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NEWS & LETTERS, December 2002
Youth Column
Iraqi's view of war driveIf one learns anything from living under a totalitarian
system it is how to decipher the news and sift through official propaganda. When
I was in Iraq, my parents always got our news from other sources than those fed
to us by the Iraqi regime. Later when we lived in the U.S., we knew that what we
heard on the news regarding Iraq was not true. Contact with our family revealed
to us what was actually happening. I was born in Iraq in 1981. The majority of my childhood involved the Iran-Iraq war. It was a war Iraq fought until 1988 and more than one million young men perished along with many civilians. Iraq had a dictator for a president. We were the game pieces he played with and terrorized. At that time, to the West, to the U.S., Iraq's leader was called the moderate man who was going to lead the most promising nation in the Arab world. But we went on living our lives with this man, and with this war that was in many ways supported by America. In 1990, my life changed completely. My father was invited by the international company he worked for to come for one month to the states. My family was to join him. It was my first time out of Iraq. We arrived in Boston, on Aug. 1, 1990. It was on Aug. 2, 1990 that Iraq invaded Kuwait. My parents had no choice but to stay. After all, we were all used to instability and wars. I had at that time known only one year of my life war free. I do not think my parents anticipated what happened next. The Gulf War, one of the most uneven wars ever fought, a big massacre, where Iraq was bombed back to the pre-industrial age, did not really end in 1991. Iraq then faced sanctions. For my parents, it meant unemployment. My mother is an architect and artist. A country completely devastated was not going to be buying art and building new homes. Our one month trip has lasted until now. We left everything in Iraq. Our home, our clothes, our memories, and the most precious thing of all--our family. My grandparents, my aunts, my uncles and cousins. I never got to say goodbye to that country and the people I loved. My teenage years were different from anyone else's because this longing burned so deep in me. We are thousands of miles away from our family who live in Baghdad, but the troubles of Iraq are what I live. Our family still telephones Baghdad every week. The only time we stopped, was during the Gulf War, when the telecommunications in Iraq were destroyed and we waited for weeks for word of whether or not our family was alive. The majority of those in my family, doctors, engineers, architects were unemployed along with 50% of Iraq's 23 million people. Our family asked us for books and medicines for 12 years: items difficult to find due to sanctions. We heard stories of the breakdown of Iraq's social fabric, children dropping out of school, beggars on the streets, crime and prostitution. What can one expect? A country that was at war for eight years, facing another war where its entire infrastructure was targeted and destroyed, was slapped with economic sanctions which hit only the people. My family, which is fortunate enough to live in the good side of Baghdad, does not receive 24 hours of electricity a day. Imagine this in Iraq's 126 degree weather. Imagine how the elderly like my grandfather can deal with this. In 2001, when I went to Iraq, all the images that I had heard about over the phone, in letters and emails were a shocking reality. I would not wish on anyone the pain of seeing one's homeland in such a devastated state. Now there is talk of another war. Oh god! My one dream in
life is that one day Iraq can wipe this thing called war from its memory. I do
not want an Iraqi child to go to sleep in fear or to think that life under
sanctions and fear of an attack has become normal. I speak to my family and they are terrified of what is going to happen. In 1991, they were the ones who suffered. It is clear, they will be the ones who will suffer this time. Children do not know whether to study for an exam or worry about being killed. I find it disgusting that they have been living each day waiting. Sometimes they write saying they wish that this inevitable thing would happen. It is the waiting and worrying that seems maddening to them. Now many people claim that this war will be fought to liberate the Iraqis and democracy will come and this terrible man will be gone. While we, as Iraqis and Iraqis who are in the diaspora, have all been yearning for Saddam's demise (since we are the ones who have tasted the fear and terror of Saddam Hussein), most of us are aware that our liberty and a democratic future are not at the top of the U.S. wish list for Iraq. We have seen and heard too much to fall for this line. If a war is waged, let's be honest and say that it will be for oil and U.S. dominion in the Middle East, and not to liberate us Iraqis. The list of the men who will be Iraq's leaders are criminals. They make Saddam Hussein look good! We see the gap between words and deeds among those who proclaim to be our champions and potential liberators. --Young Iraqi woman |
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