About Margaret Hassan

I'd been meaning to write something about the Margaret Hassan atrocity, but better you should read Robert Fisk and Kurt Nimmo.

Here's Fisk:

Who killed Margaret Hassan? After the grief, the astonishment, heartbreak, anger and fury over the apparent murder of such a good and saintly woman, that is the question that her friends - and, quite possibly, the Iraqi insurgents - will be asking.

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In the background of these appalling pictures, there were none of the usual Islamic banners. There were none of the usual armed and hooded men. There were no Quranic recitations.

And when it percolated through to Fallujah and Ramadi that the mere act of kidnapping Margaret Hassan was close to heresy, the combined resistance groups of Fallujah - and the message genuinely came from them - demanded her release. So, incredibly, did Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Al-Qaeda man whom the Americans falsely claimed to be leading the Iraqi insurrection, but who has very definitely been involved in the kidnapping and beheading of foreigners.

Other abducted women - the two Italian aid workers, for example - were freed when their captors recognised their innocence. But not Margaret Hassan, even though she spoke fluent Arabic and could explain her work to her captors in their own language.

There was one mysterious video that floated to the surface this year - a group promising to seize al-Zarqawi, claiming he was anti-Iraqi, politely referring to the occupation armies as "the coalition forces". This was quickly nicknamed the "Alawi tape" - after the American- appointed ex-CIA agent and ex-Baathist who holds the title of "Interim Prime Minister" in Iraq, the same Alawi who fatuously claimed there had been no civilian deaths in Fallujah. So if anyone doubted the murderous nature of the insurgents, what better way to prove their viciousness than to produce evidence of Margaret Hassan's murder?

And some good observations from Nimmo regarding possible motive:

It’s no secret the Bushcons hate NGOs and believe they are casting a negative light on the Strausscon plan for Word War IV. As Naomi Klein writes, the Strausscons are keen “to sweep up those pesky non-governmental organizations that are helping to turn world opinion against U.S. bombs and brands,” for instance CARE, the organization Margaret Hassan worked for.

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Is it possible the Iraqi resistance would attack and organization dedicated to saving Iraqi lives? Does it makes sense for the resistance to kill CARE workers and attack them “without any further notice,” especially if they are working to save the lives of Iraqi children?

However, the NGO-hating Strausscons in the Pentagon—the same people who bomb hospitals in Fallujah because they want to shroud the number of people killed by the recent U.S. assault—may very well be interested in attacking CARE, especially after the organization writes things such as this:

Military action in March and April <2003> resulted in an unknown number of civilian deaths and injuries, and huge damage to vital infrastructure, which continues to cause a lack of clean water, electricity and basic health care. CARE remains deeply concerned about the current situation.... As the only international non-governmental organization to have worked continuously in central and southern Iraq since 1991, CARE is well positioned to provide a rapid and co-ordinated response to the conflict and to scale up activities to meet needs. Along with other aid agencies, CARE is calling for security issues to be addressed and for restoration of public services, so that civilians can start to rebuild their lives.

There are many people shaking their heads sadly about Hassan's murder, muttering "It makes no sense." Well, no; it does make sense. The kind that compounds the sadness, and horror.

Hassan's execution, attributed to the Iraqi resistance, demonizes "insurgents" as savages needing to be put down. It buttresses the wobbly morality of those who say the war may be wrong, but America's in it now and has a job to do, so had better "finish what it started." And, perhaps most importantly, it removes a pesky NGO from the scene.

And the target is not CARE alone. "Relief agencies fear staff targetted deliberately," says yesterday's headline from AFP. "'What's new is that we're being treated as targets in a deliberate, non-accidental way,' said Christian Captier, director-general of the Swiss branch of Medecins sans frontieres."

And so on we go, deeper into the dark.