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December
28, 2001
John Chuckman
Observing
George Bush
Suren
Pillay
Civilian
Bodies
Aaron
Lehmer
Inviting
Future Terrorism
December
27, 2001
Patrick
McNamara
Palestinian
Children Bear Brunt of Mideast Violence
Nelson
Valdés
A
Possible Scenario on the Location of bin Laden
Jensen
and Mahajan
Remember
the Afghan Dead
Philip
Farruggio
A
New Year's Resolution
Ramzi
Kysia
The
People of the Valley
December 26, 2001
John Chuckman
In
Praise of the Unspeakable
Sam Bahour
2002:
Year of the Twos
December 25, 2001
Jennifer Loewenstein
Israel's
Human Rights Record
December 24, 2001
Sam Bahour
It
Happened One Morning
Yair Khilou
Why I Resisted
Being Drafted into the Israeli Army
Michael
Chisari
War
as Diversionary Tactic
Cockburn/St. Clair
Enron
and the Green Seal
December 21, 2001
Tom Turnipseed
War
Good for Bush
John Chuckman
The
First Victim in the
War on Terror
December 20, 2001
Lawrence
McGuire
Killing
Other People's Children
Miriam Rozen
Foundation
Without Representation?
Kenneth
Roth
A
Letter to Rumsfeld on
Military Tribunals
William Blum
Casualties:
Theirs and Ours
December 19, 2001
Marjorie
Cohn
Don't
Pre-Judge John Walker
Sam Bahour
Palestine
and You
A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
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War Diary
CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
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CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
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The
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by Douglas Valentine
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December
28, 2001
Weapons of Mass
Destruction
Going Nuclear in Iraq
By Ramzi Kysia
Dr Alim Abdul-Hamid's office at Al Mustanseriya
Medical College in Baghdad is decorated in bright, cheerful colours,
but what he has to say is anything but cheerful. Formerly Dean
of Basra Medical College, Abdul-Hamid has had plenty of first-hand
experience with Iraq's unprecedented plague of cancers and birth
defects.
"We have seen cases of breast cancer
among women in their 20s. In their 20s!," says Abdul-Hamid.
"This is really tragic, because, you know, in America, probably
when you come across a case of breast cancer in a woman in her
late 30s, you would consider that this is a young age for cancer,
while we see cases of breast cancer in the 20s. There are increased
incidences of colon cancer, thyroid cancer, in addition to, of
course, leukaemias and lymphomas."
What's the source of this epidemic? According
to Abdul-Hamid the problem is depleted uranium. Depleted uranium,
or "DU", is an extremely dense, heavy metal, and a
waste product of atomic bomb production. It has a half-life of
over 4 billion years. It contains trace amounts of plutonium
and is 60 per cent as radioactive as naturally occurring uranium.
The US military uses it as ballast in their missiles, and they
use it to coat shells and pellets. Because of its density, it
is armour piercing - so it is used as an anti-tank weapon. DU
is also aerosolising. When a shell coated with DU hits, it burns,
releasing uranium oxide dust. This dust then rises in the air,
is carried by the winds, and contaminates the entire surrounding
environment.
The Pentagon admits to dropping 320 tonnes
of DU in Iraq. The environmental organisation Greenpeace puts
the estimate at over 800 tonnes. Hospitals throughout Iraq have
reported as much as a 10-fold increase in overall cancer rates
and birth defects over the last 11 years.
Abdul-Hamid points to an epidemiological
study he headed in Basra, demonstrating the connection between
DU and cancer in Iraq. The study looked at five factors: biological
plausibility, strength of association, incidence rate, increased
incidences of cancer among younger children, and the dose-response
relationship. According to Abdul-Hamid, all these factors point
to a strong, causal link between DU exposure and cancer in Iraq.
To test the biological plausibility of
their hypothesis, the team of scientists studied the types of
cancer being reported, most notably leukaemias, and explored
their relationship to DU. The results strongly indicate a radioactive,
rather than chemical, contaminant. Explains Abdul-Hamid: "Leukaemia
is known to be related to radiation. We don't have evidence that
leukaemia is related to chemicals."
Additionally, if the source of the epidemic
were chemical, there would have been a sharp spike in cancer
rates following the Gulf war, followed by rapid decreases as
the source of the contamination disappeared. In contrast, with
radiation the strength of association increases as time passes.
The fact that cancer rates are still increasing at an exponential
rate in Iraq strongly implies a radioactive source.
This increase is enormous. According
to the study, malignancies and leukaemias among children under
the age of 15 have more than tripled since 1990. Whereas in 1990
young children accounted for only 13 per cent of cancer cases,
today over 56 per cent of all cancer in Iraq occurs among children
under the age of 5. Abdul-Hamid explains that it isn't just direct
exposure of the children to the radiation still present in the
environment; it's also the cumulative exposure of their parents
over time. This cumulative exposure does permanent damage to
parental genes, damage which is then passed on to their children.
Finally, pointing to a map of Basra,
Abdul-Hamid highlights the dose-response relationship between
DU and cancers. "If we look at the map of Basra, southern
Iraq, and monitor the incidences in different districts over
time, we can come out with a very important conclusion. And that
is that areas which have got the higher level of background radiation
have higher levels of cancers." These factors overwhelmingly
point to DU as the source of Iraq's current cancer plague.
Iraqi doctors aren't the only ones complaining
about DU. US veterans are upset as well. DU may be a leading
cause of the unprecedented levels of illnesses effecting Gulf
war veterans. "The Pentagon claims that there are no significant
health effects from exposure to depleted uranium, but their own
research and documents show that this is not true," says
Charles Sheehan-Miles, a Gulf war veteran and former president
of the National Gulf War Resource Centre. Almost 25 per cent
of US soldiers who fought in the Gulf war are currently receiving
disability benefits from the US Veteran's Administration. This
is twice the rate of disabilities as among Vietnam veterans.
Unfortunately, DU remains an integral
part of the American military arsenal. According to Sheehan-Miles,
"Depleted uranium, like landmines and cluster bombs, is
a weapon with effects far beyond the battlefield, with innocents
and children as the frequent victims. I resent this. As a former
American soldier, I was trained to protect the innocent, not
to kill them."
As the United States gears up for a new
"Desert Storm" against Iraq, using weapons like DU,
that is a lesson that more American soldiers, and the politicians
who command them, should be reminded of.
Ramzi Kysia
is a Muslim-American peace activist, and serves on the board
of directors for the
Education for Peace in Iraq Centre. He is currently in Iraq
as part of a Voices in the Wilderness
peace delegation trying to end the war
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