"Bombers didn't have Down syndrome"

[techweenie]

At the risk of re-opening a feud:


US: Bombers didn't have Down syndrome

By BRADLEY BROOKS, Associated Press Writer Wed Feb 20, 3:15 PM ET

BAGHDAD - The U.S. military said Wednesday that two women used as suicide bombers in attacks earlier this month had undergone psychiatric treatment but there is no indication they had Down syndrome as Iraqi and U.S. officials initially had claimed.
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Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a military spokesman, said the women used in the Feb. 1 pet market bombings had been identified as residents from the northeastern outskirts of Baghdad who were in their late 20s or early 30s.

The two attacks killed nearly 100 people, and Iraqi and U.S. officials said at the time the women appeared to be unwitting attackers.

Lt. Gen. Abboud Qanbar, the chief Iraqi military commander in Baghdad, said soon after the attacks that photos of the women's heads showed they had Down syndrome, but he did not offer any other proof.

A U.S. military spokesman for the Baghdad area, Lt. Col. Steve Stover, also said at the time that medical experts with his division had examined the photos and agreed the women probably suffered from the genetic disorder. "They were both females and they both looked like they had Down syndrome," Stover said on Feb. 2.

A cell phone image of one of the heads viewed by The Associated Press was inconclusive.

There was speculation that the heads could have been distorted by the blast, leading police initially to believe they had Down syndrome.

On Wednesday, Smith backed away from the claim about Down syndrome while responding to a question concerning the psychiatric histories of the two bombers.

"Both had recently received psychiatric treatment for depression and/or schizophrenia. From what we know now there's no indication that they had Down syndrome," Smith said, citing records obtained by the military.

Smith also said one of the women was married but that neither had criminal backgrounds. He said it was not clear how they were linked to al-Qaida in Iraq, which the military has said was behind the bombing.

The director of the Ibn-Rushd psychiatric teaching hospital in central Baghdad, Dr. Shalan al-Abboudi, said that one of the pet market bombers, a 36-year-old married woman, had been treated there for schizophrenia and depression, according to her file. Refusing to identify her, he said she received electric shock therapy and was released into the custody of an aunt.

Smith did not address other details of the bombings. Iraqi officials have said the explosives were detonated by remote-control, presumably because people with Down syndrome could not be relied upon to set off the bombs.

The U.S. military and the Iraqi government have claimed that Sunni insurgents led by al-Qaida in Iraq are increasingly trying to use Iraq's most vulnerable populations as suicide bombers to avoid raising suspicions or being searched at checkpoints that guard access to many markets, neighborhoods and bridges in the capital.

The pet market attacks led Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to call al-Qaida in Iraq "the most brutal and bankrupt of movements."

On Tuesday, the Iraqi Interior Ministry ordered police to begin rounding up beggars, homeless and mentally disabled people from the streets of Baghdad and other cities to prevent insurgents from using them as bombers.

The people detained in the Baghdad sweep will be handed over to social welfare institutions and psychiatric hospitals that can provide shelter and care for them, according to the ministry.

It is not clear, however, that such people would be safe in psychiatric hospitals. American and Iraqi troops recently detained the acting director of the al-Rashad psychiatric hospital in eastern Baghdad on suspicion of helping supply patient information to al-Qaida in Iraq.

Police in central Baghdad detained eight beggars, three women and five men Wednesday, but they found few other street people a day after the campaign was announced, an officer said.

The officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the information, said a joint committee of police and social welfare officials will decide what to do with those taken into custody. Those considered beggars could be allowed to go home with relatives after signing a written pledge promising not to pander in the future, the officer said.

___

Associated Press writer Saad Abdul-Kadir contributed to this report.

[Mo_Gearhead]

Soooo......just what do female Muslim suicide bombers get from Allah?

An electric dildo and 72 fresh batteries?

And is that considered a Tech-weiner?

[Rearden]

Bush Lied
People Died

[stuartj]

You are surely not suggesting that the US military tells big fat lies about Iraq?

[techweenie]

Originally Posted by Rearden

Bush Lied
People Died

Big joke. 5,000 Americans dead in Iraq. I cannot understand so-called conservatives shrugging off the price of Iraq.

[Mule]

Originally Posted by Mo_Gearhead

Soooo......just what do female Muslim suicide bombers get from Allah?

An electric dildo and 72 fresh batteries?

And is that considered a Tech-weiner?

Not so much. Women dont get to go to heaven. Usually when you see a female bomber she was raped & was convinced to blow herself up to help remove the stain of her rape from her family. No *****!

You're close. A tech wiener is definitely a dildo but I don't know what kind.

[WI wide body]

Originally Posted by Rearden

Bush Lied
People Died

Surely you jest. Why would Rummy and Wolfowitz be gone if they had lied or fuked up per those nearly 4000 dead Americans?

Oops, I guess they are gone. My bad.

[KaptKaos]

I am glad that they weren't Down's syndrome people. It's still horrible.

[stuartj]

Originally Posted by Mule

Not so much. Women dont get to go to heaven. Usually when you see a female bomber she was raped & was convinced to blow herself up to help remove the stain of her rape from her family. No *****!

Hey! Lets replace the original fabrication with an even bigger one!!

[Mule]

Originally Posted by stuartj

Hey! Lets replace the original fabrication with an even bigger one!!

I'm sorry, was I mistaken? Are they still alive, or dead as fried chicken?

[stuartj]

Originally Posted by Mule

Not so much. Women dont get to go to heaven. Usually when you see a female bomber she was raped & was convinced to blow herself up to help remove the stain of her rape from her family. No *****!

In first instance, you are wrong, at least as far as Islamic beliefs go.

In the second- do you have some support for that statement? Credible support, ie that did not eminate from the US military?

[techweenie]

Hey, read the story. This wasn't a Jessica Lynch made-up fairy tale. It looks like it was an honest mistake, folks.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by Rearden

Bush Lied
People Died

When you guys get finished with the circle jerk session, can someone pls wipe up the mess?

Oh yea, do not forget that its Bush's fault about Global Warming, Custers Last Stand and the dinosaurs dying.

Lets all jump on the bandwagon now!

[frogger]

Originally Posted by Rearden

Bush Lied
People Died

Reardon finally gets it.

[Mule]

Originally Posted by stuartj

In first instance, you are wrong, at least as far as Islamic beliefs go.

In the second- do you have some support for that statement? Credible support, ie that did not eminate from the US military?

What do you mean credible, statements from the peace loving muslims?

[Tobra]

Originally Posted by stuartj

In first instance, you are wrong, at least as far as Islamic beliefs go.

In the second- do you have some support for that statement? Credible support, ie that did not eminate from the US military?

How about experience with this sort of religious fundamentalist? They will strap a bomb to their own kid, why would they have problem doing what he said?

So they only had been treated for mental illness, rather than have a genetic disorder, how does that make this less disgusting again?

[Mule]

Originally Posted by stuartj

In first instance, you are wrong, at least as far as Islamic beliefs go.

In the second- do you have some support for that statement? Credible support, ie that did not eminate from the US military?

One of us is wrong but it's not me. Are you an apologist or just uninformed? There's thousands of links on rape & honor killings but this should provide the specific info you don't want to believe. http://www.keren-inbar.co.il/INB/cache/pic_22500.pdf

By the way, was your statement an insinuation that the estimated 17,000 honor killings per yr are cool, as long as they don't make them blow someone else up?

[Hawktel]

"Both had recently received psychiatric treatment for depression and/or schizophrenia. From what we know now there's no indication that they had Down syndrome," Smith said, citing records obtained by the military.

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Well good thing they didn't have Downs. Its cool now. No exploitation here.

[Mule]

Originally Posted by Rearden

Bush Lied
People Died

I think "mohammed lied, people died," is more appropriate in this case.

[stuartj]

Originally Posted by Mule

One of us is wrong but it's not me. Are you an apologist or just uninformed? There's thousands of links on rape & honor killings but this should provide the specific info you don't want to believe. http://www.keren-inbar.co.il/INB/cache/pic_22500.pdf

By the way, was your statement an insinuation that the estimated 17,000 honor killings per yr are cool, as long as they don't make them blow someone else up?

Simply provide some credible support for your clam that:

"Usually when you see a female bomber she was raped & was convinced to blow herself up to help remove the stain of her rape from her family. No *****!"

As for your (unsourced) linked document. Have you actually read it?