A Thousand Saddams

[bookman]

I had to share this. Do you think we're getting the Faux type filterd news from Iraq?


Amal founded a craft center in Baghdad. The center was destroyed in the first Gulf war and then after being rebuilt was destroyed again in this latest ongoing war. Nermin is a renouned journalist who trained to write of civil society and its functions but found herself covering the destruction of Iraqi civil society by US led wars and sanctions over the past 13 years. They spoke with unusual candor and passion about the reality of what Iraqis are going through. They spoke of how a country that is one of the wealthiest and most civilized was taken apart and maligned. They spoke of how the wealth of the country was destroyed and looted especially since the US occupation forces arrived and previously by the US led sanctions that killed hundreds of thousands and destroyed a whole generation.

They spoke poignantly of how the US soldiers, responsible under
Geneva accords for protection of civilians under occupation watched,
encouraged, and sometimes participated in the dismantling of the
whole governmental and civic structures. They spoke of how the
rulers from abroad have now become "a thousand Saddams" living in
palaces and using far worse techniques than he did except when he
was being supported by the US in the 1980s and American advisors
were all over the country. Some of the current rulers are Americans alone connection to Iraqi society.

Nermin and Amal spoke of the "dissapeared" Iraqis, hundreds and
thousands taken by the occupation forces that no one can find what
is happening to them let alone where they are. They spoke of how
Iraq, the country that give us the alphabet, the math, the laws,
and essentially civilization is now ruled essentially by mobs. The lies and distortions of the occupation which no one believes create
surrealistic atmosphere. Amal asks what is to become of a child
drafted to mouth on TV that schools are rebuilt by the USA and what
is to become of the people who can see the PR since thousands of
schools were destroyed and looted and a cosmetic painting is being
done to the remaining few walls. How is this different from TV PR
during the time of Saddam.

> > I urge you to again to see if you can hear those two wonderful women
> > speak and spread the word...www.forusa.org