FLASHBACK: WAR ON ARAB AND MUSLIM WOMEN.

OVER THREE YEARS AGO...

Over three years ago, this newsletter had asserted that the chief victim of the right-wing Judeo-Evangelical war on Arab Iraq would be women. Here’s an excerpt from "Iran Will Launch a Tet-Like Offensive," published on or about January 15, 2004:

"[A]ll in that region are reverting...to Islam (including our unwilling protectorate: Iraq) and away from the progress they had made. The chief victim: women. For Islam, when used to resist a total war of subjugation, can hardly afford to be liberal."


DU’UA

Here’s an excerpt of an interview on May 15, 2007, by Amy Goodman, the host of Democracy Now, with Yanar Mohammed, the founder of the Organization For Women’s Freedom in Iraq. The interview concerned Du’ua Khalil Aswad.

Amy Goodman:

"...Du’ua Khalil Aswad, from a minority Kurdish religious group, Yezidi, was condemned to an ‘honor killing’ by men in her family and hardliners due to her relationship with a Sunni Muslim. She had taken shelter in the house of a Yezidi tribal leader in Bashika, near the northern capital of Mosul. Eight or nine men stormed the house and dragged Ms. Aswad into the street where they hurled stones at her for half an hour. Reports say that local security forces saw the attack but did not try to stop it. "


Yanar Mohammed:

"Honor killing is becoming something to celebrate in Iraq now...When a young woman [Du’a Khalil Aswad] is (should’ve been "was") killed...[I]t was hundreds of males standing around [her]. None of them helped, but they were very keen on photographing the scene, on videotaping it on their cell phones...

"So what happened in this new Iraq, the so-called liberation of Iraq has turned women into refugees in their country . Millions of us are vulnerable to be killed, and all our lives are threatened, and there is nobody to secure our lives for us. The policemen were standing and watching; and actually they helped to get the young girl back to the place where she was killed."