U.S. Soldiers Fire in Air to Disperse Baghdad Protest

[Judi Lynn]

U.S. Soldiers Fire in Air to Disperse Baghdad Protest
Tue October 21, 2003 05:02 AM ET
By Michael Georgy

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. soldiers fired above the heads of thousands of Iraqi government workers protesting on Tuesday after hearing that the Americans had detained a woman for refusing to be searched using a sniffer dog.

A Reuters correspondent said U.S. soldiers fired a few shots in the air to disperse a furious crowd at a complex of government buildings in Baghdad that includes the oil, electricity, trade and irrigation ministries.

There were no reports of casualties.

"I have been coming here for 27 years and now they (Americans) are searching us with dogs. We are Muslims," Saadiya Ahmad, an oil ministry engineer said.

Dogs are considered unclean in Islamic culture.

A man who gave his name as Sabeeh said U.S. troops had handcuffed a woman employee and forced her to stand in the sun for an hour because she had refused to undergo a sniffer dog search. (snip/...)

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[bluestateguy]

1. what a lesson in free speech

Now the Iraqis know just how dissenters are treated by this Administration.

[saigon68]

2. Winning their hearts and minds

Check out the movie "RED Dawn" sometime to see what a population does to resist the invader.

[izzie]

4. No pet dogs in Saudi either.

Do these men get any information on the countries they are going to?Or do we just force our beliefs on them? This is not nice to say but when I was in Saudi the Texas people who worked their had the mean way of calling the people they worked for as 'Sand N----' Few Southern people did it also. I never heard it from Yankee types, Can. Eng. Ger or the It. The Texas and Southern seened to like to see who could be more rude and I thought it was a high school locker room style thing, it was so childish. We were in the part of the country that few Western had worked and the people who lived their were generally friendly to us but could that last long with such rude people? Most of us generally did as the people who lived their did but the Texes and the few rude So. said the Saudi were wrong and they would show them how to live.Don't you love it when you go over seas and up turns the Am who say they are not like us so must be wrong?

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

8. During the first Gulf War

someone planted a fake bomb and broke the plate glass window of our favorite Arabic restaurant in Arlington, TX. It was run by a Palestinian Christian and her husband, an Iraqi Muslim who had fled Suddam Hussein because he was under sentence of death for disagreeing with Hussein. The note left used the words "Sand N----". I told the couple, who were dear friends, that I was ashamed for America.

Sounds like I'm ashamed again because of what happened in Iraq.

[Maeve]

13. I keep expecting them to get rid of dogs and replace them with pigs!

That would be just the sort of brilliance this bunch usually shows...

Frying pan to fire...

[ktranz]

3. wow

"U.S. troops had handcuffed a woman employee and forced her to stand in the sun for an hour because she had refused to undergo a sniffer dog search"

these guys surely khow how to win hearts and minds

[TheLastMohican]

5. It would be really helpful if those GIs studied local culture

That would bring more understanding between them and local people.
I am not asking about great studies, just basic training. What is considered polite, what is not, how not to offend people, how to draw sympathy with your actions, that sort of things.
Look at the brits, they know hack of a lot about it and they have a legacy of owning those mideast colonies back in time. Why don't those GI's get down from those "christian superiority skies" and learn something from the brits at least.

[leftchick]

6. this is sickening....

from the article:
<snip> I told them (the Americans) to stop it and a woman soldier slapped me across the face," she said. "Every day the dogs put their noses inside our bags and slobber over our belongings."

Word of the incident spread like wildfire among ministry employees arriving for work.


and this.... <snip> We don't just want the dogs to leave. We want the dogs who are holding the dogs to leave, every last one of them," said one employee, Nazir Mohammed.

.....I think the US has officially worn out its' "welcome". The question is when will we get the message?

[TheLastMohican]

15. Whoa!

from the article:
<snip> I told them (the Americans) to stop it and a woman soldier slapped me across the face," she said.


They have some tough face-slaping bitches in uniform over there. What would happen to those poor GI if man was to slap that woman in the face?
And after they even wonder: "Why are they not throwing flowers at us?"

[truthisfreedom]

7. hey, it's not bush's fault. he drops his dog and blames it on his wife,

never using it to sniff her.

[IndianaGreen]

9. Al-Jazeera: 'Dogs are widely regarded as religiously "impure" animals'

A demonstrator holds up an Iraqi flag
as US soldiers look on

Dogs are widely regarded as religiously "impure" animals across the Middle East and being searched in this way is seen as culturally offensive by Iraqis.

An incident involving a dog searching a woman is especially sensitive. But the US army in Iraq has nevertheless continued the practice.

US military spokespeople were not immediately available for comment.

Mortar attack

Elsewhere, in northern Iraq, a US base in the district of al-Qala, south of the town of Samarra, came under a mortar attack early on Tuesday, Aljazeera’s correspondent reported.

Locals said they saw columns of smoke rising from the scene while US helicopters flew over the area.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/3C06A751-5AF7-4320-B5AC-EE1BA3E8A696.htm

[dArKeR]

10. TORTURING Iraqi women is really going to help our soldiers out!

The entire Bush Administration should resign before any more of our children are murdered!

[0007]

11. In the Korea war "dogface'

was an expression used to called a soldier. I forgot all about that until I read this article.

Bring the troops home.

[IndianaGreen]

12. "the American soldiers took the Quran out of her bag and threw it..."

More details, buried in another story:

Coalition arrests 32 in Karbala raids
Action against Iraqi resistance follows attacks on U.S. troops
ASSOCIATED PRESS

When the Americans told her to submit her bag to a sniff-search by a dog, she refused, saying the bag held a copy of the Quran, Iraqi witnesses later reported.

Devout Iraqis often carry Islam’s holy book with them, and Muslims consider dogs to be dirty, disease-spreading animals.

“When she refused, the American soldiers took the Quran out of her bag and threw it to the ground,” said one woman, Zaineb Rahim. “Then the American soldiers handcuffed Amal.”

Pushing and punching followed between soldiers and Iraqis, Americans struck out with rifle butts, and soon about 100 Iraqis had gathered in angry protest outside the huge, modern building on Baghdad’s northern edge, leading the Americans to fire shots in the air, the witnesses said.

As the protesters hoisted an Iraqi flag, officers of the tiny, newly formed Iraqi army appeared, trying to ease tensions.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/870749.asp?0cv=CB10

[lebkuchen]

14. The soldiers are their own worst enemy

No regard for cultural differences...unbelieveable.