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US Invades
Yemen, Shoot and Kill 8-year-old Girl, 29 Others
BY MEMO
January 30,
2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- "MEMO"
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While the media attention has been focused on the death
of one US serviceman who was killed during a raid in
Yemen, one of the most tragic casualties of the assault
ordered by President Donald Trump was an eight-year-old
girl.
The raid took
place over the weekend, as US forces attempted a “site
exploitation” attack that attempted to gather
intelligence on Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP),
the extremist group behind several high-profile terror
attacks, including the Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris in
two years ago.
Though the
United States hailed the operation as a success, reports
from Yemen would seem to indicate that the price paid by
Yemeni civilians and non-combatants was extraordinarily
high.
‘Don’t cry mama, I’m
fine’
According to
medical sources on the ground cited by Reuters,
30 people were killed by US soldiers, at least ten of
them women and children in what appeared to be a case of
disproportionate force utilised by the American commando
unit who were sent in to retrieve intelligence.
Amongst the
casualties was eight-year-old Nawar Al-Awlaki. Nawar is
the daughter of US-born preacher Anwar Al-Awlaki who was
the first American citizen to be assassinated in a US
drone strike in 2011, decried by civil rights groups as
an extrajudicial execution that denied him his right to
a fair trial.
Two weeks after
Anwar’s assassination, his 16-year-old son Abdulrahman
was killed in another US drone strike. Abdulrahman was a
US citizen said to have been born in Denver, Colorado
and was a child at the time he was killed on the
authority of the Obama administration.
With Nawar’s
murder, it appears that no relative of Anwar Al-Awlaki
is safe, regardless of whether they are children or not,
or even involved in terrorism or not.
In a Facebook
post, Nawar’s uncle and former Yemeni Deputy Minister of
the Environment and Water Resources, Ammar Al-Aulaqi
said: “[Nawar] was shot several times, with one bullet
piercing her neck. She was bleeding for two hours
because it was not possible to get her medical
attention.”
“As Nawar was
always a personality and a mind far older than her
years, she was reassuring her mother as she was bleeding
out; ‘Don’t cry mama, I’m fine, I’m fine’,” Ammar’s
emotional post continued.
“Then the call
to the Dawn prayer came, and her soul departed from her
tiny body.”
Trump’s fight against
‘Islamic terrorism’
Nawar’s
violent death came as a result of the Trump
administration’s fight against so-called “radical
Islamic terrorism”. In his inaugural speech, Trump vowed
to wipe it off the face of the Earth. Trump made no
similar vow against other forms of terror, including
state terrorism.
“She was hit
with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours,”
Nasser Al-Awlaki, Nawar’s grandfather, told Reuters.
“Why kill
children? This is the new [US] administration – it’s
very sad, a big crime.”
In a statement,
the Pentagon did not refer to any civilian casualties,
although a US military official, speaking on condition
of anonymity, said they could not be ruled out. Instead,
the US was preoccupied with the death of one US
serviceman who was killed during the operation that
ended up with Nawar and many other children dead.
Hailing the
operation as a success, Trump said: “Americans are
saddened this morning with news that a life of a heroic
service member has been taken in our fight against the
evil of radical Islamic terrorism.”
Two more US
servicemen were injured when an American V-22 Osprey
military aircraft was sent to evacuate another wounded
commando, but came under fire and had to be
“intentionally destroyed in place,” the Pentagon said.
Social media reacts
Social media
was awash with anger at the death of Nawar, blaming the
US for “assassinating children”.
Mohammad
Alrubaa, an Arab journalist and television show host,
tweeted: “This is Nawar Al-Awlaki that the American
marines came to Yemen to kill…#American_terrorism.”
Mousa Alomar, a
Syrian journalist, tweeted “[US] marines killed Nawar
Al-Awlaki and tens of women and children in Yemen. #US_terrorism_kills_Yemenis.”
Commenting on
the fact that many civilian fatalities are justified as
“collateral damage” by US military and political
officials, Yemeni politician Ali Albukhaiti tweeted:
“Nawar Al-Awlaki was not killed in an airstrike, but by
a bullet fired by a marine and at close range. It is
terrorism beyond terrorism, but it is defended and
justified by a media that markets [such attacks].”
Though raids
like this one in the rural Al-Bayda province in Yemen’s
south are rare, the United States habitually utilises
drone strikes to target individuals in what many deem to
be extrajudicial killings, especially of its own
citizens. Civilians are routinely killed in such drone
strikes that are largely indiscriminate, but justified
as a “legal act of war” by the US Justice Department.
The views
expressed in this article are solely those of the author
and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of
Information Clearing House.
U.S. invades Yemen kills 25
civilians : At least
nine women, six children, and 10 men were killed in the
raid which was carried out at dawn in the Yakla village
within the Walad Rabi'e district in the town of Qaifa,
Baida, the sources said.
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