Thank you for this exposure of the devastation in Iraq. I want to comment about my experiences with Iraqi women when I stayed in Baghdad for 6 months in 2003-2004. I went expressly to extend my hand in friendship to Iraqi people, being much more comfortable on that side of the border than the invader’s sides. I had no acquaintances there, spoke no Arabic and was alone. I met 100s of Iraqis and enjoyed warm and generous hospitality the whole time. I was struck by the intellectual life in Baghdad. Many of the women I met had PhD’s from foreign universities all over the world: Germany, the UK, Canada, the US, Russia, France, Sweden–everywhere it seemed, and spoke several languages. They told me that Saddam Hussein had a program of: 1. sending academics to foreign universities for post-graduate degrees outside to bring knowledge to Iraq and 2. of bringing the level of education of women up to the same standard as men in Iraq and in the world. I met women engineers (many), professors in various fields, artists, dentists, feminists, medical doctors (many), teachers, an actress, university students in geology, mathematics, architecture and dentistry etc. Many of the professions are taught in English in Iraqi universities so I was never at a loss to find someone who could speak English with me or translate if needed.

During my 6 months in occupied Iraq, many women told me they were getting depressed. Because of all the bombing and gun fights constantly raging in the city, women couldn’t go out to work and go about their normal business. It was clear that there was a threat of rape as well. (This was before the so-called religious conflicts got stirred up and it was mainly US aggression and the lawlessness brought on by the war). One thing many women stressed is that for their whole lives they had been able to walk around the streets of Baghdad any time of day or night with no fear. Because of the scorching heat in summer, Baghdad had a lively night culture and women told me about walking around the balmy streets at 4am and never feeling nervous–a total contrast to now where they can’t even stay in their own homes without fear of being bombed or raided. In my lifetime, I can’t remember hearing of any city of 5 million people like Baghdad in the US where women could walk the streets at night safely.

Only one of the women I met admitted to being a Saddam Hussein supporter. Most women and men I met said they hated Saddam Hussein but they all said they had never before seen senseless violence like the US military inflicts in their lives. Saddam Hussein was a threat to anyone posing a political threat to his dictatorship and people taking that risk could expect the worst. But the Iraqis I know and still maintain contact with are still in shock about US brutality that to them seems utterly senseless, for example, bombing a whole building or market full of people to try to kill one suspect–huh???? Not to mention bombing hospitals, weddings………..

Eventually, I discovered that like most cosmopolitan cities, Baghdad reflects the culture of the intellectual and artistic life of the country. I noticed that western news reporters usually head to rural depressed areas and to the slums to photograph and interview people who are not academics and who are more traditional than the typical person walking around most of Baghdad. That would be like going to small depressed towns and the slums in the US to interview people to get a picture of life in the US. One thing I can say for sure is that the average Iraqi taxi driver in Baghdad has a much deeper understanding of history, poetry and political science than I do. And I have a university degree.

One more thing, this confuses me a lot. When I was in Baghdad and constantly mingling with Iraqi people, I never ran across any divisions between religious groups. Many Iraqis mentioned to me all the religious groups that live in Iraq in harmony: the Muslims, Christians, Yassidis, Tourkmen and Jewish people–about 90% Muslim. I heard about the so-called Sunni, Shia divide only on television so I asked a few Iraqi friends about it. They didn’t know about it because, they said, the intermarriage is so deep in Iraq there’s no way to separate people out along sectarian lines. In fact all my close friends in Baghdad have Sunni and Shia members of their families and also many tribes are combinations of Sunni and Shia people in the same tribe. The children don’t seem to be told what branch of Muslim faith they belong to and don’t even know. Also, many people are communist and although they are also Muslim, they don’t keep up on it. When I hear the average tv watching US-American sounding like an expert on Sunni/Shia relations, it astounds me. This is a story that a lot of Iraqis don’t know much about but we’re all experts on it over here! There has never been a religious war in Iraq since its inception according to Professor George Samidami in London. There are very strong arguments that the so-called religious conflicts in Iraq have been orchestrated by the US divide and rule policies that we all witnessed being laid down at the beginning of the occupation of Iraq. I don’t know. But the fact that so many totally uninformed people listening to western media think they do know is alarming.

Thanks for providing this sounding board. I went far beyond my intention to tell my experiences of Iraqi women in Baghdad in 2003-2004. Imagine how frustrating it is for those of us who’ve been there and who know Iraqi people to listen to all the propaganda in the media and not be able to respond.

Best wishes, Stefa Shaler

By sshaler on March 20th, 2009 at 2:15 am