Protesting American Terrorism

From the point of view of the generals, the bombing of a Kunduz, Afghanistan charity hospital in October was a tragedy and the result of a series of unfortunate events and botched communications. Mistakes were made, leaves of absence were ordered. No outside investigation was deemed necessary, and no criminal charges are pending.

From the point of view of the people victimized by that attack, the destruction of the Médecins Sans Frontières hospital was an act of pure terror and aggression. 

Not satisfied with the attempted whitewashing by the Obama administration and Pentagon of the murders of at least 30 people, representatives of MSF (Doctors Without Borders) planned to demonstrate in front of the White House today before delivering a petition, signed by more than half a million people, demanding accountability for the atrocity. Protesters gathering in Lafayette Park were to be given white lab coats to display solidarity with the medical personnel killed and maimed in the military attack, an apparent clear-cut violation of the Geneva Convention ban on targeting hospitals in war zones.

While the mainstream media are busy fomenting the domestic fear over ISIS, and The Donald Trump Experience is sucking up all the oxygen in the echo chamber, and people are scrambling to Tweet out their condemnations of "his" Islamophobia, the Muslims killed in the hospital terror attack have been all but ignored. Since there was no photo gallery of the victims of that particular massacre gracing the front pages of American newspapers or profiles of them aired by cable outlets, MSF has provided its own, honoring the 14 doctors and nurses and support staff who lost their lives:

  Zabiullah, 29 years old and married (bottom row) was a poet as well as a security guard at the hospital.  At the time of his horrific death, he'd been working on Pashto language translations of several books. He was also writing a book about the famous Khan Abdul Ghafar Khan. "While he started working with MSF less than a year ago", says MSF, "he had already made lots of friends due to his friendly and kind manner". Here is one of his poems:

                                     تیر به شی وختونه خو یادونه به یی وی                                    
                                                                                    جور به شی زخمونه خو داغونه به یی وی

Time will fly, but its memory will remain,
Wounds will heal, but its stain will remain.

You can read the other bios by clicking the link above. And here's a tribute by MSF President Dr. Joanne Liu:

According to MSF's own internal report of what was essentially a terroristic attack by the US Military, patients were burned alive in their beds and fleeing medical personnel were decapitated or lost limbs after being deliberately targeted by the American gunship pilots. Besides the medics, 10 patients and seven other victims burned beyond recognition are among the dead.

President Obama apologized. President Obama sent his thoughts and prayers. President Obama ordered the military to investigate itself. President Obama is probably ever so grateful that despised fascist clown Donald Trump is obligingly deflecting all the media attention and cameras away from today's demonstration. You'd think that Trump and his aggrieved supporters were the only ones scapegoating Muslims all of a sudden. He is simply boiling up the xenophobia that's been simmering for decades, or really ever since the Pilgrims landed and started their own extermination crusade against "The Other". Trump is like the Creature from the Black Lagoon, only the latest monstrous byproduct of a radioactive swamp. He's a media sensation, thrilling horror fans everywhere, enabling the Lesser Evilists to wag their fingers at the scapegoated scapegoater with all the supercilious sanctimony they can muster.

Candidates are sending out nonstop email blasts urging us to show solidarity with Muslims by sending them (the candidates, not Muslims) our money. Hillary "We Came, We Saw, He Died" Clinton, who voted for the Iraq war that killed hundreds of thousands of Muslims and was later responsible for the bombing of Libya that helped create the horrific Muslim refugee crisis, is no exception:

Gimme

 

  Meanwhile, a monstrously vague synopsis of the military's perverted self-probing exercise, released on Thanksgiving Eve to little fanfare, was about what you'd expect: a box office dud with horrible acting and an inane script. From the New York Times:

Calling the airstrike a “tragic mistake,” General (John) Campbell read a statement announcing the findings of the investigation, which he said concluded that “avoidable human error” was to blame, compounded by technical, mechanical and procedural failures. He said another contributing factor was that the Special Forces members in Kunduz had been fighting continuously for days and were fatigued.
 General Campbell and his staff did not say how many people were being disciplined, or how. But a senior United States military official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said one of those punished was the Army Special Forces commander on the ground in Kunduz during the fighting. The official would not identify the commander by name but said the officer, a captain, was relieved of his command in Afghanistan on Wednesday morning.

(snip)

The general confirmed that Médecins Sans Frontières, the French name of Doctors Without Borders, had succeeded in reaching the Special Forces commander to inform him of the attack about 12 minutes into the airstrike, at 2:20 a.m. But he said the strike was not called off until 2:37 a.m. — after the aircrew had already stopped firing. But that timeline does not agree with accounts by the aid group and other witnesses, who said the strike went on for more than an hour.

The aid group, which has called for an independent, nonmilitary international inquiry into the airstrike, was sharply critical of General Campbell’s remarks. “The U.S. version of events presented today leaves M.S.F. with more questions than answers,” said Christopher Stokes, the organization’s general director. “The frightening catalog of errors outlined today illustrates gross negligence on the part of U.S. forces and violations of the rules of war.”

 (snip)

In his account of the investigation report, which is said to be 3,000 pages long but has not been publicly released, General Campbell said that the targeting system on the AC-130 gunship that carried out the airstrike pointed to what proved to be an empty field. Realizing that was not correct, the crew on the gunship decided to target the Doctors Without Borders hospital as the building nearest to the coordinates that matched the description of the intended target.

“The investigation found that the actions of the aircrew and the Special Operations commander were not appropriate to the threats that they faced,” General (Wilson) Shoffner said. “We did not intentionally strike the hospital, and we’re absolutely heartbroken over what happened.”

Heartbroken, but not morally or criminally accountable. The folks were tired or confused when they deliberately shot at medical personnel in white coats,  and obliterated a building readily identifiable by its logo and a red cross on its roof.

 I guess that's what they mean when they tout American Exceptionalism.