What They Don't Tell You: Was Kidnaped Journalist Targeted?

The ordeal of Giuliana Sgrena, and speculation about possible US targeting of journalists.

Hi, this is Jody Paulson from Moscow, ID with what they don't tell you.

On Feb 4th, Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena was scheduled to interview refugees from Falluja near a Baghdad mosque. The refugees, of course, had horrific stories to tell, about napalm, mass graves, indiscriminate shootings, etc. Funny thing, Sgrena was kidnapped that day. Two weeks later her captors issued a video of her weeping and pleading for help, calling on all foreigners to leave Iraq. Italian journalists were subsequently withdrawn from the city after intelligence warnings of a heightened threat to their safety.

Giuliana Sgrena, like aid worker Margaret Hassan, was well-loved by many Iraqis. Sheik Hussein al Zobey, Sunni coordinator of the refugee camps inside the University of Baghdad, uttered an impassioned appeal for the journalist's release: "In the name of truth, free her. I appeal in the name of those who come to help us. I ask the kidnappers to free Giuliana, who has promised to help us. She has laughed and played with our children -- and has cried with us." Does it make sense for Iraqi insurgents to sully their cause by kidnaping and threatening to behead these women who are against the occupation and want to help *all* Iraqis? It doesn't to me. Sunni scholar Sheik Abdel Salam al Qubaisi severely denounced the abduction: "This type of kidnapping distorts and defames the resistance of the Iraqi people against the American occupation."

What does it tell us, then, that when Sgrena was finally released, the car taking her to the airport back to Italy was showered with a storm of American bullets? Did Sgrena have information the Americans didn't want anyone else to know? That's what her companion, Pier Scolari, said. "The Americans and Italians knew about (her) car coming. They were 700 meters from the airport, which means that they had passed all checkpoints -- Giuliana had information, and the US military did not want her to survive."

There's an uproar in Italy, where anti-war sentiment has been among the strongest in Europe. Bush's buddy, prime minister Berlusconi, is in big trouble. And this incident only sharpens the spotlight on the question that's been on everyone's mind of late -- is the US targeting journalists? CNN executive Eason Jordan lost his job for saying as much at an off-the-record panel at the World Economic Forum. Remember back in April 2003, when the US fired into the Palestine Hotel -- a known base for international journalists -- killing a Spaniard and a Ukranian? Before that, an Al-Jazeera correspondent was killed when the TV station's local office was struck by a US missile. Then there's the epidemic of suicidal tendencies among those who lean towards exposes here at home: Hunter Thompson. Gary Webb. Danny Casolaro. Abbie Hoffman. Steve Kangas. Jim Hatfield. Mark Lombardi. I know it's pretty depressing writing about Bush and the New World Order all the time, but dang!

Bush is promising a thorough investigation. Let's hold him to that. And it better not be another whitewash this time, either. It seems to me that someone's out there trying to kill the truth. That's something that simply can't be done. You can only hold it off for a while. But as Bush and company are finding out, the truth always catches up with you in the end.

I'm Jody Paulson, and I just thought you should know.