{"id":1459,"date":"2003-04-04T20:49:00","date_gmt":"2003-04-05T00:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.meehawl.com\/Blogfiles-wp\/?p=1459"},"modified":"2003-04-04T20:49:00","modified_gmt":"2003-04-05T00:49:00","slug":"hypocrisy-is-the-greatest-luxury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.meehawl.com\/Blogfiles\/2003\/04\/04\/20\/49\/hypocrisy-is-the-greatest-luxury\/","title":{"rendered":"Hypocrisy is the Greatest Luxury"},"content":{"rendered":"

So the chickenhawks like to diss the Iraqis for staging their military “near” civilians and interspersed between civilian infrastructures. Yet I read a fascinating report in the CSM about US troops illegally requisitioning schools and churches<\/a> to use as bases.<\/p>\n

This reporter witnessed the Humvees stopping outside a girls’ school – currently closed because of the war – heaving their backpacks over a cement fence into the playground. On the roof of a Christian church next door, US troops were setting up communications equipment. The entrance to a nearby boys’ school had been reinforced with sandbags and armed Kurdish militiamen, pesh merga, were on guard outside. A boys’ school was also seen being occupied by US forces, and local residents say three schools – all closed – now house US troops … An armed Kurdish militiamen working with the soldiers was dispatched to order this correspondent to leave – even though the activity was on a public street.<\/p>\n

Alfred Rubin, a professor of international law at Tuft’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, says the US actions may violate The Hague Convention, which compels combatants to take “…all necessary steps to spare as far as possible buildings dedicated to religion, art, science, charitable purposes, hospitals, and places where the sick and wounded are collected. It’s a pretty stupid thing to do,” says Mr. Rubin. “It does make the thing a target for enemy guerrillas and enemy operations.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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So the chickenhawks like to diss the Iraqis for staging their military “near” civilians and interspersed between civilian infrastructures. Yet I read a fascinating report in the CSM about US troops illegally requisitioning schools...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t