Madinat al-Muslimeen Islamic Message Board
| Media Pundits Advocate Civilian Targets--Action Alert! |
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| Saleema |
| 09/24/01 at 13:41:17 |
| FAIR-L Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting Media analysis, critiques and news reports ACTION ALERT: Media Pundits Advocate Civilian Targets September 24, 2001 As the news media prepare for war, some prominent journalists have been advocating military strategies that violate the laws of war and mirror the strategies of terrorists. Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly, the channel's most popular host, declared on his September 17 broadcast that if the Afghan government did not extradite Osama bin Laden to the U.S., "the U.S. should bomb the Afghan infrastructure to rubble-- the airport, the power plants, their water facilities, and the roads." O'Reilly went on to say: "This is a very primitive country. And taking out their ability to exist day to day will not be hard. Remember, the people of any country are ultimately responsible for the government they have. The Germans were responsible for Hitler. The Afghans are responsible for the Taliban. We should not target civilians. But if they don't rise up against this criminal government, they starve, period." O'Reilly added that in Iraq, "their infrastructure must be destroyed and the population made to endure yet another round of intense pain.... Maybe then the people there will finally overthrow Saddam." If Libya's Moammar Khadafy does not relinquish power and go into exile, "we bomb his oil facilities, all of them. And we mine the harbor in Tripoli. Nothing goes in, nothing goes out. We also destroy all the airports in Libya. Let them eat sand." It's unclear how O'Reilly is able to reconcile his claim that "we should not target civilians" with his calls for decimating the infrastructures of at least three countries and starving their populations. His tone remained the same a few nights later (9/19/01), as he recommended bombing Afghanistan "in strategic ways and hope that the people themselves would rise up and throw the Taliban out." Acknowledging that Afghanis "are starving as it is," O'Reilly recommended that the U.S. intensify civilian suffering by knocking out "what little infrastructure they have" and blowing up "every truck you see" to make sure that "there's not going to be anything to eat." The Geneva Conventions (Protocol 1, Part IV, Chapter III, Article 54) are very clear that "starvation of civilians as a method of warfare is prohibited." They specify that "objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population," including water and food supplies, are not legal military targets. Violating these strictures, which are legally binding on the U.S., would constitute a war crime, and might be considered a crime against humanity. New York Daily News columnist A.M. Rosenthal, formerly the executive editor of the New York Times, had similarly disturbing advice in his September 14 column. Rosenthal suggested an ultimatum be delivered to at least six countries-- Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria and Sudan-- giving them three days to hand over documents and information related to weapons of mass destruction and terrorist organizations. Rosenthal warned that "in the three days the terrorists were considering the American ultimatum, the residents of the countries would be urged 24 hours a day by the U.S. to flee the capital and major cities, because they would be bombed to the ground beginning the fourth day." The Geneva Conventions state that combatants "shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives and accordingly shall direct their operations only against military objectives" (Part IV, Chapter I, Article 48). If actually carried out, the proposals made by these pundits would almost certainly result in civilian deaths totaling in the millions. Suggesting that killing large numbers of civilians is an acceptable political strategy only legitimizes the logic of terrorism. ACTION: Please contact these journalists and point out that it is irresponsible to encourage the government to commit illegal acts and kill innocent people. CONTACT: Fox News Channel Bill O'Reilly, The O'Reilly Factor mailto:oreilly@foxnews.com New York Daily News A.M. Rosenthal mailto:rosecolumn@aol.com As always, please remember that your comments are taken more seriously if you maintain a polite tone. Please cc fair@fair.org with your correspondence. ***CORRECTION: In FAIR's 9/17 Media Advisory, the cite for Ann Coulter's column was incorrect. The column appeared in the National Review's online edition, not in the New York Daily News. FAIR regrets the error. ---------- Feel free to respond to FAIR ( fair@fair.org ). We can't reply to everything, but we will look at each message. We especially appreciate documented example of media bias or censorship. And please send copies of your email correspondence with media outlets, including any responses, to us at: fair@fair.org . FAIR ON THE AIR: FAIR's founder Jeff Cohen is a regular panelist on the Fox News Channel's "Fox News Watch," which airs which airs Saturdays at 7 pm and Sundays at 11 am (Eastern Standard Time). Check your local listings. FAIR produces CounterSpin, a weekly radio show heard on over 130 stations in the U.S. and Canada. To find the CounterSpin station nearest you, visit http://www.fair.org/counterspin/stations.html . Please support FAIR by subscribing to our bimonthly magazine, Extra! For more information, go to: http://www.fair.org/extra/subscribe.html . Or call 1-800-847-3993. FAIR's INTERNSHIP PROGRAM: FAIR accepts internship applications for its New York office on a rolling basis. For more information, see: http://www.fair.org/internships.html You can subscribe to FAIR-L at our web site: http://www.fair.org , or by sending a "subscribe FAIR-L enter your full name" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AMERICAN.EDU . Our subscriber list is kept confidential. You may leave the list at any time-- just send a message with "SIGNOFF FAIR-L" in the body to: LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AMERICAN.EDU . FAIR (212) 633-6700 http://www.fair.org/ E-mail: fair@fair.org list administrators: FAIR-L-request@american.edu |
| NS |
| Re: Media Pundits Advocate Civilian Targets--Action Alert! |
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| NewJehad |
| 09/25/01 at 09:49:00 |
| What’s the point on attacking the journalists for suggesting this? It’s already happens. America has always been doing this. You know the thing that kills most People in Iraq is not the fact that they have banned a lot of medicines, or the fact that they have put such tight restrictions on oil export that people can't feed them selves, or the fact that they have bombed all the baby milk factories so Iraq can't produce its own, or the fact that they banned the import of baby milk because they say they can't decide whether it is a medicine or food, or the fact that they have band the import of medical journals so Iraqi doctors have no way of Knowing how to treat the Knew illnesses that have come about due to the depleted Uranium shells they bombed the country with, Or the fact that they have band the import of midwife kits because they contain scissors that have steel parts which they say is a weapon because they can be melted down and used as bullets. What causes most deaths is the fact that they have blown up the water treatment works, so clean water is unavailable and sewage is everywhere. The fact is there is no point for the journalists to say their government should do the above, because the government is doing allot worse. People in Afghanistan are already starving; sanctions began long before the plain crashes. America's contempt for human life is not limited to Muslims. What is the only country to have used Nuclear weapons? Were they used on soldiers? Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not roads, military barracks, or tanks. They were cities!!! The rules of war as written by the UN are worthless. They don't follow them because they made them up for their own benefit, so if the rules contradict their benefit they will refuse to follow them. They made them up for us to be tide down by, while they use each and every method to do Dejal’s handy work. And we have our own rules. So these man made rules are worthless to us. It’s time when we follow our laws and fight them like how they should be fought. People have been shouting about how the state of Israel is illegal and how what theUS is doing in Afghanistan and Iraq is genocide under international law ever since these problems began. What is achieved? Nothing. They are the creators of these laws. These laws were created for their service. So they regard them selves as above these laws. Allah created us, so we must obey Allah. Not the other way around. The kaffar in the west created International law, so they think international law should obey them not the other way around. Whoever heard of the creator obeying the created? So why does any one think the Men in the west will obey the laws that were created by them selves? When America was doing all its evil all over the world many people were praying for its destruction. Now that America has a nosebleed, why are people praying for America, even though it is highly likely the nosebleed was self-inflicted? As yet no evidence has been produced indicating that it was Muslim, and no Muslim group has admitted it, but so many Muslim are shouting how this act was un-Islamic, and saying statements of support to the nation that has killed countless. When we prayed the Dua to Allah to destroy our enemies and when we pray to Allah to protect us from there evil, we must also be preparing to do what it takes to destroy them and do what it takes to protect our brothers in faith. Else, what different are we to the Jews, when they prayed to Allah, and when Allah gave them the command to fight they told Musa pbh “you and your god go and fight, we are staying here”. Are we going to stay here, while we ask Allah to go and fight? |
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