Mugged by reality: Joseph Farah exposes real reason anti-war 'human shields' fled Iraq

No, it's not a joke. Though I think I could come up with some good punch lines for that opener.

A group of American anti-war demonstrators who went to Iraq to serve as human shields from American attacks fled Iraq this past weekend – and what a story they have to tell.

It seems the human shields were granted some privileges by Saddam Hussein that most Americans would not be given. They were permitted to talk to ordinary Iraqis and videotape interviews with them when they didn't fear Iraqi government agents were around.

It was enough, apparently, to turn these Iraqi sympathizers into anti-Saddam zealots.

The group, now in Jordan, is bringing home 14 hours of unedited videotape of interviews with Iraqis eager for liberation by Americans.

According to a story by Arnaud de Borchgrave in the Washington Times, the Rev. Kenneth Joseph of the Assyrian Church of the East said his experience "had shocked me back to reality."

He said some Iraqis were so eager for the American attacks to begin, they "told me they would commit suicide if American bombing didn't start. They were willing to see their homes demolished to gain their freedom from Saddam's bloody tyranny."

Joseph said the Iraqis convinced him that Saddam is "a monster the likes of which the world had not seen since Stalin and Hitler. He and his sons are sick sadists."

"Their tales of slow torture and killing made me ill, such as people put in a huge human shredder for plastic products, feet first so the [torturers] could hear their screams as bodies got chewed up from foot to head."

Well, Rev. Joseph, better late than never ... I'm sure glad you learned for yourself what many of us understood before you left your country on this silly peace mission.

Many of us only needed to read about the atrocities and barbarism of Saddam Hussein, learn about his connections to international terrorism and understand his links to weapons of mass destruction to form rational conclusions that he had to go.

But welcome to the party! It's always good to see the light – even if it is very late in the day.

It's a good thing these human shields awakened when they did. My sources suggested that they were in much greater danger from the monster they discovered in Baghdad than from the U.S. forces they went to Iraq to stop.

One of Saddam's strategies from the beginning of the war was to maximize civilian casualties so the international anti-war movement would demand a stop to the slaughter. Saddam, if he were alive and well, planned to use his own weapons of mass destruction in ways that would raise the civilian casualty toll. Orders had also been given to put small-caliber rounds in the heads of human shields and blame their deaths on American weapons and firepower.

Once again, we see evidence that most Iraqis welcome liberation. They welcome the end of the brutal Saddam Hussein regime. They welcome freedom even if it costs them their homes and their lives.

Iraqis have had all the brutality they can handle. They have had all the police-state fear they can handle. They have had more pain, torture and human misery than they can handle.

The time of their liberation is nigh – and they can taste it, they can smell it, they can feel it.

It's so obvious now that even the myopic, anti-war, human-shield movement is beginning to see the truth.

I was a naive fool to be a human shield for Saddam
By Daniel Pepper
(Filed: 23/03/2003)

http://www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2003/03/23/do2305.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2003/03/23/ixop.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=297531

I wanted to join the human shields in Baghdad because it was direct action which had a chance of bringing the anti-war movement to the forefront of world attention. It was inspiring: the human shield volunteers were making a sacrifice for their political views - much more of a personal investment than going to a demonstration in Washington or London. It was simple - you get on the bus and you represent yourself.

So that is exactly what I did on the morning of Saturday, January 25. I am a 23-year-old Jewish-American photographer living in Islington, north London. I had travelled in the Middle East before: as a student, I went to the Palestinian West Bank during the intifada. I also went to Afghanistan as a photographer for Newsweek.

The human shields appealed to my anti-war stance, but by the time I had left Baghdad five weeks later my views had changed drastically. I wouldn't say that I was exactly pro-war - no, I am ambivalent - but I have a strong desire to see Saddam removed.

We on the bus felt that we were sympathetic to the views of the Iraqi civilians, even though we didn't actually know any. The group was less interested in standing up for their rights than protesting against the US and UK governments.

I was shocked when I first met a pro-war Iraqi in Baghdad - a taxi driver taking me back to my hotel late at night. I explained that I was American and said, as we shields always did, "Bush bad, war bad, Iraq good". He looked at me with an expression of incredulity.

As he realised I was serious, he slowed down and started to speak in broken English about the evils of Saddam's regime. Until then I had only heard the President spoken of with respect, but now this guy was telling me how all of Iraq's oil money went into Saddam's pocket and that if you opposed him politically he would kill your whole family.

It scared the hell out of me. First I was thinking that maybe it was the secret police trying to trick me but later I got the impression that he wanted me to help him escape. I felt so bad. I told him: "Listen, I am just a schmuck from the United States, I am not with the UN, I'm not with the CIA - I just can't help you."

Of course I had read reports that Iraqis hated Saddam Hussein, but this was the real thing. Someone had explained it to me face to face. I told a few journalists who I knew. They said that this sort of thing often happened - spontaneous, emotional, and secretive outbursts imploring visitors to free them from Saddam's tyrannical Iraq.

I became increasingly concerned about the way the Iraqi regime was restricting the movement of the shields, so a few days later I left Baghdad for Jordan by taxi with five others. Once over the border we felt comfortable enough to ask our driver what he felt about the regime and the threat of an aerial bombardment.

"Don't you listen to Powell on Voice of America radio?" he said. "Of course the Americans don't want to bomb civilians. They want to bomb government and Saddam's palaces. We want America to bomb Saddam."

We just sat, listening, our mouths open wide. Jake, one of the others, just kept saying, "Oh my God" as the driver described the horrors of the regime. Jake was so shocked at how naive he had been. We all were. It hadn't occurred to anyone that the Iraqis might actually be pro-war.

The driver's most emphatic statement was: "All Iraqi people want this war." He seemed convinced that civilian casualties would be small; he had such enormous faith in the American war machine to follow through on its promises. Certainly more faith than any of us had.

Perhaps the most crushing thing we learned was that most ordinary Iraqis thought Saddam Hussein had paid us to come to protest in Iraq. Although we explained that this was categorically not the case, I don't think he believed us. Later he asked me: "Really, how much did Saddam pay you to come?"

It hit me on visceral and emotional levels: this was a real portrayal of Iraq life. After the first conversation, I completely rethought my view of the Iraqi situation. My understanding changed on intellectual, emotional, psychological levels. I remembered the experience of seeing Saddam's egomaniacal portraits everywhere for the past two weeks and tried to place myself in the shoes of someone who had been subjected to seeing them every day for the last 20 or so years.

Last Thursday night I went to photograph the anti-war rally in Parliament Square. Thousands of people were shouting "No war" but without thinking about the implications for Iraqis. Some of them were drinking, dancing to Samba music and sparring with the police. It was as if the protesters were talking about a different country where the ruling government is perfectly acceptable. It really upset me.

Anyone with half a brain must see that Saddam has to be taken out. It is extraordinarily ironic that the anti-war protesters are marching to defend a government which stops its people exercising that freedom.

The sad thing is, most of this footage and truth from these former anti-War, human shields will be purposely ignored or greeted with sneering skepticism by the major media and liberals.

The media and leftists don't want to hear anymore evil about Saddam and his thugs. They want to make up lies and half-truths about the Hitler Bush and the evil Coalition Forces. Bush and the military are the ones who deserve all of the harm and villification.

The left (which includes most of the leftist doom & gloom journalists) wants the downfall of Bush and Blair; not Saddam Hussein whom they could care less about even though they claim that they are opposing this war for the Iraqi people's welfare. The left's goal is to protest, skew results and hope for as much bloodshed as possible (on both sides) so that they can get back into power.

Alligned with Iraq's current propaganda war and their new-found Islamofascist comrades, the tactics of the left are even finding converts here on FRee Republic where a few whining, woobly fools are posting doom & gloom scenarios.

Thank goodness for the internet and news organizations like FOX NEWS (that will, hopefully, carry some of the 13 hours of footage to the ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN-brain-dread American TV audience.) We can't forget what it is that we are fighting for and against!

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