American ammunition may be the reason behind the mounting number of babies born with birth defects in Iraq, a study revealed.
Accounts of children being born with cancer and birth defects have been highlighted in German newspaper Der Spiegel, where Iraqis who were interviewed were not sure of the explanation behind so many dead and deformed newborn babies in Basra, according to Al Arabia.
“Some had only one eye in the forehead. Or two heads,” Askar Bin Said, an Iraqi graveyard owner, told the newspaper, describing some of the dead newborn babies that are buried in his cemetery. “One had a tail like a skinned lamb. Another one looked like a perfectly normal child, but with a monkey’s face. Legs of one girl had grown together, half fish, half human,” he added.
The report cites a study published in September in the Germany-based Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology saying there was a “sevenfold increase in the number of birth defects in Basra between 1994 and 2003. Of 1,000 live births, 23 had birth defects.”
“War pollution — due to everything from heavy metals from exploded ordnance to radiation left behind by depleted uranium used on US ammunition and tanks — inhaled by Fallujah’s residents, seeped into the ground water, flowing in the nearby Tigris River, choking the air they breathe,” a report from Global Research said on Tuesday.
US depleted uranium hit Iraq newborns horrifically
US depleted uranium hit Iraq newborns horrifically
Jerusalem’s Latin Patriarch visits Gaza for Christmas
- The senior churchman “arrived in Gaza today for a pastoral visit to the Holy Family Parish, on the eve of the Christmas celebrations,” his office said
- During his visit, Pizzaballa will review developments in humanitarian response on the ground in Gaza
JERUSALEM: Jerusalem’s Latin Patriarch, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, arrived in Gaza Friday for Christmas Mass at the Holy Family Parish in Gaza City, which hosts the Palestinian territory’s only Roman Catholic church.
The senior churchman “arrived in Gaza today for a pastoral visit to the Holy Family Parish, on the eve of the Christmas celebrations,” his office said in a statement.
It said the visit “reaffirms the enduring bond of the Holy Family Parish in Gaza with the wider Diocese of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem.”
During his visit, Pizzaballa will review developments in humanitarian response on the ground in the Gaza Strip as well as rehabilitation efforts.
He will also lead an anticipated Christmas Mass at the Holy Family Parish on Sunday, the statement said.
During his last visit to Gaza in July, Pizzaballa brought in 500 tons of food for residents suffering from shortages caused by Israeli restrictions on goods entering the devastated territory.
Pizzaballa and his Greek Orthodox counterpart, Theophilos III, were visiting after Israeli fire hit the Holy Family Church, killing three people.
A famine declared in Gaza in August is now over thanks to improved access for humanitarian aid, the United Nations said on Friday, also warning that the food situation there remained “critical.”
About 1,000 of 2.2 million Gaza inhabitants are Christians, most of them Orthodox.
The Latin Patriarchate says 135 Catholics live in Gaza. They sought shelter inside the compound of the Holy Family Church in the first days of the war between Israel and Hamas.
Some members of the Greek Orthodox church joined them in the compound owned by the Roman Catholic church.
