It is very common for Western mainstream media outlets to use the word genocide in places wherein their governments are not directly part of combat missions in an event of armed conflict. In Rwanda and Sudan, the word genocide is common to hear.
When it comes to places where Western governments are involved or are part of an armed conflict, it is very rare for us to hear the word genocide being used even in the face of overwhelming unjustified killings of innocent civilians. The majority of the people living in the Middle East are Muslims and they have been extremely affected by Western imperial wars on their land.
While it may never be possible to know the exact death toll of modern Western wars in the Middle East, a new investigation has revealed that the number of Muslims killed in such wars could be 4 million or higher.
To put it in plain language, the United States and its allies fighting in the Middle East have committed, and are still committing, crimes against humanity.
In March of this year, Physicians for Social Responsibility said the body count of the Iraq War is around 1.3 million. The group even alleged that it is possible that as many as 2 million may have died and that number was hampered by inaccurate or unavailable data in some places.
A month later, in April, an investigative journalist, Nafeez Ahmed, argued that the actual death toll could reach as high as 4 million if one includes not just those killed in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also the victims of the sanctions against Iraq.
According to figures from the United Nations, about 1.7 million people died, half of them children, as a result of economic sanctions on Iraq adopted and enforced by UN Security Council Resolution 661, put forward by the United States government in the 1990’s.
The Mint Press News reports that in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, President George W. Bush employed a curious and controversial choice of words in one of his first speeches. He alarmed some by referencing historic religious conflicts. This prompted The Wall Street Journal staff writers, Peter Waldman and Hugh Pope, to say, “President Bush vowed … to rid the world of evil-doers, then cautioned: This crusade, this war on terrorism, is going to take a while. Crusade? In strict usage, the word describes the Christian military expeditions a millennium ago to capture the Holy Land from Muslims. But in much of the Islamic world, where history and religion suffuse daily life in ways unfathomable to most Americans, it is shorthand for something else: a cultural and economic Western invasion that, Muslims fear, could subjugate them and desecrate Islam.”
In the wars the US fought in Iraq and Afghanistan in the name of ending terrorism, the US did not only kill millions… it systematically destroyed the infrastructure necessary for healthy, prosperous life in those countries. It thereafter used rebuilding efforts as opportunities for profit from oil and other scarce resources of these poor countries.
To add to the genocidal pattern of behavior, there is ample evidence of torture and persistent rumors of sexual assault from the aftermath of Iraq’s fall. Commentators say it appears likely that the US has contributed to further destabilization and deaths in the Middle East by supporting the rise of the self-declared Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), arming rebel groups on all sides of the conflict.
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What is the last picture about?
US Army torture of Iraqis at Abu-Ghraib prison in Iraq.
Where is the statistic of how many Muslims were killed by Muslims out of the number 4 M?
This “article” is purely an opinion piece. Actual civilian casualty data varies enormously depending on the source. The author of this routinely misuses the word genocide. Genocide being the deliberate killing of a specific people based on race, religion, ect. While I claim to be no expert, it seems as though the U.S. & the UK have a tremendous amount of public pressure to act well within the rules of engagement (through the majority of the conflict) and that with the exception of some terrible incidents they have performed as you would expect of any nations at war and followed the ROE to the best of their ability. I’m certainly not arguing that the US or UK are saints, I do believe that given the nature of the conflict, the length of the war and the tactics of their enemies, the soldiers have for the most part performed their duty honorably. This article has no shame blaming the west for an area that has been in turmoil for decades.
Your figures are widely disputed estimates of questionable methodology. The author then takes these highest estimates and attributes the deaths to ‘America and the West’ and accuses them of war crimes etc & systematic destruction. As the previous poster mentioned, the public pressure and numerous media sources, with competing agendas serve to create the best environment for the facts to get out.
This is not perfect of course and neither are any governments, but the whole argument here is based on the conspiracy theory that they have all been silenced or look the other way. The thing people forget about conspiracies is that the bigger they are, the more people need to be involved and the greater chance of exposure and greater benefit to the one who blows the lid on the thing. Soldiers are inhuman monsters, raised like you and me, but able to massacre untold numbers of people and keep it a secret. The fact is countries like this fight with their gloves on against people who do not even acknowledge the legitimacy of the philosophical thought that underpins concepts like libertarianism, equality, human rights, Geneva convention and articles of war. How many of those deaths were Iraqi’s killing Iraqi’s or other Muslim foreign fighters, or local personal vendettas, or (when the coalition was involved) because of the ‘insurgents using human shields, hiding in residential buildings and bombarding, placing IED’s, kidnappings, and cold-blooded killings because of revenge or for sectarian motives?
I’ve spoken to people expressing outrage at the perceived mount of death and in the next breath talking about going to fight for the people doing the most killing (the Islamist insurgents). I’m sure articles like this will provide plenty more fodder for such philosophically incoherent individuals.
These opinions are loose and fairly untroubled by any objective analysis, but apart from that….You haven’t even bothered to pull apart the facts, so it would obviously be too much to expect you to know what the definition of genocide is and the necessary proof needed to qualify the statement, but that is what is required for serious journalism, which is why I guess you are writing in this here opinion section.