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EXCLUSIVE REPORT: American military creating an environmental disaster in Afghan countryside (Part 1 of 3)

America plans to withdraw its troops but leave behind a toxic mess
Matthew J. Nasuti (Former U.S. Air Force Captain)
Sunday 25 April 2010

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The American military presence in Afghanistan consists of fleets of aircraft, helicopters, armored vehicles, weapons, equipment, troops and facilities. Since 2001, they have generated millions of kilograms of hazardous, toxic and radioactive wastes. The Kabul Press? asks the simple question:

“What have the Americans done with all that waste?”

The answer is chilling in that virtually all of it appears to have been buried, burned or secretly disposed of into the air, soil, groundwater and surface waters of Afghanistan. While the Americans may begin to withdraw next year, the toxic chemicals they leave behind will continue to pollute for centuries. Any abandoned radioactive waste may stain the Afghan countryside for thousands of years. Afghanistan has been described in the past as the graveyard of foreign armies. Today, Afghanistan has a different title:

“Afghanistan is the toxic dumping ground for foreign armies.”

The (U.S.) Air Force Times ran an editorial on March 1, 2010, that read: “Stamp Out Burn Pits” We reprint here the first half of that editorial:

“A growing number of military medical professionals believe burn pits are causing a wave of respiratory and other illnesses among troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Found on almost all U.S. bases in the war zones, these open-air trash sites operate 24 hours a day, incinerating trash of all forms — including plastic bottles, paint, petroleum products, unexploded ordinance, hazardous materials, even amputated limbs and medical waste. Their smoke plumes belch dioxin, carbon monoxide and other toxins skyward, producing a toxic fog that hangs over living and working areas. Yet while the Air Force fact sheet flatly states that burn pits “can be harmful to human health and environment and should only be used until more suitable disposal capabilities are established,” the Pentagon line is that burn pits have “no known long-term health effects.”

On April 12, 2010, the Richmond Times-Dispatch carried an article by David Zucchino who investigated the American burn pits in Iraq. He interviewed Army Sgt. 1st Class Francis Jaeger who hauled military waste to the Balad burn pit which was being operated by a civilian contractor for the Pentagon. Jaeger told Zucchino:

“We were told to burn everything - electronics, bloody gauze, the medics’ biohazard bags, surgical gloves, cardboard. It all went up in smoke.”

The Pentagon now admits to operating 84 “official” burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan. The number of unofficial burn pits is not known. The Pentagon claims that it is phasing out its burn pits in favor of incinerators and that 27 incinerators are currently operating in Iraq and Afghanistan with 82 more to be added in the near future.

According to a website called the “Burn Pits Action Center,” hundreds of American veterans who came in contact with burn pit smoke have been diagnosed with cancer, neurological diseases, cardiovascular disease, breathing and sleeping problems and various skin rashes. In 2009, they filed more than 30 lawsuits in Federal courts across the United States, naming Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR), and its former parent company Halliburton. These companies were named because of their involvement in the LOGCAP (Logistics Civil Augmentation Program) contracts for Iraq and Afghanistan. Several KBR entities either managed or assisted in the management of the American military’s waste in both countries and allegedly operated some or all of the burn pits. Additional lawsuits were filed in 2010, including one in Federal District Court in New Jersey.

The lawsuits reveal that the Pentagon has ignored American and international environmental laws and the results appear to be the widespread release of hazardous pollutants into the air, soil, surface water and groundwater across Afghanistan. This is a persistent problem that continues today. Unlike Saudi Arabia which insisted that American forces cleanup their pollution after the war to oust Iraq from Kuwait in 1991, or the Government of Canada which likewise insisted on a strict cleanup of American bases on its soil, the Government of Afghanistan has been unable to force the Americans and their allies to repair all the environmental damage that they have caused and continue to cause. Afghanistan does not want to wind up like Vietnam. While American ground combat units withdrew from South Vietnam in 1972, neither Vietnam nor its people have recovered from the long term environmental damage and mutagenic effects that American military operations and their exotic chemicals caused.

This article summarizes the problem of America’s military wastes and examines the types of hazardous wastes that are likely to have been released into Afghanistan.

Part 2 of this series will address the contradictory responses by the Pentagon to this problem and it will explore one of the remedies that the Pentagon is currently implementing, which is to phase out the burn pits, replacing them with incinerators. The article examines the flaws in that strategy and why Afghanistan should carefully consider whether to permit the continued use of military incinerators.

Part 3 of this series will set out the recommendations of the author to the Government of Afghanistan on how to investigate and clean up the pollution of Afghanistan’s countryside caused by the burn pits, landfills and other disposal facilities used by American forces.

THE SOURCES OR MEANS BY WHICH THE VARIOUS WASTES ARE BEING RELEASED

The American military hazardous wastes that are believed to have entered the air, soil, groundwater and surface water of Afghanistan did so through the following methods (this list is partial only):

  • Burn pits
  • Incinerators
  • Burying/landfilling of the waste and ash
  • Intentional dumping
  • Accidental spills
  • Surface runoff
  • Leaking storage tanks, sumps and basins
  • Latrines

CATEGORIES OF AMERICAN MILITARY WASTE

The American military’s waste, at this time, cannot be completely characterized. The volume and variety of waste (i.e., thousands of different chemicals) are not known and there are certain to be classified items and materials which have been brought into Afghanistan for which there may be no documentation. Regardless of that, much is known about the materials and chemicals that the military routinely uses and about the waste that it routinely generates. Most American military wastes will falls into one of the following twelve (12) categories:

The Dirty Dozen:

1. Fuel leaks and spills. These include releases of aviation fuel, gasoline and diesel fuel. These releases would range from large releases at American airbases of hundreds or even thousands of liters, to minor spills at Forward Operating Bases and combat outposts as soldiers seek to refill diesel generators. Petroleum residues have the ability to leach rapidly into underground drinking water aquifers and create plumes that will permanently contaminate local wells. There is no known way to completely remediate a groundwater source after it has been contaminated with hydrocarbons.

2. Paints, asbestos, solvents, grease, cleaning solutions (such as perchloethylene) and building materials that contain formaldehyde, copper, arsenic and hydrogen cyanide.

3. Hydraulic fluids, aircraft de-icing fluids, antifreeze and used oil. Used oil is carcinogenic, anti-freeze is poisonous, de-icing fluids can contain hazardous ethylene and propylene glycol, along with toxic additives such as benzotriazoce (which is a corrosion and flame inhibitor). Hydraulic fluids can contain TPP (triphenyl phosphate).

4. Pesticide/poison leaks and spills: Afghanistan apparently has no list of the pesticides, fungicides, termiticides and other poisons that the Americans brought into Afghanistan and used, spilled and released into the countryside in order to control flies, mosquitos, ants, fleas and rodents. The military refers to such practices as “vector control.” It is expected that the list of such neuro-toxins and the quantity sprayed or spilled throughout Afghanistan is staggering.

5. Lead, nickel, zinc and cadmium battery waste and acids (which are toxic and/or corrosive).

6. Electronic waste (or E-waste). This includes computers, printers, faxes, screens, televisions, radios, refrigerators, communications gear, test equipment. They contain cancer-causing chemicals such as the flame retardant PBDE (polybrominated diphenyl ethers), PCDD (polychlorinated dioxins), barium, copper, lead, zinc, cadmium oxides and cadmium sulphides and trivalent antimony, which is eco-toxic.

7. Light bulbs. This may not seem important but many military light bulbs are fluorescent and therefore contain toxic levels of mercury. Disposal of these light bulbs in ordinary landfills is prohibited in the United States.

8. Plastics. The U.S. military uses thousands of different types and formulations of plastic. While most are harmless in their present state, such as plastic water bottles and Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) piping, the military has been burning its plastic waste in Afghanistan. When burned, many plastics release a deadly mix of chemicals including dioxins, furans, benzene, di 2-ethylhexyl phthalates (DEHP), hydrochloric acid, benzo(a)pyrene (BAP) and various acids and chlorine gas (which is a neurotoxin). Breathing a few seconds of this mixture in a concentrated form would likely be fatal.

9. Medical Waste. Infectious disease waste and biohazard materials, including used syringes, bloody bandages, sheets, gloves, expired drugs, amputated limbs and animal carcasses.

10. Ammunition waste. Lead, brass and other metals from ammunition along with all the constituents of the propellants, including trininitrotoluene, picric acid, diphenylamine, nitrocellulose, nitroglycerin, potassium nitrate, barium nitrate, tetracene, diazodintrophenol, phosphorus, peroxides, thiocarbamate, potassium chlorate, vinyl fluoride, vinyl chloride, sodium fluoride and sodium sulfate.

11. Radioactive waste. When one thinks of radioactive waste, usually one thinks only of atomic weapons, but that is not the case. The American military routinely uses a variety of devices and equipment that contain radioactive elements or radioluminescent elements. These materials are referred to as “Radioactive Commodities” by the American military. The primary radioactive materials are: Uranium, Tritium, Radium 226, Americium 241, Thorium, Cesium 137 and Plutonium 239.

Some of the equipment containing radioactive elements:

  • Night Vision Devices
  • M-16 Front Sight Post Assemblies
  • M72 Light Antitank Weapons
  • T-55 Aircraft Engine components
  • M58 and M59 Light Aiming Posts
  • M4 Front Sight Post Assemblies
  • RADIAC Calibrator Sets and Check Sources
  • Radium Compasses
  • L4A1 Quadrant Fire Control Devices
  • Fire Control Azimuths
  • Level Gauges
  • M-1 Collimators
  • M-1 Muzzle Reference Sensors
  • Soil Moisture Density Testers
  • TACOM Vehicle Dials and Gauges
  • Radios, including VRC-46/GRC-106/GRC-19
  • Chemical Agent Monitors
  • Testing Instruments
  • Vehicle Depleted Uranium Plates
  • Depleted Uranium Ammunition, including 20 millimeter ammunition
  • Electron Tubes for Communications Equipment
  • Various types of Laboratory and Hospital Analysis and Testing Machines.

Note: The American military will likely insist that it strictly controls the disposal of radioactive waste, but such assertions are not credible. While there are strict regulations, the time and cost of complying with them in a war zone are such that base commanders in Afghanistan most likely ignored them, opting instead for throwing the waste into burn pits. The evidence for this is contained in Part 3 of this Report, which cites to a Pentagon-funded study of what American field commanders think of the Pentagon’s environmental regulations.

If the American military continues to insist that it did not release radioactive materials in Afghanistan it should document such assertions by releasing its records. The Pentagon should publicly release all data on every radioactive commodity brought into Afghanistan. They should all be listed in HMIRS (the Hazardous Materials Information System). The Pentagon should then detail where each commodity is today.

12. Grey and Black Water. The American military and its contractors in Afghanistan operate human waste facilities. The military refers to these as LSS (Latrine, Shower and Shave) facilities. They generate what is known as grey and black waste-water. Grey water from sinks and showers has as its primary pollutant soap residue (i.e., phosphates and other chemicals that generate what is known as BOD - biological oxygen demand, which means they can absorb all the available oxygen in streams and rivers so fish cannot breathe). Some American soaps contain additives such as MIT (methylisothiazolinone), which is under investigation as a toxin.

Latrines generate black water pollution. While the American military has to adhere to strict rules regarding the discharge of such waste in the United States, it faces no restrictions in Afghanistan. Latrines can be dug near ground water and even upgradient from surface water (so that discharges can flow into them). There are no known maps of all the American latrines. After a latrine pit is filled, it is apparently covered over with dirt and forgotten.

While environmental releases involving categories 1 and 12 above are a certainty, it is feared that millions of kilograms and millions of liters of wastes set out in categories 2 through 11 were all thrown into the hundreds of American burn pits in Afghanistan or dumped into secret landfills. If true, the American legacy to Afghanistan is not freedom, but pollution.

In February 2010, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs began an 18-month study of the burn pits in Afghanistan and their effect on human health. Afghanistan cannot wait eighteen months for the results of this study, it has to act now.

The author is a former U.S. Air Force Captain. He advised on environmental cleanups at Logistics Command regarding the Air Force’s most contaminated bases and depots. He then worked for Bechtel Environmental and was involved in Superfund cleanups across the United States and radiological cleanups at U.S. Department of Energy sites. He later served as a consultant to a group of environmental remediation companies, smelters and waste recyclers.

Sources for Further Reading:

Houston Chronicle - February 7, 2010 - “GIs tell of horror from burn pits”

Los Angeles Times - February 18, 2010 - “Veterans speak out against burn pits”

The New York Times - February 25, 2010 - “Health Panel Begins Probing Impacts of Burn Pits”

Salem-News - March 29, 2010 - “Sick Veterans Sue KBR Over Iraq and Afghanistan Burn Pits”

AFP - November 10, 2009 - “Troops sue KBR over toxic waste in Iraq, Afghanistan”

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Forum posts

  • I am a columnist with the Palestine Telegraph and have written many articles on the terrible contamination of the Balkans, Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Gaza, Pakistan and now Yemen and Somalia.

    This article does have significant merit but it falls short of the terrible consequences of the major contamination caused by US and Coalition forces use of weapons containing uranium components.

    The extensive use of such weapons is at a much higher volume than Iraq and basically has the potential to kill the genetics of the Afghan people.

    The Author talks about contamination over some significant period, but we are looking here at beyond time. Depleted Uranium as an example has a half life of 4.5 billion years.

    In addition to this they also used 4th Generation "Dirty Weapons" which is a blend of both DU/EU and other highly toxic ingredients.

    These weapons attack the very DNA of all life and remain suspended in the atmosphere over a long period of time until it is rained out. It then enters the soil, crops and ground water. The problem does not stop there because it is on going via secondary contamination with Dust Storms, Helicopter Down Wash etc etc.

    It has the ability to significantly increas all types of cancers, diabetes, mental disorders, infirtility, still births, badly disfigured babies the list is endless.

    When one talks about this type of contamination is makes all other types of contamination insignificant.

    It is indiscriminate and does not identify international borders and therefore contaminates the adjacent countries down wind and the world beyond.

    As a result of the war in Afghanistan we are now seing terrible deformed babies in Northern India etc....this also is now happening in Gaza as it did in the other areas of conflict

    So I believe any adverse publicity is good.This a false war and serves no purpose other than imperialistic greed for natural resources.....they will leave the country totally contaminated for ever and the US and coalition forces continue to pound the countryside with these WMD’s.

    There will be no clean up programme....that is if clean up was possible and there is no protection for people that walk or work around it.

    Peter Eyre - Middle East Consultant - 26/4/2010

  • That is how the fate of Afghanistan will be untill From president to the very common local person in Afghanistan does not stand up firmly against it - but i bet 80% of the population wouldn’t know about these facts!!

    To protect people and to stop further contamination there must be wide Public Awareness Program - so it can bring extreme pressure on the U.S and its allied criminals.

    But - Are we yet successfull in claiming compensation that the USSR, RED FORCES caused and Afghanistan is still suffering that!!!???

    We definitely need to woo international support against all these.

    • TALMUDIC JEWS ARE IN DARKNESS
      PEDOPHILIA:
      THE TALMUD’S DIRTY SECRET
      Sometimes You ARE What You READ!
      The Traditional Jewish View of Modesty

      King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
      Matthew 18:6
      “But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.”
      “Beware the teachings of the Pharisees”

      THOUSANDS OF MILLSTONES NEEDED

      CHILD BRIDES 3 YEARS OLD
      Babylonian Talmud: Tractate Niddah
      Niddah 44b
      MISHNAH. A GIRL OF THE AGE OF THREE YEARS AND ONE DAY MAY BE BETROTHED23 BY INTERCOURSE; IF THE YABAM24 HAD INTERCOURSE WITH HER, HE ACQUIRES HER THEREBY;25 THE GUILT26 OF ADULTERY27 MAY BE INCURRED THROUGH HER,28 AND SHE29 CAUSES UNCLEANNESS TO THE MAN WHO HAD INTERCOURSE WITH HER SO THAT HE IN TURN CONVEYS UNCLEANNESS TO THAT UPON WHICH HE LIES,30 AS TO A GARMENT WHICH HAS LAIN UPON [A ZAB].31 IF SHE WAS MARRIED TO A PRIEST, SHE MAY EAT TERUMAH. IF ANY OF THE INELIGIBLE PERSONS32 COHABITED WITH HER HE DISQUALIFIES HER FROM THE PRIESTHOOD.33 IF ANY OF THE FORBIDDEN DEGREES ENUMERATED IN THE TORAH COHABITED WITH HER HE IS TO BE EXECUTED ON HER ACCOUNT, BUT SHE34 IS EXEMPT [FROM THE PENALTY]. IF ONE WAS YOUNGER THAN THIS AGE INTERCOURSE WITH HER IS LIKE PUTTING A FINGER IN THE EYE.

      GEMARA. Our Rabbis taught: A girl of the age of three years may be betrothed by intercourse; so R. Meir. But the Sages say: Only one who is three years and one day old. What is the practical difference between them? — The school of R Jannai replied: The practical difference between them is the day preceding the first day of the fourth year.35 R. Johanan, however, replied: The practical difference between them is the rule that thirty days of a year are counted as the full year.36
      An objection was raised: A girl of the age of three years and even one of the age of two years and one day may be betrothed by intercourse; so R. Meir. But the Sages say: Only one who is three years and one day old.

      23 ubject to her father’s approval.
      24 he brother of her deceased childless husband, whose duty it is to contract the levirate marriage with her.
      25 In consequence of which he gains possession of his deceased brother’s estate, is entitled if she dies to inherit her own estate and even if he is a priest, he may defile himself to her as to a legally married wife.
      26 Punishable by death.
      27 Lit., ’on account of the wife of a man’.
      28 If, for instance, her father betrothed her to one man and another cohabited with her.
      29 When a menstruant.
      30 Lit., ’lower couch’.
      31 Lit., ’like the upper’.
      32 A bastard or a slave, for instance.
      33 Sc. if she was the daughter of a priest she loses the privilege of eating terumah.
      34 Being a minor.
      35 Lit., ’the eve of the beginning of the year’. According to R. Meir she attains the prescribed age on that day while according to the Rabbis she does not attain it until the following day.
      36 According to R. Meir the prescribed age is attained as soon as thirty days of the third year have passed, while according to the Rabbis it is not attained until the first day of the fourth year.

      Three Year Old Brides

      When Christ accused the Pharisees of His day of being Satan’s spiritual children, He fully realized what they were capable of. Second century Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai, one of Judaism’s very greatest rabbis and a creator of Kabbalah, sanctioned pedophilia—permitting molestation of baby girls even younger than three! He proclaimed,
      “A proselyte who is under the age of three years and a day is permitted to marry a priest.” 1 Subsequent rabbis refer to ben Yohai’s endorsement of pedophilia as "halakah," or binding Jewish law. 2 Has ben Yohai, child rape advocate, been disowned by modern Jews? Hardly. Today, in ben Yohai’s hometown of Meron, Israel, tens of thousands of orthodox and ultra-orthodox Jews gather annually for days and nights of singing and dancing in his memory.
      References to pedophilia abound in the Talmud. They occupy considerable sections of Treatises Kethuboth and Yebamoth and are enthusiastically endorsed by the Talmud’s definitive legal work, Treatise Sanhedrin.
      The Pharisees Endorsed Child Sex
      The rabbis of the Talmud are notorious for their legal hairsplitting, and quibbling debates. But they share rare agreement about their right to molest three year old girls. In contrast to many hotly debated issues, hardly a hint of dissent rises against the prevailing opinion (expressed in many clear passages) that pedophilia is not only normal but scriptural as well! It’s as if the rabbis have found an exalted truth whose majesty silences debate.
      Because the Talmudic authorities who sanction pedophilia are so renowned, and because pedophilia as “halakah” is so explicitly emphasized, not even the translators of the Soncino edition of the Talmud (1936) dared insert a footnote suggesting the slightest criticism. They only comment: “Marriage, of course, was then at a far earlier age than now.” 3
      In fact, footnote 5 to Sanhedrin 60b rejects the right of a Talmudic rabbi to disagree with ben Yohai’s endorsement of pedophilia: "How could they [the rabbis], contrary to the opinion of R. Simeon ben Yohai, which has scriptural support, forbid the marriage of the young proselyte?" 4
      Out of Babylon
      It was in Babylon after the exile under Nebuchadnezzar in 597 BC that Judaism’s leading sages probably began to indulge in pedophilia. Babylon was the staggeringly immoral capitol of the ancient world. For 1600 years, the world’s largest population of Jews flourished within it.
      As an example of their evil, Babylonian priests said a man’s religious duty included regular sex with temple prostitutes. Bestiality was widely tolerated. So Babylonians hardly cared whether a rabbi married a three year old girl.
      But with expulsion of the Jews in the 11th century AD, mostly to western Christian lands, Gentile tolerance of Jewish pedophilia abruptly ended.
      Still, a shocking contradiction lingers: If Jews want to revere the transcendent wisdom and moral guidance of the Pharisees and their Talmud, they must accept the right of their greatest ancient sages to violate children. To this hour, no synod of Judaism has repudiated their vile practice.
      Sex with a “Minor” Permitted
      What exactly did these sages say?
      The Pharisees justified child rape by explaining that a boy of nine years was not a “man” Thus they exempted him from God’s Mosaic Law:
      “You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination” (Leviticus. 18:22)
      One passage in the Talmud gives permission for a woman who molested her young son to marry a high priest. It concludes,
      “All agree that the connection of a boy aged nine years and a day is a real connection; whilst that of one less than eight years is not." 5
      Because a boy under 9 is sexually immature, he can’t "throw guilt" on the active offender, morally or legally. 6
      A woman could molest a young boy without questions of morality even being raised:
      "…the intercourse of a small boy is not regarded as a sexual act." 7
      The Talmud also says,
      "A male aged nine years and a day who cohabits with his deceased brother’s wife acquires her (as wife)."
      8 Clearly, the Talmud teaches that a woman is permitted to marry and have sex with a nine year old boy.
      Sex at Three Years and One Day
      In contrast to Simeon ben Yohai’s dictum that sex with a little girl is permitted under the age of three years, the general teaching of the Talmud is that the rabbi must wait until a day after her third birthday. She could be taken in marriage simply by the act of rape.
      R. Joseph said: Come and hear! A maiden aged three years and a day may be acquired in marriage by coition and if her deceased husband’s brother cohabits with her, she becomes his. (Sanhedrin 55b)
      A girl who is three years of age and one day may be betrothed by cohabitation. . . .(. Yebamoth 57b)
      A maiden aged three years and a day may be acquired in marriage by coition, and if her deceased husband’s brother cohabited with her she becomes his. (Sanhedrin. 69a, 69b, also discussed in Yebamoth. 60b)
      It was taught: R. Simeon b. Yohai stated: A proselyte who is under the age of three years and one day is permitted to marry a priest, for it is said, But all the women children that have not known man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves, and Phineas (who was priest, the footnote says) surely was with them. (Yebamoth. 60b)
      [The Talmud says such three year and a day old girls are] . . . fit for cohabitation. . . But all women children, that have not known man by lying with him, it must be concluded that Scripture speaks of one who is fit for cohabitation. (Footnote to Yebamoth. 60b)
      The example of Phineas, a priest, himself marrying an underage virgin of three years is considered by the Talmud as proof that such infants are "fit for cohabitation."
      The Talmud teaches that an adult woman’s molestation of a nine year old boy is "not a sexual act" and cannot "throw guilt" upon her because the little boy is not truly a "man.” 9 But they use opposite logic to sanction rape of little girls aged three years and one day: Such infants they count as “women," sexually mature and fully responsible to comply with the requirements of marriage.
      The Talmud footnotes 3 and 4 to Sanhedrin 55a clearly tell us when the rabbis considered a boy and girl sexually mature and thus ready for marriage. "At nine years a male attains sexual matureness… The sexual matureness of woman is reached at the age of three."
      No Rights for Child Victims
      The Pharisees were hardly ignorant of the trauma felt by molested children. To complicate redress, the Talmud says a rape victim must wait until she was of age before there would be any possibility of restitution. She must prove that she lived and would live as a devoted Jewess, and she must protest the loss of her virginity on the very hour she comes of age. “As soon as she was of age one hour and did not protest she cannot protest any more.” 10
      The Talmud defends these strict measures as necessary to forestall the possibility of a Gentile child bride rebelling against Judaism and spending the damages awarded to her as a heathen - an unthinkable blasphemy! But the rights of the little girl were really of no great consequence, for, "When a grown-up man has intercourse with a little girl it is nothing, for when the girl is less than this (three years and a day) it is as if one put the finger into the eye." The footnote says that as “tears come to the eye again and again, so does virginity come back to the little girl under three years.” 11
      In most cases, the Talmud affirms the innocence of male and female victims of pedophilia. Defenders of the Talmud claim this proves the Talmud’s amazing moral advancement and benevolence toward children; they say it contrasts favorably with "primitive" societies where the child would have been stoned along with the adult perpetrator.
      Actually, the rabbis, from self-protection, were intent on proving the innocence of both parties involved in pedophilia: the child, but more importantly, the pedophile. They stripped a little boy of his right to "throw guilt" on his assailant and demanded complicity in sex from a little girl. By thus providing no significant moral or legal recourse for the child, the Talmud clearly reveals whose side it is on: the raping rabbi.
      Pedophilia Widespread
      Child rape was practiced in the highest circles of Judaism. This is illustrated from Yebamoth. 60b:
      There was a certain town in the land of Israel the legitimacy of whose inhabitants was disputed, and Rabbi sent R. Romanos who conducted an inquiry and found in it the daughter of a proselyte who was under the age of three years and one day, and Rabbi declared her eligible to live with a priest.
      The footnote says that she was “married to a priest” and the rabbi simply permitted her to live with her husband, thus upholding “halakah” as well as the dictum of Simeon ben Yohai,
      “A proselyte who is under the age of three years and one day is permitted to marry a priest.” 12
      These child brides were expected to submit willingly to sex. Yebamoth. 12b confirms that under eleven years and one day a little girl is not permitted to use a contraceptive but “must carry on her marital intercourse in the usual manner.”
      In Sanhedrin 76b a blessing is given to the man who marries off his children before they reach the age of puberty, with a contrasting curse on anyone who waits longer. In fact, failure to have married off one’s daughter by the time she is 12-1/2, the Talmud says, is as bad as one who “returns a lost article to a Cuthean” (Gentile) - a deed for which “the Lord will not spare him.” 13 This passage says: “… it is meritorious to marry off one’s children whilst minors.”
      The mind reels at the damage to the untold numbers of girls who were sexually abused within Judaism during the heyday of pedophilia. Such child abuse, definitely practiced in the second century, continued, at least in Babylon, for another 900 years.
      A Fascination with Sex
      Perusing the Talmud, one is overwhelmed with the recurrent preoccupation with sex, especially by the most eminent rabbis. Dozens of illustrations could be presented to illustrate the delight of the Pharisees to discuss sex and quibble over its minutest details.
      The rabbis endorsing child sex undoubtedly practiced what they preached. Yet to this hour, their words are revered. Simeon ben Yohai is honored by Orthodox Jews as one of the very greatest sages and spiritual lights the world has ever known. A member of the earliest "Tannaim," rabbis most influential in creating the Talmud, he carries more authority to observant Jews than Moses.
      Today, the Talmud’s outspoken pedophiles and child-rape advocates would doubtlessly spend hard time in prison for child molestation. Yet here is what the eminent Jewish scholar, Dagobert Runes (who is fully aware of all these passages), says about such “dirty old men” and their perverted teachings:
      There is no truth whatever in Christian and other strictures against the Pharisees, who represented the finest traditions of their people and of human morals. 14
      Aren’t Christ’s words more appropriate?
      “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.” (Matthew 23:27, 28.)
      Endnotes:
      1 Yebamoth 60b, p. 402.
      2 Yebamoth 60b, p. 403.
      3 Sanhedrin 76a.
      4 In Yebamoth 60b, p. 404, Rabbi Zera disagrees that sex with girls under three years and one day should be endorsed as halakah.
      5 Sanhedrin 69b.
      6 Sanhedrin 55a.
      7 Footnote 1 to Kethuboth 11b.
      8 Sanhedrin 55b.
      9 Sanhedrin 55a.
      10 Kethuboth 11a.
      11 Kethuboth 11b.
      12 Yebamoth 60b.
      13 Sanhedrin 76b.
      14 Dagobert Runes, A Concise Dictionary of Judaism, New York, 1959.

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