How many Iraqis died as a result of enemy war crimes?

The AP is publishing various estimates of civilian casualties in Iraq during the last year. The Ministries of Health, Defense and Interior put the number at 14,298. The AP's own count taken from news reports put the total at 13,738. The story fails to mention that the enemy's deliberate targeting of non combatants is a war crime. It is an aspect of the story the media has avoided since the war began. Yet, the same media gets all excited when US forces accidentally kill civilians while searching for enemy troops who are camouflaged as civilians. It is an extraordinary double standard that they adhere to shamelessly.

To this problem of enemy war crimes should be added the additional problem of a tendency by Iraqi hospitals and morgues to count enemy fatalities as civilian, because they camouflage themselves as civilians. For example, in the first battle of Fallujah, the hospital claimed all Iraqis and foreigners killed during the battle were civilian, when that clearly was not the case. At best, the hospital was clueless on the point, since the enemy is unlikely to admit his status when seeking medical help.

Update: Gateway Pundit points out that these official Iraqi figures and AP figures put the lie to the bogus Lancet/John Hopkins fantasy figures on casualties in Iraq. Jules Crittenden also looks at the non sequiturs in the AP story.

Don Surber also takes a look at the numbers and finds that deaths are down compared to when Saddam was doing the killing.