[antiwar-van] FW: [Al-Awda-media] what YOU can do

Tue Mar 18 13:01:09 PST 2003

-----Original Message-----
From: Mazin Qumsiyeh [mailto:qumsi001 at yahoo.com]
Sent: Tuesday, March 18, 2003 11:15 AM
To: al-awda-news at yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Al-Awda-media] what YOU can do

What you can do before or even as the war begins.

The pen is mightier than the sword (the keyboard is
mightier than the cruise missiles?) so act:

1) Write to the Pope via his UN mission and ask him to
go to Iraq now.  The website of the Papal UN  mission
is www.holyseemission.org, there you a find a "Contact
Us"  link, providing this E-mail address:
vatobservny at qwest.net

2) Write to politicians and shame them for standing by
while innocent people are being killed and will be
killed. Use http://cflweb.org/congress_merge_.htm
All politics is local so get involved locally in
politics.

3) Write to the media (local, national, international)
and demand they hear and publish/publicize the voices
of the people.  For tips on media issues, please see
http://www.commondreams.org/
http://www.fair.org/media-contact-list.html
http://www.MrSmithMedia.com/MrSmithNewspaper.html
http://al-awda.org/media
http://pmwatch.org/

Also see these sites for additional Iraq information:
http://www.healthsentinel.com/Essays/101IraqWarQuestions.htm
http://leb.net/iac
http://www.iraqconflict.org/
http://epic-usa.org/
http://www.indymedia.org.il/imc/israel/webcast/48386.html
http://www.observer.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12239,882526,00.html

4) Stop buying!  Stay with the necessities of food and
shelter.  Save your money for good causes and let us
make corporations pay for their wars.   Simplify your
life.  This consumer society is what drives the
military industrial complex that has brought us this
Orwellian world.  As Americans, we represent less than
5% of the world population, yet use 50% of its
resources.

5) Reach out to others (neighbors, friends,
co-workers).

Below is an article I sent to the media today.

Support for the war is a minority opinion throughout
the world except in Israel and in the US.  In the US,
polls show 54% support and 42% oppose the war (and
opposition is growing; see
http://www.zogby.com/news/ReadNews.dbm?ID=687

Sincerely,

Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD
============
An Orwellian Century of War
Mazin Qumsiyeh

Let me get this straight:

- The British government was caught using plagiarized
material distributed as "intelligence analysis."
- Chief UN inspector Blix contradicts claims by Powel
regarding Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
- The US government was caught passing forged
documents that claim their intelligence showed Iraq
had acquired material to use in nuclear technology
from an African country.  The Bush administration
claimed the forged documents were supplied by a third
country (unnamed but many speculate is actually
Israel) and "not checked".
- We issued 76 vetoes at the UN security council (35
to protect Israel) then we now claim that a veto by
France, Russia, or China against going to war will
make the UN Security Council irrelevant.
- American forces in the gulf plan to drop thousands
of bombs in the first 24 hours on a city inhabited by
millions while "minimizing collateral damage" (read
civilian casualties).  Like in Afghanistan, we will
drop food rations (oh wait, some of those yellow
packages were deadly in Afghanistan) immediately after
the bombing stops.
- The key people around Bush are connected intimately
to the Israeli lobby & Paul Wolfowitz's Tritreme
company is slated to profit handsomely from this war.
His wife is on the board of an Israeli propaganda
organization called MEMRI.
- Vice President Cheney while in office collected
millions from Haliburton which conveniently also got
the contract for Iraqi oil wells under an "emergency
bid procedure" by USAID.
- We will have democracy in Iraq just like we have it
in Afghanistan.  I wonder who will be the "Karzai" of
Iraq and whether US Special Forces will also protect
him in his palace from his liberated people.
- We claim there is governmental support yet the media
ignores the resignation of the speaker of the British
House of Commons and several US State Department
officials.
- Israel will be encouraged to show restraint.  Last
time we bribed Israel to show restraint.  This time,
not only are we giving billions but also a green light
for mass killing and ethnic cleansing of the
Palestinian natives (which has been going on in
installments for 30 months).
- Our US troops in the field are not allowed access to
world media but only to selected "cheerleader media"
and to a newsletter from the army titled "Stars and
Stripes." None of our troops include children of any
political leader in Washington DC. We actually have a
government over-run by draft dodgers of the 1960s.
- We are going to war so that we can save the UN
system and guard international law and to do that we
will ignore the UN and the United Nations Charter
since they do not agree with us.
- We spent so much effort to get a second UN security
council resolution and when we failed, we claimed it
was not important to do that.  We will go to war
against the will of teh UN to enforce UN resolutions.
- Our government claims Iraq's army is so weak and
demoralized that the war will be over quickly and yet
our justification for going to war is partially based
on the idea that Iraq is a threat to its neighbors and
even the security of the world.
- Britain, the US, and Australian governments declare
Saddam a threat to their countries while Turkey and
Iran (his neighbors) state he poses no threat and is
contained.
- The UN security council sends inspectors to Iraq and
as they report good progress the US government asks
for them to be removed.  Kofi Annan complies since he
was appointed following dismissal by a UN Chief who
was not sympathetic to Washington's hegemony on the
UN. This illegal action occurs without approval of the
removal of inspectors by the body that sent them
there: The UN Security Council.
- The US government is fighting for freedom by
curtailing freedom of speech, assembly, and dissent.
We are also suspending key elements in the bill of
rights because we are fighting terrorists who are
attacking our freedom.  The thousands we detained
without due process and the use of "secret evidence"
and profiling are legitimate means to defend freedom.
- The war may go well for us because, unlike Vietnam,
we will have no reporters roaming uncontrolled and
documenting atrocities (we asked those to leave and in
the past few wars "detained" those who resisted our
demands for their "safety").  The compliant
journalists are now in the trenches training with our
troops.  Heck, some even proudly display the American
flag lapel pins in their reporting on Fox and MSNBC
(and those are indeed influential media outlets).
Even if atrocities are documented, we have already
explained that those are committed by Saddam forces
dressed up as American GIs.
- Millions in the world protest and public opinion
shows that 80-90% of the inhabitants of this planet
are against the war and yet Bush claims he has wide
support for this war.

Orwell would have never imagined it in his wildest
dreams.

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