War in Iraq: Fallujah metal jacket: A city sacrificed for… something

The dead know only one thing: It is better to be alive

Nearly two weeks after US forces surged into the Iraqi city of Fallujah, purported hiding place of arch-beheader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the city is under US control (or maybe not?) and in ruins. Aid supplies have been prevented from reaching helpless civilians (men aged 15-50 were not allowed to leave the city and 800 are feared dead) while contractors are waiting to spend $178 million to rebuild the city. Fallujah had long been controlled by insurgents who thwarted previous attempts at pacification (even by an ex-Saddam era general) and eventual US control was never really questioned (at least until after November 2 when the real battle and serious talk of elections could begin). The discovery of possible hostage slaughterhouses underscored the confidence that Zarqawi’s group had in the city, but the real news came at the release of a pool video showing the execution of a wounded insurgent by a US Marine in a Fallujah mosque. Although fellow Marines later rallied around their comrade, the soldier was suspended and a UN official denounced the human rights violations taking place (without naming names). Meanwhile, new attacks against Iraqi police and US forces sprouted across the Sunni heartland and in Mosul, prompting US Marines and Iraqi troops to continue their insurgent whack-a-mole. More? A leading Sunni party (the minority) left the fledgling Iraqi government after the Fallujah attacks and a new policy apparently aimed at destroying cities to save them. “The Americans don’t want this place to be quiet,” said Mohammad Hassan al-Balwa, a Fallujah businessman. “From the beginning they brought chaos and treated people badly. The pressure the Americans put on the Fallujan people is what has made them so tough.” And trying to get some attention amidst the chaos, a shadowy group later murdered Margaret Hassan, the Iraq director of CARE International (babies and kittens are next) and someone even al-Zarqawi called to release. Concerns continue about the ability of the US to contain the spreading insurgency and the viability of the Iraqi government amidst growing resentment. “There are elections, and then there are legitimate, successful elections,” said a senior aide at the independent Iraqi Election Commission on condition of anonymity. “The most we can hope for right now is the first kind.”

Zahed Amanullah is associate editor of altmuslim.com.  He is based in London, England.