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2008

"Stronger Women. Stronger Nations - 2008 Iraq Report"
In a report released on March 2, Women for Women International reviews the current situation of women in Iraq.

"It has been five years since the American invasion of Iraq and while the mistakes made there continue to accumulate still no-one has stopped to listen to what this critical mass of the population, women, have to say about solving the problems," said Zainab Salbi of Women for Women International.

The 34-page report compares women's opinions and situations from a survey in 2003 with new data from interviews with 1500 Iraqi women in 2007.

Some of the results, quoted in a BBC report, show the worsening of women's situation in Iraq:

26.9% optimistic about the situation in Iraq

63.9% said violence against them had increased

76.2% said girls in their family were not allowed to attend school

68.3% described the availability of jobs as "bad"

70.5% said their family cannot afford to pay for the necessities

43.6% did not think that the circumstances of women were considered by decision-makers.
Download the report here: http://www.codepink4peace.org/downloads/Iraq_report030308.pdf

2007

Baghdad Burning: Girl Blog from Iraq... let's talk war, politics and occupation.

"... I'll meet you 'round the bend my friend, where hearts can heal and souls can mend..."

In August 2003 a blog was started by 'Riverbend': "I'm female, Iraqi and 24. I survived the war. That's all you need to know. It's all that matters these days anyway."

In April 2007 she posted a message saying that her family had finally decided to leave, joining the millions of Iraqis who are refugees in neighboring countries and beyond. That was the last message (as of 2 July '07). She wrote:

Thursday, April 26, 2007

The Great Wall of Segregation...

…Which is the wall the current Iraqi government is building (with the support and guidance of the Americans). It's a wall that is intended to separate and isolate what is now considered the largest 'Sunni' area in Baghdad- let no one say the Americans are not building anything. According to plans the Iraqi puppets and Americans cooked up, it will 'protect' A'adhamiya, a residential/mercantile area that the current Iraqi government and their death squads couldn't empty of Sunnis.

The wall, of course, will protect no one. I sometimes wonder if this is how the concentration camps began in Europe. The Nazi government probably said, "Oh look- we're just going to protect the Jews with this little wall here- it will be difficult for people to get into their special area to hurt them!" And yet, it will also be difficult to get out.

The Wall is the latest effort to further break Iraqi society apart. Promoting and supporting civil war isn't enough, apparently- Iraqis have generally proven to be more tenacious and tolerant than their mullahs, ayatollahs, and Vichy leaders. It's time for America to physically divide and conquer- like Berlin before the wall came down or Palestine today. This way, they can continue chasing Sunnis out of "Shia areas" and Shia out of "Sunni areas".

I always hear the Iraqi pro-war crowd interviewed on television from foreign capitals (they can only appear on television from the safety of foreign capitals because I defy anyone to be publicly pro-war in Iraq). They refuse to believe that their religiously inclined, sectarian political parties fueled this whole Sunni/Shia conflict. They refuse to acknowledge that this situation is a direct result of the war and occupation. They go on and on about Iraq's history and how Sunnis and Shia were always in conflict and I hate that. I hate that a handful of expats who haven't been to the country in decades pretend to know more about it than people actually living there.

I remember Baghdad before the war- one could live anywhere. We didn't know what our neighbors were- we didn't care. No one asked about religion or sect. No one bothered with what was considered a trivial topic: are you Sunni or Shia? You only asked something like that if you were uncouth and backward. Our lives revolve around it now. Our existence depends on hiding it or highlighting it- depending on the group of masked men who stop you or raid your home in the middle of the night.

On a personal note, we've finally decided to leave. I guess I've known we would be leaving for a while now. We discussed it as a family dozens of times. At first, someone would suggest it tentatively because, it was just a preposterous idea- leaving ones home and extended family- leaving ones country- and to what? To where?

Since last summer, we had been discussing it more and more. It was only a matter of time before what began as a suggestion- a last case scenario- soon took on solidity and developed into a plan. For the last couple of months, it has only been a matter of logistics. Plane or car? Jordan or Syria? Will we all leave together as a family? Or will it be only my brother and I at first?

After Jordan or Syria- where then? Obviously, either of those countries is going to be a transit to something else. They are both overflowing with Iraqi refugees, and every single Iraqi living in either country is complaining of the fact that work is difficult to come by, and getting a residency is even more difficult. There is also the little problem of being turned back at the border. Thousands of Iraqis aren't being let into Syria or Jordan- and there are no definite criteria for entry, the decision is based on the whim of the border patrol guard checking your passport.

An airplane isn't necessarily safer, as the trip to Baghdad International Airport is in itself risky and travelers are just as likely to be refused permission to enter the country (Syria and Jordan) if they arrive by airplane. And if you're wondering why Syria or Jordan, because they are the only two countries that will let Iraqis in without a visa. Following up visa issues with the few functioning embassies or consulates in Baghdad is next to impossible.

So we've been busy. Busy trying to decide what part of our lives to leave behind. Which memories are dispensable? We, like many Iraqis, are not the classic refugees- the ones with only the clothes on their backs and no choice. We are choosing to leave because the other option is simply a continuation of what has been one long nightmare- stay and wait and try to survive.

On the one hand, I know that leaving the country and starting a new life somewhere else- as yet unknown- is such a huge thing that it should dwarf every trivial concern. The funny thing is that it’s the trivial that seems to occupy our lives. We discuss whether to take photo albums or leave them behind. Can I bring along a stuffed animal I've had since the age of four? Is there room for E.'s guitar? What clothes do we take? Summer clothes? The winter clothes too? What about my books? What about the CDs, the baby pictures?

The problem is that we don't even know if we'll ever see this stuff again. We don't know if whatever we leave, including the house, will be available when and if we come back. There are moments when the injustice of having to leave your country, simply because an imbecile got it into his head to invade it, is overwhelming. It is unfair that in order to survive and live normally, we have to leave our home and what remains of family and friends… And to what?

It's difficult to decide which is more frightening- car bombs and militias, or having to leave everything you know and love, to some unspecified place for a future where nothing is certain."

2006

Iraqi Women Under Siege is an excellent, fact-filled new 20 page report from the US peace group CODEPINK. Download from:
http://www.globalexchange.org/update/press/IraqiWomenReport.pdf
“The report shows that from 1958 to the 1990s, Iraq provided more rights and freedoms for women and girls than most of its neighbors. Though Saddam Hussein's dictatorial government and 12 years of severe sanctions reduced these opportunities, Iraqi women were active in all aspects of their society. After the occupation, with the exception of women in Iraqi Kurdistan, women's daily lives have been reduced to a mere struggle for survival.

"March 8 anti-war actions (are) planned in 18 countries and 65 cities in the US! In Hyderabad, Pakistan a group will go to their US Embassy with signatures and a message that 'the Pakistani people don't want war in Iraq.' In Cairo, Egypt they are going to both the US and UK Embassies. On the Fiji island of Suva, women have been wearing pink every Wednesday to spread awareness and get more signatures to deliver to the US Embassy on their island. In Venezuela, after hearing the call from President Hugo Chavez to support the Women Say NO To War campaign, a brand new CODEPINK Caracas chapter formed last week and is organizing an action on March 8th..."

"Gold Star Families for Peace" activist Cindy Sheehan and others were arrested as they tried to present the petition at the UN in New York City. See more on Cindy Sheehan and her recent writings.

In Berlin Women and Life on Earth and others delivered petition posters with the signature totals to the US Embassy and German Chancellor, calling for an end to the US occupation of Iraq and a halt to German support for US illegal war-related activity on German soil.

From Women and Life on Earth on International Women’s Day 2006:
It’s not enough for women to say: “That’s enough!”

" It remains unclear who was responsible for the attack on the golden-domed Askariya Shi'a mosque in Samarra. In the two days following the bombing over 200 Iraqis were killed, and the country was put under a day-and-night curfew... The spike in sectarian violence does not reflect a sudden danger of civil war. Rather, if it continues to escalate it may lead to a shift from the existing low-intensity political civil war between supporters (reluctant or not) of the U.S. occupation and opponents of that occupation, to a civil war identified largely along sectarian lines..."

2005

Iraqi Mother's Open letter to Cindy Sheehan:

..."Being a mother myself I have been following your campaign to pull out the US armed forces from Iraq. Having lost my son, as yourself, on the same battle-field, IRAQ, but on opposite sides, I felt both compassion and relief to have an ally on the other side..."
17 November 2005

The World Tribunal on Iraq

"The attack on Iraq is an attack on justice, on liberty, on our safety, on our future, on us all"
After two years of hearings and research, the closing session of this international investigation on the causes and effects of the US-led war on Iraq was held in Istanbul, Turkey from June 23-27, 2005.
Press Release about Jury Statement

Four women's voices from the Tribunal

The Most Cowardly War in History: Opening Statement of Arundhati Roy, 24 June 2005

.."The testimonies at the previous sessions of the World Tribunal on Iraq in Brussels and New York have demonstrated that even those of us who have tried to follow the war in Iraq closely are not aware of a fraction of the horrors that have been unleashed in Iraq... The assault on Iraq is an assault on all of us: on our dignity, our intelligence, and our future.

We recognize that the judgment of the World Tribunal on Iraq is not binding in international law. However, our ambitions far surpass that. The World Tribunal on Iraq places its faith in the consciences of millions of people across the world who do not wish to stand by and watch while the people of Iraq are being slaughtered, subjugated, and humiliated."

Towards A New Political Imaginary: Corinne Kumar, Women in Black India, El Taller International, Asian Women’s Human Rights Council
Read this inspiring speech on the informative website of Women in Black Leuven (Belgium)

"Only the imagination stands between us and fear : fear makes us behave like sheep when we should be dreaming like poets...
We must seek new imaginaries from the South : the South not only as third world, as the civilizations of Asia, the Arab world, Africa, Latin America; but the South as the voices and movements of peoples, wherever these movements exist; the South as the visions and wisdoms of women..."

Eve Ensler's Letter to America, written at the close of the Tribunal. She challenges America to wake up and act.

"Dear America,
I am longing to reach you-crossing this river of indifference and consumption and denial. I am trying to find you, reaching out through the desperate limitations of words and descriptions, swimming through the rhetoric of terror and God..."

Jodie Evans reports for CodePink
Also on Alternet: http://www.alternet.org/story/22308/

Views on Iraq

"Anti-war organizing that began within days of September 11th and kicked into high gear in the run-up to Bush's war in Iraq is paying off..." writes Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies in a widely circulated article: Tipping Point, 28 June 2005 See other articles by Phyllis Bennis

28 June: Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Oakland) offered the following statement in response to President Bush’s speech on Iraq 

"The President misled the American people about this war, and he has no credibility on Iraq. There were no Weapons of Mass Destruction. There was no connection between Saddam and al Qaeda. There was no post war planning, and our nation is less safe as a result..."

20 June 2005: Phase II of the Anti-War Movement
By Medea Benjamin, CODEPINK, on commondreams.org 

"For the history books, mark down June 2005 as the moment the US movement against the occupation of Iraq got its second wind. In June, the US public became solidly anti-war, Bush's approval rating took a nosedive, and a significant number of Congresspeople started to call for an exit strategy..."

 
Oil-For-Food is Small Potatoes
By Molly Ivins, AlterNet. Posted April 1, 2005.

"Some days, it's hard to pick the outrage du jour, but hypocrisy is always an inviting target, and the United Nations oil-for-food scandal provides a two-fer..."