Christians are beseiged in Iraq
Posted by judyw on March 14, 2008
We reported in January on a spate of coordinated bomb attacks against churches and monasteries in Iraq. A high proportion of Christians have fled the country, and those who remain are at great risk. Yesterday the BBC reported on the death of Father Paulos Faraj Rahho, Archbishop of Mosul, a Chaldean Christian.
For the Christians still remaining in Mosul the reaction may very well be that this death is neither the first nor likely to be the last.
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The Barnabas Fund, a charity in the UK that has tried to help Iraqi Christians, says there have been some very nasty cases of Christians being abducted, tortured and then killed and it says many Christians in Iraq are now deadened to the violence.
The report mentions the coordinated attacks on churches in January. It continues:
In many cases the motivation behind attacks on Christians is religious – to drive the minority out of Iraq. But very often criminal groups or bandits pretend to belong to a jihadist group in order to mask their true motive – which is money.
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Christians are regarded as having money and they are known to sacrifice everything to pay ransom demands – partly because, unlike Shia or Sunni, they do not have powerful tribal or militia links to protect them, so they are a soft target.
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In the university of Mosul, there are reports of Christian students being targeted – with notices being put up warning the girls to wear a hijab and giving Christians a choice between dying, converting to Islam or leaving the town.
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A year ago there were also reports of a push to drive Christians out of the historically Christian suburb of Dora in southern Baghdad, with some Muslims accusing the Christians of being allies of the Americans.
It doesn’t look good for the Christians.
Nobody knows how many of Iraq’s Christians have now fled. Before the war there were estimated to be about 800,000 and Chaldeans were the largest Christian community in Iraq.
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It is thought about half the Christian population of Iraq has moved – the majority to Syria, fewer to Jordan and some to northern Iraq.
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Of the 1.5m Iraqi refugees in Syria it is assumed around 20% are Christian, but firm figures are hard to come by. That means, as a proportion, Christians are massively over-represented in the Iraqi refugee population.
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Syrian churches have been helping the refugees and say they speak of being forced to convert to Islam or flee, women being told to wear Islamic dress and those who sell alcohol for communion being beaten.
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The killing of the archbishop of Mosul and the spate of bomb blasts against churches in January may well put off those Christian refugees in Syria who were contemplating returning to their country, even if it does not trigger a new exodus from Iraq.
When I posted on the church attacks in January, I commented,
As much as we think these Christians are deserving of refugee status, we still would prefer that Iraqis work it out so they can return home and live safely. Not only would they do better in their own culture, but these are the most ancient Christian communities, far pre-dating the Muslim conquests, and it is a terrible thing for them to be destroyed.
After reading Us and Them: The Enduring Power of Ethnic Nationalism the other day (my post on it is here), I am rethinking this. The author’s conclusion was that much as we like the idea of ethnic groups living together and try to make it work where it can, in many places today it cannot work and will create only greater strife and misery. It is a great pity that it has come to this. I’m not smart enough to see where this trend will lead in the long term. At any rate, if this continues, we must bring the Iraqi Christian refugees here.
Infinicat said
They don’t have to come here. They can be moved within Iraq to a less dangerous place, which is what State is planning.
FOX News had one line in its article that says the aggression is not due to Muslim Nativism and the supposed instinct for ethnic purity, but to something else: “Since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, Iraqi Christians have been targeted by Islamic extremists who label them “crusaders” loyal to U.S. troops.”
They identify them as collaborators with US “Liberators”, and the liberators with the Crusaders. Aggression begets aggression. If it was about Nativism, the Christian issue would have arisen eons ago.
— Infinicat
judyw said
Mosul was a less dangerous place. Now it is dangerous. Believe me, Infinicat, I would be happy if they could live in Iraq. I have long thought that we should have made southern Lebanon a place of refuge for Middle East Christians. I’m going to post an article shortly from America, the National Catholic Weekly, that gives another view of the situation.
I’m not sure what you mean by “nativism.” I don’t think you understand the original “Us and Them” article, Infinicat. It is about the forces that have led to ethnic nationalism, not a statement that everything is due to ethnic nationalism, and neither am I saying that, though that seems to be what you are arguing against. To say “aggression begets aggression” is too simplistic, since the aggression that is begotten is based on ethnic nationalism or religion, so that needs an explanation.
Infinicat said
Here’s an interesting article about the way the 25,000 Iranian Jews are being treated.
If ethnic nationalism was the cause of all problems, they would already be in trouble, but apparently, they are free, vote, and claim to be well-treated in Iran — despite the usual macho saber-rattling from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, which, like Saddam’s posturing, I’m sure is a bluff to Israel’s nukes.
I do wonder about the mysterious Jewish/Christian Volag mentioned that offered 40 of these Jews $10,000 EACH to leave Iraq. Who were they? Why would they do that? That had to be US tax dollars.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsMaps/idUSDAH42760120080314?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=0
Watch what happens to those Jews after we attack Iran. That is what I mean by aggression begets aggression, just as with the Iraqi Christians and the US attack/invasion of Iraq. In that case, initial aggression was based on Neocons & Zionists, & corporate greed, not on ethnic nationalism.
— Infinicat
judyw said
I posted on the Jews and other minorities in Iran here, on March 1.
And I don’t want to be mean, Infinicat, but do you have a reading comprehension problem? Who said ethnic nationalism is the cause of all problems? You’re so eager to get your licks in against Zionists, neo-cons and corporate greed that you are blind to what people are actually saying. Actually, you appear to believe that Zionists, neo-cons and corporate greed are the cause of all problems, so that doesn’t leave any room for ethnic nationalism, does it?
Infinicat said
JW wrote: “And I don’t want to be mean, Infinicat, but do you have a reading comprehension problem?”
Grrrr…
You’re not just being mean, you’re being rude,condescending and insulting. I have less than zero interest in getting into a personal squabble with you — on your blog.
FYI, I understand ethnic nationalism (EN), but disagree with some of the author’s constructs and conclusions.
Muller thinks Americans live in ‘relative peace’? Were #24 out of 120 world-wide in terms of murders per cap. More than four times as many Americans die via murder yearly than in the entire Iraq war to date.
The total loss of American lives, from the year 1983 to date, due to terrorism is 6,472.
About 16,000 are murdered every year stateside.
Eight times (per cap) as many in Russia. That’s with more people imprisoned per cap than any other nation on earth, including all third world hellholes.
Nor do we live in peace in terms of warfare. Since WWII, we’ve had Korea, The Cold War, Viet Nam, the War On Drugs, Desert Storm, The attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan, and now the War on Terror, with a few dozen “interventions” along the way, and funding countless terrorist operations in other countries.
Peace? We live in the condition of Endless War. Everyone born since WWII, has not known a single day of peace in their entire lives. It’s like water to a fish, far away, and other people are fighting on our behalf, so most forget about it.
I agree with Muller that EN has played a significant role in history, but in many ways, if you read Muller closely, the ethnic movements are largely synonymous with imperial conquests and the dissolution of those empires, which in no small part caused strife/peace, and how one would assign causality to which part and how much, seems nearly impossible. One can see EN as the cause of some of WWII’s strife, or most of it. Or its effect.
It is used to explain the German attitude towards the Jews, but I think Muller’s own commentary on economics (and the ensuing resentments which he does not touch on) and class is a far more realistic explanation.
IN WWII, we put many German citizens in internment camps, in spite of the Ethnic homogeneity (from N. Europe) and shared DNA that Muller sees as an EN bond among Americans.
While Churchill attempted to unify England by talking about “this island race,” the reality is that there were 1)native descendants of Pre-Anglo-Saxon Britons in Wales, 2)French in S. England, 3)Picts, which were different from the pre-Anglo Britons, in Scotland 4) and Irish, who were descendants of people from Northern Spain. But as Muller says, what people believe is more important than the facts.
One could argue that Europe has been stable not so much because of EN, but because of the lack of internecine imperial warfare.
“How much of the problem can be traced to discrimination, how much to the cultural patterns of the immigrants themselves, and how much to the policies of European governments is difficult to determine.”
No kidding, and this renders the whole thesis more than a little nebulous.
He links ethnonationalism to immigration policy, and I think it’s part of it, but if you look closely, you’ll see that most of the easy admission countries are also currently
experiencing low or declining birth rates, so it could be claimed that liberal immigration also has to do with satisfying industrial demands.
— Infinicat
judyw said
Infinicat, if all of your posts were like the previous one, I would never be tempted to insult you. I am sorry I did. Sometimes I think you are really two people.
You make some good points. But I think you have somewhat of a utopian attitude if you think there have not been wars and crime at all times. And it’s rather insulting to people who live through real wars to compare our murder rate to war. “Relative peace” means just that, relative to many other times and places. My life has always been peaceful and probably yours has too, as has that of most Americans. Whereas my grandparents had to flee pogroms. So when you say “Everyone born since WWII, has not known a single day of peace in their entire lives,” you must mean that if there is a war going on anywhere in the world we do not know peace. If that is so, then nobody has known a day of peace since Adam left the Garden of Eden.
I have to think about your other comments on ethnic nationalism. I’m too tired tonight.
Infinicat said
I am no utopian. I have experienced war first-hand and have few illusions about the immediate future. Yet I have to harbor hope that the US will be at peace — not waging war — while I am alive.
I meant everyone born in the US has not experienced a day of peace, not in the literal sense of physically being present in a theater of operations, but in a country that is not spending huge sums on bellicose activities instead of infrastructure, education, & human services. Our own wealth as a nation, and what should have been its legacy, has never been fully apparent to its citizens because it has been consistently squandered as military-industrial corporate welfare through endless warfare.
By any measure, the US is relatively violent as a country. That is a fact, not an opinion. The comparisons I made are merely to give some perspective to the figures. The means and reasons are different, the results, the same. The US is not relatively peaceful, not compared with the other countries of the world (only 23 are worse, and you should see the list! All are 3rd world). Being 90th-something in violence relative to all other nations is not peaceful.
Colombia, which is #1 in murders,
I am told by Dr. friends born and raised there, looks just as peaceful as the US — unless your luck runs out.
Most US murders are domestic. Note EN does not seem to bring peace to US families, who after all, share the closest DNA sets and tribal membership possible, which does not lend support to Muller’s idea.
Think about Russia, with all the drinking, mob crime, oppressive government, poverty, etc, has 1/8th the murder rate per cap we do. 12%. That, to me, is an outrage.
Muller, and I respect the guy, is simply wrong on that one.
— Infinicat
— Infinicat <—{{{ the evil twin
Ps. Apology accepted, Judy. Thank you.
judyw said
Our country spends as much as we do on war because other countries refuse to. After WWII ended we faced the Soviet threat, which was real. Our European and other allies were in it with us, but we spent the lion’s share because we were wealthier and also, in some cases, more serious and committed. We are, whether we like it or not, the guardian of freedom in the world. You could call this “spending huge sums on bellicose activities instead of infrastructure, education, & human services” but only if you believe there are no threats to be fought.
(In fact, we did spend huge sums on infrastructure etc. Lyndon Johnson launched his Great Society during that time and wasted away our treasure on programs that made life worse for many people. Just look at the graph of poverty rates, which descended steadily until the Great Society and then stopped descending. The more we spend on education, the worse educated our children are. The more welfare, the more single mothers. So I reject that premise entirely.)
Today we are the world’s chief bulwark against Islamo-fascism. We may not be fighting it in the best possible way, but WWII was fought with many mistakes and false steps, as has been every war in history. Nevertheless, we are so far taking the threat seriously.
Your phrase “consistently squandered as military-industrial corporate welfare through endless warfare” is an irrelevant leftist trope. Any money spent by the government is spent somewhere. If we have to buy weapons, we buy them from a weapons manufacturer, not a grocery store. If we spend our money on infrastructure, is this corporate welfare for concrete companies? If we spend it on education, is it welfare for textbook publishers and teachers?
I do think the violence in our society is a problem. I wonder if it partly because we are ethnically varied. Probably it has something to do with our mobility, because fewer people here live where they grew up, where some control is exerted by family and people who have known you all your life. I don’t know if the violence in movies and on TV is a cause, because our movies are seen all over the world, including in more peaceful societies. Also, Americans are different from other people because we are all descended from immigrants. People who picked up their lives and came to another country are different from people who stayed where they were — more restless and more individualistic.
Infinicat said
I can just as blithely as you diss what you say as irrelevant right-wing tripe. Oops, I meant trope.
I’m an independent, and believe both GWB and BC suck, and serve(d) the same masters.
You buy the entire propaganda line used to militarize this country. We spend more militarily than all the other nations of the world COMBINED.
You’re ignorant of military history and the documented inflation of Soviet strength by intelligence.
Military expenditures do nothing for civilian life. A missile in a silo is a waste. It does not become part of the economy, create civilian jobs, educate children well (or badly), make transportation better, do anything for public health, encourage commerce, enter the economic multiplier effect, go for domestic resale, or do anything to further the quality of life. It’s a dead end. No-bid contracts are the icing on that cake.
Is the following “irrelevant leftist trope”?:
” This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence — economic, political, even spiritual — is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. ”
It was said by the last honest Republican: Dwight D. Eisenhower. We failed to heed his warning, and now, as he predicted, we’re living it.
I do not believe it is good to conduct endless wars, many of them having nothing to do with US security (Grenada? Nicaragua? Bosnia? Iraq I? Viet Nam? Iraq II?)& to bloat the size of government and debt to no end via what Eisenhower warned us about.
What happened to Russia and Rome will also happen to us unless we come to our senses.
— Infinicat
Iraqi Christians are fleeing in droves, and the U.S. doesn’t care « Refugee Resettlement Watch said
[...] reported on the murder of Father Rahho, Archbishop of Mosul, a Chaldean Christian, in March. There has been [...]