Democracy Now! Daily Digest - A Daily Independent Global News Hour with Amy Goodman & Juan González - for Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Democracy Now! Daily Digest - A Daily Independent Global News Hour with Amy Goodman & Juan González - for Tuesday, March 4, 2014
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Stories:
Are Any Plastics Safe? Industry Tries to Hide Scary New Evidence on BPA-Free Bottles, Containers
A new exposé by Mother Jones magazine may shock anyone who drinks out of plastic bottles, gives their children plastic sippy cups, eats out of plastic containers, or stores food with plastic wrap. For years, public campaigns have been waged against plastic containing bisphenol-A (BPA), a controversial plastic additive, due to concerns about adverse human health effects caused by the exposure to synthetic estrogen. But a new investigation by Mother Jones reporter Mariah Blake has revealed that chemicals used to replace BPA may be just as dangerous to your health, if not more. Plastic products being advertised as BPA-free — and sold by companies such as Evenflo, Nalgene and Tupperware — are still releasing synthetic estrogen. The Mother Jones piece also reveals how the plastics industry has used a "Big Tobacco-style campaign" to bury the disturbing scientific evidence about the products you use every day. Blake joins us to discuss her findings.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: "Are any plastics safe?" That’s the title—that’s the question of a new exposé by Mother Jones that may shock anyone who drinks out of plastic bottles, gives their children plastic sippy cups or eats out of plastic containers. For years, public campaigns have been waged against plastic containing BPA, Bisphenol-A, a controversial plastic additive. But a new investigation by Mother Jones magazine has revealed that chemicals used to replace BPA may be just as, if not more, dangerous to your health than their cousin compound.
BPA is still widely used in everything from the lining of soup cans to printed receipts, even though studies show it mimics the behavior of estrogen in the human body, and have linked it to breast cancer, diabetes, obesity and heart disease. Just last week, a study estimated the use of BPA in food and beverage containers is responsible for some $3 billion a year in healthcare costs. But because BPA can hamper brain and organ development in young children, it’s been banned in bottles and sippy cups since 2012. Now new studies show the plastic products being advertised as BPA-free, and sold by companies such as Evenflo and Nalgene, Tupperware, are still releasing synthetic estrogen.
The Mother Jones report goes on to look at how the plastics industry has used a Big Tobacco-style campaign to bury the disturbing evidence about the products you use every day.
We’re joined in Washington, D.C., now by Mariah Blake, staff reporter with Mother Jones magazine.
Mariah, welcome to Democracy Now! Just lay out what you have found.
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, essentially, there is relatively new research showing that the vast majority of plastics, at least commercially available plastics that are used for food packaging, contain BPA-like chemicals, so chemicals that are what they call estrogenic. And the—
AMY GOODMAN: And explain what BPA is.
MARIAH BLAKE: So BPA is a chemical that mimics the hormone estrogen. And estrogen plays—we all have estrogen in our bodies. It plays an essential role in various bodily functions and is also very important in human development, so the development of our brain, the development of our organs. However, too much or too little of this hormone, basically, especially during early childhood or prenatally, can set you up for disease later on in life. So, exposure—what the research shows is that exposure in the womb can then lead to breast cancer, diabetes, increased aggression, really sort of a staggering list of health problems later on in life.
AMY GOODMAN: And so, talk about what has happened since BPA has been banned.
MARIAH BLAKE: So, yes, and many people will recall that in 2008 the dangers of BPA became very widely known. There was a scare. Major retailers pulled BPA from their shelves. Customers began demanding BPA-free products, especially for children. And many manufacturers began introducing products that were BPA-free. And all of us who have children have these BPA-free products in our home, most likely. One of the—so—and in many cases, it turns out that the chemicals that were used to replace BPA, or the plastics contained chemicals that were, you know, similar to BPA—at any rate, many of these chemicals had not been tested to see whether they had similar properties to BPA, whether they mimicked estrogen, in essence. And it turns out that many of them do. So, the implication is that they could have similar effects on human health.
AMY GOODMAN: You begin your piece by telling us the story of Michael Green and his daughter.
MARIAH BLAKE: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: Talk about that experience.
MARIAH BLAKE: So, Michael Green is—he had a two-year-old daughter. He’s somebody who works in the environmental health field. And he had heard—he had seen research suggesting that BPA-free plastics may have posed some of the same problems to human health. And—but he told me this very moving story about himself and his two-year-old daughter. Somebody else in the family had given his two-year-old daughter this pink plastic sippy cup with a picture of a princess on it, which she just loved. And every night at dinner time, they would have this battle of the wills over this pink plastic sippy cup: He wanted to give her the stainless steel sippy cup; she wanted the pink plastic sippy cup. And in the interest of maintaining peace in the household, occasionally he gave in and gave her this pink plastic sippy cup. But the decision really weighed on him. And I think that those of us who have children—I have a three-year-old son—can relate to this situation, where sometimes you do the expedient thing in the interest of peace, but you wonder if it’s the best thing for your child. And in this case, he decided that he would try to answer that question. And he runs this environment health organization, and he collected sippy cups from Wal-Mart and Toys"R"Us—Babies"R"Us, I’m sorry—and he sent them to an independent lab in Texas to be tested. And he found out that in fact roughly a third of them did contain estrogen-like chemicals.
AMY GOODMAN: And that pink sippy cup?
MARIAH BLAKE: His daughter’s sippy cup was leaching estrogenic chemicals. So his fears were founded.
AMY GOODMAN: And what can that do to her?
MARIAH BLAKE: This is the big question. We know a lot about BPA. BPA is one of the most studied chemicals on the planet. And we know that these chemicals generally are associated with a range of negative health effects. But the specific effect of any given chemical varies slightly from chemical to chemical, and we actually don’t know what chemical is leaching out of that sippy cup. So it’s impossible to know. I mean, there’s a very high correlation with breast cancer, for example, with all of these estrogenic chemicals, and with certain developmental problems. But other specific diseases vary from chemical to chemical. So, Michael Green, the way he describes it is an unplanned science experiment that we’re doing on our families all of the time.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to break and then come back to this discussion and talk about Big Tobacco, what Big Plastic has learned from Big Tobacco. We are talking to Mariah Blake, a staff reporter with Mother Jones. Her story is in the new issue of the magazine. It’s called "The Scary New Evidence on BPA-Free Plastics: And the Big Tobacco-Style Campaign to Bury It." Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman. We are with Mariah Blake, staff reporter for Mother Jones magazine. "The Scary New Evidence on BPA-Free Plastics: And the Big Tobacco-Style Campaign to Bury It" is her new piece. What is the campaign to bury the information, Mariah Blake?
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, there are multiple facets to the campaign, but the primary—the primary objective is to cast doubt on the scientific evidence linking these chemicals to human health problems. So—and there are various ways this is done. In the case of BPA, for example, the industry funded studies, which were biased studies that found that this—that the chemical was not harmful to health. And there’s a sort of network there. They published them in certain journals that, in many cases, had links to the tobacco industry. They relied on scientists that, in many cases, had helped to discredit the science linking smoking and secondhand smoke to disease. So, in many ways, this is—they didn’t only borrow strategies and tactics from Big Tobacco; they are actually relying on the same cadre of experts that Big Tobacco relied on to bury—to bury the truth about smoking.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to turn to a video made by the plastics industry featuring the vice president of Eastman’s specialty plastics division, Lucian Boldea, speaking in the video made by the company. A pregnant woman is one of the people shown buying plastic products as Boldea speaks.
LUCIAN BOLDEA: We understand that there are concerns about plastic materials that are used in consumer products that consumers use every day. Those products include water bottles, baby bottles and food storage containers. We can see how available information about plastic materials can be confusing and how it can be difficult for consumers to tell what is really safe. We want you, the consumer, to know the facts behind our clear, tough material named Tritan. Consumers can feel confident that the material used in the product is free of estrogenic activity.
Consumers should have high expectations of the products that they use, and no one is tougher on our products than the researchers and engineers at Eastman Chemical. Most importantly, we have used reputable, independent, third-party laboratories that have used well-recognized scientific methods to prove that Tritan is free of estrogenic activity. Numerous regulatory agencies around the world have independently reviewed our data and have approved the product for use in food contact applications. Some of the world’s most recognized brands trust Tritan as their ingredient.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Lucian Boldea, who is president of Eastman Chemical’s specialty plastics division. Can you respond to this, Mariah Blake?
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, the Eastman product, called Tritan, which is the product that Boldea is speaking about in this video, is actually one of the primary focuses of my investigation. A number of independent scientists have tested this product and found that it is actually more estrogenic than polycarbonate, which is the plastic that contains BPA. And Eastman Chemical, according to internal documents which were released as part of a lawsuit, has taken pains to suppress the evidence showing that its products—or that this product, in particular, is in fact estrogenic.
AMY GOODMAN: So how is it the EPA isn’t regulating this?
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, and this is one of the most surprising things to me when I read this—when I was reporting the story. So, there are about 80,000 chemicals in circulation in the United States. Virtually none of those chemicals has been tested for safety, or a very, very small fraction of those chemicals has been tested for safety. In general, chemicals are presumed safe until proven otherwise under the U.S. regulatory system. So, when a chemical like BPA is removed from a production line, the industry will substitute another chemical that is untested, and we really, in many cases, just don’t know the health effects of that chemical. So, it’s largely an unregulated realm.
AMY GOODMAN: Tell us about George Bittner.
MARIAH BLAKE: OK. George Bittner is a neuroscientist at the University of Texas, and he has launched an independent lab called CertiChem—it also has a sister company called PlastiPure—and it tests products for estrogenic activity. And he—working with a prominent Georgetown professor, he and his staff tested, I think it was, 455 commercially available plastics that are on the market and published a paper in Environmental Health Perspectives, which is the premier NIH journal, which found that virtually all commercially available plastics have estrogenic activity. And among the plastics he tested were Tritan products, several Tritan products. And this publication, this finding, prompted a pretty big backlash from the industry. So he ended up being targeted by the industry as a result and, in fact, was sued by Eastman, which is—many of the documents that formed the basis of my story were released as a result of that lawsuit.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to read from a memo that Eastman’s senior chemist, Emmett O’Brien, wrote after customers began asking about George Bittner’s tests that showed that Tritan may still be estrogenic. O’Brien describes a meeting with Whole Foods executives who were considering replacing their polycarbonate bulk food bins with ones made from Tritan. He wrote, quote, "We called Bittner a mad scientist. They didn’t know his name actually. They asked twice, by two independent people, what we thought of them. I hemmed and hawed (ducked and dodged) saying I prefer not to comment, but we joked and pushed and flat out said the guy was 'shady' — with this non-stereotypical crowd it was a good term." O’Brien added, "They asked if they could do their own tests — I mentioned the cost is very high and they were quick to chime in that the tests take very long." Can you respond to that, Mariah Blake?
MARIAH BLAKE: I think you chose the most telling possible quote. So this was effective—this was the strategy they used. Firstly, they worked to discredit Bittner, and they did this through a campaign of personal character assassination and by calling his business practices into question. And secondly, they worked to discredit the science. So, one of the things that Eastman did was they claimed that the test that Bittner is using, which relies on a specialized line of breast cancer cells, had been rejected by the EPA, when in fact it hadn’t. The EPA is considering using this very line of breast cancer cells for its own screening program for what they call endocrine-disrupting chemicals. BPA is one of those.
So, the other thing they did was they commissioned their own research, so they paid labs to perform research which found that Tritan was not estrogenic. And—but if you look at—if you look at the research closely, you’ll see that it is—the studies are essentially designed in a way that guarantee that estrogenic activity will not be found. So, for instance, they use a type of rat; it’s called a Charles River Sprague Dawley rat. This rat is known to be insensitive to estrogen, so it can withstand doses, according to one Japanese study, a hundred times higher than a human female can withstand, with—and show absolutely no effect. They also used doses that are below what is known as the no-observable-effect level, so the doses that are known not to cause an effect. And they then published their own study in a scientific journal, which is—has numerous tobacco industry ties, finding that Tritan was in fact not estrogenic. So, that is essentially how they responded to the finding that their product contained these chemicals that are potentially harmful to human health: They attempted to cover it up.
AMY GOODMAN: Your report cites some leaked minutes from a 2009 meeting of the BPA Joint Trade Association, whose members include the American Chemical—the American Chemistry Council, Coca-Cola, Del Monte. During the meeting, they explored messaging strategies that included using what they called, quote, "fear tactics." For example, "Do you want to have access to baby food anymore?" The attendees agreed that the "holy grail" spokesperson was a, quote, "pregnant young mother who would be willing to speak around the country about the benefits of BPA." Mariah?
MARIAH BLAKE: Yes, and this is one of the most disturbing things I discovered during the course of reporting this, is that in their efforts to portray plastics as safe, they oftentimes target the groups who are most vulnerable to the effects of these chemicals. So, prenatal exposure and exposure during early childhood is potentially the most harmful, and oftentimes the marketing of these products targets pregnant women, targets families with children. And also, Eastman, for example, in their efforts to portray their products as safe, also targeted these specific groups.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about Nalgene bottles, Evenflo—is it Evenflo?—Tupperware, Rubbermaid, CamelBack?
MARIAH BLAKE: Yes, all of these companies produce at least some products that are made with Tritan, so—and they’re not alone. There are hundreds, probably, of companies that use this. This is the only plastic on the market that markets itself as being free of all estrogenic activity, so many companies that cater to consumers who are concerned about their health and many of the high-end consumer brands have started using this plastic. I think the thing to keep in mind is that Eastman misrepresented their product to their customers, as well. So these brands are not necessarily to blame for this. They have been told by Eastman that Eastman produced—performed independent, third-party testing and found no evidence of estrogenic activity. And so, in many cases, it appears that these companies are trying to do the best thing for their customers, but they were not given—they were not given accurate information about the plastic that they use in their products.
AMY GOODMAN: Last week, NPR did a report, "Maybe That BPA In Your Canned Food Isn’t So Bad After All." Can you talk about that?
MARIAH BLAKE: Yes. So, this is based on a recent study that was performed by FDA scientists. This is a $30 million taxpayer-funded study. And the FDA used many of the same tactics that the industry uses. For instance, they used the Charles River Sprague Dawley rat. The other thing about this study is that the lab appears to have been contaminated. So the control group of rats—these are the rats that are supposed to not be exposed to BPA, so that you can—you have some sort of a baseline to measure the animals that have been exposed to this chemical—they were somehow accidentally exposed to BPA. I have been talking to scientists about this and am planning to write about this later this week. And the academic scientists I have been speaking to say that this essentially—this raises very serious questions about the validity of the findings, and it’s unclear whether any conclusions can be drawn based on this study.
AMY GOODMAN: What most shocked you in all your research, Mariah?
MARIAH BLAKE: Boy, that’s a good question, because there were a lot of—a lot of shocking things I discovered. I would say there’s a couple things. One, the fact that so few of the chemicals that are in the products we use every day have been tested for safety. So, as I said, there are 80,000 chemicals that are in commercial use in the United States; only a tiny fraction of those have been tested for safety.
Two, how easy it is for the industry to bias that safety testing in their favor. I had—obviously, many of us know about Big Tobacco and the way they were able to essentially buy science saying their products were safe. But I was not aware that that was happening on such a grand scale today. And it really is. You know, plastics—as I worked on the story, it became evident to me that plastics—that this is not the only industry—the plastics and chemical industry are not the—is not the only one that is using these tactics. These tactics are fairly widespread.
And I guess, on a micro level, one of the things that surprised me most, in Bittner’s testing, he looked at various types of commercially available plastics, and one of the types of plastic that was most frequently estrogenic was the corn-based plastic, so the plastic that is biodegradable, that you often find in restaurants—health food restaurants, health food stores, that this is potentially one of the most harmful types of plastic.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain that again.
MARIAH BLAKE: So, Bittner looked at various kinds of plastic, Bittner and his colleagues, when they tested plastics. There’s a variety of different kinds of plastic—polyurethane, PET-P, polycarbonate—all these different kinds of plastic. So he broke it down by types of plastic. He tested a number of samples of each one. And he—in the final paper, they showed which ones—what percentage of each type of plastic tested positive in their tests. And there is a type of plastic that is—frequently you’ll find it in Whole Foods, you’ll find it in health food stores. It is corn-based, and it is marketed as biodegradable. Oftentimes there are forks made out of this, for example, in health food restaurants. I believe the statistic was 95 percent of samples made out of this kind of plastic tested positive for estrogenic activity.
AMY GOODMAN: So what are you going to do with your three-year-old? What have you decided to use?
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, what I’ve already done is removed all plastic from my home. So, I have switched to natural materials. We use glass or stainless steel for our Tupperware, for our sippy cups, for everything that we possibly can. Plastic is unavoidable, so we still buy food packaged in plastic, because there is no alternative. But we try to minimize it.
AMY GOODMAN: Saran Wrap?
MARIAH BLAKE: Saran Wrap, actually, in Bittner’s tests, I believe it was somewhere around 99 to 100 percent of plastic wraps tested positive for estrogenic activity.
AMY GOODMAN: And where does the EPA come down when you question them about when they’re going to be regulating some of this, in the way that they regulated BPA?
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, the EPA still does not regulate BPA. The FDA—the FDA banned BPA in sippy cups and bottles at the request of the industry. So—and they still—the agency still insists that BPA is safe. So the industry asked the FDA to ban it, because they wanted to reassure parents that their products are safe. There has been no meaningful regulation of any of these chemicals, with the exception of phthalates. And in the case of the EPA, they have a program which was supposed to screen these 80,000 chemicals for what’s called endocrine disruption. So, endocrine-disrupting chemicals are chemicals that mimic hormones, like BPA. And they—this was supposed to be at least partially done by 2000. They still haven’t fully vetted a single chemical. So the industry has managed to throw stumbling blocks in their path. And delay is the name of the game, essentially, sowing doubt and delay. So—
AMY GOODMAN: And how much does the plastic in water bottles and juices leach into the water and the juices?
MARIAH BLAKE: PET or PETE, which is most commonly used for water bottles, is—I believe 75 percent of samples in Bittner’s study leached estrogenic activity. There is another study performed by a scientist in Germany which also found that this particular type of product was estrogenic. So, it seems, based on the available evidence, that many or most of these bottles leach estrogen.
AMY GOODMAN: And the longer the bottle of water you buy sits, is the water becoming increasingly contaminated?
MARIAH BLAKE: Well, there are certain factors that increase the risk of these chemicals being released. So, exposure to UV rays, heat, if they’re put in a dishwasher, these are the things that are known to increase—increase the risks that these chemicals leach out of plastics. So, with reusable plastics, in particular, this is a concern. If you boil them, if you put them in your dishwasher, if you leave them in your car, that causes plastics to break down, and it’s more likely that estrogenic chemicals will leak into whatever those containers contain.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Mariah Blake, we want to thank you for your research, staff reporter with Mother Jones magazine. Her story is just out in the new issue; it’s called "The Scary New Evidence on BPA-Free Plastics: And the Big Tobacco-Style Campaign to Bury It." We’ll link to it at democracynow.org. You can also follow her on Twitter. Later today, she’ll be doing a Twitter chat with readers.
This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. When we come back, we’re going to try to reach Medea Benjamin, who has just been deported from Egypt to Turkey. Stay with us.
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"Help. They Broke My Arm. Egypt Police": Peace Activist Medea Benjamin Detained en Route to Gaza
U.S. peace activist Medea Benjamin was detained Monday at Cairo’s airport by Egyptian police without explanation. She says she was questioned, held overnight in an airport prison cell and then violently handcuffed by Egyptian officials, who dislocated her shoulder and broke her arm. She was then put on a plane and deported to Turkey, where she is now seeking medical treatment. We speak to her by telephone from the airport medical facility. Benjamin had intended to meet up with international delegates before traveling to Gaza for a women’s conference.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to U.S. peace activist Medea Benjamin, who was just detained at Cairo’s airport by Egyptian police. She was in Cairo to meet up with an international delegation before traveling to Gaza for a women’s conference, but she said she was detained upon arrival and held overnight before being deported to Turkey, where she’s now seeking medical treatment. Medea Benjamin joins us on the phone from Turkey.
Medea, how are you?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Well, I’m in a lot of pain. I’ve gotten two shots of painkiller, but it’s not enough. They fractured my arm, dislocated my shoulder, tore the ligaments. They jumped on top of me. And this was all never telling me what was the problem. And so, it was a very brutal attack, and I’m in a lot of pain.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain what happened. You arrived at Cairo’s airport, and you were attacked there?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: No, I arrived at the airport. When I gave in my passport, I was taken aside, brought into a separate room, where I was held for seven hours without anybody ever telling me what was wrong. Then I was put into a jail cell in the airport, held overnight. And in the morning, five very scary-looking men came in and wanted to take me away. And I said, "The embassy is coming. The embassy is coming." They were supposed to have arrived. Instead, they dragged me out, tackled me to the ground, jumped on me, handcuffed my wrists so tight that they started bleeding, and then dislocated my shoulder, and then kept me like that, grabbing my arm. The whole way, I was shouting through the airport, screaming in pain. Then the—I demanded to get medical attention. The Egyptian doctors came and said, "This woman cannot travel. She’s in too much pain. She needs to go to the hospital." The Egyptian security refused to take me to a hospital and threw me on the plane. Thank God there was an orthopedic surgeon on the plane who gave me another shot and put the arm back in its shoulder. But they were so brutal, and, as I said, Amy, never saying why.
AMY GOODMAN: Did the U.S. embassy representative ever come to see you at the airport?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: No. Some of the delegates, including Ann Wright, who had already arrived for the Gaza delegation, had been calling the embassy non-stop. The CodePink people in D.C. were calling the embassy non-stop. They were always saying, "They’re supposed to show up. They’re supposed to show up." They never showed up. I was on the tarmac. The Turkish airline was forced to take me, but we delayed an hour while they were debating what to do. There were about 20 men there. And the embassy never showed up the entire time.
AMY GOODMAN: And how long were you held, that the U.S. embassy, that’s supposed to protect U.S. citizens, never showed up?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Well, I was held from 8:30 in the evening until the next day at about 11:00 a.m. They—as I said, we put in so many calls. And they even knew then, when I was attacked and I was in excruciating pain and wanted their help to get to a hospital. They still didn’t show up then. And so, they were missing in action the entire time.
AMY GOODMAN: Medea, talk about what your intention was. Talk about why you were going to Gaza.
MEDEA BENJAMIN: We had plans for March 8th, International Women’s Day, to go on a 100-woman delegation to Gaza to show our support for women who feel really abandoned. Since the upheavals in Egypt, the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza has been closed much of the time, and people are feeling very desperate in Gaza. So this was to highlight their situation. We had Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire coming with us; a heroine from the anti-colonial struggle in Algeria, very well known in the Arab world; and many other very well-known women. And I was one of the main organizers of the delegation.
AMY GOODMAN: And this meeting is taking place as Benjamin Netanyahu is in Washington, D.C., the Israeli prime minister, meeting with President Obama. What were you calling for? What is CodePink calling for?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Well, we have been calling for the lifting of the siege on Gaza. We’ve been calling, of course, for the stop of the settlements. We’ve been calling for basic human rights for Palestinians. In fact, we were out in front of AIPAC protesting during their policy conference on Sunday. And we’ve been very vocal in our support for the Palestinians and our call for Israel and now Egypt to open up those borders and, especially for Gaza, allow goods to come in and out, so people can have more electricity and more of the goods that they need just to survive.
AMY GOODMAN: And now what is your intention, now that you are—where are you in Turkey?
MEDEA BENJAMIN: I’m in a hospital in the airport right now. The doctors just gave me another shot. They’re going to do an MRI on my shoulder. And they are going to continue with the deportation. There’s not a plane until tomorrow, so I will be here overnight, and then I will be leaving tomorrow back to the U.S.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, all the best to you, Medea. I also want to let people know, of course, about the four Al Jazeera reporters who are currently being held in Egypt, three of whom have been charged with belonging to a terrorist group and spreading false news. Many thousands of activists are being held in Egypt right now. Medea, thanks so much for joining us.
MEDEA BENJAMIN: Thanks for having me on, Amy. Bye-bye.
AMY GOODMAN: Medea Benjamin is founder of CodePink, the peace group based here in the United States. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report.
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Humanitarian Crisis Intensifies in Fallujah as Iraqi Gov't Accused of Killing Over 100 Civilians
A new report by Truthout has revealed doctors, residents and non-governmental organization workers in the city of Fallujah are accusing the Iraqi government of war crimes and crimes against humanity in its ongoing attack against the city. According to one account, at least 109 civilians have been killed and 632 wounded since January when Iraqi government forces began shelling Fallujah in its fight against militants. For more on this developing story, we are joined by Dahr Jamail, a staff reporter at Truthout.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to Iraq. A new report by Truthout has revealed doctors, residents and NGO workers in the city of Fallujah are accusing the Iraqi government of war crimes and crimes against humanity in its ongoing attack against the city. According to one account, at least 109 civilians have been killed and 632 wounded since January, when Iraqi government forces began shelling Fallujah in its fight against militants.
For more on this, we’re joined by Dahr Jamail, staff reporter at Truthout. He’s joining us from Doha, Qatar.
Dahr, tell us what you found.
DAHR JAMAIL: By phoning in to several doctors in Fallujah—well, one of them, in fact, who is—had to flee because her home was being shelled, so she had to take her family and leave—but after speaking with all three of them, I found, you know, the really shocking numbers that you just discussed as far as the total numbers of dead and wounded. But in addition to that, they’re all claiming, from different parts of the city, that it’s really indiscriminate firing, that the military, the Iraqi military, that they all are referring to as Maliki—as in Prime Minister of Iraq Nouri al-Maliki’s military—that Maliki’s army has been shelling the city indiscriminately, that they aren’t—they aren’t seeing any official targets or anything military for them to target, that the main hospital, Fallujah General Hospital, has been shelled, that we have a situation where apparently several mosques have been shelled, and unknown numbers of civilian homes have also been shelled. And in addition to the numbers that you just spoke of, we—according to Dr. Ahmed Shami, the head of—the chief of resident doctors at Fallujah General Hospital, there’s been at least 10 children killed, 40 wounded, and in addition to that, five women killed and at least 35 wounded. And those statistics are now a few days out of date, and the shelling has continued since I wrote this report.
AMY GOODMAN: So, take us back to 2004 in Fallujah, 10 years ago, and talk about what has happened in this city for the past decade.
DAHR JAMAIL: What’s happening now is very disturbing because there are so many parallels between what happened in 2004. Remember, I was in—by the time we got to the end of 2003 in the U.S. occupation, Fallujah was essentially a no-go zone for the U.S. military. I managed to go in there a couple of times in December of 2003, and then again a little bit later than that, and found that people there were very much opposed to U.S. military occupation. The detentions that were going on, the stories were already coming out of Abu Ghraib, so there was a lot of tension in the city and a lot of fierce resistance against the military. So, by the time it got to the point that the four Blackwater mercenaries were killed in—I believe it was on April 4, 2004, that was a situation that the Bush administration used to essentially say, "OK, we’re going to take advantage of this and go full-on into the city."
So, on April 8, the first siege was launched. That was a siege that I reported to you from inside the city, from a small clinic where the same thing was happening then—indiscriminate bombings, ambulances being targeted. Medical supplies weren’t being allowed into the city. That’s happening now, as well, no medical supplies being allowed in. Women being killed, children. I was seeing a lot of this with my own eyes. And then—and then that siege went on for about a month before the military realized they could not take the city, so basically a détente was reached, and we had about six months, between May—May 4th, I believe it was—until November 8, when, again, the military just was softening up the city—artillery strikes, air strikes. Funeral parties—funeral processions were being hit. Wedding parties were being hit. And then on November 8, just after the presidential election in the United States, carte blanche was given: Invade the city; do whatever you need to do. So a full-scale invasion was launched—again, to so-called root out terrorists.
At that time, they were claiming the Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was in the city, despite the fact that there’s to date never been any evidence delivered that showed his presence in the city at any time. But again, that was the pretense used, just like now the pretense being used that, well, the city is controlled by terrorists, people belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. And while there is a small presence of those members within the city, all the reports I’ve been getting, including from the doctors themselves, say it’s the tribes, the local tribes, who are in charge of the city. They’re just trying to keep the military out, because the military has been accused, for over a year now—and I reported on this in March when I was in Iraq—that the Maliki army is being accused of detentions, widespread torture and even rape in the prisons.
AMY GOODMAN: Is the U.S. involved in any way anymore in Iraq?
DAHR JAMAIL: Well, to date, according to the Congressional Research Service, the U.S. has sold over $20 billion worth of arms into Iraq. And when this situation in Fallujah arose, if you remember—I believe it was even reported on Democracy Now!—that the Obama administration was rushing armaments and missiles into the Iraqi military to be used in this situation directly.
AMY GOODMAN: What are the people of Fallujah calling for, finally, Dahr?
DAHR JAMAIL: They’re saying they just want peace. They just want the military to leave them alone. They can handle the small amount of the members of the ISIS that are in the city—again, very similar parallels to what I saw in 2004. They want the military to stop the indiscriminate shelling, and they’re calling on the U.N. to investigate, and then, of course, to get—allow medical supplies and other relief supplies back into the city, as well as to allow all the hundreds of thousands of refugees back home.
AMY GOODMAN: Just a news report right now: Armed men wearing military uniforms seized the City Council headquarters in Samarra and briefly took employees hostage.
DAHR JAMAIL: We have unrest all around Anbar province because of unmet demands from people in the tribes and religious leaders across the province to Maliki’s government. So, are we going to keep seeing this kind of thing, armed resistance against the military? Until some of these demands of stop the home raids, stop the illegal detentions, stop the torturings—until some of these demands are met, this is going to be ongoing.
AMY GOODMAN: Dahr Jamail, I want to thank you very much for being with us, staff reporter at Truthout, speaking to us from Doha, Qatar. And that does it for our broadcast. We’ll link to his report.
We’ll be on the road next week, on March 11th at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. On March 13th, we’ll be at Flagstaff at Northern Arizona University at Cline Library at 7:00 p.m. Friday, March 14th, in Santa Fe at the Lensic. And on Saturday, March 15th, in Denver, Colorado. Then to St. Louis on March 29th. Check our website at democracynow.org.
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Headlines:
U.S. Suspends Military Ties with Russia as Ukraine Standoff Continues
The United States has suspended all military ties with Russia and is preparing possible sanctions on top Russian officials amid the ongoing crisis in Ukraine. Over the weekend, Russian troops seized parts of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula following the ouster of the pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych. Speaking earlier today, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Yanukovych is Ukraine’s only legitimate leader.
President Vladimir Putin: "The definition of what has happened in Kiev, and in Ukraine as a whole, the definition could be the only one: It is an unconstitutional coup and a military seizure of power. Nobody is arguing with that. Who is arguing with that?"
Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Nations said Russia had deployed 16,000 troops in the Crimean Peninsula and had called for Ukrainian forces to surrender. Putin said Russia would use military force only as a "last resort" in the event of "lawlessness" and would take action only to protect the Ukrainian people. On Monday, President Obama said the United States is considering a range of steps against Russia.
President Obama: "I think the strong condemnation that it’s received from countries around the world indicates the degree to which Russia is on the wrong side of history on this. We are strongly supportive of the interim Ukrainian government. John Kerry is going to be traveling to Kiev to indicate our support for the Ukrainian people, to offer very specific and concrete packages of economic aid, because one of the things we’re concerned about is stabilizing the economy, even in the midst of this crisis."
Kerry is meeting with interim leaders in Ukraine today. Earlier today, the Ukrainian Parliament approved a deal to receive $839 million in loans from the European Union, while Russia’s state gas company, Gazprom, said it would cancel its discount for Ukraine.
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Yemen: At Least 3 Killed by U.S. Drone Strike
A U.S. drone strike has reportedly killed at least three people in Yemen’s Marib province near the town of Shebwan. Tribal sources said a drone hit the vehicle of a suspected al-Qaeda fighter, killing him and two other occupants. Two civilians tending sheep nearby were reportedly wounded. Reuters reported there was a second drone strike in Yemen, saying at least four people had been killed in the two strikes. Last week, the European Parliament voted overwhelmingly to condemn the drone strikes, passing a resolution that calls for member states to ban extrajudicial killings. The vote was 534 to 49.
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U.S. Peace Activist Medea Benjamin Detained, Abused in Egypt
U.S. peace activist Medea Benjamin says she was detained at Cairo’s airport by Egyptian police who broke her arm and held her without explanation. Benjamin had intended to meet up with international delegates before traveling to Gaza for a women’s conference. But she said she was detained upon arrival and held overnight before being deported to Turkey where she is now seeking medical treatment. Her detention came as Egypt banned all activities of the Palestinian group Hamas. We’ll hear directly from Benjamin later in the broadcast.
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Report: Nearly 14,000 Afghan Forces Died in U.S.-Led War
New data from the Afghan government shows Afghan forces have borne the brunt of the U.S.-led invasion, with nearly 14,000 Afghan soldiers and police killed in the war, a far higher toll than previously known. Most of the deaths happened in the past three years as the United States transferred more authority to the Afghans. More than 16,000 Afghan forces were wounded. The Afghan death toll is four times higher than that of the U.S.-led coalition, which has seen more than 3,400 soldiers killed, about 2,300 of them Americans. The report follows Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s statement to The Washington Post that "Afghans died in a war that’s not ours."
President Hamid Karzai: "If you go to President Obama’s speeches, he repeatedly says that he is here for the sake of American interests, for the safety of America and for the security of America, and that they’re here in Afghanistan helping Afghanistan in order to help America; therefore, it’s not for us."
President Karzai has so far refused to sign a deal to keep U.S. troops in Afghanistan beyond 2014, leading Obama to threaten a total withdrawal.
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Iraq: More Than 700 Confirmed Dead in February
Iraq is also continuing to see increased levels of violence. The United Nations confirmed more than 700 people died in Iraq in February alone, most of them civilians, a higher toll than the same month last year. The total does not include nearly 300 deaths reported in Anbar province where security forces are fighting rebels.
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U.N. Proposes 12,000-Member Peacekeeping Force for Central African Republic
The United Nations has proposed a nearly 12,000-member peacekeeping force for Central African Republic where sectarian conflict has raised fears of a possible genocide. At least 2,000 people have died and more than 700,000 have been displaced since December amid fighting between Muslim rebels and Christian vigilantes. The European Union is preparing to deploy hundreds of soldiers to join thousands of African and French troops already on the ground.
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Knife Attack Suspects Arrested in China
Authorities in China say all eight suspects who attacked a train station armed with knives have either been arrested or killed. Four alleged assailants were shot by police after the attack in Kunming, which killed 29 people and wounded many more. Another four suspects have been arrested. The government has blamed separatist members of China’s Uyghur minority.
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Mozambique: 300,000 Facing Famine
In the southeastern African country of Mozambique, officials are warning more than 300,000 people are facing famine this year. Agriculture Minister José Pacheco said the conditions stem from factors including plagues of insects, floods and drought.
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Netanyahu, Obama Meet at White House
President Obama met with his close ally, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at the White House on Monday. Obama said he assured Netanyahu of his "absolute commitment" to preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon and also urged him to embrace a U.S.-brokered peace process with the Palestinians. Netanyahu took a firm stance.
President Benjamin Netanyahu: "The only peace that will endure is a peace that we can defend. And we’ve learned from our history, Jewish history, but I think from general history, that the best way to guarantee peace is to be strong. And that’s what the people of Israel expect me to do, to stand strong against criticism, against pressure, stand strong to secure the future of the one and only Jewish state."
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Report: Israeli Settlements in West Bank Doubled Last Year
President Obama’s meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came as Israeli government figures showed Israel initiated more than twice as many West Bank settlement homes last year than it did the previous year. Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics said construction began on more than 2,500 settlement housing units in 2013, compared to just more than 1,100 the year before. Last year’s number is the highest in a decade. In the West Bank’s Jordan Valley, Palestinian residents and local officials say Israel has demolished hundreds of homes.
Ali Ka’abneh, Jordan Valley resident: "The Israeli occupation forces came here on the 29th. They came in the morning, of course, while we were sleeping, at 6:30 with their bulldozers and their soldiers. They gave us 10 minutes to leave the buildings we lived in, and then they demolished them all at once, without any warning at all."
Arif Daraghmeh, head of Al-Maleh Council: "The occupation has demolished more than 500 structures in the past year alone in this area, and now the Israeli army and occupation is carrying out all these policies in order to pressure the people and drive them out. They have demolished these tents and driven out the inhabitants, and they plan to have exercises in this area and to build more settlements and military camps."
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Contractor for Israel’s West Bank Barrier Wins U.S.-Mexico Border Contract
An Israeli contractor that provides surveillance systems along Israel’s separation barrier in the West Bank has won a $145 million contract to provide similar technology along the U.S.-Mexico border. Bloomberg reports the contract with Elbit Systems could reach $1 billion if an immigration bill passes.
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Report: U.S. Border Agents Stepped in Front of Cars to Justify Shootings
U.S. border agents are facing new scrutiny for killing migrants, with 21 civilian deaths reported since 2010. The Los Angeles Times obtained a report by law enforcement experts that criticized the Border Patrol’s "lack of diligence" in investigations and found agents deliberately stepped into the paths of cars, apparently to justify shooting the drivers. U.S. Customs and Border Protection tried to suppress the report, omitting key findings when it was released to members of Congress. In its response to the report, the government rejected its two central recommendations: stopping agents from shooting at cars unless someone inside is trying to kill them, and blocking them from firing at people who are throwing things that cannot cause serious injury. Last week, McClatchy reported that in January a border agent shot and killed a migrant in Arizona who appeared to be on his knees. The agent claimed the victim lunged for his gun.
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Mexico: Hospitals Accused of Turning Away Indigenous Women in Labor
Mexico’s Human Rights Commission is investigating possible medical negligence over the care of indigenous women giving birth in the southern state of Oaxaca. In one case, an indigenous woman died from an infection after scissors were left in her uterus. A second woman was refused care at a hospital and gave birth in a nearby bathroom. A wave of reports about indigenous women being turned way from hospitals has highlighted discrimination in Mexico’s medical system. McClatchy reports women have given birth on the lawns or steps of hospitals at least seven times since the middle of last year.
Chile: Daughter of Ousted President Allende to Lead Senate
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In Chile, the daughter of ousted President Salvador Allende is poised to become the first female leader of the Senate. Senator Isabel Allende will take up the post next week after she was selected by lawmakers from the party of President-elect Michelle Bachelet. Allende’s father also led the Senate before he was elected president in 1970. He was overthrown in a U.S.-backed coup on September 11, 1973. He died in the presidential palace on that day.
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Supreme Court Considers Role of IQ Tests in Death Penalty Cases
The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments Monday in a key death penalty case concerning the execution of prisoners with mental disabilities. Freddie Lee Hall, a convicted murderer, who professionals say is mentally disabled, is challenging Florida’s strict use of an IQ test to determine whether he lives or dies. The Supreme Court banned the execution of mentally disabled prisoners in 2002 but allows states to determine who meets that definition. Florida is among the states where prisoners who score a 70 or higher on an IQ test can be executed, despite other evidence of disabilities. Hall has scored above 70, but multiple medical professionals say he is disabled, and an earlier judge ruled he "had been mentally retarded his entire life." During arguments Monday, a majority of Supreme Court justices appeared skeptical of Florida’s rigid use of the IQ test.
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In Rare Interruption, Supreme Court Urged to Uphold Campaign Spending Caps
The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on a key campaign finance case that has been dubbed "the next Citizens United." The case, McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, is named for Shaun McCutcheon, a Republican donor who wants the court to throw out the aggregate limits on what an individual can donate in a single election cycle. Critics say striking down the caps would do for individuals what the Citizens United case did for corporations, opening the floodgates for unlimited spending. In a rare action last week, a campaign finance activist interrupted proceedings inside the Supreme Court chamber. Kai Newkirk of 99 Rise spoke out in what is reportedly the only known video of the Supreme Court in session.
Kai Newkirk: "I rise on behalf of the vast majority of the American people who believe that money is not speech, corporations are not people, and our democracy should not be for sale to the highest bidder. Overturn Citizens United. Keep the cap in McCutcheon. The people demand democracy."
A number of groups, including Public Citizen, are planning to hold more than 100 actions across the country on the day the McCutchen ruling is issued.
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78 Groups Urge Scrutiny of Wall Street Cash in Local Housing Markets
A group of 78 organizations are asking federal regulators to address problems caused by private equity firms buying up local housing markets. The group says the bulk sale of foreclosed homes and an influx of Wall Street money are displacing renters, pricing out first-time homebuyers and laying the grounds for another mortgage crisis. They say the drive for higher profits coupled with a lack of oversight is particularly hurting low-income borrowers and people of color.
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U.S. Allows Sale of Generic Morning-After Pills Without Age Limits
Young people in the United States will now have an easier time purchasing emergency contraception to prevent unwanted pregnancy. The Obama administration says it will allow generic brands of the morning-after pill to be purchased over the counter without age restrictions. Previously, only the more expensive brand-name Plan B One-Step was available without a prescription to people of all ages.
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