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<DIV><FONT face=Verdana size=2>** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **<BR>** <A
href="http://dahrjamailiraq.com">http://dahrjamailiraq.com</A>
**<BR><BR><BR> November 26,
2004<BR><BR><BR> 'Unusual Weapons' Used in
Fallujah<BR><BR>Dahr Jamail<BR><BR>BAGHDAD, Nov 26 (IPS) - The U.S. military has
used poison gas and other <BR>non-conventional weapons against civilians in
Fallujah, eyewitnesses report.<BR><BR>”Poisonous gases have been used in
Fallujah,” 35-year-old trader from <BR>Fallujah Abu Hammad told IPS. ”They used
everything -- tanks, artillery, <BR>infantry, poison gas. Fallujah has been
bombed to the ground.”<BR><BR>Hammad is from the Julan district of Fallujah
where some of the heaviest <BR>fighting occurred. Other residents of that area
report the use of <BR>illegal weapons.<BR><BR>”They used these weird bombs that
put up smoke like a mushroom cloud,” <BR>Abu Sabah, another Fallujah refugee
from the Julan area told IPS. ”Then <BR>small pieces fall from the air with long
tails of smoke behind them.”<BR><BR>He said pieces of these bombs exploded into
large fires that burnt the <BR>skin even when water was thrown on the burns.
Phosphorous weapons as <BR>well as napalm are known to cause such effects.
”People suffered so much <BR>from these,” he said.<BR><BR>Macabre accounts of
killing of civilians are emerging through the cordon <BR>U.S. forces are still
maintaining around Fallujah.<BR><BR>”Doctors in Fallujah are reporting to me
that there are patients in the <BR>hospital there who were forced out by the
Americans,” said Mehdi <BR>Abdulla, a 33-year-old ambulance driver at a hospital
in Baghdad. ”Some <BR>doctors there told me they had a major operation going,
but the soldiers <BR>took the doctors away and left the patient to
die.”<BR><BR>Kassem Mohammed Ahmed who escaped from Fallujah a little over a
week ago <BR>told IPS he witnessed many atrocities committed by U.S. soldiers in
the <BR>city.<BR><BR>”I watched them roll over wounded people in the street with
tanks,” he <BR>said. ”This happened so many times.”<BR><BR>Abdul Razaq Ismail
who escaped from Fallujah two weeks back said <BR>soldiers had used tanks to
pull bodies to the soccer stadium to be <BR>buried. ”I saw dead bodies on the
ground and nobody could bury them <BR>because of the American snipers,” he said.
”The Americans were dropping <BR>some of the bodies into the Euphrates near
Fallujah.”<BR><BR>Abu Hammad said he saw people attempt to swim across the
Euphrates to <BR>escape the siege. ”The Americans shot them with rifles from the
shore,” <BR>he said. ”Even if some of them were holding a white flag or white
<BR>clothes over their heads to show they are not fighters, they were all
<BR>shot..”<BR><BR>Hammad said he had seen elderly women carrying white flags
shot by U.S. <BR>soldiers. ”Even the wounded people were killed. The Americans
made <BR>announcements for people to come to one mosque if they wanted to leave
<BR>Fallujah, and even the people who went there carrying white flags were
<BR>killed.”<BR><BR>Another Fallujah resident Khalil (40) told IPS he saw
civilians shot as <BR>they held up makeshift white flags. ”They shot women and
old men in the <BR>streets,” he said. ”Then they shot anyone who tried to get
their <BR>bodies...Fallujah is suffering too much, it is almost gone
now.”<BR><BR>Refugees had moved to another kind of misery now, he said. ”It's a
<BR>disaster living here at this camp,” Khalil said. ”We are living like
<BR>dogs and the kids do not have enough clothes.”<BR><BR>Spokesman for the
Iraqi Red Crescent in Baghdad Abdel Hamid Salim told <BR>IPS that none of their
relief teams had been allowed into Fallujah, and <BR>that the military had said
it would be at least two more weeks before <BR>any refugees would be allowed
back into the city.<BR><BR>”There is still heavy fighting in Fallujah,” said
Salim. ”And the <BR>Americans won't let us in so we can help people.”<BR><BR>In
many camps around Fallujah and throughout Baghdad, refugees are <BR>living
without enough food, clothing and shelter. Relief groups estimate <BR>there are
at least 15,000 refugee families in temporary shelters outside
<BR>Fallujah.<BR><BR><BR>_______________________________________________<BR>More
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