The left has now published TWO phony counts of civilian deaths in Iraq.The first (100,000) in Lancet has been thoroughly debunked, though it still shows up everywhere.

Now there's a figure one—fourth as high, but it's no better:

SPLASHED ON THE front page of The Independent yesterday, was the figure 24,865. 'Revealed: Iraq's Civilian Death Toll', read the headline.

It was not alone. The BBC's bulletins ran with the same figure, as did the Daily Mirror and The Guardian — derived, said the latter, from 'a detailed study of the human cost of the conflict'. 

There is only one problem with the figure — not that you would know it from the credulous reporting. It is an entirely arbitrary figure published by political agitators.

The figure was released yesterday by two organisations, Iraq Body Count and the Oxford Research Group. According to the BBC, the former 'is one of the most widely—quoted sources of information on the civilian death toll in Iraq'. Indeed it is — because the BBC itself reports its propaganda as fact.

Clarice Feldman  7 20 05