Achievements we do not underestimate

Mother of priest of Syrian Orthodox Church of Baghdad, Adel Yousif,

touches her son's face as she grieves near his coffin. Yousif was killed

by gunmen April 5.

 

 

Azzaman, Iraq

'War-Mongering Leaders are Isolated from Iraqis'

 

"Iraq remains an ever-shifting and butchered land … It has lost its dignity and turned its people into vagrants where stoves that once were used by mothers to bake their tasty bread have become furnaces in which corpses and values are roasted alike."

 

By Fateh Abdusalam

                                    

 

Translated By Ahmed Naoual and Nicolas Dagher

 

April 9, 2008

 

Iraq - Azzaman - Original Article (Arabic)

Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr: His latest clash in Basra - first with militia of other Shiite factions, and then against the Government and the Americans who came to bail them out - demonstrates the contining muddle in Iraqi society.

 

Al-Jazeera TV, Qatar: Interview with Moqtada al-Sadr recorded just after the outbreak of violence in Basra, Mar. 29, 00:10:16RealVideo

Five years have elapsed since the invasion and occupation of Iraq began and government officials in Baghdad still feel the need bring up the former regime in every sentence they make. As a consequence, Saddam’s reign now appears to have more sway than all of their "achievements," which range from a military operation in eastern Baghdad and another in Basra, to a third long-forgotten operation in Mosul and a fourth scheduled to strike another densely-populated town.

 

In the sixth year of the new dispensation and still looking for excuses to justify its policies, Iraq's war-mongering government is isolated from Iraqis, which includes those suffering forced internal displacement and deteriorating public services and those who have been forced to live in exile. An entire generation has been destroyed. Children have been forced to leave school only to fall prey to militias, terrorists and groups with “a cause” in a nation ruled by a government without a program for political or economic development. Furthermore, it is a government hesitant to act without instructions from Washington on international issues, not least of all Iran, its nuclear status and our economic ties.

 

Libyan ruler Muammar Qadhafi scolds Arab leaders over Palestine, Iraq and other issues, and warns them that after Saddam, any one of them may be the next to be hung by the Americans, at the Arab Summit in Damascus, Syria, Mar. 29.

 

Al-Jazeera TV, Qatar: Qadhafi Scolds Arab Leaders, 'Americans Might Hang You All Like Saddam', Mar. 29, 00:11:35RealVideo

For five years, Iraqis have been subject to complete subjugation only to be rewarded by a televised thank you from “the President of the Republic” to American military commanders for “occupying the dictatorship” and “delivering” Iraqis from the regime - a word jumble meant to suit the one offering thanks and the recipient of that thanks, but no one else.

 

The sixth year of occupation has already begun, yet Iraq is still deprived of support from the Arabs - whose presence is for appearance only. According to Dick Cheney and the Iraqi government, this Arab "support" is meant to "counterbalance" Iranian dominance.

 

Iraq remains an ever-shifting and butchered land, which has been compelled to enter a new era. It has lost its dignity and turned its people into vagrants where the stoves that once were used by mothers to bake their tasty bread, have become furnaces in which corpses and values are roasted alike.

 

And who has forced Iraq into this but the politicians whose heads are filled with the ash of the past and the soot of the present, and who intend to force Iraq into ever-greater humiliation?

 

CLICK HERE FOR ARABIC VERSION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Posted by WORLDMEETS.US April 13, 12:58pm]