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Meanwhile, civilians are dying in Yemen

And the US is supporting Saudi Arabia's continued assault on them.

MSF = Médecins Sans Frontières.  Doctors Without Borders.

A state of emergency has been declared in Yemen's opposition-held capital, Sanaa, according to the local Saba news agency, after a cholera outbreak killed scores of people over the past two weeks.

The health ministry of the Houthi government announced the measure late on Sunday, saying that "the number of casualties surpassed the normal rates, exceeding the capacity of the health system, which has become unable to contain this unprecedented health and environmental disaster".

[...]

More than 11,000 suspected cases of the waterborne disease were reported in the same period in 14 governorates across Yemen, according to Dominik Stillhart, ICRC's director of operations.

The latest figure is a marked increase from the 2,300 cases in 10 governorates announced last week.

[...]

This is the second outbreak of cholera in less than a year in war-torn Yemen, the Arab world's poorest country in the grip of a war between government forces, which are backed by an Arab coalition, and Houthi fighters.

More than 10,000 people have been killed and millions displaced in more than two years of war, which has also destroyed much of the country's infrastructure.

Only a few medical facilities are still functioning and two-thirds of the population are without access to safe drinking water, the UN has said.

[...]

In December, UNICEF said at least one child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen because of malnutrition, diarrhoea and respiratory-tract infections.In December, UNICEF said at least one child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen because of malnutrition, diarrhoea and respiratory-tract infections.In December, UNICEF said at least one child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen because of malnutrition, diarrhoea and respiratory-tract infections.In December, UNICEF said at least one child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen because of malnutrition, diarrhoea and respiratory-tract infections.In December, UNICEF said at least one child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen because of malnutrition, diarrhoea and respiratory-tract infections.

[...]

About 17 million of Yemen's 26 million people lack sufficient food and at least three million malnourished children are in "grave peril", the UN has also said.

  alJazeera

And one US Congressman - Ro Khanna, D-California - wants to stop all sales of arms to Saudi Arabia.

Earlier this year, Khanna introduced a resolution that condemned the war and would have used a provision of the War Powers Act to halt U.S. support for Saudi Arabia.

Khanna’s resolution was fervently opposed by House leadership – both Republicans and Democrats. Even though the resolution would cause legal complications for the Trump administration, one of the key figures pushing back against the resolution was Democratic whip Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md.

[...]

“We had a huge breakthrough in the House, where the military briefed the leadership staff. And, for the first time, the leadership staff on both parties is acknowledging in a compromise resolution that the United States is involved in refueling Saudi planes and in providing assistance in targeting,” [Khanna told investigative reporter Jeremy Scahill.]

[...]

Saudi Arabia began bombing Yemen in March 2015, months after Houthi rebels stormed the capital and deposed the Saudi-backed ruler, Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi. Saudi Arabia has since waged a brutal war of collective punishment trying to reinstall Hadi – blockading the desert country and bombing food sources, water infrastructure, schools, and hospitals.

The United States has stood by the Saudis every step of the way – flying refueling missions to help Saudi planes, providing them with targeting intelligence, and sending U.S. warships in the region to help reinforce the blockade. All of this has taken place with no congressional authorization and very little debate in Congress or the national media.

  The Intercept

Par for the course.

[U]nder former President Barack Obama, the United States sold more than $100 billion in weapons to Saudi Arabia. [ During his visit to Riyadh, Trump signed a deal promising nearly $110 billion in future weapons sales to the kingdom.

Still Bombing Hospitals

And it's still a war crime. (As if war itself isn't.)

A Syrian hospital backed by Médecins Sans Frontières and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has been destroyed in an airstrike in Aleppo, killing patients and doctors including one of the last paediatricians remaining in the rebel-held part of the city.

[...]

MSF condemned the attack in a series of tweets that said al-Quds hospital was targeted in an airstrike on Wednesday, killing 14 patients and staff members including three doctors, with the toll expected to rise.

[...]

The latest attack is part of a broader pattern of systematic targeting of hospitals by the government of Bashar al-Assad, as the humanitarian situation in the divided commercial capital of Syria grows more desperate under intense combat.

  Guardian

Oh, yes, because western allies never bomb hospitals.

Neither the ICRC nor MSF assigned blame for the attack, but the Syrian and Russian air forces have carried out almost all the aerial strikes on the opposition-controlled east of the city.

Oh! So we don't yet even know who did it. The blame was laid on Assad in the second paragraph of this article. Halfway through - if you've read that far - we find out that's not necessarily the case. The report also claims that hospitals don't give their coordinates to Assad's forces for fear of being bombed intentionally, which could lead one to believe that, even if it was Assad's forces, it might have been accidental, unlike the one in Afghanistan.

I'm increasingly disappointed by the Guardian's reporting. Sad to say, because they were one of the last trustworthy sources.

UPDATE:  Here's your punishment for the war crime of bombing hospitals if your American.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

MSF Hosptial Bombing Investigation Concluded

More than a dozen U.S. military personnel have been disciplined — but face no criminal charges — for mistakes that led to the bombing of a Doctors Without Borders hospital that killed 42 people in Afghanistan last year, U.S. defense officials say.

  Mashable

Not like we were expecting any.

The punishments, which have not been publicly announced, are largely administrative. But in some cases the actions, such as letters of reprimand, are tough enough to effectively end chances for further promotion. The military has previously said some personnel were suspended from their duties but has given no further details.

The disciplined include both officers and enlisted personnel, but officials said none are generals.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Another Hospital Bombing

At least four people have been killed in a missile strike on a Medecins Sans Frontieres medical facility in Yemen, a spokesman has confirmed. The organization “strongly condemns this,” while adding that 10 people have been injured in the attack.

[...]

According to MSF staff on the ground, one missile hit the Shiara Hospital, where the humanitarian organization has been operating since November, 2015. MSF say they are unable to say who was responsible for the attack, but mentioned planes were seen flying over the facility at the time the attack took place. The organization adds that the death toll [4 dead, 11 injured] could rise as there is the possibility that people are still trapped in the rubble.

  RT

As far as I know, IS does not have an air force and is not using planes.

“All the warring parties, including the Saudi-led coalition, are regularly informed of the GPS coordinates of the medical sites where MSF works and we are in constant dialogue with them to ensure that they understand the severity of the humanitarian consequences of the conflict and the need to respect the provision of medical services,” said Raquel Ayora, MSF’s Director of Operations.

MSF pointed out on their Twitter feed that this is the third severe incident the organization has had to deal with in the last three months.

[...]

[]ore than 21 million people in Yemen need help, or about 80 percent of the population. More than 5,800 people have been killed in Yemen since March, about half of them civilians, according to the UN, as cited by AFP.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Kunduz Report

The investigation, known officially as a combined civilian casualty assessment, was led by U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Richard Kim and was comprised of representatives of NATO and the Afghan government.

[...]

The crew of a U.S. warplane that attacked a medical charity's hospital in northern Afghanistan last month, killing and wounding dozens of civilians, misidentified the target, believing it to be a government compound taken over by the Taliban, according to an investigation report obtained Wednesday.

  Daily Camera

Bullshit.

Doctors Without Borders has already reported that they made sure all parties involved in war knew precisely where the hospital was, as you do if you are in charge of a hospital in a war zone. In fact, they desperately reported their location again to the US and Afghan authorities EIGHTEEN times during the attack.

The report said the crew of the U.S. AC-130 gunship relied on a physical description of the compound provided by Afghan forces, which led the crew to attack the wrong target. It said the intended target, thought to be under Taliban control and being used in part as a prison, was 450 yards away from the hospital.

Again, precise coordinates were provided. They knew it was a hospital.  Their Afghan counterparts knew it was a hospital.  If there was a prison nearby, it would have been even more pertinent to know precisely which was which.  US forces may have been directed to bomb the hospital by the Afghans - who knows? - but they knew what they were bombing. In fact, one of the early reasons given by the US military for bombing it was that there were Taliban inside. That, of course, was still not only immoral, but illegal, so they had to drop that line.

The report said investigators found no evidence that the Americans involved knew they were attacking a hospital. It said they found no evidence that key commanders, including the Afghans and the AC-130 gunship crew, had access to a "no strike" list of targets that were off-limits to attack. Under U.S. rules of engagement, no hospital or similar facility is a valid target.

This particular operation was the only one ever carried out  in Afghanistan (or any war theater) in the absence of off-limits targets. How odd.

It is unclear whether the U.S. Special Forces commander on the ground, who authorized the air assault, had the map grid coordinates for the Doctors Without Borders hospital available to him at the time he authorized the attack, the report said.

Did they not just say they had no evidence of such a thing? What exactly is unclear in regard to this commander?

The medical charity had provided GPS coordinates for its medical facilities in Kunduz to U.S. military authorities in Kabul and to Afghan government officials on Sept. 29.

Well, did they or did they not have "access" to a no strike list?

"This mission critical information was not received by the AC-130 aircrew" or the Afghan commanders, the report said.

What did the "US military authorities" who were provided with it do with that "mission critical information"? Eat it?

Investigators found no evidence that the crew or the U.S. Special Forces commander on the ground who authorized the strike knew the targeted compound was a hospital at the time of the attack.

Yeah, they would find that, wouldn't they.

The plane fired 211 shells at the compound over a 25-minute period before commanders realized the mistake and ordered a halt, it says.

Twenty-five minutes before they called a halt. It was a mistake alright, just not in the sense they're claiming.

"The misidentification of the MSF compound and its subsequent engagement resulted from a series of human errors, compounded by failures of process and procedure, and malfunctions of technical equipment which restricted the situational awareness" of the U.S. forces involved, the report concluded.

How rich. That must be the standard conclusion in the US military investigation guide book, leaving a blank for the target du jour to be filled in PRN.

President Barack Obama has apologized for the attack, one of the worst incidents of civilian casualties in the 14-year history of the U.S war effort.

And that wasn't enough? Christ, what do these people want?

A subsequent U.S. military investigation was done to look further at the case and to determine accountability. Gen. John Campbell, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, was scheduled to make a public statement Wednesday about the further investigation.

Gee, I wonder what General Campbell will have to add to this clearly thorough report.

UPDATE:

WTF?

What's the plan here?

Kunduz

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

#Investigate Kunduz

Kunduz

https://www.change.org/p/tell-president-obama-to-consent-to-independent-investigation-of-kunduz-hospital-bombing...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Kunduz

Remains of the MSF hospital after bombing by US military.

Kunduz

And with a headline like this, the LATimes will no longer be getting any access to DC VIPs.



http://www.latimes.com/world/afghanistan-pakistan/la-fg-kunduz-tic-toc-20151009-story.html

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

War Crimes

While the international outcry has been significant, history suggests this is less because of what happened and more because of whom it happened to. The U.S. has repeatedly attacked civilian facilities in the past but the targets have generally not been affiliated with a European, Nobel Peace Prize-winning humanitarian organization such as MSF.

Below is a sampling of such incidents since the 1991 Gulf War.

  The Intercept

You can read the list here, which includes an air raid shelter, Red Cross complex and an infant formula factory.

But, but, but Russia!

Russian airstrikes in Syria have hit three medical facilities in two days, constituting a war crime, humanitarian nonprofit group Physicians for Human Rights said on Tuesday.

The New York–based group said Russian airstrikes, which began in Syria last week, are “exacerbating an already dire situation” for civilians living in areas where health care facilities have been targeted by the government forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for the past several years. Russia’s defense ministry maintains the airstrikes are supporting the Syrian government by targeting the militant group ISIS, yet all three medical facilities struck by Russian planes are located more than 30 miles away from the nearest ISIS-controlled territory, said Physicians for Human Rights.

  Newsweek

PHR press release

In case you're wondering, PHR did condemn the Kunduz hospital bombing:

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) today condemned an aerial attack on a Doctors without Borders (MSF) clinic in Kunduz, Afghanistan that reportedly killed at least 16 people, including nine MSF staff and seven patients.

"This is truly horrific and inexcusable," said Susannah Sirkin, director of international policy and partnerships at PHR. "'Collateral damage' is not an acceptable excuse for what by all accounts seems to be a serious violation of international humanitarian law. Targeting a hospital is a war crime and warring parties are obligated to take every measure possible to avoid attacking health facilities."

  Physicians for Human Rights

MSF Not Going Away

On Saturday morning, MSF patients and staff killed in Kunduz joined the countless number of people who have been killed around the world in conflict zones and referred to as ‘collateral damage’ or as an ‘inevitable consequence of war’. International humanitarian law is not about ‘mistakes’. It is about intention, facts and why.

The US attack on the MSF hospital in Kunduz was the biggest loss of life for our organisation in an airstrike. Tens of thousands of people in Kunduz can no longer receive medical care now when they need it most. Today we say: enough. Even war has rules.

In Kunduz our patients burned in their beds. MSF doctors, nurses and other staff were killed as they worked. Our colleagues had to operate on each other. One of our doctors died on an improvised operating table - an office desk - while his colleagues tried to save his life.

Today we pay tribute to those who died in this abhorrent attack. And we pay tribute to those MSF staff who, while watching their colleagues die and with their hospital still on fire, carried on treating the wounded.

This was not just an attack on our hospital - it was an attack on the Geneva Conventions. This cannot be tolerated.

[...]

Today we announce that we are seeking an investigation into the Kunduz attack by the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission. This Commission was established in the Additional Protocols of the Geneva Conventions and is the only permanent body set up specifically to investigate violations of international humanitarian law. We ask signatory States to activate the Commission to establish the truth and to reassert the protected status of hospitals in conflict.

Though this body has existed since 1991, the Commission has not yet been used. It requires one of the 76 signatory States to sponsor an inquiry. Governments up to now have been too polite or afraid to set a precedent. The tool exists and it is time it is activated.

  MSF

As The Guardian’s headline yesterday noted, the U.S. admission that its own personnel called in the airstrike – not Afghan forces as it claimed the day before – meant that “US alters story for fourth time in four days.” All of this led [MSF’s international president, Dr. Joanne] Liu to state the obvious today: “We cannot rely on internal military investigations by the U.S., NATO and Afghan forces.”

[...]

But at its daily press briefing on Monday, the U.S. State Department, through its spokesman Mark Toner, insisted that no such independent investigation was needed on the ground that the U.S. Government is already investigating itself and everyone knows how trustworthy and reliable this process is.

[...]

Many Americans, and especially a large percentage of the nation’s journalists, need no investigation to know that this was nothing more than a terrible, tragic mistake.

[...]

They’re certain of this despite how consistent MSF has been that this was a “war crime.” They’re certain of it despite how many times, and how often, MSF notified the U.S. military of the exact GPS coordinates of this hospital. They’re certain of it even though bombing continued for 30 minutes after MSF pleaded with them to stop. They’re certain of it despite the substantial evidence that their Afghan allies long viewed this exact hospital with hostility because – true to its name and purpose – the group treated all wounded human beings, including Taliban. They’re certain of it even though Afghan officials have explicitly defended the airstrike against the hospital on the ground that Taliban were inside. They’re certain of it despite how many times the U.S. has radically changed its story about what happened as facts emerged that proved its latest claims false. They’re certain of it despite how many times the U.S. has attacked and destroyed civilian targets under extremely suspicious circumstances.

But they are not apparently so certain that they desire an independent, impartial investigation into what actually happened here.

  Glenn Greenwald

Easy Target

MSF Update

Following an earlier statement Sunday morning reiterating MSF's call for an independent investigation of the bombing of its hospital in Kunduz, MSF General Director Christopher Stokes released this additional statement on Sunday, in response to claims from Afghan officials that MSF's hospital in Kunduz was routinely used by the Taliban for military purposes:

"MSF is disgusted by the recent statements coming from some Afghanistan government authorities justifying the attack on its hospital in Kunduz. These statements imply that Afghan and US forces working together decided to raze to the ground a fully functioning hospital with more than 180 staff and patients inside because they claim that members of the Taliban were present.

This amounts to an admission of a war crime. This utterly contradicts the initial attempts of the US government to minimize the attack as 'collateral damage.'

  Doctors without Borders

MSF Demands an Independent Investigation into the 2:00 am Air Strike on the Hospital

A senior defense official told Fox News on Saturday that the Taliban have been in control of the area around the hospital since Monday, guarding the building and drawing U.S. special operations forces into a firefight in the area. U.S. forces called in the airstrike because they were under fire and needed cover, the official said.

Taliban fighters were among those being treated at the hospital, a defense official told Fox News.

While defense officials told Fox News they “regret the loss” of innocent life, they say the incident could have been avoided if the Taliban had not used the hospital as a base, and the civilians there as human shields.

  Fox

Executive Director of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) Jason Cohn, was asked by a PBS interviewer to respond.

"We were not under threat [by the Taliban] in any way.

[...]

We were in complete contact with all sides of the fighting. They accepted that this was a facility that was treating anyone who was wounded.

[...]

The gates of the compound were closed all night, so that no one who was not staff, a patient or a caretaker was inside the hospital when the bombing happened. It's also important to keep in mind that according to humanitarian law, any injured person in the hospital is considered a non-combatant whatever side they may have fought for before. In any case, bombing a fully functional hospital can never be justified.

[...]

We need answers. And we need answers not just from the US military, but we need some kind of independent investigation that's credible. And we don't want to just hear that this was some kind of mistake and that there's just collateral damage. They had EVERY information that they needed to prevent this loss of life, and it's one of the darkest days in our organization's history, and we will accept nothing less than a full transparent independent investigation."

  PBS interview: Jason Cone, MSF Executive Director

And at last, can we expect war crimes trials? Yeah, right.

 ...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.