Friday, June 10, 2016

How a Qatari regime mouthpiece is contributing to the propaganda of ISIS

Al-Quds Al-Arabi has become (since it sale to Qatari regime owners and the dismissal of its former editor-in-chief, `Abdul-Bari `Atwan) a blatantly sectarian rag.  It has been publishing for many days stories about massacres are the hands of the Shi`ite militias around Fallujah.  I thought that I would look around to see if there are stories in Western media. This is what I found in the New York Times (despite my detestation of the Shi`ite militias of Iraq, especially the militia of Hadi `Amiri): "But for the most part, civilians who have fled the areas around Falluja have said they had tired of the grim life under the Islamic State and had been treated well by the militias and Iraqi soldiers."  As the Times suggested, ISIS propaganda has been airing stories about massacres in order to keep the civilians as human shields inside its territory.  This however does not in my mind excuse any crimes against civilians in ISIS territory by US or Russian raids.