…that works out to about 28 dead every day.
It is also an estimate, given that many areas of the country are not readily accessible, and because the death toll from the siege of Ramadi is not accounted for in the figures. More than 3.2 million Iraqis are internally displaced and/or homeless.
Iraq is now an ungoverned, failed state, a killing field on the scale of genocide.
At least 18,802 civilians were killed and 36,245 wounded in Iraq over the last 22 months, according to the UN’s Report on the Protection of Civilians in the Armed Conflict in Iraq. Another 3,206,736 Iraqis are internally displaced, including more than one million children. The study emphasizes that these are conservative estimates. The UN also is careful to note that the number of civilians killed by secondary effects of the violence, such as lack of access to food, water or medical care, is unknown. In many areas of Iraq schools are closed and basic infrastructure is not functioning.
All that is in addition to the more than one million people already killed during the American occupation period.
These horrors are directly caused by the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation. In addition to unleashing near-total chaos in the nation, the U.S. invasion led directly to the rise of Islamic State, which found the consuming violence fertile soil for growth. ISIS went on to see a new role to emerge, protector of the Sunni population, which was being slaughtered and impoverished by the Shiite majority empowered by the Americans and Iran.
“Armed violence continues to take an obscene toll on Iraqi civilians and their communities,” remarked the UN high commissioner for human rights. “The so-called ‘Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant’ continues to commit systematic and widespread violence and abuses of international human rights law and humanitarian law. These acts may, in some instances, amount to war crimes, crimes against humanity and possibly genocide.”
ISIS is targeting non-Sunni ethnic and religious communities, “systematically persecuting” them, subjecting them to violent repression and crimes, the UN notes. Women and children are particularly affected by these atrocities. Women face extreme sexual violence and even sexual slavery. Children are being forcibly recruited as fighters.
In addition to ISIS violence, the UN notes that civilians have been killed and kidnapped, and that civilian infrastructure has been destroyed by pro-government forces, militias and tribal fighters. Moreover, civilians are being killed by U.S. airstrikes.
Adding to the depth of horror in Iraq, many Iraqi refugees have sought asylum in the West, but have been largely unwelcome. In a time of heightened Islamophobia, some European countries and many right-wing American politicians — including more than half of the U.S. governors — have made it clear they do not want to accept Muslim refugees.
Copyright © 2020. All rights reserved. The views expressed here are solely those of the author(s) in their private capacity.
b. traven said...
1From the film Apocalypse Now:The American commander
“I love the smell of napalm in the morning”
01/26/16 11:16 AM | Comment Link
John Poole said...
2But it was worth it to get that rascal (Saddam) out of power. Madeline Albright’s ethos still rules (deaths of children for lack of medicine during the embargo/blockade) Albright of, “I didn’t even know I was Jewish!” fame would be cheering her country’s skill at creating a hell in Syria. Millions displaced, thousands killed BUT! If that is what it takes to take out that rascal Assad so be it. We have sociopaths running America today. End of rant.
01/26/16 11:55 AM | Comment Link
Kyzl Orda said...
3Thanks to baked intel –politicized by politicians
01/26/16 1:03 PM | Comment Link
Rich Bauer said...
4“Thanks to baked intel –politicized by politicians”…elected by the Dumbest Country on the Planet.
01/26/16 1:51 PM | Comment Link
jo6pac said...
5#4
Yep
01/26/16 4:01 PM | Comment Link
John Poole said...
6Rumsfeld to Obama. (Oliver to Stan) “I told you what would happen if you took your hand off the bicycle seat. See what a fine mess you’ve made now!”
01/26/16 6:07 PM | Comment Link
teri said...
7But we got their gold. And Libya’s. And Ukraine’s. Wanted their oil, too, but it is proving to be a little more difficult to wrest complete control over the oil fields, because we created ISIS (in the case of Iraq and Libya), who are interfering in the process (which may be on purpose to hurt the Dread Russians, under the rather abstruse economic theory that harming Russia’s economy is worth the cost of harming ours) and because we created Nuland’s Nazis Civil War (in the case of Ukraine) which has so far blocked completion of the Biden Bid for Oil Takeover of Eastern Ukraine.
Part of a long joke one of my kids sent me:
AN IRAQI CORPORATION
Everyone thinks you have lots of cows.
You tell them that you have none.
No one believes you so they bomb the crap out of you and invade your country.
Now everyone is sure you have no cows, but at least you have democracy.
01/27/16 6:36 AM | Comment Link
Rich Bauer said...
8Who thought things would go BREAKING BAD?
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/10/breaking-bad-america-has-used-walter-white-logic-since-9-11/281029/
We all did.
01/27/16 7:28 AM | Comment Link
Links 27/1/2016: Tails 2.0, GPUOpen | Techrights said...
9[…] Freedom! 19,000 Iraqi Civilians Killed in Less Than Two Years […]
01/27/16 8:14 AM | Comment Link