IRAQ: FORCED MARRIAGES ON THE ROCKS

REZA JALALI, PORTLAND PRESS HERALD - Iraq is a complicated place. What
Medard Gabel said in describing wars as "a violent response to
complexity by simple minds" seems to describe the situation in Iraq
well.

Iraq before the invasion was a secular country, with more drinking water
and electricity than now. With the exception of the Kurdish areas,
today's Iraq resembles Iran under the mullahs when it comes to its
women's rights, while resembling Israeli-occupied Gaza when it comes to
the violence caused by suicide bombers and car bombs. The Iraq that we
broke is a precious china vase passed down the family line that was
dropped and broken into many pieces when excessive force was employed to
snatch it away violently from the thief of Baghdad.

To better understand Iraq, home to an ancient culture, one has to
recognize the role of the British in putting together the modern Iraq,
made up of vastly different ethnic and religious groups. This indeed was
an arranged marriage, blessed by the British and intended to control
Iraq's oil resources. As in most arranged marriages, each partner's
consent was not sought. The Kurds in the north, Shias in the south and
Sunnis in the middle found themselves together in a bond that was
destined to unglue given the chance.

As forced arranged marriages go, this one, too, turned abusive with
Kurds and Shias being the victims of horrendous domestic abuse. It's for
this reason that Iraq will never again be a country as we knew it. Kurds
seek a civil and honorable divorce, hoping that the oil wealth in Kirkuk
could be their alimony. Shias in the south hope for the same, leaving
the once-powerful Sunnis to become the new poor and weak.

It is sheer fantasy to pretend, as the Bush administration does as it
attempts to remake the Middle East in the image of the United States,
that Iraq will stay united, and democratic at that. Iraq is made up of
warring tribes who have different visions of a future.

The Kurds, for example, are getting increasingly impatient with their
leaders, who have been wooed by the occupiers into asking their people
to postpone their dream of self-determination in the name of unity. To
the Kurds, this is their historic moment to leave their sorrows behind
and to begin a life of independence, security and prosperity. Their
incentive to remain in a federal Iraq is to follow the orders of future
Shia fundamentalist governments in Baghdad, which already behave more
like the one in neighboring Iran.

The Sunnis have little to gain by joining the peaceful rebuilding of
their nation as they, too, fear being governed by Iraqi ayatollahs.
That's unless the minority Kurds and Sunnis receive assurances,
guaranteed by the international community and the United Nations, that
they have a secure future in the new country.

Just as elections conducted under occupation serve only to bare the
fault lines of the Iraqi society, the Americans' support of one group
over another could push the country toward civil war. For building
democracies has never started with invasions and bombs.

"The human heart is the first home of democracy," writes naturalist
Terry Tempest Williams. But there is little room in the hearts of
ordinary Iraqis, which are filled with fear, hatred and intolerance.
Elections or not, it is the national sense of unity that is missing.
Indeed, a nation is built in people's imagination before it becomes a
reality on the ground.

We broke Iraq, but own it and fix it, we may not. Repairing and
rebuilding factories, bridges and schools is easy compared to rebuilding
the lives of ordinary Iraqis and mending their shattered hearts and
hopes. The happy ending to this tale is perhaps possible once the
occupying forces have left.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/insight/stories/060226cover.shtml

[Reza Jalali, a Kurd from Iran, has lived in the U.S. since 1985]