Monday, December 31, 2007
"They Saw Me Disappear"
Imagine stepping into your Army superior’s office in one of those former palaces inside Baghdad’s Green Zone and saying, “I refuse to participate in any more combat operations.” Probably wouldn’t make them very happy, especially since you had security clearance and recently had been given top honors for your service. You were high profile soldier, good enough to be a military escort for VIP visitors to Baghdad ... And a sniper when not providing escort protection.
This, however, is not the plot for a TV show or movie or book. It is, rather, the real life experience of Army Spc Eleonai “Eli” Israel, who, at the time of his resistance, was stationed at Baghdad’s Green Zone palace, called Camp Victory, with the Joint Visitors Bureau, Bravo Company, 1-149 Infantry of the Kentucky Army National Guard.
Upon making his statement of resistance, Israel told me, “I was immediately and aggressively detained and confined illegally [no contact with a lawyer, family or friends] for three weeks.”
Unfortunately for those who sought to silence him, Spc. Israel had been telling his view of the war via Internet blogs, writing of what he had seen in the way of “killing everyone who resisted” the military, and torture. “We are torturing right now,” Israel told me, and our government is guilty of as much “mass killing and torture” as Saddam Hussein.
What Eli feared after he announced his refusal was that he would “disappear” from his family, friends and the public. “I thought it was a likely scenario,” he said to me. “I was not able to contact anyone; I was flagged as a security threat and was forced to take psychiatric evaluations. I had the fortune of [holding] the highest scored security clearance, and two weeks before my stand” had been given among the highest evaluations for his performance.
“If my story had not gotten out, they [would have] tried to re-write my history.”
Here’s what happened after his detention.
Those who followed his blogs on http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/ and other sites, including Iraq Veterans Against the War, knew something was amiss when his postings suddenly stopped. They saw him disappear. On the “Courage” site on June 21st this announcement appeared:
“Yesterday, Eli’s urgent message from Baghdad buzzed around the Internet.” This is that message:
“I have told them that I will no longer play a ‘combat role’ in this conflict or ‘protect corporate representatives,’ and they have taken this as ‘violating a direct order.’ I may be in jail or worse in the next 24 hours. Please rally whoever you can, call whoever you can, bring as much attention to this as you can. I have no doubt that the military will bury me and hide the whole situation if they can. I'm in big trouble. I'm in the middle of Iraq, surrounded by people who are not on my side. Please help me. Please contact whoever you can, and tell them who I am, so I don't ‘disappear.’”
Later, he wrote, “It would have been a lot ‘easier’ for me to simply keep doing combat missions for a couple more weeks, and be done with things. Moral convictions are not based on timing or convenience.”
Eli spent two months in an Army brig in Kuwait for his courage to stand up to authority. Why did he do it?
“I started to see myself in the eyes of the people shooting at me,” he said to me. “It’s an information war,” he said; “an occupation” full of “bribes, threats and intimidation” aimed at “turning them against each other and against us.”
“When I first signed up, I believed everything I was told,” Eli told me. Eventually, he saw that “the situation on the ground is not” what we’ve been led to believe. “We’re killing everyone who resists. Decisions are not being made by [Prime Minister Nouri al-]Maliki.
This war “is about control of the day-to-day decisions of another country. The people in Iraq want to control their own lives. [They fight] because no one is going to take over their country,” just as we would do under similar circumstances. “They want us to leave,” Eli said to me.
“It’s not democracy [over there]; we’re imposing martial law ... with raids on houses, torturing people. The people of Iraq are trying to protect the dignity of their own families and keep us out.” He spoke of seeing “on the street, a mother screaming for her children.”
While chauffeuring VIPs, Eli began to understand, he noted, that “corporate representatives tell our generals what kind of action to take.”
And he reacted with anger, when he saw President Bush’s speech to the VFW. “He was comparing it to Vietnam, and he was laughing.”
“Young people in the U.S. don’t have access to the same information I do; they need to know that my military brothers and sisters died for the same lies” our young people hear from our leaders. “The best thing I can do,” Eli concluded, “is speak out, and surround myself with others who believe as I do.”
He has joined the campaign of former Alaska Gov. Mike Gravel, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for president, and was driving the Governor on a southern campaign tour, while speaking with me Sunday.
As I reflected on our conversation, I realized I’ve never encountered such in-the-moment bravery and passion for justice. I felt as though I was speaking to a Lieutenant John Kerry, who testified similarly to Congress in 1971. Those who speak truth to power are in danger in these jingoistic times, but Eli Israel has given them a public face and a cause to champion.
For more information on former Army National Guard Spc. Eleonai "Eli" Israel, go to http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/.
Nick Penning (www.nickpenning.com) is an Arlington, Va., freelance writer.
This, however, is not the plot for a TV show or movie or book. It is, rather, the real life experience of Army Spc Eleonai “Eli” Israel, who, at the time of his resistance, was stationed at Baghdad’s Green Zone palace, called Camp Victory, with the Joint Visitors Bureau, Bravo Company, 1-149 Infantry of the Kentucky Army National Guard.
Upon making his statement of resistance, Israel told me, “I was immediately and aggressively detained and confined illegally [no contact with a lawyer, family or friends] for three weeks.”
Unfortunately for those who sought to silence him, Spc. Israel had been telling his view of the war via Internet blogs, writing of what he had seen in the way of “killing everyone who resisted” the military, and torture. “We are torturing right now,” Israel told me, and our government is guilty of as much “mass killing and torture” as Saddam Hussein.
What Eli feared after he announced his refusal was that he would “disappear” from his family, friends and the public. “I thought it was a likely scenario,” he said to me. “I was not able to contact anyone; I was flagged as a security threat and was forced to take psychiatric evaluations. I had the fortune of [holding] the highest scored security clearance, and two weeks before my stand” had been given among the highest evaluations for his performance.
“If my story had not gotten out, they [would have] tried to re-write my history.”
Here’s what happened after his detention.
Those who followed his blogs on http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/ and other sites, including Iraq Veterans Against the War, knew something was amiss when his postings suddenly stopped. They saw him disappear. On the “Courage” site on June 21st this announcement appeared:
“Yesterday, Eli’s urgent message from Baghdad buzzed around the Internet.” This is that message:
“I have told them that I will no longer play a ‘combat role’ in this conflict or ‘protect corporate representatives,’ and they have taken this as ‘violating a direct order.’ I may be in jail or worse in the next 24 hours. Please rally whoever you can, call whoever you can, bring as much attention to this as you can. I have no doubt that the military will bury me and hide the whole situation if they can. I'm in big trouble. I'm in the middle of Iraq, surrounded by people who are not on my side. Please help me. Please contact whoever you can, and tell them who I am, so I don't ‘disappear.’”
Later, he wrote, “It would have been a lot ‘easier’ for me to simply keep doing combat missions for a couple more weeks, and be done with things. Moral convictions are not based on timing or convenience.”
Eli spent two months in an Army brig in Kuwait for his courage to stand up to authority. Why did he do it?
“I started to see myself in the eyes of the people shooting at me,” he said to me. “It’s an information war,” he said; “an occupation” full of “bribes, threats and intimidation” aimed at “turning them against each other and against us.”
“When I first signed up, I believed everything I was told,” Eli told me. Eventually, he saw that “the situation on the ground is not” what we’ve been led to believe. “We’re killing everyone who resists. Decisions are not being made by [Prime Minister Nouri al-]Maliki.
This war “is about control of the day-to-day decisions of another country. The people in Iraq want to control their own lives. [They fight] because no one is going to take over their country,” just as we would do under similar circumstances. “They want us to leave,” Eli said to me.
“It’s not democracy [over there]; we’re imposing martial law ... with raids on houses, torturing people. The people of Iraq are trying to protect the dignity of their own families and keep us out.” He spoke of seeing “on the street, a mother screaming for her children.”
While chauffeuring VIPs, Eli began to understand, he noted, that “corporate representatives tell our generals what kind of action to take.”
And he reacted with anger, when he saw President Bush’s speech to the VFW. “He was comparing it to Vietnam, and he was laughing.”
“Young people in the U.S. don’t have access to the same information I do; they need to know that my military brothers and sisters died for the same lies” our young people hear from our leaders. “The best thing I can do,” Eli concluded, “is speak out, and surround myself with others who believe as I do.”
He has joined the campaign of former Alaska Gov. Mike Gravel, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for president, and was driving the Governor on a southern campaign tour, while speaking with me Sunday.
As I reflected on our conversation, I realized I’ve never encountered such in-the-moment bravery and passion for justice. I felt as though I was speaking to a Lieutenant John Kerry, who testified similarly to Congress in 1971. Those who speak truth to power are in danger in these jingoistic times, but Eli Israel has given them a public face and a cause to champion.
For more information on former Army National Guard Spc. Eleonai "Eli" Israel, go to http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/.
Nick Penning (www.nickpenning.com) is an Arlington, Va., freelance writer.
In Hot Pursuit
If life is a race, then the outcome --- in these times --- is all but certain: those who ‘have’ will sail along with few impediments; those who ‘have not’ will struggle forward and be pushed back; for every gain, it seems, brings with it a loss.
How so?
Consider the Connection’s recent HOT (high occupancy toll) editorial, which brought news that the coming of new $400 million state-backed HOT lanes on the Virginia beltway will allow drivers to “move at the speed limit,” if they either bring two other riders with them or, alone, can afford up to $14 to sail along 14 miles of profit-making concrete.
“The plan,” stated our paper’s editorial, “is to charge enough money so that the traffic on the toll lanes continues to move at the speed limit.”
That’s right, if you’ve got the dough, you can go; if your bank account’s too low, your ride will be slow.
And this isn’t the only way the well-off enjoy taxpayer-financed advantages. Consider the security waiting lines at National Airport. The airlines convinced the feds to let first class passengers whiz by us other suckers to a first-class only security check-in. The line moves so fast that these moneyed travelers barely have enough time to take off their shoes before they’re waved along to their departure gate.
At Dulles, if you can afford 30 bucks a night ($17 for each additional day), you can have a valet park your car while you walk to the terminal. If you’re an average Joe, then your option is a reasonable nine dollars per day; but the only way to get to the ticket counter is by shuttle bus, taking a lot more precious time.
Time is money, we hear so often. No debating that when you look at the new beltway scheme and airport parking.
As to the taxes that bring money for airport and highway construction, we all know that if you’ve got deep pockets you can escape a boatload of federal taxes: inheritance taxes got eliminated a couple years back, not to save family farms, as was so often claimed, but to allow the heirs of anyone with an estate of any size to pay nothing.
Prior to the death of that tax, cleverly nicknamed by the Republican Party as the “Death Tax,” an estate of $2 million or more was hit the then-inheritance tax of 46 percent.
IRS records, though, according to Loren Steffy, business columnist for The Houston Chronicle, reported that most such heirs --- due to “exemptions and credits” --- paid a tax of only 18.8 percent. And before Mr. Bush and his GOP Congress killed the inheritance tax, “fewer than 1 percent of Americans who died had estates valuable enough to trigger” it.”
On WETA the other night, Bill Moyers had a discussion with William Donaldson former Bush-appointed chairman of the Security and Exchange Commission, who told Moyers, “I think the sharing of the benefits of society are increasingly disproportionate.” People “read every day about the fantastic profits being made by hedge fund managers and so forth. And yet ... they're paying more for gasoline and paying more for the everyday necessities of life ... . So in effect, the great middle class in this country has not really shared in what's going on now.”
In a soul-baring speech, delivered just before his 2004 reelection in white tie and tails to a prestigious crowd, our president accurately and stunningly stated, “This is an impressive crowd -- the haves and the have mores. Some people call you the elite -- I call you my base.”
That’s right, the man in control of the levers of power served not with ‘compassion’ for all citizens, but with fervor for the top one percent of all U.S. citizens whose wealth, the Federal Reserve has reported, is greater than that of the bottom 95 percent.
So, while you’re stuck in traffic in the coming years of HOT pay-to-drive wealth, think of who’s been represented in Washington during the ‘conservative revolution,’ and understand that you’re not one of them.
Nick Penning (www.nickpenning.com) is an Arlington, Va., freelance writer.
How so?
Consider the Connection’s recent HOT (high occupancy toll) editorial, which brought news that the coming of new $400 million state-backed HOT lanes on the Virginia beltway will allow drivers to “move at the speed limit,” if they either bring two other riders with them or, alone, can afford up to $14 to sail along 14 miles of profit-making concrete.
“The plan,” stated our paper’s editorial, “is to charge enough money so that the traffic on the toll lanes continues to move at the speed limit.”
That’s right, if you’ve got the dough, you can go; if your bank account’s too low, your ride will be slow.
And this isn’t the only way the well-off enjoy taxpayer-financed advantages. Consider the security waiting lines at National Airport. The airlines convinced the feds to let first class passengers whiz by us other suckers to a first-class only security check-in. The line moves so fast that these moneyed travelers barely have enough time to take off their shoes before they’re waved along to their departure gate.
At Dulles, if you can afford 30 bucks a night ($17 for each additional day), you can have a valet park your car while you walk to the terminal. If you’re an average Joe, then your option is a reasonable nine dollars per day; but the only way to get to the ticket counter is by shuttle bus, taking a lot more precious time.
Time is money, we hear so often. No debating that when you look at the new beltway scheme and airport parking.
As to the taxes that bring money for airport and highway construction, we all know that if you’ve got deep pockets you can escape a boatload of federal taxes: inheritance taxes got eliminated a couple years back, not to save family farms, as was so often claimed, but to allow the heirs of anyone with an estate of any size to pay nothing.
Prior to the death of that tax, cleverly nicknamed by the Republican Party as the “Death Tax,” an estate of $2 million or more was hit the then-inheritance tax of 46 percent.
IRS records, though, according to Loren Steffy, business columnist for The Houston Chronicle, reported that most such heirs --- due to “exemptions and credits” --- paid a tax of only 18.8 percent. And before Mr. Bush and his GOP Congress killed the inheritance tax, “fewer than 1 percent of Americans who died had estates valuable enough to trigger” it.”
On WETA the other night, Bill Moyers had a discussion with William Donaldson former Bush-appointed chairman of the Security and Exchange Commission, who told Moyers, “I think the sharing of the benefits of society are increasingly disproportionate.” People “read every day about the fantastic profits being made by hedge fund managers and so forth. And yet ... they're paying more for gasoline and paying more for the everyday necessities of life ... . So in effect, the great middle class in this country has not really shared in what's going on now.”
In a soul-baring speech, delivered just before his 2004 reelection in white tie and tails to a prestigious crowd, our president accurately and stunningly stated, “This is an impressive crowd -- the haves and the have mores. Some people call you the elite -- I call you my base.”
That’s right, the man in control of the levers of power served not with ‘compassion’ for all citizens, but with fervor for the top one percent of all U.S. citizens whose wealth, the Federal Reserve has reported, is greater than that of the bottom 95 percent.
So, while you’re stuck in traffic in the coming years of HOT pay-to-drive wealth, think of who’s been represented in Washington during the ‘conservative revolution,’ and understand that you’re not one of them.
Nick Penning (www.nickpenning.com) is an Arlington, Va., freelance writer.
Labels: Bush, inequality, middle class, Republicans
