Thursday, September 15th, 2005
Good morning...
Yesterday was the day of hell in Baghdad...
11 trapped cars exploded in many areas of Baghdad, within minutes of
each other...
There were hundreds of deaths and wounded among civilians...and we
don't know how many among the Iraqi police, or the occupation
forces...
But there was news saying it was the responsibility of Al- Qaida
organization in Iraq, avenging the killings of their group in Tell a'
afar...
No body knows what is happening in Tell a' afar and around it...there
is a military campaign for more than a week now, besieging the city,
there was news about air raids, houses destroyed, armed men killed,
and the residents driven away from their homes...the same story of
Fallujah is being repeated in various places...
The Iraqi resistance of the Sunnie Parties say they asked the Iraqi
Government and the occupation forces to intercede in bringing out the
fighters from the city peacefully, without putting the civilian's
lives in danger, but with the occupation's arrogance, which they
learned from President Bush, that says: We do not converse, we do not
negotiate, the Iraqi civilians paid its price yesterday, when Baghdad
exploded with angry acts, in revenge for what happened in Tell a'
afar...
The explosion's victims are the responsibility of all the parties
involved in the problem: the gunmen who avenged in a criminal way from
the Iraqis, and the governmental officials who do not posses the
wisdom or the conscience to handle the matters, to apply the principal
of: let us solve the problems with the least possible loss of lives...
As if all parties agreed to be reckless about the Iraqis blood, and
their souls...
Is this the successful model of democracy in Iraq?
*********************************
A lot of the Iraqis, and some of the clergies, Sunnies or Shia'ats,
doubt the existence of Al-Zarqawi, and say his family held a funeral
for him along time ago, and they deny his being alive, that these
explosions are for the benefit of no one but the occupation forces, as
the only losers in them are the Iraqi people, by all their factions,
and the only winner being the occupation forces, to justify the reason
for them to remain, and to kindle the fire between the Sunnies and the
Shia'ats. Those who live in Baghdad, or generally in Iraq do not smell
that smell of turmoil and hatred among the Iraqis as the media portray
it, and as America wants to send the story and market it to the world,
and whoever lives in Iraq doesn't see or hear about any true existence
of Al-Zarqawi or his gang, he is merely a lie about which many stories
are repeated daily on TVs and on the internet, so the Iraqis and the
others would believe it.
What is the benefit of Al-Zarqawi in killing the Iraqi civilians, for
example? Why wouldn't he go and kill the occupation forces, for
example, if he was really a Muslim seeking Jihad?
That subject is getting sharper, questions are multiplying, and the
doubts grow.
And all accusation fingers are pointing to the occupiers, because he
is the only beneficiary from all this chaos. Nevertheless, he bursts
into towns, kills civilians or detains them under the cover of
Al-Zarqawi story, for that story, it seems, is to his benefit from all
sides.
And every Iraqi is subjected to the stupid question every day,
especially by the deluded westerners, ignorant about what is happening
in Iraq, as their source of information is their own lying, poisonous
media.
The question is always: Why do Iraqis kill each other?
***********************************************************
A few days ago, the election results were announced in Egypt, and
President Mubarak and the ruling Party won again, as was expected...
But the percentages are questionable, and interesting...
An 88% of the votes were for the President and the ruling Party. The
participation in the elections was some 23%, which is skinny and
shameful number, I do not know why there isn't a minimum percentage
for legitimacy in such elections, like at least some 50% of the people
should participate to give legitimacy to the act...
But this low number expresses the people's frustration, no doubt...
their unwillingness to participate, in spite of the opposition
parties' urging to the people to come along, but I understand the
difficult conditions there; where the people are busy with the worries
and sorrows of their daily lives, and the unemployment, according to
the official ratings are about 10%, but by the international
organization's estimations, it is about 20%.
And of course, the President after his success promised to improve the
conditions, the economy, to solve the unemployment problem, and other
reforming promises, and the opposition will keep on watching to make
sure they will be applied, or shall invest them against the ruling
party in the next elections, as non-credibility points...
Gondalisa Rice made a statement one day after the results, saying:
Egypt is walking on the road of complete democracy!
Where is the completeness in the subject, within those weird numbers?
Is this the democracy America wants to export to the Middle East?
Of course, its specifications are different from those they have in
Europe and America... the latter would be more truthful, realistic,
and express the wishes of their people, even if the results wouldn't
satisfy a lot of people, and they would deny its credibility... at
least there is some supervision from parties who have real power, to
prevent omission and fraud in the election process, there is a
somewhat independent judicial power that doesn't submit to the
pressures of the ruling parties, isn't biased, and doesn't flatter
them....
Democracy is an experiment the people should live through, gain
experience, and find out the weak points through which the liars and
forgers sneak, those who consider democracy just a title to cover
their transgressions, and fool their people.
Democracy is a long span, hard struggle experience, it is not imported
words, or acrobatic acts, like the clowns in a circus...
The democratic process, and the conversion to it, should be an
ideological process, meaning; an intellectual process, meaning; it
needs a clear explanation of its vocabularies, then, just, model
practicing on the ground of reality, so people's hearts would accept
it, and their minds... so it would become a part of their living
habits...
********************************
As for the miserable democracy model they want to apply in Iraq, it is
a catastrophe of a special type...
There are some sectarian and ethnic leaders, narrow-horizoned, and
biased, and they were brought and put on the ruling seats somehow,
marketing their biased, racial ideals to the poor Iraqi people, trying
to force everybody to believe their delusions, and lies....
How can one trust a Kurdish leader, for example, struggling for more
rights and privileges for the Kurds, in comparison to the other
Iraqis?
How can one trust a Shia'at leader, for example, who thinks he came as
a savior for the Shia'ats, like Christ the Savior... to give them
privileges more than the rest of the Iraqis?
Where is the democratic vision or the democratic idea in the minds of
those leaders?
How can a true democratic country be built under their rule?
That who doesn't have, cannot give...
Iraq now is in dire need of leaders moderate in their look at the
Iraqi people, who wouldn't categorize them according to their moods
and interests, who look at Iraq as one piece, one people, with all its
colors... the beautiful thing about Iraq is that it has varying
people, containing all colors of the spectrum, but they turned this
point into an ugliness for Iraq, exploiting it in the worst possible
way....
A constitution that dedicates sectarianism, and drags the country to
more violence, and ruin.....
Then, President Bush would say: that this is the best constitution in
the Middle East!
Why, and how?
Because it will create a weak, torn country?
Is this the type of countries that are required to be here?
Perhaps yes....
This is a type of countries without value, or significance...
This is a type of countries without identity, or character...
The Iraqi no longer introduces himself as an Iraqi, a Muslim, and an
Arab...
The Iraqi now should choose how to present himself under this canopy
only, and choose a definite category: Sunnie, Shia'at, a Kurd, or an
Arab.
This is the only permitted range, and nothing other than that....
******************************
Does democracy mean disintegrating homelands, kindling turmoil and
hatreds under the pretext: the right of self determination and
separation? Aren't all the countries of the world a mixture of various
religions and ethnics?
Isn't America itself a mixture of all that?
Why wouldn't they give the blacks, for instance, a self-rule?
Or the Catholics? Or the Protestants?
Or those with European or Asian origins?
Why the intellectual speech there is: Unite!
And the intellectual speech for the Arabs is: Scatter!
By GOD, I started to see that the invasion on the land of the Arabs
and the Islam isn't just for economical and investments reasons, this
is a clear ideological invasion, as president Bush and his government
members always spoke about a change in the region's countries, and
reforms in the existing systems, among them; the educational system...
Very well, what will they change of the educational system?
Physics, chemistry, and mathematics?
Or history, geography, and religion?
These are connected to the people's ideologies, and their ways of
thinking, so, does the Bush administration plan to change all this, to
achieve the dream of the "Big Middle East"?
And what is that dream?
New markets for the capitalist goods, investments for their companies
which are about to be bankrupt, so they would be revived back to life,
people tamed to become like sheep, presenting cheap labor, and safe
counties for western tourists, to enjoy the magic of the east, and its
beauty...
The capital is a coward, as they say, and wouldn't come to places with
tension, and worries... so, programming the region and rearranging it,
is the No. 1 step, even if it takes many years, and many causalities,
but it is worth all that patience.....
And we see with our own eyes, on the ground of reality, the steps of
this slow, and continuous programming...
Whoever lives here, understands things not like those who live in
Europe and America, as those would think that their governments are
just, noble, and humane, thinking that we reject their interferences
because we are barbarians, terrorists, ungrateful, and rejecters of
the ideas of progress....
There is a huge gap between the talks and statements, and the sad
reality, that is, in truth, exactly the opposite of what they are
saying....
And there are some readers who send me e-mails, reproaching me and
saying; we used to think you were more moderate, and now you are
heading towards more stern positions....
I am not stern, but I like justice....and that who chooses to be
moderate and intermediate in saying the truth, is a trifling
hypocrite, not a diplomatic. There is no diplomacy in telling the
truth, everything is clear; this is white, this is black, this is red,
and so on...
Sometimes, we are besieged by the harsh conditions, but we do not run
from telling the truth, because when I write, I want to tell my
convictions, and what my conscience dictates to me...not what would
please my readers, or my western fans...
********************************************
I want to see how will the curriculums be changed, and what shall they
say in the books?
For example: That Palestine was never for the Arabs or the Muslims
once? That its people have no right to go back home?
Or that Iraq was created by GOD torn and divided, and that it shall
stay like this forever?
That the American, British, and Israeli occupations all bear goodness,
love, and the helping spirit for us, but we are shortsighted,
ungrateful, racists, and terrorists, because we reject their existence
among us?
****************************
Yesterday evening, I went out with my family to participate in a
candle demonstration with a lot of people, mostly from Palestine, to
stand in front of the UN building in Amman, and give an outcry against
the existence of the Separating Wall in Palestine, for which an
International Justice Court's verdict was issued, to be demolished,
but Israel refuses to fulfill the verdict, and the Security Council is
drowning in stories of administerial and financial corruption...
And the whole world seems like it is in a deep sleep......
I saw the Palestinian women wearing their traditional embroidered
clothes, putting the Arab kuffia on their shoulders, with the
Palestinian flag drawn on it, they were carrying the candles, and
shouting: "Palestine is Arabic, from water to water." (Meaning; from
the Dead Sea waters, to the Mediterranean).
And we all shouted: No to the wall....
They sang, and I sang with them, the anthem of " My homeland"....
And they sang old songs I thought they were extinct, for I haven't
heard them in a long time....
(The wind blew, and the gunpowder sang... oh, my homeland, ask for as
much young men as you wish...)
I smiled bitterly as I looked at them, there were generations standing
before me; women in their sixties, certainly grandmothers, young women
in their twenties and thirties, and young girls in primary schools...
Memory took me back to the Palestinian camps in Lebanon, where I
worked in a rebuilding engineering committee, from 1976 to 1978.
They used to sing the same songs, and shout the same slogans.....
I said to myself: these people saw hell from America, Britain, and
Israel, but the new generations still shout and sing the songs of the
ancestors, completely believing in their rights in the land of
Palestine, the right to return....
A few days ago, one of the Arab satellite channels showed a report
about Palestinian communities living in the countries of South
America, and the new generations are still thinking of going back to
their country one day, completely believing they will......
Yesterday in the demonstration I thought to myself: a lot of Iraqis
left Iraq after the war, because of the bad conditions and the direct
threats to their lives and their families, but the wait to get back
home after the conditions calm down, by the will of GOD...in one, two,
or five years...
But the Palestinians; they were thrown out of their homes so that
other people can live there....their homeland's name was erased from
the world map, and those who lived in their homes tell them: There is
nothing called Palestine, this is our land since thousands of years...
Well then, what about those who lived there for those thousands of
years, generations and generations, planting, building, getting
married, breeding generations, where should they go?
To substitute homelands?
Where is the justice in this story?
*****************************************
Like it or not, the problem of the Palestinian people is the core of
the conflicts in what they call the middle east...
The 1948 war, then 1967, then the 1973 war. These were supposed to
have been wars against Israel, to get her out or reduce her leverage
in Palestine, but they all failed, and other wars started, to
eliminate the Palestinian resistance...
A civil war in Jordan, 1970.
And the resistance left to Lebanon...
1973; the beginning of a civil war in Lebanon.
Then; massacres in the Palestinian camps, led by Sharon, the defense
minister then, 1982, and the resistance went out of Lebanon...
Then, they followed the resistance leaders to Tunisia and Europe, and
assassinated them, one after the other...
Then, the uprising took place in Palestine in 1987, followed by long
negotiations... and after 1990, they allowed the resistance leaders to
return to Gaza and the West Bank, and those who opposed the
negotiations or refused to give up the people's national rights were
eliminated, assassinated one after the other; nationalists, Marxists,
or Islamic.
Now, a military resistance is left in Palestine, and they want to
eliminate it in a Palestinian-Palestinian way, meaning; the new
Palestinian government should give an obligation to eliminate it, and
build a peace with Israel...
And now, a military resistance is still going on in southern Lebanon
against Israel, Hizb Allah, and who supports it?
Iran and Syria...
So, we should now direct the battle to destroy Iran and Syria, destroy
Hizb Allah...so no noticeable bother should remain....
Will peace really prevail?
This is the theory and mentality of the Bush and Sharon
administrations, and they are very, very similar....
Will the Arabs and Palestinians really forget their right in
Palestine?
Is it really possible for peace to prevail, without justice in the
issue?
People replaced by other people, denying their rights in the land and
identity, then say; let us live in peace, after we have killed
thousands of you, and assassinated hundreds of your leaders. Who will
agree to such a deal?
There are ideologies in struggle, two conflicting ideas that cannot be
brought together...
So, violence continues to settle one, and eliminate the other....
This is the reality of things, since some 60 years.....
Who has the wise, calm solution, which by accepting and applying it
real peace would come?
As for Bush and Sharon's strict ways, they wouldn't bring but more
conflicts, violence, and destruction to the region.......
And Iraq was a victim of the imaginary peace plan in the Middle
East....
Can peace be achieved by violence against the others, by not listing
to them, debating with them, or recognizing them as full partners,
with full rights??
*************************
These days, I am reading a book about the personal diaries of Miss
Gertrude Bell, 1914-1926. She lived in Iraq, working as a secretary of
the Military Commander or such, during the British occupation of
Iraq...
I wish all the Arabs and their children would read that book, so they
could understand the occupier's mentality, and the way they look at
our people; the superior look, full of contempt.....
Isn't that look the same today?
Miss Bell used to prepare reports about the Iraqi tribes, the
prominent Iraqi personalities, and the princes of Arabia. Then,
according to her recommendations, some were appointed in important
positions, while others were removed, or banished outside Iraq.
From my readings, I can understand how she measured matters; If that
person had conviction and faith in our mission, (meaning-the Great
Britain mission), then he is the best to deserve to be in power, and a
position of decision...because he shall be our hand in here....as for
those who oppose us, we shall know how to expose them, stain their
reputations among people, and remove them away from the picture....
This, in brief, was her way of thinking, and by GOD, as I saw
Gondalisa Rise on TV yesterday, I laughed, for here is a new Miss
Bell, but she lives outside of Iraq....
Then, I saw Miss Bell talking about Iraq in her letters to her family
and friends, as if it belonged to her and to Brittan forever....
She looks kindly and lovingly at the palm trees, the plants, rivers,
and the fertile lands...but contemptuously at people, as if they were
slaves, born so Great Britain would live happily, pampered by the
wealth of these countries, and the toil of its people in the fields,
then, the products would be sent from India or Iraq so the people in
Britain would get the use of them, or to the investing companies....
The only worry was: How do we maintain the presence of cooperative men
who believe in Britain, and are loyal to her, in the seats of power?
Of course, they found hundreds of such fools, adulators who wanted to
sit on the power seat, at whatever price...
And Nouri Al-Sai'eed, the Premier then, was the closest to them, and
the most loving, and faithful to Britain, but after the revolution in
Iraq, in 1958, and the throwing out of his government, his body was
pulled around in the streets of Baghdad....his story kept circulating
among generations, as an example of that who sold his country, his
people, and their interests, to become a servant for the foreign
occupation's interests......
I have lived in Iraq for long years of my life; I have seen many sons
and daughters of families who proudly declared that their families had
an honorable nationalistic history against the British occupation,
that their grandfathers were defending the rights of the Iraqis during
the dark days...
But I have never met anyone who said: My ancestor was Nouri
Al-Sai'eed....
*********************************************
General Maude entered Baghdad in 1917, and made his famous speech: We
came here as liberators, not conquerors...
Meaning; friends, not occupiers... (Doesn't this seem like a repeated
story today?).
And at one party in his honor, he drank unboiled milk, became ill with
cholera, died, and was buried in Baghdad. Then, they started a
donations box, and made a statue for him in the middle of Baghdad,
that remained there till the angry people brought it down, in the 1958
revolution. So the book says....
Imagine if they should say now that Bremer died, and the Iraqis have
to pay donations to build a statue for him in the middle of Baghdad,
considering that he brought freedom and democracy to the Iraqis.
I can imagine now the misery in which my Iraqi ancestors lived through
then...
Then, Miss Bell died in1926, and was buried in Baghdad....
The question is: What is left of the British colonization in Iraq but
the memories.... They had endless dreams of domination and expansion,
like the Ottomans before them, who had done to Iraq and the other
colonies just like them....then they all went out, defeated.....
Now, whose turn is it to play the same game, thinking himself GOD the
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