Iraqi women say there s no animosity between Iraqis

We keep hearing report after report on the Sunnis and the other groups there are going to cause a civil war, I watched a show where two women brought here by code Pink to protest the war were shocked that our media is reporting this. Whose lying?

www.democracynow.org.../03/06/1424239
I asked you during the break, Faiza, are you Sunni or Shia?

FAIZA AL-ARAJI: I don't like this question. I'm Iraqi. And I'm insisting I am Iraqi. I don't want to use these new titles, have been entered Iraq after Bremer. When he entered Iraq he put this division for the Iraqi people. And we refuse it.

AMY GOODMAN: What do you mean it’s just been introduced? I mean, there is a sense in the media in this country that this is age-old sectarian, almost tribal hatred.

FAIZA AL-ARAJI: 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.

AMY GOODMAN: Eman?

EMAN AHMAD KHAMAS: 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.

[edit on 7-3-2006 by goose]





[edit on 7-3-2006 by intrepid]

Sorry everyone for the confusion the title is supposed to be, Iraqi women say there is no animosty beween Iraqis, mod please edit if you see this.
TIA

I got to ask, why don't you guy's see the importance of these two women's statement? They are saying this story that the Bush Adminstration has put out and that our media continues to build is a lie. We are constantly being told that if our troops leave there will be a civil war, so we must stay.

The Iraqi women are saying there is no talk or fear of a civil war among the Iraqi people, that there has never been that much hatred between the different groups in the 6000 year history before and that there is not now. I watched the interview, the first woman was absolutely shocked that anyone would think this.

I also watched another show on Link tv about some of the families who had to flee their homes, and it showed the different groups, that our media keeps showing as hating one another, actually giving shelter and food to these homeless families.

On a sidenote, Thank you Intrepid for fixing the thread.

Yeah yeah . .... so 2 ladies words now hold sway over that of 100's of researchers, history, and recent deaths.

Wow, just who is trying to rewrite history and deny the past?

What nonsence, let the bodies, and history speak in condemnation of the biased niave comments by these women.

What do we get next, 2 elderly women saying that Germans really loved the Jews during WW2 as well?

Just what agenda is being pushed here, and why? I suspect its those pushing the "Islam is a religion of peace" mantra that we are all being told to suck in.



[edit on 8-3-2006 by Netchicken]

I find it interesting that you tell me, these two ladies who are Iraqi, well educated and has knowledge of their country, don't know what their talking about, but yet you don't give a single link showing a history of the so called wars caused by the conflict between these groups.

We are all being told there is a history of such wars by the media. Since you did nothing but give an opinion I can only assume that is where you got your info and thus your opinion. This same media is what I am questioning. So while you are definitely entitled to an opinion, I would like to know why you are so certain these ladies are wrong.

Well I looked it up and the ladies are right; there is no history of such wars. If you can find anything other than the current media job being done promoting this idea on these wars, please post it. This link lists every war and uprsing for almost a hundred years and most of the conflicts are with the Britain and Iran.

www.historyguy.com...

The current borders of Iraq and most Middle Eastern nations, such as Syria and Palestine/Israel, were drawn by the conquering Europeans, often with little regard to the preferences of the people who were to live in these newly created nations.

Thus, Iraq became a nation with three large demographic groups; the Sunni Kurds in the north, the Sunni (Sunna) Arabs in the middle of the country, and the Shiite (Shia) Arabs in the south. The Kurds wanted a nation of their own, as did the Kurds living in neighboring Turkey and Iran. Though the British eventually granted full independence to Iraq, it was not without much bloodshed and hard feelings in Iraq about the long occupation. [quote/]




[edit on 9-3-2006 by goose]

en.wikipedia.org...'a-Sunni_relations

The sixth Shi'a imam died during al-Mansur's reign, and there were claims that he was murdered on the orders of the caliph.(Ya'qubi; vol.lll, pp.91-96, and Tarikh Abul Fida', vol. I, p.212.).

Soon, Shias claim, intolerance reached such high levels that even the founder of a Sunni school of law, Abu Hanifah, was imprisoned by al-Mansur and tortured. He also had Ibn Hanbal, the founder of another school of law, flogged. (Ya'qubi, vol.lll, p.86; Muruj al-dhahab, vol.lll, p.268-270.)

Shia sources further claim that by the orders of the tenth Abassid caliph, al-Mutawakkil, the tomb of the third Shia Imam al-Hussain in Karbala was completely demolished (Bihar al-Anwar, vol. XII, on the life of Imam Ja'far al-Sadiq), and Shias were sometimes beheaded in groups, buried alive, or even placed alive within the walls of government buildings still under construction.(Shi'a Islam, p62) Such practices were even carried out during the time of Taliban rule in Afghanistan when "apostates" were executed by being put under collapsing walls. ref The Taliban are an extremist faction and generally equate Shiism with apostasy.

The Shia believe that they thus continued to live for the most part in hiding and followed their religious life secretly without external manifestations.

.... In present-day Iran, while Shi'a religious institutions are encouraged, Sunni institutions are blocked. In 1993 a newly constructed Sunni mosque in Sanandaj was destroyed by a mob of Shi'a zealots. Despite the fact that more than one million Sunnis live in Tehran, many of them Kurds, no Sunni mosque exists to serve their religious needs

... Shias claim that The House of Saud has made no secret of declaring the Shi'a as "not being Muslims"[8], (The Arab Shia, chap1) , or "Mushrik". They claim this is evident from the Shia minority in Saudia Arabia which has absolutely no political power or rights.

.... The Shia suffered indirect and direct persecution under independent Iraqi governments since 1932, especially that of Saddam Hussein. Shia religious leaders have been particularly targeted. "Between 1970 and 1985 the [Baathist] regime executed at least 41 clerics" (ibid, p101), and Shia opposition to the government following the first Gulf War was ruthlessly suppressed.

The Sunni act of ostracizing however is turning out to have serious consequences for the political world as events in Iraq continue to unfold. Iraq is poised to become the first Shi'a ruled state in the Arab world, and Shi'a Iran has shown no hesitation in trying to support Iraq in this way, filling in the vacuum left by Sunni Arab countries.


... and on and on and on.....

Goose, it may have excaped your notice but there are many people who are well educated who are pushing ideological barrows for their particular belief. Just because they appear as 2 ladies doesn't mean that their message has any more veracity or innate truthfulness than if they came in the guise of a a young male with a gun

Yes but what you listed is not showing a war beween these different groups, it is simply showing horrible incidents and a type of oppression, that exists in almost every country between different groups. As I said there is no history of a war between these groups..