundreds more bodies still lay in the streets and were being fed on by packs of wild dogs.

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Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Falluja remained too dangerous to secure proper retrieval and burial of corpses.

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"The city is still suffering shortage of public services. There is no water or electricity. There is no way to offer medical treatment for the injured families still surrounded inside the city," he added.

  Aljazeera article

Another truckload of bodies reached the outskirts of the city for burial Friday in a ceremony marked by anger at U.S. troops, who say they killed 1,200 Iraqi and foreign fighters.

With Marines scouring the largely deserted city house by house and occasionally clashing with remnants of the insurgent force, travel in or out is limited but the Americans have allowed local voluntary organizations to retrieve some bodies.

Two dozen arrived on a truck at the dusty outlying village of Saqlawiya Friday, greeted by a crowd of about 150 men who removed the corpses from military body bags to try to identify them and to bury them in shrouds, according to Muslim custom.

Amid the flies and stench of the blackened and bloated bodies, apparently dead for many days, identification was next to impossible but most appeared to be of men of fighting age and at least one wore an ammunition vest.

U.S. commanders say they do not believe civilians were killed during the offensive begun 11 days ago.

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As onlookers stood in line to hear the traditional prayers for the dead, the preacher also called for revenge on Americans and their Iraqi allies, who believe the assault on Falluja has "broken the back" of the Sunni Muslim insurgency.

"We ask you God to be merciful," the preacher chanted.

"Shake the earth beneath the feet of the Americans, shake the earth beneath the feet of the Crusaders, shake the earth beneath the feet of the hypocrites that help them.

"God grant victory to Iraq."

  ABC News article

On the eve of the assault on Falluja, the US military ordered troops to shoot any male on the street between the ages of 15 and 50 if they were seen as a security threat, regardless of whether they had a weapon.

"You are killers, not murderers. You are warriors not war criminals. Don't cross that line."

Those were the words of a US officer to his men before they took part in the recent assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja.

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"The enemy can dress as a woman, the enemy can be faking to be dead," said one company commander to his marines before entering the heart of the city. "So shoot everything that moves and everything that doesn't move," he said.

The photographer embedded with this unit, which carried out some of the most dangerous missions on the frontlines of the Falluja battle, said the rules of engagement were gradually modified as the situation evolved.

"A marine was killed when a unit entered a house. They pulled out and dynamited the building, but when they moved back in, an arm stuck out from under the rubble and threw a grenade," he said.

The photographer, who did not wish to identify his unit, said the fear of human bombers combined with the discovery that fighters were taking amphetamines and adrenaline prompted his platoon to take new measures.

"From that point on, the rule was the so-called 'double tap': two bullets in every body," he said.

The night before the assault began, the order came down that troops could shoot any male on the street between the ages of 15 and 50 if they were viewed as a security threat, regardless of whether they had a weapon.

When marines asked a gunnery sergeant for clarification, he told his men if they saw any military-aged males on the street "Drop 'em."

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After one marine was killed and five were wounded on the second day of the assault, the military command ordered platoons to spray homes with machine-gun and tank fire before entering them, in an effort to kill members of the resistance lurking inside waiting for them.

  Brunei Direct article

Yes, after telling the civilians in Falluja to stay inside their houses and they would be safe.

FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. Marines searching from house to house in Falluja are finding weapons caches everywhere from an upscale villa to the homes of Iraqi policemen.

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Rebel snipers fire on search parties eager to stabilise Falluja after seizing control. Some houses are booby-trapped. Some weapons are hidden behind paintings, in air conditioning units and in couches -- and the arms supply seems endless.

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"We found policemen with mortars and mines and surface-to-air missiles. What policeman do you know that needs that?" said 2nd Lieutenant James Collins, 23, of Jamesville, North Carolina.

  Reuters article

Oh, you mean it isn't foreign fighters? You mean the very Iraqis we claim to be training to help us "stabilize" the country are fighting us? Oh, no, I'm sure you don't mean that.

Here's a look at it from Jamaica...

As for the city's inhabitants, the US military repeatedly assured the world that some 250,000 of its 300,000 population (again, those neatly rounded figures!) had fled Falluja in advance. But where exactly they fled to - that, we have not been told. A quarter of a million people is a lot of people! Where are they now; and how have they been accessing the bare necessities of life?

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A Bush-supporting US congressman, whose name I sorely regret having missed, had no doubt his finest moment when he told CNN that among the many benefits Fallujans would reap from this heraldic harvest of blood and concrete was 'the tremendous number of jobs' they were going to get when the rebuilding of the city begins. (Bet you never thought of that antidote to unemployment, Mr Patterson - flatten downtown Kingston and then rebuild it!)

If fewer people made it out of the city than claimed, look at it this way....there will be less job competition for rebuilding. Continue reading 'The battle for Falluja' in the Jamaican Observer.