What do you think?
Rate this book
Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq
“Dahr Jamail does us a great service, by taking us past the lies of our political leaders, past the cowardice of the mainstream press, into the streets, the homes, the lives of Iraqis living under US occupation. If what he has seen could be conveyed to all Americans, this ugly war in Iraq would quickly come to an end. A superb journalist.”—Howard Zinn We walk slowly under the scorching sun along dusty rows of humble headstones. She continues reading them aloud to me, “Old man wearing jacket with dishdasha, near industrial center. He has a key in his hand.” Many of the bodies were buried before they could be identified. Tears welling up in my eyes she quietly reads, “Man wearing red track suit.” She points to another row, “Three women killed in car leaving city by American missile.” As the occupation of Iraq unravels, the demand for independent reporting is growing. Since 2003, unembedded journalist Dahr Jamail has filed indispensable reports from Iraq that have made him this generation’s chronicler of the unfolding disaster there. In these collected dispatches, Jamail presents never-before-published details of the siege of Fallujah and examines the origins of the Iraqi insurgency. Dahr Jamail makes frequent visits to Iraq and has published his accounts in newspapers and magazines worldwide. He has regularly appeared on Democracy Now! , as well as the BBC, Pacifica Radio, and numerous other networks.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2007
12 people are currently reading
646 people want to read
About the author
Dahr Jamail
16 books99 followersDahr Jamail is an American journalist who is best known as one of the few unembedded journalists to report extensively from Iraq during the 2003 Iraq War. He spent eight months in Iraq, between 2003 to 2005, and presented his stories on his website, entitled Dahr Jamail's MidEast Dispatches. Jamail writes for the Inter Press Service news agency, among other outlets. He has been a frequent guest on Democracy Now!. Jamail is the recipient of the 2008 The Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
September 6, 2024
Started out okay but last half was a complete slog. Entire book can be boiled down to the journalist going “went to X, spoke with Y, who told me Americans are killing people and should leave the country.” Uhh anything else? I’m about as anti-Iraq war as the next guy but there was so little context, introspection, or guiding narrative in between these anecdotes that usually make these books interesting and insightful reads. Repetitive and miserable book.
October 29, 2007
It's time for American citizens to be confronted with the truth, with what is actually going on in Iraq. Our media is controlled by corporate interests tied to executive interests and the only way to get the real story is from independent media outlets which are a) under-circulated and b) underfunded.
November 26, 2007
This book is incredibly important, because Dahr Jamail's work is important. He went from being a mountain guide in Alaska to a real-journalist doing the leg work in oh-so-dangerous Iraq that our corporate media shills won't do. Mr Jamail's is a pretty amazing story! It's a sad statement about our corporate media that you learn nothing of the real situation in Iraq, and the scope of the destruction we have wrought. Instead the corporate media are busy serving as a bent pipe for official pronouncements from Generalissimo Bush and the various soon-to-be weapons-contractor/mercenary-corp board members who parade around as our four and five star generals these days...
What Dahr Jamail finds in Iraq is the situation isn't as the government spokespeople (the ones in Bush's White House and the ones who work for corporate media) say it is. For example when Bush whines about foreign fighters, Mr Jamail finds nobody from our army guarding the borders. (You get to pick between incompetence and malevolence, as the explanation). When the military announces triumphs over "dead-enders", Mr Jamail finds instead the corpses of ordinary civilians (often women and children). And so on. It's as bad as you feared, if you've been paying attention. A big part of the book is spent unravelling official spin about the massacre in Fallujah.
The one thing I was disappointed with (a lot) is this book is desperately in need of an editor. The timeline is tough to follow, and items are repeated. In addition, you go from one page "I didn't intend to return to Iraq" to another page "with deep intentions (of returning to Iraq)..." The book is kind of a mess, from an editor's perspective! The writing isn't that good, and an editor could have helped clean that up.
If you get a chance to see Dahr Jamail speak in person, I recommend that a lot more than the book.
What Dahr Jamail finds in Iraq is the situation isn't as the government spokespeople (the ones in Bush's White House and the ones who work for corporate media) say it is. For example when Bush whines about foreign fighters, Mr Jamail finds nobody from our army guarding the borders. (You get to pick between incompetence and malevolence, as the explanation). When the military announces triumphs over "dead-enders", Mr Jamail finds instead the corpses of ordinary civilians (often women and children). And so on. It's as bad as you feared, if you've been paying attention. A big part of the book is spent unravelling official spin about the massacre in Fallujah.
The one thing I was disappointed with (a lot) is this book is desperately in need of an editor. The timeline is tough to follow, and items are repeated. In addition, you go from one page "I didn't intend to return to Iraq" to another page "with deep intentions (of returning to Iraq)..." The book is kind of a mess, from an editor's perspective! The writing isn't that good, and an editor could have helped clean that up.
If you get a chance to see Dahr Jamail speak in person, I recommend that a lot more than the book.
June 14, 2017
This is not a review but is based on an interview I had with the author. It was originally published in the Georgia Straight newspaper.
On a recent trip to Vancouver, American journalist Dahr Jamail recalled witnessing the horror of the war in Iraq that you seldom find in the media.
In April 2004, Jamail was standing in a makeshift clinic in Fallujah. It was crowded, conditions were filthy, and blood was everywhere. The electricity was out, so sleep-deprived doctors worked by flashlight. Amid the flood of wounded that poured in around Jamail, a small boy was being held in the arms of his older sister. He had been shot in the head.
Jamail recalled watching the boy as he was laid on a table and doctors feverishly went to work, "and just watching him die, basically, because they lost him". In an interview with the Georgia Straight, Jamail's anger broke through in the final word of his story.
"It was a baptism of fire for me," he continued. "It was like, well, this is war. It's not about flag-waving and patriotism and honour. War is an ugly, vile, disgusting thing."
From November 2003 to February 2005, Jamail spent eight months in Iraq working as an unembedded reporter. His plan was simple: cover the war through the eyes of Iraqis.
On December 8, Jamail spoke to roughly 200 people at the Vancouver planetarium about his book, Beyond the Green Zone (Haymarket Books, $19.98), a damning account of the U.S. military's actions in Iraq.
At times, the audience was visibly shaken by Jamail's stories. "I want people to hear, see, smell, and taste, what the occupation is really like," he said. "My whole goal was to really give the Iraqis a voice."
This desire to speak out has been echoed by a U.S. army specialist. Ian Combs told the Straight by phone from Fort Richardson, Alaska, that he was the first of his unit to regain consciousness after his Humvee was hit by an explosive. Immediately after the blast, his hearing was "totally screwed" and he remained disoriented. The driver, an old roommate of Combs's, had had a leg blown off. The two had switched seats just 10 minutes earlier.
Combs pulled himself out of the vehicle and ran round to help a medic save his friend's life. "That was the first time something really, really bad happened over there," he said.
Combs, American by birth, grew up on the Sunshine Coast. On December 23, he will travel home to Vancouver to visit his family. When Combs enlisted in the U.S. army, he was "skeptically neutral" about the war, but wanted to see it for himself.
"When it comes down to it, with or without me, the situation is still going to be going on," he said. "So on my small, personal level, I was going to go there and make whatever difference I could for the better."
While posted to Iraq, Combs did his best to learn Arabic. He received a military award for his efforts upon completing his first tour of duty.
In an e-mail home, Combs wrote of an Iraqi translator who was granted an American visa for his services. "He asked if it would be funny to say he was in America for flying lessons," Combs wrote. "After I stopped laughing, I told him it was a bad idea."
Combs later told the Straight: "We're just like them and they're just like us. You've got your cool people and you've got your assholes and everything in between."
In his final e-mail from Iraq, Combs wrote of the security situation in the country: “Things have changed a lot here.”¦It’s only starting to show up as we’re getting on the plane home, but at least we’re here to see the beginnings of it.” He said he believes that progress is finally being made, but he acknowledged the criticism that journalists like Jamail have reported.
U.S. Army specialist Ian Combs (left) with Iraqi Army staff sergeant Daouhd. The two grew close fighting al-Qaeda together, Combs said.
"The world is expected of us, but we're fallible, too; we're human beings," Combs said. "Nobody wants to screw up, and there are a lot of control measures in place to keep it from happening, but no matter what, sometimes something is going to go wrong."
From the other side of the continent, Farah Nosh, a UBC graduate with family in Iraq, told the Straight that she had her first photography class on September 11, 2001. Soon after, she flew to Baghdad.
Speaking from New York, where she was preparing for a trip to Turkey, Nosh said that she was staying with family in Iraq during the U.S.'s "shock and awe" campaign. Originally in the country as a photographer covering weapons inspections, Nosh seized the opportunity to capture the war like few other westerners could.
Today, Nosh questions how much progress has really been made in Iraq. "It's a lull, but how much of a lull and relative to what?" she asked. “It doesn’t mean that all of the explosions have stopped or that the assassinations have stopped.”
Nosh, who was born in Canada and whose parents live in Vancouver, has lost family to the war in Iraq. She described scenes from Iraqi hospitals where morgues had reached capacity, leaving bodies to rot in the sun, and where, in the aftermath of explosions, mothers and fathers would come looking for their children. Upon discovering their lifeless bodies, they would drop to the floor sobbing, she recalled.
Through her photography, Nosh explained, she hopes that people can feel a connection to Iraqis who have suffered through the trauma she has seen.
"I think that we're just removed," she said. "We need to put ourselves with them...to really feel something for what's happening."
Returning from a place like Iraq can be very difficult, Jamail said. "When you're there and you're reporting”¦you're traumatized." In his book, Jamail writes about the "weary numbness" he took from Iraq and the difficulties he faced reconnecting to North American society.
"There were atrocities being carried out on both sides," Jamail said. "Those are the things that, I think, have come back to visit me the most."
On a recent trip to Vancouver, American journalist Dahr Jamail recalled witnessing the horror of the war in Iraq that you seldom find in the media.
In April 2004, Jamail was standing in a makeshift clinic in Fallujah. It was crowded, conditions were filthy, and blood was everywhere. The electricity was out, so sleep-deprived doctors worked by flashlight. Amid the flood of wounded that poured in around Jamail, a small boy was being held in the arms of his older sister. He had been shot in the head.
Jamail recalled watching the boy as he was laid on a table and doctors feverishly went to work, "and just watching him die, basically, because they lost him". In an interview with the Georgia Straight, Jamail's anger broke through in the final word of his story.
"It was a baptism of fire for me," he continued. "It was like, well, this is war. It's not about flag-waving and patriotism and honour. War is an ugly, vile, disgusting thing."
From November 2003 to February 2005, Jamail spent eight months in Iraq working as an unembedded reporter. His plan was simple: cover the war through the eyes of Iraqis.
On December 8, Jamail spoke to roughly 200 people at the Vancouver planetarium about his book, Beyond the Green Zone (Haymarket Books, $19.98), a damning account of the U.S. military's actions in Iraq.
At times, the audience was visibly shaken by Jamail's stories. "I want people to hear, see, smell, and taste, what the occupation is really like," he said. "My whole goal was to really give the Iraqis a voice."
This desire to speak out has been echoed by a U.S. army specialist. Ian Combs told the Straight by phone from Fort Richardson, Alaska, that he was the first of his unit to regain consciousness after his Humvee was hit by an explosive. Immediately after the blast, his hearing was "totally screwed" and he remained disoriented. The driver, an old roommate of Combs's, had had a leg blown off. The two had switched seats just 10 minutes earlier.
Combs pulled himself out of the vehicle and ran round to help a medic save his friend's life. "That was the first time something really, really bad happened over there," he said.
Combs, American by birth, grew up on the Sunshine Coast. On December 23, he will travel home to Vancouver to visit his family. When Combs enlisted in the U.S. army, he was "skeptically neutral" about the war, but wanted to see it for himself.
"When it comes down to it, with or without me, the situation is still going to be going on," he said. "So on my small, personal level, I was going to go there and make whatever difference I could for the better."
While posted to Iraq, Combs did his best to learn Arabic. He received a military award for his efforts upon completing his first tour of duty.
In an e-mail home, Combs wrote of an Iraqi translator who was granted an American visa for his services. "He asked if it would be funny to say he was in America for flying lessons," Combs wrote. "After I stopped laughing, I told him it was a bad idea."
Combs later told the Straight: "We're just like them and they're just like us. You've got your cool people and you've got your assholes and everything in between."
In his final e-mail from Iraq, Combs wrote of the security situation in the country: “Things have changed a lot here.”¦It’s only starting to show up as we’re getting on the plane home, but at least we’re here to see the beginnings of it.” He said he believes that progress is finally being made, but he acknowledged the criticism that journalists like Jamail have reported.
U.S. Army specialist Ian Combs (left) with Iraqi Army staff sergeant Daouhd. The two grew close fighting al-Qaeda together, Combs said.
"The world is expected of us, but we're fallible, too; we're human beings," Combs said. "Nobody wants to screw up, and there are a lot of control measures in place to keep it from happening, but no matter what, sometimes something is going to go wrong."
From the other side of the continent, Farah Nosh, a UBC graduate with family in Iraq, told the Straight that she had her first photography class on September 11, 2001. Soon after, she flew to Baghdad.
Speaking from New York, where she was preparing for a trip to Turkey, Nosh said that she was staying with family in Iraq during the U.S.'s "shock and awe" campaign. Originally in the country as a photographer covering weapons inspections, Nosh seized the opportunity to capture the war like few other westerners could.
Today, Nosh questions how much progress has really been made in Iraq. "It's a lull, but how much of a lull and relative to what?" she asked. “It doesn’t mean that all of the explosions have stopped or that the assassinations have stopped.”
Nosh, who was born in Canada and whose parents live in Vancouver, has lost family to the war in Iraq. She described scenes from Iraqi hospitals where morgues had reached capacity, leaving bodies to rot in the sun, and where, in the aftermath of explosions, mothers and fathers would come looking for their children. Upon discovering their lifeless bodies, they would drop to the floor sobbing, she recalled.
Through her photography, Nosh explained, she hopes that people can feel a connection to Iraqis who have suffered through the trauma she has seen.
"I think that we're just removed," she said. "We need to put ourselves with them...to really feel something for what's happening."
Returning from a place like Iraq can be very difficult, Jamail said. "When you're there and you're reporting”¦you're traumatized." In his book, Jamail writes about the "weary numbness" he took from Iraq and the difficulties he faced reconnecting to North American society.
"There were atrocities being carried out on both sides," Jamail said. "Those are the things that, I think, have come back to visit me the most."
November 21, 2010
Beyond the Green Zone is a powerful, shocking, and meticulous account the US invasion of Iraq told from the perspective that has been largely neglected by US corporate media: its victims.
The US military, in the wake of Vietnam, considered the media to be a great threat to its ability to wage offensive wars of counterinsurgency and occupation. When the public is fully informed of the atrocities that quite naturally follow wars pitting modern armies against grass roots, popularly supported resistance movements, domestic outrage and anti-war sentiment quickly erodes the political foundation of the war. In the past 20 years, among the efforts to ensure what happened in Vietnam did not happen again, the Pentagon developed "embedding", a most pernicious assault on journalistic integrity, to ensure information about the war was restricted US political and military leaders perspective. Embedded journalists rely on the soldiers around them for their lives, causing them to form unprofessional relationships and abandon the responsibility of holding authorities to account that should define the profession of journalism in a functioning democracy. They see only what military authorities want them to see, and fail to independently examine assertions or cover perspectives from members of the society in which the military is operating.
That is why this Jamail and his work are so critically important. Working as a park ranger in Alaska, he was struck by the contrast between the way international news agencies in Britain, France, and the Arab world and the US corporate media were covering the lead up to the war. Assertions by the US government relating to the non-existent WMD, links between Saddam to Al-Qaeda/9-11, and other false claims were critically examined and debunked by foreign press, but taken on faith and passed as truth and trumpeted by the war cheerleading US media. Outraged that his country was being lied into a war and determined to help get the truth out, Jamail scraped some money and equipment together and set off to Iraq to independently report the consequences of the war.
Jamail spends his time in country visiting residential neighborhoods, rural farms, hospitals, and various cities around Iraq. He interviews countless locals, farmers, resistance leaders and fighters, and the occasional Iraqi authority or US soldier. Much of his reporting is from Baghdad, but some of the most powerful section of the book were trips he made to the city of Fallujah during the Marines' two attempts to destroy the resistance movement there, at massive cost to civilian life. The great risk he took to tell this suppressed truth is beyond admirable. Beyond the risk of random carbombings, kidnappings, and other daily Iraqi occurrences, unembedded journalists in Iraq were sometimes targets of US military detention and even assassination (see the killings of Al Jazeera journalists, documented elsewhere).
Jamail's accounts reveal the extent to which the US military establishment blatantly lied about the nature of the resistance movement, the scope of military operations, and the extent of civilian casualties. He frequently juxtaposes pictures and first hand accounts he documents with a dishonest military press release, which is uncritically accepted by the establishment media.
Overall, Jamail paints a horrendous, heart wrenching picture of the utter chaos and destruction that has been unleashed on 27 million innocent people, already suffering from decades of US sponsored genocidal sanctions and brutal US backed dictatorship. One of the elements most lacking in the US national discourse is empathy, and it's difficult not to be overwhelmed with anger and sadness at the Jamail's endless accounts of 8 hour gas lines, lack of electricity, lack of medical supplies, use of illegal cluster bombs and white phosphorous on civilians, intentional sniping of women and children, intentional firing upon ambulances, night raids, and the general sense of anxiety, uncertainty, and terror that pervades the lives of ordinary people throughout the country.
On top of the sheer horror and scale of the crimes perpetrated by the US in Iraq, Jamail touches on the obscene levels of corporate profiteering and corruption. Bechtel, despite receiving almost 3 billion in reconstruction money, failed to deliver the medical facilities, electricity, and clean water it promised. The US and Iraqi puppet authorities amended Iraqi law to permit foreign companies to invest in Iraq without local partnership, without hiring Iraqis, and to freely take any profits out of the country. What kind of reconstruction is structured to exclusively benefit foreign companies at the expense of the local population?
After reading this book, it's quite easy to understand why such a massive resistance movement developed in Iraq. I fail to understand how anyone in the US can act as if Iraqis should be happy to have our armies in their homeland, murdering innocent people with abandon. Human beings everywhere chafe and revolt under foreign occupation. Our ideology pretends that we are freedom incarnate, and constitutionally incapable of aggressive war and occupation, but that is preposterous. The US establishment's attempts to write these people off as terrorists are absurdly hypocritical, as this country was founded in exactly that kind of nationalistic grass roots resistance to foreign power.
The time period covered by Jamail's coverage in the country mainly ended before the sectarian conflict really developed to horrific proportions, and I would have liked to hear more about that, but I'm sure there are other sources for that.
Upon perusing other reviews, I noticed some people accusing him of 'bias' or questioning his journalism because it did not flow through an editor. I find these claims absurd. Given the extremely well documented failures of US corporate media, with their huge number of employees, editors, and resources, to do basic fact checking on the claims of the US government and military, and their willingness to spread the lies and propaganda that started this war, criticizing Jamail for not having the infrastructure they have is a weak argument. I hope these people hold the corporate media to the same level of skepticism and treat everything that comes out of such blatantly dishonest institutions as suspect. Many of the incidences Jamail documents have been investigated by international human rights organizations as well, whose accounts corroborate his. Furthermore, if even 10% of what he said was true, if only 10% of those women and children were brutally murdered, the US occupation of Iraq would still be an unconscionable travesty of justice that that can't be tolerated by a civilized world.
Jamail is an angry citizen holding his government to account by allowing the victims of a war to share their suppressed stories. The US military and their corporate media lapdogs have a well documented record of lying, murdering, committing war crimes, and advancing corporate interests above human interests. Who will you believe?
The US military, in the wake of Vietnam, considered the media to be a great threat to its ability to wage offensive wars of counterinsurgency and occupation. When the public is fully informed of the atrocities that quite naturally follow wars pitting modern armies against grass roots, popularly supported resistance movements, domestic outrage and anti-war sentiment quickly erodes the political foundation of the war. In the past 20 years, among the efforts to ensure what happened in Vietnam did not happen again, the Pentagon developed "embedding", a most pernicious assault on journalistic integrity, to ensure information about the war was restricted US political and military leaders perspective. Embedded journalists rely on the soldiers around them for their lives, causing them to form unprofessional relationships and abandon the responsibility of holding authorities to account that should define the profession of journalism in a functioning democracy. They see only what military authorities want them to see, and fail to independently examine assertions or cover perspectives from members of the society in which the military is operating.
That is why this Jamail and his work are so critically important. Working as a park ranger in Alaska, he was struck by the contrast between the way international news agencies in Britain, France, and the Arab world and the US corporate media were covering the lead up to the war. Assertions by the US government relating to the non-existent WMD, links between Saddam to Al-Qaeda/9-11, and other false claims were critically examined and debunked by foreign press, but taken on faith and passed as truth and trumpeted by the war cheerleading US media. Outraged that his country was being lied into a war and determined to help get the truth out, Jamail scraped some money and equipment together and set off to Iraq to independently report the consequences of the war.
Jamail spends his time in country visiting residential neighborhoods, rural farms, hospitals, and various cities around Iraq. He interviews countless locals, farmers, resistance leaders and fighters, and the occasional Iraqi authority or US soldier. Much of his reporting is from Baghdad, but some of the most powerful section of the book were trips he made to the city of Fallujah during the Marines' two attempts to destroy the resistance movement there, at massive cost to civilian life. The great risk he took to tell this suppressed truth is beyond admirable. Beyond the risk of random carbombings, kidnappings, and other daily Iraqi occurrences, unembedded journalists in Iraq were sometimes targets of US military detention and even assassination (see the killings of Al Jazeera journalists, documented elsewhere).
Jamail's accounts reveal the extent to which the US military establishment blatantly lied about the nature of the resistance movement, the scope of military operations, and the extent of civilian casualties. He frequently juxtaposes pictures and first hand accounts he documents with a dishonest military press release, which is uncritically accepted by the establishment media.
Overall, Jamail paints a horrendous, heart wrenching picture of the utter chaos and destruction that has been unleashed on 27 million innocent people, already suffering from decades of US sponsored genocidal sanctions and brutal US backed dictatorship. One of the elements most lacking in the US national discourse is empathy, and it's difficult not to be overwhelmed with anger and sadness at the Jamail's endless accounts of 8 hour gas lines, lack of electricity, lack of medical supplies, use of illegal cluster bombs and white phosphorous on civilians, intentional sniping of women and children, intentional firing upon ambulances, night raids, and the general sense of anxiety, uncertainty, and terror that pervades the lives of ordinary people throughout the country.
On top of the sheer horror and scale of the crimes perpetrated by the US in Iraq, Jamail touches on the obscene levels of corporate profiteering and corruption. Bechtel, despite receiving almost 3 billion in reconstruction money, failed to deliver the medical facilities, electricity, and clean water it promised. The US and Iraqi puppet authorities amended Iraqi law to permit foreign companies to invest in Iraq without local partnership, without hiring Iraqis, and to freely take any profits out of the country. What kind of reconstruction is structured to exclusively benefit foreign companies at the expense of the local population?
After reading this book, it's quite easy to understand why such a massive resistance movement developed in Iraq. I fail to understand how anyone in the US can act as if Iraqis should be happy to have our armies in their homeland, murdering innocent people with abandon. Human beings everywhere chafe and revolt under foreign occupation. Our ideology pretends that we are freedom incarnate, and constitutionally incapable of aggressive war and occupation, but that is preposterous. The US establishment's attempts to write these people off as terrorists are absurdly hypocritical, as this country was founded in exactly that kind of nationalistic grass roots resistance to foreign power.
The time period covered by Jamail's coverage in the country mainly ended before the sectarian conflict really developed to horrific proportions, and I would have liked to hear more about that, but I'm sure there are other sources for that.
Upon perusing other reviews, I noticed some people accusing him of 'bias' or questioning his journalism because it did not flow through an editor. I find these claims absurd. Given the extremely well documented failures of US corporate media, with their huge number of employees, editors, and resources, to do basic fact checking on the claims of the US government and military, and their willingness to spread the lies and propaganda that started this war, criticizing Jamail for not having the infrastructure they have is a weak argument. I hope these people hold the corporate media to the same level of skepticism and treat everything that comes out of such blatantly dishonest institutions as suspect. Many of the incidences Jamail documents have been investigated by international human rights organizations as well, whose accounts corroborate his. Furthermore, if even 10% of what he said was true, if only 10% of those women and children were brutally murdered, the US occupation of Iraq would still be an unconscionable travesty of justice that that can't be tolerated by a civilized world.
Jamail is an angry citizen holding his government to account by allowing the victims of a war to share their suppressed stories. The US military and their corporate media lapdogs have a well documented record of lying, murdering, committing war crimes, and advancing corporate interests above human interests. Who will you believe?
May 22, 2022
An absolute must-read for anyone who wants to know more about the war in Iraq, how the war affected the ordinary people in the country and also about war in general. In these times where everyone is demonizing Russia, it is an important lesson to learn that these war-crimes are not being committed by some evil entity, but by people like you and me who follow the rules of state, capitalism and imperialism. It is time that we look inwards. Into our own governments, and point out their own hypocrisy in these lands of hypocrisy
July 31, 2025
A good reminder that the U.S. military is unparalleled in its ability to do awful things on Earth. They should not be trusted to do anything remotely complex because they are so wildly incompetent at doing anything besides killing.
The book was kind of poorly written, disorganized, and repetitive - and yet - I appreciate the author for the work he did and the risks he took. This book made me want to read something more current about the state of Iraq.
The book was kind of poorly written, disorganized, and repetitive - and yet - I appreciate the author for the work he did and the risks he took. This book made me want to read something more current about the state of Iraq.
February 21, 2025
Brutal. Understanding the US invasion of Iraq from a facts standpoint is one thin. Hearing stories from the ground is another level of fucked up. Really proof that America’s been forsaken by god and we deserve everything we’re getting: also shows the clear inadequacy of the mainstream media’s war reportage, all done from the safety of US military vehicles.
I love America! :)
I love America! :)
October 3, 2020
this was so good. like harrowing but great. Dahr Jamail is a great writer and there is a lot in here. Keep a pillow nearby to scream into often.
October 21, 2021
What's new when dealing with the military in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan......
March 26, 2013
Beyond the Green Zone is independent American journalist Dahr Jamail's recounting of his time in Iraq where he traveled on and off from November 2003 through February 2005. Instead of embedding himself with U.S. or British troops, he visited the country independently. Since many journalists got their information directly from military reports that were often skewed in U.S. favor, he wanted to hear directly from Iraqi citizens. In his writing, he foregoes giving a full account of the war, including the propaganda that started it, and instead focuses on the personal stories of the Iraqi civilians he met, interviewed, and, at times, worked with. Anyone who has followed the news for the Iraq War over the last ten years or heard much about it now that ten years have passed since its inception shouldn't be surprised that the Iraqi version of the war differs greatly from the American version or, at least, the version provided in mainstream American media outlets.
In September 2006, the World Public Opinion poll found that seventy percent of Iraqis wanted the occupying forces out of their country. While Jamail gives no polls from earlier than this, all accounts show many Iraqis wanted the troops out by the time Saddam Hussein had been captured in late 2003, regarding them as murderers and terrorists. While it may be anecdotal evidence, Jamail provides an awful lot of it, making it tough to refute, especially considering the extremely brutal conditions most Iraqis faced in seeing friends and family members dying in such routine occurrences. And insultingly, Iraqis were compensated for the mistaken killing of a family member with a mere five hundred dollars. In one particular egregious incident, a family was compensated with a cake.
While Iraqi civilians were being killed amidst various war crimes early on in the war, Jamail made it a point to return to Iraq for the two big battles in Fallujah in April and November of 2004 where the bloodshed and civilian death toll rose considerably.
In April, Jamail ended up in a dismal medical facility where women, children, and elderly Iraqis were continually rushed in with severe wounds—usually gun shot wounds to the head or neck. Here, they would most likely die due to inadequate supplies and a lack of medical workers. Aside from the fact that U.S. troops were required to provide supplies and aid medical facilities, which they failed to do, they often actively worked against them. Doctors were stopped from entering certain areas where injured Iraqis lay, and ambulance drivers were picked off by U.S. snipers as they attempted to drive back and forth with victims, thus, forcing them to give up or be killed. Similar tragedies occurred in November when an estimated five thousand Iraqi citizens were killed in Fallujah.
When a study was published in the Lancet medical journal in October 2006, it stated an approximate 655,000 Iraqis had died since the war began in March 2003. It also reported that half of those deaths "would have been preventable had it not been for the fact that even the most basic treatments were lacking."
Throughout the whole war, many deaths occurred because of serious war crimes: the targeting of civilians; the use of cluster bombs, depleted uranium, and white phosphorous in civilian areas; and torture, most infamously at Abu Ghraib prison.
Jamail admits on some occasions that Iraqis may have been misrepresenting true accounts or unsure about exactly what happened, but he makes it even more clear that the U.S. military misrepresented facts on a regular basis. He also shows how some Iraqis erroneously believed the U.S. was at war with Islam; although, once the troops began storming mosques and killing people during prayers, it becomes easy to see why they might have believed this.
The main criticism of this book will be that it is anti-American and doesn't give the accounts of the U.S. troops, but this is exactly the point. The troops' stories have been told by embedded journalists—and deserve to be—and the high ranking officials' stories have become the narrative in the mainstream media. Even if the Iraqis didn't always understand what was going on or got the wrong impression at times—although, I believe in many ways they knew exactly what was going on and had the right impressions—they still deserve to have their voices heard. Besides, the U.S. soldiers themselves were at least as confused as the Iraqis. A Zogby poll from February 2006 showed that eight five percent of U.S. soldiers thought they were fighting the Iraq War to retaliate against Saddam Hussein for perpetrating 9/11.
With so many conflicting groups, moving parts, and misinformation, it's no wonder this quickly became such a disaster.
In September 2006, the World Public Opinion poll found that seventy percent of Iraqis wanted the occupying forces out of their country. While Jamail gives no polls from earlier than this, all accounts show many Iraqis wanted the troops out by the time Saddam Hussein had been captured in late 2003, regarding them as murderers and terrorists. While it may be anecdotal evidence, Jamail provides an awful lot of it, making it tough to refute, especially considering the extremely brutal conditions most Iraqis faced in seeing friends and family members dying in such routine occurrences. And insultingly, Iraqis were compensated for the mistaken killing of a family member with a mere five hundred dollars. In one particular egregious incident, a family was compensated with a cake.
While Iraqi civilians were being killed amidst various war crimes early on in the war, Jamail made it a point to return to Iraq for the two big battles in Fallujah in April and November of 2004 where the bloodshed and civilian death toll rose considerably.
In April, Jamail ended up in a dismal medical facility where women, children, and elderly Iraqis were continually rushed in with severe wounds—usually gun shot wounds to the head or neck. Here, they would most likely die due to inadequate supplies and a lack of medical workers. Aside from the fact that U.S. troops were required to provide supplies and aid medical facilities, which they failed to do, they often actively worked against them. Doctors were stopped from entering certain areas where injured Iraqis lay, and ambulance drivers were picked off by U.S. snipers as they attempted to drive back and forth with victims, thus, forcing them to give up or be killed. Similar tragedies occurred in November when an estimated five thousand Iraqi citizens were killed in Fallujah.
When a study was published in the Lancet medical journal in October 2006, it stated an approximate 655,000 Iraqis had died since the war began in March 2003. It also reported that half of those deaths "would have been preventable had it not been for the fact that even the most basic treatments were lacking."
Throughout the whole war, many deaths occurred because of serious war crimes: the targeting of civilians; the use of cluster bombs, depleted uranium, and white phosphorous in civilian areas; and torture, most infamously at Abu Ghraib prison.
Jamail admits on some occasions that Iraqis may have been misrepresenting true accounts or unsure about exactly what happened, but he makes it even more clear that the U.S. military misrepresented facts on a regular basis. He also shows how some Iraqis erroneously believed the U.S. was at war with Islam; although, once the troops began storming mosques and killing people during prayers, it becomes easy to see why they might have believed this.
The main criticism of this book will be that it is anti-American and doesn't give the accounts of the U.S. troops, but this is exactly the point. The troops' stories have been told by embedded journalists—and deserve to be—and the high ranking officials' stories have become the narrative in the mainstream media. Even if the Iraqis didn't always understand what was going on or got the wrong impression at times—although, I believe in many ways they knew exactly what was going on and had the right impressions—they still deserve to have their voices heard. Besides, the U.S. soldiers themselves were at least as confused as the Iraqis. A Zogby poll from February 2006 showed that eight five percent of U.S. soldiers thought they were fighting the Iraq War to retaliate against Saddam Hussein for perpetrating 9/11.
With so many conflicting groups, moving parts, and misinformation, it's no wonder this quickly became such a disaster.
April 25, 2015
Where do I even start when reviewing this book? I can start by saying I found this book devastating. I keep reading sections, and summarizing sections, to my husband, to the point of probably driving him crazy. Me, "Can you believe...?! Really, you don't find that amazing? Shocking? Really, you don't?" This book is about, at the end of the day, what the US military has done in Iraq. What is HAS done. Not what the US mainstream media, through embedded reporters, report it has done. But what it has actually done. Which means: killing 5,000 civilians (80% of them women and children) in Fallujah; opening fire on unarmed civilians protesting the US presence in Iraq on multiple occasions; engaging in a policy on "collective punishment" against the Iraqi people whenever they in any way resisted the US military presence in Iraq; refusing to acknowledge a difference between Iraqi civilians (including women and children) and Iraqi resistance fighters (i.e. those who chose to no longer tolerate US soldiers indiscriminately killing civilians in their homes and on streets in their villages, but instead wanted Iraqi police and security forces policing their streets) and terrorists. Not actually carrying out perhaps 95% of the promised reconstruction of Iraq (leading to tens of thousands of civilian deaths due to health issues from an untold number of problems). Giving multi-billion dollar contracts to corporations (i.e. Bechtel) and then not holding them responsible if they didn't carry out even a fraction of what they were hired to do (and then the American mainstream media having no interest whatsoever in covering such malfeasance).
Forget the fact that that the US is legally bound to upload the Geneva Convention --such as being responsible for the security of the people under which it occupies a country. I always wondered why the US didn't care that the Israeli government blatantly kills Palestinian civilians and children. Well, now I know why... how can we hold them to standards we don't even hold ourselves to?
What I continue to find interesting is that watching the news should never be *confusing.* I now realize that when the news is confusing, it simply means that the viewer lacks information. I have often found the violence in Iraq confusing. Of course NOW I realize, after reading this book, that the violence has been confusing because I completely lacked knowledge regarding what has been happening on the ground in Iraq for the last 10 years. I listened to mainstream US media, which consisted, 100%, of embedded US reporters, who reported ONLY the story as told from behind US soldiers. They never, ever had access to Iraqi civilians, Iraqi villages, Iraqi towns or cities, or Iraqi anything. So how could we possibly understand why Iraq was spiraling into chaos, or how Iraq and its people felt about the US occupying its country for more than 10 years?
I read a review by an author named Chalmers Johnson and I think he describes this book best when he writes that this book is a "collection of reports on such subjects as American disinformation about how we captured Saddam Hussein, the battles of Fallujah, and the US campaign to bring freedom of democracy to Iraq. His observations of the gratuitous cruelty of American soldiers toward innocent Iraqis are particularly devastating." That last line is what strikes me about this book. The *gratuitous cruelty" that Johnson describes, of which you'll find Jamail detailing in this book again and again (showing that the incidents are not exceptions to the rule, but rather either a US policy or actually encouraged) is what broke my heart reading this book --because it is everything I don't believe America stands for (and neither did the Iraqis, until we occupied their country and subjected their people to the overwhelming violence described in this book). I am so ashamed of the US when reading this book, and I cannot believe that this is how my tax money has been spent. And I really don't want to think what the consequences of these soldiers' actions (and our government's sanction of their actions) will be for the US, and all of our citizens, in the years to come.
Forget the fact that that the US is legally bound to upload the Geneva Convention --such as being responsible for the security of the people under which it occupies a country. I always wondered why the US didn't care that the Israeli government blatantly kills Palestinian civilians and children. Well, now I know why... how can we hold them to standards we don't even hold ourselves to?
What I continue to find interesting is that watching the news should never be *confusing.* I now realize that when the news is confusing, it simply means that the viewer lacks information. I have often found the violence in Iraq confusing. Of course NOW I realize, after reading this book, that the violence has been confusing because I completely lacked knowledge regarding what has been happening on the ground in Iraq for the last 10 years. I listened to mainstream US media, which consisted, 100%, of embedded US reporters, who reported ONLY the story as told from behind US soldiers. They never, ever had access to Iraqi civilians, Iraqi villages, Iraqi towns or cities, or Iraqi anything. So how could we possibly understand why Iraq was spiraling into chaos, or how Iraq and its people felt about the US occupying its country for more than 10 years?
I read a review by an author named Chalmers Johnson and I think he describes this book best when he writes that this book is a "collection of reports on such subjects as American disinformation about how we captured Saddam Hussein, the battles of Fallujah, and the US campaign to bring freedom of democracy to Iraq. His observations of the gratuitous cruelty of American soldiers toward innocent Iraqis are particularly devastating." That last line is what strikes me about this book. The *gratuitous cruelty" that Johnson describes, of which you'll find Jamail detailing in this book again and again (showing that the incidents are not exceptions to the rule, but rather either a US policy or actually encouraged) is what broke my heart reading this book --because it is everything I don't believe America stands for (and neither did the Iraqis, until we occupied their country and subjected their people to the overwhelming violence described in this book). I am so ashamed of the US when reading this book, and I cannot believe that this is how my tax money has been spent. And I really don't want to think what the consequences of these soldiers' actions (and our government's sanction of their actions) will be for the US, and all of our citizens, in the years to come.
November 19, 2007
Let me start this review by laying down the skinny. I've spent a considerable amount of time being an online editor for several websites that featured Dahr Jamail's articles, the main one being electroniciraq.net. That site published the beginnings of the authors work as an independent freelance journalist in Iraq, who was, before the beginning of the war, a mountain rescue worker in Alaska who became fed up with the way information was coming out of Iraq. So, I know the author, and that may make this review suspect.
The book is dedicated to the people of Iraq, and that is one thing that is constant with the author, his unwavering dedication to telling the tales from the perspective of the Iraqi people rather than as a mouthpiece of a corporation or indeed the military itself as most embedded journalists are by default. That shouldn't be read as a way to discount his journalistic abilities; Jamail uncovers a story just as well, and better, than his corporate counterparts.
Regardless of political views of the war itself, or what answers one has to the questions of whether the US should have troops on the ground, whether the US should have invaded in the first place, or can the Iraqi people now govern themselves if the US leaves (I find that last question itself to be pretty racist or at least elitist), the book is a perspective worth paying attention to. The stories are pretty gripping to and the writing is good too.
The Iraqis Jamail interviews and writes about are just that, people, and they come across as such in the book. They are not statistics but rather individuals with loved ones and aspirations.
The book covers a large part of the last 4 and a half years and shows how things spiraled in Iraq. For instance, on a return flight into the Baghdad airport, the commercial plane Jamil was on literally spirals down because at that point the resistance was in full swing and shooting. The chapters about Fallujah are particularly engrossing. Being someone that read the original articles that the book is largely based on, I was still turning the pages.
The book is dedicated to the people of Iraq, and that is one thing that is constant with the author, his unwavering dedication to telling the tales from the perspective of the Iraqi people rather than as a mouthpiece of a corporation or indeed the military itself as most embedded journalists are by default. That shouldn't be read as a way to discount his journalistic abilities; Jamail uncovers a story just as well, and better, than his corporate counterparts.
Regardless of political views of the war itself, or what answers one has to the questions of whether the US should have troops on the ground, whether the US should have invaded in the first place, or can the Iraqi people now govern themselves if the US leaves (I find that last question itself to be pretty racist or at least elitist), the book is a perspective worth paying attention to. The stories are pretty gripping to and the writing is good too.
The Iraqis Jamail interviews and writes about are just that, people, and they come across as such in the book. They are not statistics but rather individuals with loved ones and aspirations.
The book covers a large part of the last 4 and a half years and shows how things spiraled in Iraq. For instance, on a return flight into the Baghdad airport, the commercial plane Jamil was on literally spirals down because at that point the resistance was in full swing and shooting. The chapters about Fallujah are particularly engrossing. Being someone that read the original articles that the book is largely based on, I was still turning the pages.
October 8, 2008
50 of 55 people found the following review helpful:
First Rate Journalism, October 6, 2007
Dahr Jamail is one of the only unembedded journalists covering the U.S. occupation of Iraq, and this is his published report. 'Beyond the Green Zone' is a harrowing account of a brutal occupation which refuses to be covered and discussed honestly in the corporate media. Jamail has uncovered a record of war crimes and crimes against humanity that is difficult to stomach; he has finally brought us the much needed perspective of the Iraqis themselves as they struggle to live in a torn country under military occupation.
This book is a compelling documentation of war. Jamail has uncovered horrendous atrocities in Fallujah and elsewhere, and he has debunked the view that the military objectives include the submission of the warring factions and the implementation of a democratic government. On the contrary, Jamail has revealed that the U.S. has often delayed elections and decision-making processes in an attempt to escalate the sectarianism and increase their military presence in the region. He has exposed the intentions of the U.S. as well as its puppet government in Iraq with regard to its attempt to control the oil resources of the region. Jamail writes: "On February 26, 2007, Iraq's cabinet approved a draft of an oil law that would set guidelines for nationwide distribution of oil revenues and foreign investment in Iraq's giant oil industry. The law would grant regional oil companies the power to sign contracts with foreign companies for exploration and development of oil fields, and open the door for investment by foreign oil companies" (287). Jamail has unearthed the practices of an imperial project in a compelling and first-hand account. Beyond the Green Zone is indispensable literature for anyone who wants to understand what is actually happening on the ground in Iraq.
First Rate Journalism, October 6, 2007
Dahr Jamail is one of the only unembedded journalists covering the U.S. occupation of Iraq, and this is his published report. 'Beyond the Green Zone' is a harrowing account of a brutal occupation which refuses to be covered and discussed honestly in the corporate media. Jamail has uncovered a record of war crimes and crimes against humanity that is difficult to stomach; he has finally brought us the much needed perspective of the Iraqis themselves as they struggle to live in a torn country under military occupation.
This book is a compelling documentation of war. Jamail has uncovered horrendous atrocities in Fallujah and elsewhere, and he has debunked the view that the military objectives include the submission of the warring factions and the implementation of a democratic government. On the contrary, Jamail has revealed that the U.S. has often delayed elections and decision-making processes in an attempt to escalate the sectarianism and increase their military presence in the region. He has exposed the intentions of the U.S. as well as its puppet government in Iraq with regard to its attempt to control the oil resources of the region. Jamail writes: "On February 26, 2007, Iraq's cabinet approved a draft of an oil law that would set guidelines for nationwide distribution of oil revenues and foreign investment in Iraq's giant oil industry. The law would grant regional oil companies the power to sign contracts with foreign companies for exploration and development of oil fields, and open the door for investment by foreign oil companies" (287). Jamail has unearthed the practices of an imperial project in a compelling and first-hand account. Beyond the Green Zone is indispensable literature for anyone who wants to understand what is actually happening on the ground in Iraq.
August 10, 2008
I have a deep regard for Dahr Jamail and the brave reporting he has done. As he said in his Afterword, if more Americans knew about the suffering our government and military have inflicted and continue to inflict on the Iraqi people, the occupation would be over by now. He exposes U.S. war crimes (from bombing hospitals to using banned chemical and incendiary weapons on civilians), the complicity of the media in selling the war and covering up its reality, and the repressive occupation that has stoked Iraqi resistance and led to the breakdown of security in Iraq. After reading about U.S. soldiers firing into crowds of peaceful demonstators and sniping at ambulances, the collective punishment meted out to cities like Fallujah that left thousands of civilians - mostly women and children - dead or severely injured, the censorship of the Iraqi press, the storming of mosques during Friday prayer and killing of civilian worshippers, the lack of medical supplies and the detention of doctors (one doctor Jamail interviewed recalled being handcuffed in the midst of delivering a baby, leaving the child still attached to its mother through the umbilical cord), and countless other examples of U.S. brutality, I don't think any American citizen could continue to support "Operation Iraqi Freedom." But the book isn't a litany of atrocities, either. The Iraqis Jamail spoke to come alive, particularly the translators who accompanied him around the country and with whom he formed deep and affectionate friendships.
May 2, 2015
Deserves some full three stars out of three for the information presented. Even though the book is organized chronologically, the book is very messy and offers most of the time a visual description of what the author is seeing. That is in and by itself extraordinary, however it offers very little background information, and I feel that I didn't understand much on why anything happened. Quite often the book is repetitive and I had the impression that I got it from the first 20 pages that it was better for the Iraqis under Saddam than under the US occupation.
I definitely recommend it because it shows that there is no clean war, that human rights are rarely respected during conflicts, and that what we see in the medias is often a sanitized version of reality, described in one way or another in order to get support for this or that policy.
On the other hand, the style needs a lot of polishing, and I painfully felt the lack of a more profound analysis.
I definitely recommend it because it shows that there is no clean war, that human rights are rarely respected during conflicts, and that what we see in the medias is often a sanitized version of reality, described in one way or another in order to get support for this or that policy.
On the other hand, the style needs a lot of polishing, and I painfully felt the lack of a more profound analysis.
December 8, 2007
this book is what journalism should be about. dahr jamail risked his life not only by going to iraq as an unembedded journalist, but by actually following the trails of dangerous leads in order to bring america the devastating truth about this insane war. if the fourth estate had been doing its job, our citizenry would never have allowed this war to happen. amy goodman wrote the forward---she is both a published author and a big part of democracy now!(i listen to it on the radio) which is independent journalism at its finest. one powerful tool we have as citizens is our ability to support independent journalism---our support & participation sends the message that journalists/citizens should be out there asking the tough questions and holding politicians, corporations, etc. accountable for their actions.
August 25, 2009
As far as a real and true account of what America's corporate media failed to report, this book was great. On the otherhand the author failed to gain solid sources and the accounts seemed a bit non-auhoritative. I could appreciate how well the author embedded the reader into the atrocities that the Iraqi people suffered at the cost of free market globalization carried out by the US and other developed powers. It would have been nice to see many more detailed examples of US military responses to the atrocities committed by it's soldiers, and the direct relationships between US attacks and Iraqi retaliation.
February 13, 2016
Thank you, Dahr Jamail. Thank you for placing yourself at risk in order to bear witness and write this book. The backstory to the invasion of Iraq needs to be circulated and read in order to counter corporate media.
Jamail's book needs to be on the same shelf of war correspondents as Ernie Pyle, Martha Gelhorn, Michael Herr, Phil Caputo, Dexter Filkins, and Bernard Fall.
Musing on these dispatches, I recall how the United States has used the Boston massacre as a rally cry at the beginning of the American Revolution. When the U. S. military is the oppressor and the massacres outnumber the media reports, we citizens need to get the truth out.
Jamail's book needs to be on the same shelf of war correspondents as Ernie Pyle, Martha Gelhorn, Michael Herr, Phil Caputo, Dexter Filkins, and Bernard Fall.
Musing on these dispatches, I recall how the United States has used the Boston massacre as a rally cry at the beginning of the American Revolution. When the U. S. military is the oppressor and the massacres outnumber the media reports, we citizens need to get the truth out.
January 6, 2014
This book is not very easy to read because the content challenges the very notions that one can sit quietly at home and read about whatever one chooses, and perhaps for that reason alone, it is worth your time. Your investment is rewarded with a deep understanding of how complicit all Americans are in the disaster, devastation, torture, and slaying of over 655,000 Iraqis, more than half of which are women and children, as well as the devastation of the country, economy, and so much humanity. Jamail leaves us with the question, what are we going to do about this?
February 11, 2021
No book I’ve ever read –Ilan Pape’s magisterial work on the foundation of Israel may be the only exception – has filled me with more anger. Although some may scoff at the idea, or indeed yell “demagogy” as they genuflect to the powers that be: I think Tony Blair, George Bush and all the architects of the criminal war in Iraq must be brought within the orbit of the law. That’s unless MLK’s famous quote proves prescient; “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it always bends towards justice".
Read
May 12, 2013Jamail offers readers a gripping recount of the US invasion of ʿIrāq, as told through the eyes of ʿIrāqis themselves. I remember picking up my own copy in my first semester studying journalism. Years later, and the passages still resonate with me. The honesty of his work-—the way he gathered stories and interviews to evoke a larger [and often unwelcoming] truth-—inspired me to continue with journalism. Thank you for this, Dahir Jamail.
Want to read
March 9, 2008I just caught on Book TV (C-Span 2) the end of an talk by Dahr Jamail, the author of this book, at a Unitarian Universalist church in San Diego. His perspective on the differences between the reporting of conditions in Iraq and the actual conditions that he observed there is one well worth reading and sharing. I definitely want to read this book!
May 30, 2023
As much as I'm totally on board with the anti-war narrative of this book, it's purely anecdotal. I'm sure everything it says is accurate, and it may be helpful to break out when considering what U.S. invasions do, but that's really nothing new. Also, a bit repetitive. Good narrative, not the best source for hard facts other than "it was terrible for the people of Iraq."
January 23, 2008
Dahr Jamail is an independent journalist doing some of the most important work anyone can do: telling the stories of Iraqis themselves and what this terrible war has done to their lives. He tells the stories with facts, pathos and candor.
January 6, 2012
I literally cannot imagine the would without this book. It should be required reading for anyone with any opinions about the US's military posture and the Iraq War. The mistakes we made in Fallujah will affect us for generations.
August 24, 2012
Definetely a must read materjal for everyone who cares about liberty, democracy and modern day warfare and well...the truth. 100% quarenteed that after reading this book you think differently of the Iraqi people. The contrast between mainstream media and the real situation is just not comperable.
September 22, 2008
Read this.
March 17, 2008
Amazing analysis of the current state of the U.S. occupation in Iraq. Can't wait to read more from Jamail.
Read
May 5, 2008Very interesting of un-told events of the war...
Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews