Could Haditha Be A Rathergate?

[Annie]

I would say this is interesting and I wouldn't be surprised. I thought I posted this yesterday, but I can't find it:



http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5566

Haditha: Is McGirk the New Mary Mapes?
June 9th, 2006

Evidence accumulates of a hoax in Haditha. The weblog Sweetness & Light has done an estimable service gathering together the articles which cast substantial doubt on the charge of a massacre of civilians at Haditha . Because the blog is too busy gathering and fisking the news, I offered and the publisher accepted my offer to put what he has uncovered in a narrative form.

Having done so, I can tell you that the story has a whiff of yet another mediagenic scandal like the TANG memos or the Plame “outing.” While the Marines quite correctly will not comment on the case pending the outcome of their investigation, I am not bound by those rules, and I will sum up the story for you.

(a) On November 20, 2005, Reuters reported that on the previous day an IED killed a US Marine and 15 civilians in Haditha, a town known to be a center of the insurgency, a town as hostile to our forces as the better known Fallujah was. Reuters reported that “immediately after the blast, gunmen opened fire on the convoy” and US and Iraqi forces returned fire, killing 8 insurgents and wounding another in the fight. The paper further reported that “A cameraman working for Reuters in Haditha says bodies had been left lying in the street for hours after the attack.” Reuters never named this cameraman but he was almost undoubtedly Ali al-Mashhadani.

(b) Ali al-Mashhadani had been imprisoned for five months before his report because of his ties to insurgents. He was subsequently placed under another 12 days in detention for being a security threat.

(c) Tim McGirk of Time wrote about the incident at Haditha for the March 27 issue of the magazine. He unsuccessfully lobbied his editors to use the term “massacre” in the story. McGirk seems hardly a neutral reporter. He spent the first Thanksgiving after 9/11 in Afghanistan dining with the Taliban and concluding of this celebratory meal:

Our missing colleagues finally arrive, and I leave thinking that maybe this evening wasn’t very different from the original Thanksgiving: people from two warring cultures sharing a meal together and realizing, briefly, that we’re not so different after all.

Right, Tim. We all want to enslave women, bend the world to Sharia law, behead nonbelievers and otherwise carry on the honored traditions of the Taliban.

A key source for McGirk’s report that US Marines in Haditha had deliberately attacked civilians was Thaer al-Hadithi. whom McGirk inexplicably described as “a budding journalism student”. He is a middle-aged man, and was subsequently described by the AP as an “Iraqi investigator.”

McGirk also failed to note that Hadithi is “a member and spokesman for the Hammurabi.” The chairman of Hammurabi Organization and Hadithi’s partner in publicizing the “massacre” is Abdul–Rahman al-Mashhadani. It is unknown if he is related to Ali al-Mashhadani but their names suggest a possible relationship, and it beggars belief that as Sweetness& Light notes,

“Abdel Rahman al-Mashhadani just happened to be given a video by and unnamed local. And that he then turned it over to Ali al-Mashhadani who just happens to make videos for Reuters.”

Hadithi’s story is that was staying near to one of the two houses where the massacre occurred and saw it with his own eyes. According to his version of events he waited one day to videotape what had occurred, though apparently nothing prevented his doing so from the very window he “watched” it from as it took place. More troubling is why he waited months to turn the tape over to anyone.

The actions of his partner al-Mashhadani are equally puzzling. On December 15, 2005 Mashhadani was interviewed by the Institute for War and Peace which described him as “an election monitor.” In that interview he expressed great satisfaction with the election turnout (which in fact was terribly low in Haditha). Why did he not mention to this apparently sympathetic group one word about the supposed “atrocity” which he claimed had occurred three months earlier?

Hammurabi apparently did share the video in March with the largely Soros-funded Human Rights Watch which in turn provided it to Time.

(d) The videotape. On March 21, 2006 Reuters reported that Hadithi and Mashhadani’s organization, the Hammurabi Organization, had provided the organization was a copy of a videotape showing corpses lined up in the Haditha morgue, claiming these were the bodies of civilians deliberately killed by the Marines. Aside from the suspiciously-timed release of the video and the fact that chairman al-Mashhadani had never mentioned the incident or the tape in December when he was interviewed, the video shows people removing bodies from a home, a report at odds with the Reuters report the day after the incident which spoke of bodies lying in the street.

(e) The witnesses to the “massacre”

(1) The Doctor.

In the March 27 report, McGirk quotes the local doctor:

Dr. Wahid, director of the local hospital in Haditha, who asked that his family name be withheld because, he says, he fears reprisals by U.S. troops, says the Marines brought 24 bodies to his hospital around midnight on Nov. 19. Wahid says the Marines claimed the victims had been killed by shrapnel from the roadside bomb. “But it was obvious to us that there were no organs slashed by shrapnel,” Wahid says. “The bullet wounds were very apparent. Most of the victims were shot in the chest and the head–from close range.”

Another report however, indicates the doctor bore considerable animus to the US troops.

(2)The Iraqi eye-witnesses.

In “Haditha: Reasonable Doubt,” Andrew Walden describes how a similar case against British soldiers fell apart , describing the Arabic “blood money” tradition which hardly is as exotic as it sounds. Ask the American Trial Lawyers Association.

Reports of the eyewitnesses are conflicting and incredible. Al-Haditha was the source of a report by the AP on the death of a man whom the Washington Post quoted 10 times as an eyewitness on May 27,six months after his reported death, and the young girl “survivor” has given between two and four utterly inconsistent versions of the events.

(3) The American eye witnesses.

There are two American witnesses who have spoken out. Despite the press spin, neither has a first hand account of the events.

Lance Cpl. James Crossan is the source of some very selective quotes on the incident. He, however, was wounded in the IED explosion which killed the US Marine Martin Terrazas. He was evacuated from the scene and saw none of the after-action.

And then there is Lance Cpl. Ryan Briones. He helped evacuate Crossnan and took bodies to the morgue. He was not an eyewitness. He claims he took pictures of the bodies at the morgue and has made various statements about what happened to the pictures and his camera. Aside from the fact that he is not an eyewitness, and his claims about his photographs seem unlikely, his story remained unuttered until he was arrested for stealing a truck, driving under the influence and crashing the stolen vehicle into a house. It was then for the first time that he claimed post traumatic distress and pointed to Haditha as the source of that stress. (His report of taking the bodies to the morgue, moreover, seems inconsistent with the first Reuters report that there were 15 bodies left lying in the street the day after the incident.)

The sum and substance of this thumbnail sketch on the Haditha claims is that it follows so closely the template for the TANG and Plame stories. Take a reporter with an anti-Administration agenda, an interested group (think of the Mashhadanis as the VIPS in the Plame case or Burkett and Lucy Ramirez in the TANG case) and a story too good to be checked and circumstances where the people attacked are limited in what they can quickly respond to and you get a story which smells to me like it will soon be unraveled.

This time, I’m betting the consequences to the press which rushed to judgment will be more disastrous than it was to Dan Rather. I surely hope so.

 

[no1tovote4]

If this turns out to be a truth and Haditha was just a see BS story...

Wow, the Rs will retain control in this election!

 

[insein]

If this turns out to be a truth and Haditha was just a see BS story...

Wow, the Rs will retain control in this election!

Who cares about the R's or the D's. This is more about the ability of our National Media to print lies and create terror before the facts are known. This is misleading the public on the most perverse scale. Trying to manipulate the masses to convict soldiers as mass murderers before anyone knows ANYTHING!! This has got me so fired up reading this. If it does indeed turn out to be a hoax then people NEED to be arrested or at least fired for this atrocity.

 

[Bonnie]

I would say this is interesting and I wouldn't be surprised. I thought I posted this yesterday, but I can't find it:



http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5566

I hope and pray that if this is true that it comes out as such and isn't covered up as well.

 

[no1tovote4]

Who cares about the R's or the D's. This is more about the ability of our National Media to print lies and create terror before the facts are known. This is misleading the public on the most perverse scale. Trying to manipulate the masses to convict soldiers as mass murderers before anyone knows ANYTHING!! This has got me so fired up reading this. If it does indeed turn out to be a hoax then people NEED to be arrested or at least fired for this atrocity.

I think it hovers close to Treason, if not climbing right on that bird like a parasite ready to suck blood.

 

[nt250]

What's the TANG story?

Sorry, I've never heard that term before.

 

[red states rule]

I hope and pray that if this is true that it comes out as such and isn't covered up as well.

or this one from the liberal media..............

In a recent story on the alleged killing of Iraqi civilians by U.S. Marines in Haditha, The Times of London ran a brutal photograph of dead Iraqis lying in a bullet-riddled ditch, and the Chicago Sun-Times later ran a cartoon based on the photograph to attack the administration over the Haditha incident. But it turns out that the photograph actually depicts Iraqis murdered by Sunni insurgents months before the Haditha incident.

The Times, which is owned by the parent company of this network, issued a correction, and the Sun-Times says it "deeply regrets" what it called its "egregious error," adding, "we apologize to the U.S. servicemen, especially those in the Marine Corps, and to our readers who were understandably offended."

 

[Annie]

I hope and pray that if this is true that it comes out as such and isn't covered up as well.

Well like Rathergate, if it's false it will be up to the new media to get it out there, here's more from Sweetness & Light. Lots of links:

http://www.sweetness-light.com/archive/time-corrects-its-mistakes-about-haditha

Collateral Damage or Civilian Massacre in Haditha?

Last November, U.S. Marines killed 15 Iraqi civilians in their homes. Was it self-defense, an accident or cold-blooded revenge? A Time exclusive

From TIME
By TIM MCGIRK / BAGHDAD

Sunday, Mar. 19, 2006

In the original version of this story, TIME reported that "a day after the incident, a Haditha journalism student videotaped the scene at the local morgue and at the homes where the killings had occurred. The video was obtained by the Hammurabi Human Rights Group, which cooperates with the internationally respected Human Rights Watch, and has been shared with TIME." In fact, Human Rights Watch has no ties or association with the Hammurabi Human Rights Group. TIME regrets the error.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1174649-1,00.html

One Morning in Haditha

U.S. Marines killed 15 Iraqi civilians in their homes last November. Was it self-defense, an accident or cold-blooded revenge?

By TIM MCGIRK/ BAGHDAD

Mar. 27, 2006

In the original version of this story, TIME reported that "a day after the incident, a Haditha journalism student videotaped the scene at the local morgue and at the homes where the killings had occurred. The video was obtained by the Hammurabi Human Rights Group, which cooperates with the internationally respected Human Rights Watch, and has been shared with TIME." In fact, Human Rights Watch has no ties or association with the Hammurabi Human Rights Group. TIME regrets the error.

http://time-proxy.yaga.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,1174682, 00.html

In fact, Time had originally reported that it was Human Rights Watch who had provided the tape. They then retracted that and claimed that it came from Hammurabi which works with Human Rights Watch. And now they have backed off even that.

Note that even now Time still does not correct the intentionally false portrayal of the source of the videotape that they gave in all of their original stories and interviews.

Time’s source, Thaer Thabit al-Hadithi, is not a "young man." He is not a "budding journalism student."

And al-Haditha is not separate and apart from the Hammurabi Human Rights Group. Nor is he a man who wanted to remain anonymous because he feared for his safety.

Thaer Thabit al-Hadithi

Al-Haditha is 43 years old. He "created" Hammurabi 16 months ago. (Before that he worked directly under the head of Haditha’s hospital, Dr. Walid al-Obeidi, who pronounced that all the victims had been shot at close range.)

In fact, al-Haditha is one of Hammurabi’s only two members. He serves as its "Secretary General" while the only other member, Abdul-Rahman al-Mashhadani, performs as its "Chairman.")

Al-Haditha is the one and only person behind this tape. He made it. And he sat on it for four months before turning it over to Time magazine.

But it looks like Time did not consider these mundane facts about the maker of this tape compelling enough. So they made up additional romantic details and invented the involvement of the "internationally respected Human Rights Watch" to burnish the video’s provenance.

It’s something Time does on a regular basis.

Here is another "correction" that is now buried at the bottom of another Time Haditha story from last month. It is by Matthew Cooper of Plame/Rove notoriety.

The Haditha Scandal’s Other Casualty
With the Pentagon completing its probe into whether U.S. forces massacred civilians one November morning in Western Iraq, the damage to America’s image abroad could take a further hit

By MATTHEW COOPER/WASHINGTON

Posted Friday, May. 26, 2006

In the original version of this story, TIME reported that "one of the most damning pieces of evidence investigators have in their possession, John Sifton of Human Rights Watch told Time’s Tim McGirk, is a photo, taken by a Marine with his cell phone that shows Iraqis kneeling — and thus posing no threat — before they were shot." While Sifton did tell TIME that there was photographic evidence, taken by Marines, he had only heard about the specific content of the photos from reports done by NBC, and had no firsthand knowledge. TIME regrets the error.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1198843,00.html

Never mind that now "one of the most damning pieces of evidence" has already taken on the mantle of historical fact. Time regrets the error.

So much so that they once again buried the correction at the bottom of its online archive of the story which few will revisit.

Clearly Time thinks very highly of the Soros-funded (and viscerally anti-American) Human Rights Watch. They use every opportunity to cite HRW to bolster their claims, even if they have to make things up.

Apparently Time believes invoking "the internationally respected Human Rights Watch" gives their questionably sourced facts credibility

And so what it if they aren’t involved?

Time can always sneak in a retraction later when nobody is looking, once the story has "gotten legs."
haditha time magazine

Related Articles:

* Reuters Reported "Bodies In The Street" At Haditha
* Why Did "Rights Group" Sit On Its Haditha Story?
* Did Marine Photographer Have A Personal Motive?
* Time's McGirk Wanted To Call Haditha "A Massacre"
* The Questionable Sources For Time's Haditha Scoop
* Haditha Lawyer Wants More "Compensation"
* Times Claims COs Knew Of Haditha Within 2 Days
* Haditha Reporter's Thanksgiving With The Taliban
* The Haditha Our Media Won't Tell You About
* Haditha Doctor Was Arrested, Hates US
* Haditha Reporter Was Jailed By US, Shares Name With Source
* What Google Considers News Sources For Haditha
* Times Begs For Tales Of "Marine Massacre"

This article was posted on Friday, June 9th, 2006 at 12:50 pm.

 

[red states rule]

It is nearly an everyday occurance. The liberal media gets another story wrong. No wonder folks are getting their news from other sources

Is that why Fox News is adding viewers and cable systems?

 

[musicman]

Another great find, Kathianne! Soros is going to be apoplectic with rage if the blogoshere busts his ass on this one. What's the point of being a tyrannical, manipulative, pathological liar if you can't control the flow of information?

I look for aggressive, increasingly frantic assaults on Internet control in the very near future.

 

[Annie]

Another great find, Kathianne! Soros is going to be apoplectic with rage if the blogoshere busts his ass on this one. What's the point of being a tyrannical, manipulative, pathological liar if you can't control the flow of information?

I look for aggressive, increasingly frantic assaults on Internet control in the very near future.

I must admit to hoping this was made up and they are caught. CBS is with it again regarding the story that Stephanie posted a bit ago. For Haditha it's TIME.

 

[musicman]

I've often wondered why the MSM/DNC don't - as a matter of simple survival - take realistic stock of their steadily worsening situation; their increasing irrelevance. Why don't they look at what alternative media do well, and emulate it?

But then I realize that they simply CANNOT. That would entail their following the truth wherever it took them, and presenting it faithfully - regardless of the dictates of political expediency. They would have to concern themselves with pursuing and reporting facts, rather than patiently indoctrinating and improving the great unwashed masses. In other words, they would have to change their essential selves. Not gonna happen.

 

[Annie]

I've often wondered why the MSM/DNC don't - as a matter of simple survival - take realistic stock of their steadily worsening situation; their increasing irrelevance. Why don't they look at what alternative media do well, and emulate it?

But then I realize that they simply CANNOT. That would entail their following the truth wherever it took them, and presenting it faithfully - regardless of the dictates of political expediency. They would have to concern themselves with pursuing and reporting facts, rather than patiently indoctrinating and improving the great unwashed masses. In other words, they would have to change their essential selves. Not gonna happen.

Actually I think it's proof they don't really believe what they profess to. 'The truth can be uncovered,' I mean that is what investigative journalism is all about. I think they do look, but what they find does not fit into their vision of what is the 'truth,' so they create some alternative reality to alleviate the dissonance, comforting themselves with the belief they are really providing the truth. For the rest of us, it would be considered a mental disorder.

 

[musicman]

Actually I think it's proof they don't really believe what they profess to. 'The truth can be uncovered,' I mean that is what investigative journalism is all about. I think they do look, but what they find does not fit into their vision of what is the 'truth,' so they create some alternative reality to alleviate the dissonance, comforting themselves with the belief they are really providing the truth. For the rest of us, it would be considered a mental disorder.

Insightful observation, K. It reminds me of Bernard Goldberg's sensible belief that Upper Manhattan Elites don't actually sit in their offices and say, "OK - how can we slant this particular story?" It's just that their perception ITSELF is so myopic - so divorced from reality - that they have lost the ability to think objectively.

 

[red states rule]

Insightful observation, K. It reminds me of Bernard Goldberg's sensible belief that Upper Manhattan Elites don't actually sit in their offices and say, "OK - how can we slant this particular story?" It's just that their perception ITSELF is so myopic - so divorced from reality - that they have lost the ability to think objectively.

As Rush put it, "The liberal media does not report what happened - they report what they want to happen"

 

[Abbey Normal]

Another great find, Kathianne! Soros is going to be apoplectic with rage if the blogoshere busts his ass on this one. What's the point of being a tyrannical, manipulative, pathological liar if you can't control the flow of information?

I look for aggressive, increasingly frantic assaults on Internet control in the very near future.

Hasn't this already started with Google's removal of certain news stories? There is a thread somewhere...

 

[Annie]

More is coming out on this today, links at site; including the WaPo article:

http://www.mudvillegazette.com/archives/005621.html

Haditha: The Accused Speak
Greyhawk

The other side of the story, from The Washington Post:

Marine Says Rules Were Followed
Sergeant Describes Hunt for Insurgents in Haditha, Denies Coverup

A sergeant who led a squad of Marines during the incident in Haditha, Iraq, that left as many as 24 civilians dead said his unit did not intentionally target any civilians, followed military rules of engagement and never tried to cover up the shootings, his attorney said.
<...>
[Staff Sgt. Frank D.] Wuterich's detailed version of what happened in the Haditha neighborhood is the first public account from a Marine who was on the ground when the shootings occurred. As the leader of 1st Squad, 3rd Platoon, Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, Wuterich was in the convoy of Humvees that was hit by a roadside bomb. He entered the house from which the Marines believed enemy fire was originating and made the initial radio reports to his company headquarters about what was going on, Puckett said.​

Read it all. The actual comments are by the Marines' lawyers, who are relating what the Marines told them.

The accounts given are actually consistent - on the broader story - with reports from Iraqi civilians (houses were entered, non-combatants were killed). But the Devil's in the details, as they say, and in this case (as with most such cases) that's where divergence occurs.

The issue will indeed be settled by a determination of whether the Marines followed rules of engagement for the circumstances. Two questions that are key to that issue are 1) did they correctly assess the situation and 2) did they respond appropriately to that assessment. On-the-scene decision makers have broad latitude to act in response to attack (this is not to imply they can shoot children with reckless abandon), must rely on training and experience to do so (the Marines had both), and obviously can't pull out an instruction manual to determine what to do in any combat situation.

It's worth noting that there are two investigations ongoing into events at Haditha, and that this report addresses both. The first is to determine what happened, the second to evaluate if a "cover up" followed. Obviously, initial reports that civilians were killed by the IED were wrong - but initial reports more often than not are wrong.

The "cover-up" investigation is complicated in that it involves individuals who were not on the scene (one of whom was the company commander of the Marines who were), and the potential for miscommunication as a story is "up-channeled" through multiple levels. According to the attorneys quoted in the Post:

Kevin B. McDermott, who is representing Capt. Lucas M. McConnell, the Kilo Company commander, said Wuterich and other Marines informed McConnell on the day of the incident that at least 15 civilians were killed by "a mixture of small-arms fire and shrapnel as a result of grenades" after the Marines responded to an attack from a house.

McConnell was relieved of his command in April for "failure to investigate," according to McDermott. But the lawyer said McConnell told him that he reported the high number of civilian deaths to the 3rd Battalion executive officer that afternoon and that within a few days the battalion's intelligence chief gave a PowerPoint presentation to Marine commanders.

"It wasn't a situation that dawned on him as the captain of Kilo where it was like, 'Okay, guys, we need to conduct a more thorough investigation,' " McDermott said. "Everywhere up the chain, they had ample access to this thing."
<...>
Marine Corps public affairs officers reported that the civilians had been killed in the bomb blast, a report that Puckett [the attorney representing Wuterich in the ongoing investigation] believes was the result of a miscommunication.
​

Another question to be answered in the investigation and possible court martial (and apart from the "cover-up" charge) is whether commanders were negligent in failing to further investigate the deaths. In hindsight this may seem obvious, but the determination must be made based on information available at the time. The statement that Captain McConnell was relieved for that cause may not be completely correct - earlier reports indicated he - and his commander - were relieved by Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski, commanding general of the 1st Marine Division, "because he [Natonski] lacked confidence in their leadership, based on their recent deployment to Iraq and a series of actions by the battalion." (A third officer was relieved at the same time for unrelated reasons.)

The story is complex, and this is certainly not the first case where accounts of various parties conflict, or in which the accused maintain their innocence. Regardless of the feelings or opinions of others watching the story unfold, the task of determining the need for a trial (court martial) in this event falls to investigators. And if such is the outcome, the determination of guilt or innocence will be made by a panel formed for that purpose...

From yesterday, there is video link here:

http://www.riehlworldview.com/carnivorous_conservative/2006/06/haditha_marines.html

 

[Annie]

Oh my, there is much more. Lots of links:

http://www.riehlworldview.com/carnivorous_conservative/2006/06/haditha_lies_ex.html

Haditha Media Errors Exposed

To keep this straight-forward, I'm taking this item by item. It proves there are false reports being told by some Iraqis as regards Haditha. Unfortunately, the AP and the MSM appear to be gleefully reporting them without checking their facts.

From the AP today:

At about the same time, a man who stepped out of his nearby house to see what was happening at Ayed Ahmed's home was shot and wounded, according to al-Hadithi. Aws Fahmi, 43, was left to bleed on the street for about two hours before a female neighbor dragged him to safety, al-Hadithi told the AP. Fahmi's family was not able to take him to a hospital until two days later, al-Hadithi said.​

Someone must have forgotten that Aws Fahmi was quoted ten times in this WaPo piece from May27, as a witness. Not once did he claim to be involved, let alone shot. Are we to believe he forgot? Or that the WaPo wouldn't tell the story of a man shot and left to die in the street by our Marines?

Aws Fahmi, a Haditha resident who said he watched and listened from his home as Marines went from house to house killing members of three families ... After the killings, Fahmi said, more Americans arrived at the scene. They shouted among themselves. The Marines cordoned off the block; then, and for at least the next day, Marines filed into the houses, looked around and came out.​

In the WaPo piece Fahmi also claims to have observed events in part from his roof.

Then one of the Marines took charge and began shouting, said Fahmi, who was watching from his roof.​

But if you look at this account from the AP on June 3, you'll see that it is now an Iraqi lawyer looking for cash, Khaled Salam Rsayef who is bringing all the new information out and claiming to have been the observer on the roof. The names are changed but the accounts are the same.

Rsayef said his account of what happened was based on his personal observations from the rooftop of his home and windows.​

Now look at these two different accounts below, both from the same eyewitness, the young girl who survived and was filmed by ABC calling for the execution of the Marines. She's told at least two versions of her story and possibly as many as four.

AP June 3rd - In an off-camera conversation with the cameraman, Iman, the 9-year-old survivor, told of hiding under a bed for hours after the shootings. She said Marines finally found her and initially took her for dead when they pulled her out. ... The Marines later flew her and her brother Abdul-Rahman to a nearby hospital for treatment of their minor wounds. They were later moved to a Baghdad hospital.​

But look what she had already told Time.

Eman Waleed, 9, lived in a house 150 yards from the site of the blast ... She claims the troops started firing toward the corner of the room where she and her younger brother Abdul Rahman, 8, were hiding; the other adults shielded the children from the bullets but died in the process. Eman says her leg was hit by a piece of metal and Abdul Rahman was shot near his shoulder. "We were lying there, bleeding, and it hurt so much. Afterward, some Iraqi soldiers came. They carried us in their arms. I was crying, shouting 'Why did you do this to our family?' And one Iraqi soldier tells me, 'We didn't do it. The Americans did.'"​

Now look at this, it gets worse:

WaPo on the 27th - Only 13-year-old Safa Younis lived -- saved, she said, by her mother's blood spilling onto her, making her look dead when she fell, limp, in a faint.​

From a CNN Interview: A 12-year old survivor of the alleged massacre of innocent civilians by U.S. Marines patrolling Haditha has admitted she had prior knowledge of the plot to detonate an IED as their convoy was passing by her house on the morning of Nov. 19, 2005. "I was planning to go to school. I was about to go out of bed. I knew the bomb would explode so I covered my ears," the youngster said, according to a CNN translator."The American forces entered the house and started shooting with their guns. They killed my mother and my sister Nour. They killed her when she shot her in the head. She was only 15 years old. My other sister was shot with seven bullets in the head and she was only 10 years old." "And my brother Muhammad was hiding under the bed when the U.S. military hit him with the butt of the gun and the started shooting him under the bed. The U.S. military then shot me and I was showered in blood. Younis said she survived by pretending to be dead.

She knew the IED was going to explode? And we're to assume there were no terrorists in that house, assuming she was even there?

Now look at this: The quote below is circling the globe and I can't find a legitimate original news source.

Safa Younis Salim, a 13-year old girl, who in an interview said she lived by faking her death. ”I pretended that I was dead when my brother's body fell on me and he was bleeding like a faucet," she said. She said that she saw American troops kick her family members and that one American shouted in the face of one relative before he was killed.​

And this from the Seattle Times:

Safa Younis Salim, the 12-year-old, said she lay on the ground, covered with her sister's blood, and pretended to be dead while her family died around her. Her sister's blood spurted fast; it was like a water tap, she said.​

She's one of the videotaped witnesses and I can find quotes attributed to her claiming it was just about anyone's blood, including her own. And she knew about the IED? Meanwhile, MSNBC has the nerve to head a piece - Witness Stories Consistent???? Come on!! They should be ashamed!

Time did a ten week investigation of this story and if you search it, none of these witnesses existed. Not Al-Hadithi, Safa Younis, or the lawyer Khaled Salem Rsayef. Now, not only are they bringing out videos, they are claiming to have lived next door. And the MSM is splashing their stories all over the place. This is obscene.

It also appears as though the names of the people in the second home have been changed to match the lawyers last name and one eyewitness said it was the male owner's sister - another said it was his wife's sister. The body count has changed twice and suddenly the girl on video appeared.

All Time originally said of the second home was this:

The Marines then began firing, killing eight residents—including the owner, his wife, the owner's sister, a 2-year-old son and three young daughters.(7)​

On May 27th the WaPo said this:

The Marines moved to the house next door, Fahmi said. Inside were 43-year-old Khafif, 41-year-old Aeda Yasin Ahmed, an 8-year-old son, five young daughters and a 1-year-old girl staying with the family, according to death certificates and neighbors. (9 people)The Marines shot them at close range and hurled grenades into the kitchen and bathroom, survivors and neighbors said later. Khafif's pleas could be heard across the neighborhood. Four of the girls died screaming. Only 13-year-old Safa Younis lived -- saved, she said, by her mother's blood spilling onto her, making her look dead when she fell, limp, in a faint.​

Today we are being told this:

Later, the Marines moved next door to the house of Younis Salem Rsayef and his family. "There was intense gunfire and I could see a fire at the Rsayef home," said al-Hadithi, who watched from a window at his family home. In the second home, eight people were killed: Rsayef, his wife, her sister and five children.
​

Because the names in the first and third house are identified, there are too many families for three houses.

1st house - the home of 76-year-old Abdul Hamid Hassan Ali

3rd house - the house of Ayed Ahmed​

I put the two Ahmeds in red for a reason. If it's a mix up, it still doesn't make sense, because the new witness states there were four male victims in the Ahmed house, not an entire family as with the first Ahmed cited above.

the house of Ayed Ahmed There, he said, four brothers, all of fighting age, were ordered inside a closet and shot dead. Everyone else was spared, al-Hadithi said.​

Update: The Seattle Times has another report which appears to have the full name of those in the second house. It isn't Rsayef.

The Marines stopped next at the home of Customs official Younis Salim Nusaif, 45, and his wife, Aida Yassin.

And now this: AP Interview: Iraqi activist details deaths at Haditha

BAGHDAD, Iraq An Iraqi human rights advocate says a few Marines accused of killing unarmed Iraqi civilians in Haditha went on a three-hour house-to-house hunt, while Marines nearby did not intervene.

An Associated Press interview with the activist (Thaer al-Hadithi) offers details, but largely follows other witness accounts that claim U-S Marines went on a vengeful rampage after a comrade was killed by a roadside bomb.
​

Twenty-seven and a half million Google hits for Haditha - and not one of them the truth thanks to a MSM that can't wait to tell a horrible story we don't yet know is true.

But due to the contradictions in their own reporting, we can be sure the AP and some in the MSM can't possibly be accurate.

Update 2: It appears the following two stories might conflict, as well. That's assuming the implication is that the boy was in the room when his Father was shot.

"Then we did what we always do when there's an explosion: my father goes into his room with the Koran and prays that the family will be spared any harm." Eman says the rest of the family—her mother, grandfather, grandmother, two brothers, two aunts and two uncles—gathered in the living room. ... "First, they went into my father's room, where he was reading the Koran," she claims, "and we heard shots."

His 9-year-old daughter, Eman, who survived, said she was wearing her pajamas when the Marines arrived. Her brother, Abdul Rahman, 7, also survived, and said he hid his face with a blanket when his father was shot.
​

Update 3: Another possible conflict and possible scenario.

One body was charred, al-Obeidi added. That was believed to be Iman's father, Walid Abdul-Hameed, who witnesses said was burned to death after a grenade was thrown into his room.​

Iman states her Father was off in his room praying, the military went in the room and she heard shots. The account directly above suggests a grenade was thrown into his room.

To be clear, I am not trying to absolve the guilty. I would simply like to see the accounts out there make sense.

Update 4: Another inconsistency: compare

“The Americans knocked at the door,” she said on the video released this week by the human rights group, which is not well-known outside of Iraq. “My father went to open it. They shot him dead from behind the door, and then they shot him again after they opened the door.”

Safa said one attacker shot at other family members. She said she hid in a bedroom by the bodies of her mother and siblings. “I pretended to be dead.”
​

SAFA YOUNIS, FAMILY KILLED (through translator): A bomb exploded on the street outside. We heard the sound of the explosion, and we heard shouting. We were inside the house when U.S. forces broke through the door. They killed my father in the kitchen. The American forces entered the house and started shooting with their guns.

Update 5: Another one - one report has them in a different house.

Time: Eman says her leg was hit by a piece of metal and Abdul Rahman was shot near his shoulder. "We were lying there, bleeding, and it hurt so much.

CNN: CHILCOTE: Safa's cousins, 8-year-old Abdul Rahman Walleed (ph) and 9-year-old Iman Walleed (ph) were next door in the first house entered by the Marines. They say seven were killed in this house

Thursday, June 08, 2006 at 12:34 AM

 

[insein]

Really Pissing me off.

 

[Annie]

Really Pissing me off.

Well, someone's got to tell everyone. I knew if there were 'dots to be connected' it would come from the new media, blogs.