Pat Dollard | Young Americans

Iraqi Shiite journalist Dia al-Kawwaz(R), editor of Internet website Shabakat Akhbar al-Iraq (Network of Iraqi News), accepts condolences in Jordan, 26 November 2007.

Family blasts Iraqi newsman over claims they were killed
8 hours ago

BAGHDAD (AFP) — The angry family of an Iraqi journalist went on local television on Wednesday to blast him for claiming they had been massacred three days ago by Shiite militiamen in Baghdad.

“We are still alive. Thank God!” the sister of the journalist said, before bursting into tears.

The journalist, Dia al-Kawwaz, had said she was among the 11 family members slaughtered by militamen on Sunday in his home in Baghdad’s northern Al-Shaab neighbourhood.

Al-Hurrah television paraded the relatives of Kawwaz, clearly alive — and clearly angry.

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Gateway Pundit:

Reportedly, on Sunday 11 close family members of Jordanian-based Baathist reporter Dia al-Kawwaz, who runs the online anti-Iraq newspaper Shabeqat Akhbar al-Iraq, were slaughtered in Baghdad. The attack occurred in the Al-Shaab neighborhood shortly after 7 a.m. Shia militia men shot dead two of Kawwaz’s sisters, their husbands and their seven children, aged 5 to 10. They then exploded the house on their way out.

This story was carried by dozens of media outlets around the world.

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Newsbusters:

Fortunately, anti-American lies don’t always get as far as the Haditha “murders” did. Witness the tale of Dia al-Kawwaz, a jihadist supporter journalist who falsely claimed (h/t Gateway Pundit) that some of his relatives were massacred, even going so far as to hold a fake funeral service for them. Kawwaz’s plans were foiled, however, when his family turned up, very much alive:

The angry family of an Iraqi journalist went on local television on Wednesday to blast him for claiming they had been massacred three days ago by Shiite militiamen in Baghdad.

“We are still alive. Thank God!” the sister of the journalist said, before bursting into tears.

Continue

Iraq Media Report Today:

Journalist’s family deny death by gunmen

Baghdad, Nov 28, (VOI) – An 11-member family of an Iraqi journalist, reported to have been slain by unknown gunmen two days ago, denied the death news and said they had repudiated him for making the allegation, a source from the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory (JFO) said on Wednesday.

“The observatory recognized this fact after contacting the family of Diaa all-Kawwaz and Kut Governor Adel al-Tarfa, who denied attending the funeral services allegedly held by al-Kawwaz in the city,” a JFO source told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI) by phone.

Al-Kawwaz, an Iraqi journalist residing in Jordan and the editor-in-chief of the Shabakat Akhbar al-Iraq (Iraq News Network), said on Monday that his 11-member family were killed by unidentified gunmen during a raid on his house in Baghdad’s northern al-Shaab area.

Iraqi Interior Ministry Spokesman Abdul Karami Khalaf had denied the news.

The observatory further revealed that the funeral services allegedly held by al-Kawwaz for his family were for an old man called Hamid Khamees al-Aameri, who died in his house in Kut.

Established in 2003 after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the JFO, a non-governmental Iraqi organization that monitors violations and aggression against media staff in Iraq, revealed that 218 media workers, including 112 journalists, have been killed in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.