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MONTH: March 2007

Pet market bombings & dog abuse reflect the low price of life in Iraq war zone

BAGHDAD--Who bombed the Ghazil pet market? Four times? Why?

The anonymous perpetrators of the Ghazil mayhem against both humans of animals may pretend to motives rooted in religion and ideology.

Yet, killing and maiming both Sunnis and Shiites, of both genders and all ages, along with countless animals of multiple species, the Ghazil bombings exhibited the same depraved disregard for others' lives as the alleged deeds of former U.S. Army private first class Steven Dale Green.

Green, 21, is soon to stand trial in U.S. federal court in Kentucky, facing the death penalty, for allegedly leading four other soldiers in the March 12, 2006 gang rape and murder of Abeer Qassim Hamza, 14. First, testified the other soldiers, Green shot her parents and her five-year-old sister. Then, after the rapes, Green shot Hamza several times in the head at close range, and set her hair on fire before fleeing the scene.

Green had apparently rehearsed the acts with an animal victim.

At an August 7, 2006 pre-trial hearing, wrote Paul von Zielbauer of The New York Times, soldiers of Green's unit who were called by his defense to demonstrate his purported mental unfitness to be tried "testified to a grisly tale of how Mr. Green tossed a puppy off the roof of a building and set the puppy on fire."

Two of Green's alleged partners in crime, Specialist James P. Barker, 24, and Sergeant Paul E. Cortez, 24, pleaded guilty to rape and murder in November 2006 and February 2007, respectively, receiving sentences of 90 and 100 years in prison. Barker will be eligible for parole in 20 years, Cortez in only 10 years. Privates first class Jesse Spielman, 22, and Bryan Howard, 19, are still awaiting court martial.

Ghazil market

At the Ghazil pet market on January 25, 2007, "Blood stained the ground and small birds chirped in battered cages around the small square in front of an ancient Sunni mosque," reported Alastair Macdonald of Reuters. "Tattered black Shi'ite prayer flags hung in the clear, still air. The population of the busy area is religiously mixed," Macdon-ald wrote. "A police source said witnesses believed Friday's market bomb was planted in a cardboard box that the bomber had punched with air holes, to pass off as containing birds. Parrots, canaries and more exotic pets are prime attractions at the Ghazil market."
Associated Press elaborated that a witness said "a carton containing pigeons blew up as potential buyers gathered around."

"My friends and I rushed to the scene," customer Raad Hassan told Associ-ated Press, "where we saw burned dead bodies, pieces of flesh, and several dead expensive puppies and birds."

Fifteen people died. Fifty-five were wounded. No source counted the dead and injured animals.

"The Ghazil pet market is a popular destination on Fridays," Associated Press continued. "People gather to sell and buy monkeys, cats, dogs, and other animals."

Baghdad has one struggling zoo, but in the whole of Iraq there are no functioning humane societies or animal shelters, and are few opportunies other than pet markets for most people to see animals other than dogs, cats, and those used for work or food.

But someone is making a concerted effort to close the Ghazil market, an institution believed to have endured--with occasional relocations--since before the time of the Prophet Mohammed.

The first two Ghazil bombs detonated in rapid succession on June 2, 2006, killing five people, wounding 57. The bombs were reportedly left in bags that looked as if they might hold snakes.

Three people died in the next bombing, on December 1, 2006.

Attacks on Iraq pet keepers and pets in the first months after the 2003 U.S. invasion were mostly attributed to sectarian militants expressing rejection of U.S. and British pro-animal values. Wiring dogs with explosives, alive or dead, was allegedly a gesture of cultural defiance, as well as a means of killing.

Death threats for "collaborating" with Americans to found the Iraq Society for Animal Welfare in mid-2003 forced former Baghdad Zoo veterinarian Farah Murrani to flee Iraq toward the end of 2004. Surviving for at least another year, the Iraq Society for Animal Welfare is now apparently dormant.

But the Ghazil pet fair has nothing to do with American or British invaders, nor with western values, nor with any clear strategic objective of either Shiite or Sunni warring factions, other than the general notion of making Iraq ungovernable by any other faction.

The Ghazil bombings appear instead to indicate the involvement of non-Iraqis espousing a strain of extreme Islamic fundamentalism most often seen in Afghanistan and adjacent parts of Pakistan.
The predominant Shiite and Sunni interpretations of Islam both accept keeping caged birds, as well as other pets.

The Taliban, however, who governed Afghanistan from 1996 to 2003, believe Islam forbids keeping birds in cages. Soon after the Taliban took control of Kabul, the Afghan capital, they forced the release of all caged birds, no matter how dependent the birds were for survival on human feeders.

The Ghazil market also sells dogs, a practice explicitly forbidden by at least three Hadiths, or sayings, of Mohammed.

"Allah's Apostle forbade taking the price of a dog," agree Hadith 3:439, 3:440, and Hadith 3:482.

Shooting dogs

Street dogs and fear of dogs due to endemic rabies are both ubiquitous in Iraq, as elsewhere throughout the world. Wherever refuse collection is haphazard, dogs do much of the rodent control, and vaccination and dog sterilization have yet to become commonplace.

U.S. troops were often portrayed as protectors of dogs and other animals in the first phases of American involved in Iraq. Soldiers who adopted Iraq street dogs, and sometimes cats, often found ways of transporting them stateside, with the help of the Iraq Society for Animal Welfare and the Boston-based organization Military Mascots.

Between sixty and 100 animals adopted by U.S. soldiers reached the U.S. before the most accessible routes were cut off by intensified biosecurity measures imposed at all U.S. ports of entry in 2004, after outbreaks of Sudden Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and the H5N1 avian influenza spread from southern China throughout the world.

By March 2005, e-mails and web postings from U.S. troops in Iraq indicated that the attitudes of some toward dogs had become overtly hostile, to the consternation of others.

Read one e-mail forwarded to ANIMAL PEOPLE, "Hi my name is M. D. formerly of A TRP 1-10 CAV 4ID. While in Iraq we had a sport of killing dogs whenever the Iraqis weren't shooting us. I shot one at about 50 yards with my M4 and it ran yelping to lower ground. We had to finish it, so my friends and I went to it and started shooting it. I've never seen a dog take as many shots to the head, at least four, as this one did. After we thought it was dead we dug a hole and when I picked it up with the shovel it came back to life, so we shot it a couple more times."

The e-mail included the web coordinates of a malfunctioning video clip that the sender described as "pretty funny."

"I am currently stationed in Iraq with the Tennessee National Guard," wrote another soldier in mid-2005, identifying himself as Mike Hoback. "We have several dogs whom the National Guard states are wild. However, these dogs have never once tried to bite or harm any soldier, and are loved and cared for by the soldiers. We are fighting for our lives every day over here," Hoback said, "not knowing if we will make it to the next day, but upon arriving back at the camp and seeing the dogs, all of our worries go out the window and we feel at peace with our K-9 friends."

Unfortunately, Hoback alleged, "The Tennessee and Texas National Guards have a policy that the animals are to be caught using a device similar to an old bear trap. Several dogs have been caught in these traps, and for some reason a week later the traps are still on them. Once the dogs are caught, they are transported to a garbage dump and used for target practice, sometimes requiring ten to fifteen shots before finally being killed.

"I don't understand this, as the military provides medicine to put dogs to sleep," Hoback continued, "but our leadership will not try to get it, stating 'We will be gone by the time it gets here.' I have been fighting this battle with my chain of command for almost two weeks," Hoback said, "and right now they have suspended the use of traps and shootings until they look into the law, but I need help fast."

ANIMAL PEOPLE forwarded the e-mail to several potential sources of help, but received no further particulars and no confirmation that the response ever reached Hoback.

On September 28, 2005, ANIMAL PEOPLE received a forwarded e-mail from someone identifying himself as "a soldier in 2nd of the 3rd ACR," who was "ordered by my company commander to kill all dogs I see. We are living at a place called Ft. Telifar," the soldier said. The company commander allegedly called the dogs a health risk. "This is not true," the soldier wrote. "The dogs help keep us protected. At night the dogs bark at anything coming near us."

The soldier claimed the order to kill dogs came after a litter of puppies defecated in the commander's quarters.

"People just started shooting dogs like it was some kind of sport," the soldier said. "I even heard over the radio that one of the tank crews killed a cat with a main gun round. At my last count, there were 26 dead dogs here at the fort in the last two weeks."

Killing dogs, however, was not only not U.S. policy, but was explicitly against orders for soldiers on patrol.

"Coalition troops in Iraq have been warned not to run over or shoot stray dogs they see watching them from the roadside," reported Brendan Nicholson of the Melbourne Age on August 2, 2005, "because they may be cut-out shapes hiding a home-made bomb.

"Explosives experts say insurgents have created bombs with the trigger mechanisms hidden behind these fake dogs," Nicholson explained. "The terrorists have apparently used florescent tape to create eyes in their canine cut-outs, to make them look more realistic in a vehicle's headlights.

"The device includes two metal plates," Nicholson said, "that when hit by a bullet or the wheel of a truck, are jammed together, closing an electric circuit and setting off the bomb. Coalition soldiers say the dog bombs are the biggest threat they face."

Notice at last

Reports of U.S. troops killing or abusing dogs in Iraq drew only sporadic activist notice for more than two years. News reports occasionally mentioned suspected rabid dogs being shot in combat areas, but death squad activities and frequent revelations of abuse of human prisoners tended to draw attention away from anything done to animals, until January 2007.

Then a video clip posted to a public web site drew more than 287,000 mostly outraged hits within a matter of days. The clip showed an injured dog lying in ruts left by the recent passage of a vehicle. Not clear was whether the dog had just been hit, or was injured earlier. Several U.S. soldiers walked near, taunting and stoning the dog, laughing at the dog's awkward efforts to limp away.

"There is no one in Iraq to rescue animals in need of help," posted Colorado activist Gayle Hoenig, after days of trying to identify and help the dog. "The Iraq Society for Animal Welfare cannot operate under these dangerous conditions. They are no longer a contact and not an option. There is no place to take animals even if someone does rescue them. There is no way to get animals out of Iraq. The U.S. military in Iraq is doing whatever they want," Hoenig added. "Current U.S. military policy is to shoot dogs who pose a threat or a nuisance."

But U.S. Army chief of public affairs Brigadier General Tony Cucolo on February 2, 2007 wrote to Hoenig and others that the Army is taking the videotaped incident seriously.

"We know from the uniforms and the unit patches," Cucolo said, that "the video was shot in the late 2003 to late 2004 time frame. We know the unit, but have yet to identify the individuals who were present three years ago. We consulted the appropriate experts, who are making inquiries. We are trying to determine who is responsible, as well as what actions can and should be taken."

Although discharged U.S. soldiers--like Steven D. Green--can be recalled to the military to face trial on felony charges, throwing rocks at a dog is usually charged as a misdemeanor, if charged at all.

"I ask to you understand this is not at all representative of our soldiers," Cucolo wrote. "My personal experience in 27 years of service, deploying to difficult and challenging environments such as the Balkans in the mid-1990s, and both Afghanistan and Iraq, is that the overwhelming majority of American soldiers are kind to animals, in particular dogs, because they remind us of home.

"This video has had other effects," Cucolo continued. "My duties include training senior officers and non-commissioned officers (sergeants) who are headed to key command positions. I now use this video to show Army leaders the far-reaching impact of the negative acts of a misguided few.

"We will continue to pursue this issue and strive to see that this does not happen again," Cucolo promised.

Responded U.S. Army Sergeant Roy Batty, in e-mails to Hoenig, "Unfortunately, this is pretty much standard soldier stuff. If you take a bunch of young guys, stick them in a country where people are trying to kill them, and have them live in a place which is very boring except for the occasional moment of sheer terror, some will react with cruelty. I've had to stop some of my own soldiers from doing similar things.

"In a country where humans are brutally torturing and killing other humans," Batty added, "and dumping the carcasses in whatever street, lot, or river is closest, for everyone to see, I would question the logic behind trying to discipline a soldier for throwing rocks at a dog."

But historically, worldwide, what humans can do to a dog with impunity sets the floor for what may be done to fellow humans. The safer dogs are, the higher the general level of respect for human rights.

U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Jay Kopelman, 46, in November 2004 adopted and sent home a puppy named Lava while fighting in Fallujah, in acknowledged violation of General Order 1A, forbidding such rescues. "We had to kill dogs while I was in Fallujah, when they endangered our troops," Koppelman posted to his personal web site. "Yet I would never--not for one second--tolerate any of my troops treating an animal as these soldiers have. This is the kind of behavior that must require the Department of Defense to re-think GO-1A. It should also be a wake-up call to the Department of the Army that its recruiting practices and Big Army are terribly broken if the people depicted in this video are typical of who they enlist. We don't need immature, ignorant and abusive people fighting this war. Soldiers who have abused a helpless animal are not who should be representing our country."

Commented Humane Society of the U.S. senior policy advisor Bernard Unti, "We are planning to act on the goal of securing revisions to the Universal Code of Military Justice some time in 2007, on the assumption that it would help to minimize and eliminate such incidents, and worse ones."
--Merritt Clifton