Update: The War On Iraq

I never expected to post a second part to this, but I'd like to add some excerpts and analyses (thanks to all who provided me with this information) to this topic.

Democracy Now hosted an interview with several people who have seen the atrocity and civil strife in the country. Amongst those interviewed was Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Global Exchange and Code Pink that organized the delegation of Iraqi women of whom two attended the interview. While she stated much of the obvious, this particular quote caught my eye.

"They could not prove that they would want to go home. So, yes, we killed their families and then denied them the right to come to the United States to tell what the U.S. had done to their families. "

You can't blame her for knowing about the mess going on Iraq. What she's claiming is that those who have seen the true horrors of war as it is going on in Iraq have been barred from recounting their experiences on American soil, save for those who have been slaved under the imperialist demands for America and have been discouraged from saying things other than "Everything's dandy down here." Well, at least Faiza El-Araji escaped all this media buzz to tell Democracy Now what is really happening.

"I'm watching the documentary on the TV now. I’m Iraqi. I left Iraq because of the kidnapping of my son in the last summer and stay in Jordan as refugee. You know, the story went out; living there is different. It’s completely different about the story your media is sending you or the message the media is sending you. When somebody telling you that things is going on in Iraq well and everything is fine, please ask him, “What is your evidence? What is your proof? What is your clue? Give me. Give me something on the ground.”"

The point that she's making is that the media is giving us only one part of the whole story. However, what is happening in Iraq, on the ground as it is, is definitely different than how the media is portraying it in the sense that the war on Iraq has been masked by media outlets, even "liberal" ones.She goes on to say,

"I can make a kind of debate. I'm ready to have a debate with the American leaders, to sit with them in front of the American people. I want to hear from them, and I will give them the answers for everything they are talking about, because we have the real story on the ground. After three years of evaluation, I think Iraqis have the right to talk about the evolution of the war, not the American leaders, because we are who are suffering here and we are -- we lost the money of Iraq, we lost the souls of Iraqis, we lost the souls of loved ones in Iraq. We have -- our kids have been kidnapped. Our neighbors have been killed. We lost everything. But what about the leaders? They are sitting in their chairs, and they have the power. And they did nothing for the Iraqi people to help the Iraqi people. I'm not telling this from my mind. It is facts on the ground."

While pro-war supporters claim that not everything can be done in a jiffy, the situation in Iraq is being purposefully exacerbated by the rightwing Coalition. Much later on in the interview, she claims,

"Oh, my God. Yeah, they are trying to tell you another story. The reality is there. We are brothers and sisters. We are Muslim, my dear. This is the identity of the nation. We are Muslim. But they are trying to divide the people, to go to the sub-identity, to make a cause of fighting or to provoke the people against each other. And we refuse it. "

This, of course, is the "divide and conquer" (فرق تسد; farriq tasud in Arabic) policy that has been repeated by American and British colonialists in the past during the 5 decades of interventionism that has stirred up the worst of anti-American feelings all around the world. I am against "divide and conquer" as it is the main policy that has been responsible for the divisions we are seeing amongst the disunited Muslim community today. Faiza then stresses my point that indeed the strife we are seeing in Iraq is brand new:

"And a thing I said yesterday, in the history there is fighting between the regime and the Kurds or the regime against the Shia. But it doesn't mean it is civil war. It is something between, you know, for political reasons. But the media here is investing these actions to tell you another kind of stories."

The media has been responsible for quite a clouding on Iraq's present situation, it seems. Ever since the downplay of civilian casualties and property damage in Iraq, we have seen the worst of the rightwing pro-war movement steeping to very low levels in order to "justify" such depravity.

One thing intrigued me most in Faiza's argument.

"Well, I worked mainly on the bombed cities, the refugee camps. I also worked on the missing, a very big issue in Iraq now, that I don't think people here have any idea about. I worked on the detainees. These are the things that I worked on."

What about the missing?

Well, people are -- people disappear in Iraq. People are -- especially men -- arrested, and you don't hear anything about them later. For example, in the first – in the first era of the war, between March 20 until April 9, when the Iraqi state fall down, people disappeared. There are eyewitnesses that these people were taken by the American troops. Some of them may be killed. Some of them may be in jail. But now, they don't exist. "

She speaks of the many Iraqis who are in prisons like Abu Ghraib and alleged "terrorists" in Guantanamo; in fact, a large percentage of prisoners have been "associated with terrorists", claims TalkLeft. Enough of that, but let's turn back to Faiza, who tells us of the miserable situation in Iraq.

"Every day, stories of horrible – the life is horrible for Iraqis now. Iraq now is the hell. It is the land of hell. There is nothing. There's no electricity. There’s no water. There's no security. You can’t send your boy to the school, because you are scared. You have to change the priority of your life. What is the priority? The education of my son or the life of him? Yes, sure. The life of my son. So the people are putting their son in the houses. They will never send them to the schools or to the universities. And you can imagine what kind of life, if you want to move to your job or to your school, and there’s curfew or there is blocks of concrete barriers for the occupation and checkpoints and checkpoints, and everywhere. It is a kind of hell. You can’t go out for shopping. You can’t go for the hospital. Everything is -- everything is destroyed in Iraq now. And this is for the services or the conditions on the ground."

Just to show you the "freedom" that the Coalition brought to Iraq.

Another woman interviewed was Eman Ahmad Khamas, who, although spoke as much as Faiza and repeated much of what she said, claimed a little fact that stood out from the rest of her arguments.

"Well, the reality is that it never happened in the history of Iraq for thousands, six thousands of years. It never happened, a civil war or these kind of distinctions. It is true that there are in Iraq, there are Kurds, there are Arabs and Sunnis and Shia and the Christians and many other minor religions and groups. But it never happened that we fight each other. No. At all."

This confirms my assertion that Iraq's civil strife is something totally new, and is disuniting the people of Iraq.

"No. I mean, it’s not going to be like that. I mean, you have to plan it in a way that, you know, guarantee that there will be no civil war, as you said. There is the U.N., there is the Security Council, there are the peacekeeping troops. There are many things that they can work out to, you know, follow this security vacuum, so that it wouldn’t, as you say, go into civil war. But the occupation should end immediately. It’s something wrong. It’s wrong for the Iraqis, for the Americans, for the world, for peace, for the international law. Everything. It’s wrong. It has to end now. Immediately. And then – and we Iraqis, we can work things out. We are capable of that. And if we kill each other, it’s our problem. It’s not the American’s problem. But we -- I'm sure that we are capable of taking care of ourselves."

Unfortunately, the last bolded parts is what many pro-war racists argue: that Iraqis are unable to take care of themselves and that they won't protect themselves. The Iraqis on the street don't want the troops to stay in Iraq, because it's obvious that the Coalition's occupation is what is denigrating the Iraqi people. Well, along with my recent article from The Independent regarding the death squads operating in Iraq and this special report on Iraq from Al Jazeera, I would say that yeah, something ugly is going on in Iraq and the Coalition is responsible for stirring up something, alright. There was no religious conflict prior to this invasion, and now the rift that was never there came out and grew wider. Looks like "divide and conquer" from what I'm seeing, along with a bit of Northern Ireland and an Orwellian 1984 scenario.

The WSWS wrote a special report on the atrocity in Najaf, on part of the U.S. Coalition. The Editorial Board wrote,

Describing the conduct of the US forces, a Marine spokesman told the Associated Press on August 11 that they had “pretty much just been patrolling and flying helicopters all over the place, and when we see something bad, we blow it up.”No estimate is being given by the US attackers of civilian casualties, but given the massive firepower being thrown against urban centers—including the Shiite slum of Sadr City in Baghdad and other southern Iraqi cities besides Najaf—they must number in the thousands.

Earlier this week, the US military told tens of thousands of Najaf residents their homes were a “military zone” and ordered them to evacuate. Thousands chose to defy the invaders, or were prevented from leaving by the fighting raging all around them.
Electricity, water and medical services have ceased to function in the city of 600,000. Thousands of shrines and graves in the revered cemetery have been destroyed or damaged. Much of the historic old city, dating back 1,300 years, which surrounds the mosque has been reduced to rubble.

The US media has failed to take note of the bitter irony in the American military laying waste to the religious and cultural center of Iraq’s Shiite population. The “no-fly zone” enforced by the US over southern Iraq from 1991 until last year’s invasion was justified as a measure to protect the Shiite population from repression by Saddam Hussein’s Baathist regime. The US invasion was propagated as an act of “liberation” of the oppressed Shiites.

Now the American “liberators” are unleashing the most savage repression the Shiites have suffered since 1991. The Shiite masses have responded with large demonstrations against the slaughter in Najaf in cities such as Baghdad, Basra, Nasiriya and other predominantly Shiite cities in Iraq. Demonstrations have also been held in other Middle Eastern countries.

This is just sick: the military is using the "penal code" and semantics to justify what it's doing in Iraq, steeping to low levels in condoning what they supposedly condemn when it comes to the actions being committed by the "enemy". The passage continues to write that the White House

ensured that Allawi, who had been on the payroll of the CIA for a decade, was named as prime minister. Allawi’s qualifications were his total subservience to American imperialism and his well-known penchant for brutality. He has not hesitated to place his imprimatur on the renewed US offensive against the Iraqi resistance.

The media itself has shut out any vehement opposition to the war, using the form of propaganda to further accelerate its goals in Iraq, but yes, this is another case of colonization and I can't wait till every Iraqi crook in the government goes on welfare. Moving on...

The main Sunni Muslim religious organization, the Association of Muslim Scholars, has issued a fatwa, or instruction, prohibiting all Sunnis in the interim government’s military and police forces from assisting the US military in the attack on Sadr’s movement. Fighting is once again flaring in the Fallujah area.

This of course asserts the point that the Coalition is inciting civil strife by dragging sects into fights with each other.

Haaretz quoted Reuters in a report on claims by Sunnite clerics and influential figures in the Iraqi Sunnite community that the Coalition is desperate for civil strife. The report claims,

A respected Sunni cleric on Sunday accused the United States of trying to ignite conflict between Iraqi Shi'ite and Sunni Muslims to divide the country.

"America wants to enhance sectarian strife among Iraqis but it has so far failed to do so," Sheikh Abdul Salam al-Kubeisi, a senior official at the Association of Muslim Clerics, a Sunni body, told Reuters.

"Those enemies and invaders who are bargaining for sectarian strife among Iraqis are mistaken," he said.

I really do hope so that they of the Coalition fail to do so. Kubeisi, like his Shiite counterpart, Al Sistani, has called for peaceful resistance to the Coalition's aims in Iraq. Such resistance lead to elections, instead of appointing crooks to the government.

He also called for the U.S.-backed Governing Council - whose 25 members reflect Iraq's religious and ethnic mix - to resign because it could not achieve an independent government.

"They don't represent the Iraqi people," he said. "It should dissolve itself if it has the courage to do so."

This interested me even more. Perhaps my theory on incitation of civil strife is true?

While debating this issue on a political forum, a friend and ally in the cause against this farce of a war dug up an excellent link from Dahr Jamail's dispatches. Dahr Jamail writes,

British Prime Minister Tony Blair stated that those who committed the attack on the Golden Mosque “have only one motive: to create a violent sedition between the Sunnis and the Shiites in order to derail the Iraqi rising democracy from its path.”

Well said Mr. Blair, particularly when we keep in mind the fact that less than a year ago in Basra, two undercover British SAS soldiers were detained by Iraqi security forces whilst traveling in a car full of bombs and remote detonators.

Jailed and accused by Muqtada al-Sadr and others of attempting to generate sectarian conflict by planting bombs in mosques, they were broken out of the Iraqi jail by the British military before they could be tried.

Despite the bombings, there is still some Sunni-Shia solidarity. There's no doubt, however, that the US government wants to keep permanent bases in Iraq. Who's really getting what out of continued civil strife and war? Obviously, the Coalition: "divide and conquer" is definitely what it's up to. Definitely, this war is about oil.

During the Fallujah air raids, Al Jazeera was there to report the misfortunes of the Iraqis living there. It reports,

Residents of Falluja have taken to the streets after Friday prayers to denounce the continuous bombing of their homes and to support their city's security forces.

Hundreds of protesters condemned the killing of civilians by US warplanes, calling US air raids a cowardly action and calling on US soldiers to fight them on the battlefield.

This only confirms that the Coalition is definitely inciting strife and has met only resistance, not just "terror".

Can't you just feel the love?

Anyways, moving on...

Colonel Sabbar al-Janabi, who led the Falluja Brigade formed last April, attended the gathering and criticised US and Iraqi officials for violating the agreement with Fallujans.

"[The] US military wants us to disperse Falluja police which keeps stability in the city," he said.

This is akin to Israel's killing of Palestinian security personnel, and then they moan about how Palestinians are not "curbing in the terrorists". I agree with Mr. Janabi on his issue.

Falluja has become a no-go zone for US-led forces since an April offensive in the city ended with an agreement for Iraqis to police themselves and bring to justice hardcore members of Iraqi armed factions.

Subservience is nothing new.

With regards to the U.S. military leaving Iraq, and its prospects, Noam Chomsky said in an interview,

"Now let's talk about withdrawal. Take any day's newspapers or journals and so on. They start by saying the United States aims to bring about a sovereign democratic independent Iraq. I mean, is that even a remote possibility? Just consider what the policies would be likely to be of an independent sovereign Iraq. If it's more or less democratic, it'll have a Shiite majority. They will naturally want to improve their linkages with Iran, Shiite Iran. Most of the clerics come from Iran. The Badr Brigade, which basically runs the South, is trained in Iran. They have close and sensible economic relationships which are going to increase. So you get an Iraqi/Iran loose alliance. Furthermore, right across the border in Saudi Arabia, there's a Shiite population which has been bitterly oppressed by the U.S.-backed fundamentalist tyranny. And any moves toward independence in Iraq are surely going to stimulate them, it's already happening. That happens to be where most of Saudi Arabian oil is. Okay, so you can just imagine the ultimate nightmare in Washington: a loose Shiite alliance controlling most of the world's oil, independent of Washington and probably turning toward the East, where China and others are eager to make relationships with them, and are already doing it. Is that even conceivable? The U.S. would go to nuclear war before allowing that, as things now stand."

This confirms the fact that the presence of the Coalition is what is controlling the oil assets in the region.

"Now, any discussion of withdrawal from Iraq has to at least enter the real world, meaning, at least consider these issues. Just take a look at the commentary in the United States, across the spectrum. How much discussion do you see of these issues? Well, you know, approximately zero, which means that the discussion is just on Mars. And there's a reason for it. We're not allowed to concede that our leaders have rational imperial interests. We have to assume that they're good-hearted and bumbling. But they're not. They're perfectly sensible. They can understand what anybody else can understand. So the first step in talk about withdrawal is: consider the actual situation, not some dream situation, where Bush is pursuing a vision of democracy or something. If we can enter the real world we can begin to talk about it. And yes, I think there should be withdrawal, but we have to talk about it in the real world and know what the White House is thinking. They're not willing to live in a dream world."

What Chomsky is asserting is that the White House is giving people the perception of "dream world" materials, like "democracy" and "freedom" (rats, I had to scroll back to democracy and put in quotes). THe propaganda inherent in their mission has clouded perception and rational thought amongst many in the public, even the anti-war movement. With regards to coverups, the CIA has asked the Justice Department to review the links to "hidden prisons", after it has been leaked to the Washington Post... according to CNN. Also, the detainee death toll in Iraq and Afghanistan is well over a hundred, according to BBC. The U.S. has also brought elements of the Peshmerga into the Iraqi police, to further incite civil strife. Moreover, body counts have come from many sources, according to this PBS interview. Moreover, Ghassan Charbel of Al Hayat speaks of the circumstances surrounding civil strife.

Perhaps we can hold the occupation responsible for the disintegration that Iraq is experiencing. Were it not for the collapse of security institutions, due to arbitrary US decisions, Abu Musab Zarqawi would not have been able to find a foothold in Iraq. The decisions themselves allowed this bloody visitor to establish a stronghold in the Sunni triangle, and thus enter the Iraqi equation. The Americans' frivolous method of administering Iraq after the war gave Zarqawi an opportunity to lead the resistance and drown it in program that was not Iraqi to begin with. Perhaps we can draw up a long list of errors and sins by the occupation. But in the end, it's an occupation, and no one should expect it to be a charity association whose only objective is distributing the bread of democracy and prosperity to the people of the region. Something like this would allow those who love Iraq in the Arab world to ask about the responsibility of Iraqi forces for the growing dangers in the country, such as the attempt to launch a civil war by targeting religious symbols and sparking reactions of the same type.

According to Stephen Zunes of antiwar.com, assuming that tracing civil strife in Iraq as it is now to times before the Coalition's invasion would be "blaming the victim". The farce of multiple elections, according to Phyllis Bennis, has become a repetitive issue used to mask the chaos in Iraq and give a false sense of "security" and "order". Iraq has no order... no freedom... no security... no water... no electricity... no unity... no end to violence... no hope... nothing... as long as the Coalition is there. This post was meant to augment what I have written before, and is not an addition of any new topics regarding the war on Iraq. I hope this war ends, the Coalition pulls out, the Iraqi people unite and fix their country... and I want to see all war criminals hanged... yes, even Iraqi war criminals in the government.

Salaam, from
Saracen