'655,000 Iraqis killed since invasion'
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- Written by Sarah Boseley, health editor Sarah Boseley, health editor
- Published: 11 October 2006 11 October 2006
- Hits: 6521 6521
The figure for the number of deaths attributable to the conflict - which amounts to around 2.5% of the population - is at odds with figures cited by the US and UK governments and will cause a storm, but the Lancet says the work, from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, has been examined and validated by four separate independent experts who all urged publication.
"Although such death rates might be common in times of war, the combination of a long duration and tens of millions of people affected has made this the deadliest international conflict of the 21st century and should be of grave concern to everyone," write the authors, Gilbert Burnham and colleagues.
Just Another Mother Murdered
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- Written by ALISON WEIR ALISON WEIR
- Published: 08 October 2006 08 October 2006
- Hits: 6540 6540
There was nothing on CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, PBS, NPR, Fox News. Nothing.
The LA Times, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and Associated Press each had one sentence, at most, telling about her. All three left out the details, the LA Times had her age significantly off, and the Washington Post reported that she had been killed by an Israeli tank shell.
It hadn't been a tank shell that had killer her, according to witnesses. It had been bullets, multiple ones, fired up close.
Lunch in Damascus
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- Written by Uri Avnery, Gush Shalom Uri Avnery, Gush Shalom
- Published: 08 October 2006 08 October 2006
- Hits: 6570 6570
Suddenly I had an inspiration. "When we have peace," I said, "You can take your taxi in the morning and go to Damascus, have lunch there with real authentic Hummus and come back home in the evening."
He jumped at the idea. "Wow," he exclaimed, "If that happens, I shall take you with me for nothing!"
"And I shall treat you to lunch," I responded.
He continued to dream. "If I could go to Damascus in my car, I could drive on from there all the way to Paris!"
Israel's 'Nowhereland': Security fence is doomed land grab
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- Written by Gershom Gorenberg Gershom Gorenberg
- Published: 08 October 2006 08 October 2006
- Hits: 6873 6873
Next to the road that leads south from Jerusalem to Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the big yellow machines are scraping the earth, carving a flat, white, dusty shoulder. Along that strip, a high concrete wall is already being built, part of the newest segment of Israel's "separation fence." The planned route loops around the cluster of settlements known as the Etzion Bloc, putting them on the Israeli side of the de facto border.
Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy is stalled. The bulldozers are not. Once again they are changing the face of the land in a way that makes life far more difficult for Palestinians while damaging Israel's own long-term interests.
As described by Israel's Defense Ministry, the fence is purely a security measure intended to protect Israelis from Palestinian terrorists. Instead of running along the Green Line, the Israel-West Bank border, the route has been drawn to place major "settlement blocs" on the Israeli side -- supposedly only to defend them as well.
Read more: Israel's 'Nowhereland': Security fence is doomed land grab
Iraqi-Kurd bomb clearance team flies into Lebanon
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- Written by Mine Advisory Group Mine Advisory Group
- Published: 07 October 2006 07 October 2006
- Hits: 6831 6831
Read more: Iraqi-Kurd bomb clearance team flies into Lebanon