On November 19, 2005, a U.S. humvee was hit by a powerful Improvised Explosive Device (IED) near the western Iraqi town of Haditha, killing one marine and wounding two others. The next day, U.S. soldiers claimed that the roadside bombing killed the marine as well as 15 Iraqi civilians, and that "gunmen attacked the convoy with small-arms fire," prompting the marines to return fire, killing eight rebels and wounding one.
This incident seemed like so many others, repeating the same tragedy that has become a routine amid daily reports of violence in Iraq. But the details of what happened that day in Haditha are more disturbing and horrific than the army initially reported.
According to the Time U.S. magazine, eyewitnesses, doctors and local officials said that the civilians who died that day weren’t killed by a roadside bomb, but by the marines themselves, who went on a rampage in the village after the attack, indiscriminately killing 15 unarmed civilians in their homes, including seven women and three children.
All the witnesses agreed that a U.S. humvee was struck by an IED at around 7:15 a.m. on Nov. 19. "We heard a big noise that woke us all up," said nine-year-old Eman Waleed, who lived in a house 150 yards from the site of the blast. “Then we did what we always do when there's an explosion: My father goes into his room with the Koran and prays that the family will be spared any harm." Eman says the rest of the family, her mother, grandfather, grandmother, two brothers, two aunts and two uncles, gathered in the living room.
The marines claimed that they came under fire from the direction of the Waleed house immediately after the roadside bombing. A group of marines then headed toward the house. When they entered Eman’s home, they “first went into my father's room, where he was reading the Qur’an … and we heard shots." They then entered the living room. "I couldn't see their faces very well—only their guns sticking into the doorway. I watched them shoot my grandfather, first in the chest and then in the head. Then they killed my granny."
Eman says the marines then started firing toward the corner of the room where she and her eight-year-old brother were hiding. The others died while shielding the children from the Americans’ bullets. "We were lying there, bleeding, and it hurt so much. Afterward, some Iraqi soldiers came. They carried us in their arms. I was crying, shouting 'Why did you do this to our family?' And one Iraqi soldier tells me, 'We didn't do it. The Americans did.'"
Military investigators say the marines then thought they came under fire from another house, prompting them to break down its door and throw in a grenade. They began firing, killing more civilians, including the owner of the house, his wife, his sister, his two-year-old son and three young daughters.
The marines then stormed a third house, which belongs to a man identified as Ahmed Ayed. According to his son, Youssef, the marines killed his father and four brothers. But again, the military has a different account of what happened at that house. Officials familiar with the investigation say the marines broke into the third house and found a group of ten to 15 women and children. The troops claim they left one marine to guard that house and raided a house next door, where they found four men, one of whom was carrying an AK-47. A second seemed to be reaching into a wardrobe for another weapon. The marines admitted they shot both men dead, but didn’t specify how the two others died.
One day after the incident, a Haditha journalism student videotaped the scene at the local morgue and at the homes where the killings took place. The video, which was obtained by the Human Rights Watch and shared with Time, shows that many of the victims, especially the women and children, were still in their nightclothes when they died. "Their bodies were riddled with bullets," Time reporter Bobby Ghosh said. "There was evidence there had been gunfire inside their homes, there were blood spatters inside their homes." Moreover, the video doesn’t show any bullet holes on the outside of the houses, which doesn’t back the troops’ claims that they engaged in gunfight with fighters after the roadside bombing.
Dr. Wahid, director of Haditha local hospital, who hid his family name because he fears reprisals by U.S. troops, says the marines brought 24 bodies to his hospital around midnight on Nov. 19, adding that the marines claimed the victims had been killed by shrapnel from a roadside bomb. "But it was obvious to us that there were no organs slashed by shrapnel," Wahid says. "The bullet wounds were very apparent. Most of the victims were shot in the chest and the head--from close range."
The military’s initial investigation states that the series of raids took five hours and left at least 23 people dead. The army classified the 15 victims as in the first two houses as noncombatants. It considers the four men killed in the fourth house, as well as four youths killed by the marines near the site of the roadside bombing, as enemy fighters.
In January, Time presented its findings, including the video and witnesses’ accounts, to the U.S. military, which opened its own investigation into the brutal incident, interviewing 28 people, including the marines, the families of the victims and local doctors. The probe dismissed the findings of the army’s initial report, acknowledging that the 15 Iraqi civilians were killed by the marines, not by the roadside bomb or by gunmen. However, it described the deaths as "collateral damage" rather than malicious intent by the marines.
Last week, the military announced that the case has been handed over to the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS), which will conduct a criminal investigation to determine whether the troops broke the laws of war by deliberately targeting innocent civilians. Military investigators must now determine whether the killings of the 15 unarmed civilians was an act of legitimate self-defense or negligent homicide. Military sources say that if the NCIS finds evidence of wrongdoing, U.S. commanders in Iraq will decide whether to pursue legal action against the marines.
There have been previous accusations by Iraqi officials and human rights activists that U.S. occupation forces caused numerous civilian deaths since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, especially during the deadly offensive on Fallujah in November 2004. Human rights group say that if the accusations of the Haditha witnesses are true, the incident will be the worst case of deliberate killing of Iraqi civilians by U.S. soldiers.
Iraqi officials also question the military’s slow response in investigating the incident. Soon after the killings, the mayor of Haditha, Emad Jawad Hamza, demanded the U.S. army to investigate the incident. Amnesty International has long accused the U.S. army of failing to adequately probe reports that its soldiers have killed Iraqi civilians.
The U.S. paid relatives of the Haditha victims $2,500 for each of the 15 dead civilians, plus smaller payments for the wounded. But nothing can compensate Eman for what she lost on that black day. She still doesn’t understand why or how her father’s prayers weren’t answered that day. "He always prayed before, and the Americans left us alone," she says.