Kids Killing Kids

I came across a story this morning in The Scotsman which I've not seen reported elsewhere yet...

Child is killed in US checkpoint shooting

UNITED States soldiers killed an Iraqi child and wounded another when they fired on a car that failed to stop at a checkpoint in Baghdad.

The army confirmed the shooting as at least ten people died in the city of Fallujah in a US bomb attack.

A US military spokesman said: "Soldiers fired on the vehicle after the driver failed to obey verbal and visual instructions to stop, switched off the vehicle lights, and forced guards out of the way as he attempted to bypass the checkpoint."

The statement said the mother and the wounded child were taken to hospital following the shooting on Monday, while the father, who was driving, was questioned by police.

Many Iraqis accuse US soldiers of being too hasty to open fire and of killing many innocent civilians.

Baghdad residents say they often fail to notice poorly-lit and unannounced checkpoints while driving at night.

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Of course, I would be making a leap in guessing or assuming that the person who fired the gun that killed the child is but a child himself. I think, though, that it wouldn't be too big a leap, considering that eighteen- and nineteen-year-old soldiers are being killed everyday in Iraq.

I have a nineteen-year-old son and I fear to think how he might react given the above circumstances. Something tells me that it wouldn't be much different. As a soldier remarked in Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, it is a shoot-first situation.

As I think about how this is one of the obscenities of war -- particiularly this war of choice -- I can hear the voices of war supporters who will say, "It's war. Kill or be killed."

I guess that that is exactly my point. If there were no Iraq war, children would not be killing children. Children wouldn't be in the position of having to make such snap decisions. Children wouldn't be living and dying in a war zone. Children wouldn't be amongst the ravages of war.

Where is their right to life?

As I began this post, I was watching the PBS program POV. Tonight's independent film was War Feels Like War, and was about the independent photographers and journalists who followed last year's military blitz into Baghdad; stories of the un-imbedded. The film followed Chicago photographer Stephanie Sinclair on her way from Kuwait into Baghdad, as she documented stories that the imbedded media weren't reporting at the time.

Following the program, I found Sinclair's website (via the PBS site) and checked out her journal, which was last updated on June 3, after she left Iraq for Afghanistan. Funny thing, synchronicity!

I had several close calls myself during that time period as well. About three weeks ago American troops shot up my car for no apparent reason. Alaa and I were approaching what looked like a US checkpoint and when we stopped to wait for a signal from the soldiers on whether we could continue to move forward, two soldiers ran toward us and shot our vehicle destroying our radiator, ac and fan. Four inches higher and this blog would never have been updated again. When I complained to the CPA about the incident, a soldier told me it was probably because of the kind of car we were in - a civilian Chevy caprice made in AMERICA. Ironic, but when you think about it, this shows the anger and distrust felt by US soldiers to the common Iraqi civilian.

Then, reading further...

Less than a week later, Alaa, Mitch and I were in my apartment having coffee and a car bomb exploded at the entrance to our building. The windows and doors shattered and the room was covered in dust, but we were ok. Mitch ran outside with his cameras to see what had happened, but I was too freaked to go. I just wasn’t prepared to see pieces of people, particularly because this time it would be people I knew. But after a few minutes, I regained my composure enough to go check out the damage. Fortunately, there were very few casualties as it was pretty early in the morning. Only a 12-year-old boy was killed who used to sell cigarettes and candy outside. Unfortunate, but not too bad an outcome when compared to the amount of deaths car bombs usually leave behind. And I will acknowledge that it is a sad day when the death of an innocent kid is not such a terrible thing when compared to expectations.

The innocent kids. Again.