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Eyewitness Falluja: An Iraqi view of the U.S. attack

Published Mar 9, 2005 4:02 PM

Mohammad J. Haded was one of the few physicians who remained in Falluja, Iraq, during the November 2004 attack by U.S. troops. The German daily Junge Welt published an interview with him on Feb. 26, conducted by Rüdiger Göbel. Below are excerpts translated from the German by WW managing editor John Catalinotto.

About 5,000 families--about 25,000 to 30,000 Iraqis--remained during the U.S. major offensive in November in Falluja, the rest of the inhabitants having fled. Meanwhile some returned. We estimate that about 20 percent of the population of Falluja returned.

Apartments and houses that were not destroyed directly by U.S. bombs were devastated later. Furniture was smashed into little pieces. Besides, innumerable houses were purposefully set on fire. Even schools and hospitals were destroyed.

Still today corpses are found under the rubble of destroyed houses. An unknown number of dead people were thrown by the U.S. troops into the Euphrates River. The U.S. Army announced that 1,200 people had been killed. We ourselves pulled out and then buried more than 700 corpses. Beyond that we cannot give accurate data.

We have innumerable pictures and also films, on which you can see who was killed in Falluja. I invite everyone to come into our city. I can bring you together with children who had to watch their parents being shot by Americans. And I will bring you together with men who saw how their children and their wives were killed.

There was and there still is resistance in Iraq and also in Falluja. The resistance against the occupation is legitimate and corresponds to international conventions. It is not, however, by any means legal to bombard civilians. That is permitted neither to the Americans nor to opponents of the occupation.

Many Iraqis are of the opinion that the attacks on civilians are not the responsibility of the resistance, but that in the long run the Americans and the secret services of the neighboring countries are behind them. It is similar with Musab al-Zarkawi, with whose existence the Americans justified the attacks on Falluja. Where is al-Zarkawi today? He is a phantom, who manages to show up exactly where he can be used. It doesn't matter if it is in Kirkuk, Mosul, Tikrit, Samarra, Ramadi, Baghdad or Basra--everywhere, where there is resistance, al-Zarkawi manages to emerge where he is useful.

The city hospital lies in the west and is separated by the Euphrates from the city itself. Between seven and eight in the evening [of Nov. 8, 2004, when the major attack called "Dawn" began--JC], U.S. soldiers encircled and occupied the 200-bed hospital. At the time about 30 patients were still in the hospital. Although there was no resistance and also no fighters were being treated, the physicians and the maintenance personnel, 22 persons, were immediately arrested. We were thrown to the ground, bound and later interrogated. We were told we would have to vacate the hospital, patients as well as the caregivers. Afterwards the hospital was wiped out, even the medical instruments were destroyed.

The Americans were inside, looked through everything, and asked us again and again where the terrorists were hiding. If they had found someone there from the resistance, they would never have released us physicians again.

At the same time as the occupation of the hospital, the bombardment of the entire city began. The detonations were to be heard clearly. Even rescue cars were attacked. First inhabitants tried to bring the wounded with their passenger cars into a hospital. But everything that moved on the roads was fired on.

We finally established a field hospital in the eastern part of Falluja. In principle it was no more than an outpatient clinic. We gave the exact location of the building to the Americans. Two days later it was bombed, so this emergency station was thus lost. We finally established a second emergency-aid clinic, which was actually not functional. We had practically nothing there. Water and electricity were turned off, and the telephone no longer worked.

The conditions were catastrophic and nevertheless we operated on 25 wounded people there. We had no medicines, however, and the wounds became infected. For all practical purposes the patients lay in their death beds. Those with major injuries were lost. In the surrounding houses we looked for volunteers who helped us with cleaning up and to wash away the blood. My 13-year-old son was among the helpers.

After seven days I went to the Amer icans. I asked to be allowed to drive with a car and a white flag through the roads and to gather the remaining inhabitants in a mosque. In one hour I had collected about 50 people from their homes, approxi mately 10 families. Two days later there were 200 Iraqis in the mosque. Some told me that American soldiers had purposely fired their weapons at families, even those holding white flags. Also in the mosque we had set up a small outpatient clinic.

Up until today the central hospital is surrounded by U.S. soldiers. Patients must come on foot. Whoever comes by passenger car is fired at.

Some people had stayed in Falluja because they had no relatives in Baghdad with whom they could find accommodation. Others were ashamed to be in tents living like refugees. Others would gladly have fled, but had no car. However, most of those who remained simply could not imagine that the Americans would fight with such a rage. They did not believe that the U.S. soldiers would bomb and shoot directly at civilians and at whole families. Fighters, yes, but unarmed people, women, children, wounded people, old people?

I arranged with the U.S. forces to have a small group of volunteers from the 200 people in the mosque gather the dead bodies from the roads. An outbreak of epide mics was threatened, and the smell of decay was terrible. These volunteers told me later that many women and children as well as old people were among the victims.

People [in Falluja] hate the Americans-- Americans generally, not only U.S. soldiers. They are occupiers, killers and terrorists. Almost every family in Falluja has to mourn a victim; how can you expect any other reaction there?

Even if it doesn't look that way at first sight, in the long run the Americans lost in Falluja. Which else does it mean when an Empire uses all its power to attack what is a small city, without any moral scruples? That is the beginning of the end.

Further information: www.iraktribunal.de.