AP Hospital Claims Make No Sense

Update: I need about 35 votes in Wizbang's Web Awards to pass Andrew Sullivan before midnight. So, if you're interested in helping the cause. Thanks!

Research suggests the hospital / morgue aspect of the now infamous AP story is in even greater doubt as it would have required Sunni individuals from Hurriyah to travel further then they needed to in order to find a hospital. Also, the hospital in question is in a dangerous Shi'ite area, while a closer hospital was in a friendlier Sunni zone. And that at the same time it's reasonably well-known that death squads have targeted Iraqi hospitals in the past. Items I uncovered by parsing several news accounts and consulting a map now make the story even more difficult to believe.

ref. Two workers at Kazamiyah Hospital said the bodies from the clashes and immolations had been taken to the morgue at their facility. They refused to be identified by name, saying they feared retribution.

If you consult this map (or see inset) you can see Hurriyah in the northeast of Baghdad and Al-Kazimayaz, where the Kazamiyah Hospital and morgue mentioned in the AP story are located (red stars). They are in the northwest of the city. It's a four to five mile trip.

More importantly, the individuals allegedly burned were Sunni and the Kazamiyah hospital is in the middle of a Shi'ite community known for being hardline.

ref. In Baghdad, a suicide bomber detonated an explosives belt on a bus Monday in the Shiite district of Kazamiyah

The blue star is the location given for a hospital within a Sunni area.

ref. d) Al-Nouman Hospital, in the Aadamiya district, next to that of al-Kadimiya, in the northwest of the city, on the left bank.

ref. a doctor at al-Nouman Hospital in the Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiyah.

This below also indicates that the hospital was close to Hurriyah and in a Sunni area:

ref. At least 18 people were killed Friday and 24 injured in the mosque attacks in Hurriyah, said Adil Mahmoud, a physician from al-Nouman Hospital in the nearby Adhamiyah neighborhood.

It would make little sense for a group of Sunnis to carry bodies further and into a Shi'ite stronghold immediately after having been viciously attacked by Shi'ites, especially with a Sunni friendly hospital located nearby.

Now, get this - it looks like Michelle Malkin is going to Iraq! See link. Between her and or Michael Yon and others, we may get to the bottom of this, yet.

Comments

[Mark]

Good catch Dan.

It's really sad that the AP makes little to no attempt to check if these stories make any sense, little alone, whether or not they are true.