Christians in Iraq

"More than 60 percent of Iraq’s population consists of Shi’ite Muslims, most of whom look to neighboring Iran for spiritual direction. The implications of that fact are not lost on Iraq’s minorities, including the nation’s small but ancient Christian community.

As with the Iraqis’ ability to own firearms, the condition of Christians under Saddam’s reign illustrates that while that regime was brutal and highly authoritarian, it was not "totalitarian," in the full sense of the term. Saddam and his henchmen devised perversely inventive ways to torture and kill political dissidents, and the exalted likeness of the "Dear Leader" was pervasive, but Saddam did little to disrupt, reform, or destroy private institutions and customs. Avak Asadourian, Iraq’s Armenian archbishop, told the April 21st Christian Science Monitor that "we enjoyed total religious freedom and there was no religious discrimination" under Saddam’s rule. This may change if Iranian-style revolutionary Islam takes root in Iraq — a development that may be unavoidable if "democracy" is planted there at bayonet point.

Bishop Ishlemon Wardouni, head of Iraq’s Chaldean Christian Church (the only community that still speaks Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus Christ and His disciples), told the Monitor that Shi’ite Muslims who follow the late Ayatollah Khomeini "want to convert a building next to his church — formerly belonging to the ruling Ba’ath Party — into a mosque." "If this sort of thing happens, maybe later there could be problems," warns Bishop Wardouni. "We have heard their slogans, ‘No Saddam, No Bush, Yes to an Islamic State.’""

http://www.thenewamerican.com/tna/2003/05-19-2003/vo19no10_iraq.htm

 

"Al-Chalabi points out that the Iraqi Communists committed the most gruesome of these atrocities. Thus it is by no means a welcome sign of "liberation" that "the long-banned Iraqi Communist Party … won the race to publish the first newspaper in Baghdad since the fall of Saddam Hussein," as Reuters reported on April 20th.

With the help of its servants in the "respectable" conservative media, the Bush administration cultivated the impression that with Saddam’s removal, freedom would blossom in Baghdad, and the Iraqis would swoon with gratitude toward their American liberators. Unfortunately, this has not been the case."

http://www.thenewamerican.com/tna/2003/05-19-2003/vo19no10_iraq.htm

 

Actually, there was also the urging of Iraqi dissidents who fled Iraq during his brutal regime and their testimony:

www.womenforiraq.org

 

"Al-Chalabi points out that the Iraqi Communists committed the most gruesome of these atrocities. Thus it is by no means a welcome sign of "liberation" that "the long-banned Iraqi Communist Party … won the race to publish the first newspaper in Baghdad since the fall of Saddam Hussein," as Reuters reported on April 20th.

At least they aren't democrats, right, Joseph?

Nothing wrong here. Things are getting better in Iraq. WFTH-I

 

I am not fond of it. I wish I didn't have to, but you tell lies and they need to be pointed out. I have done nothing to be embarrassed about. I am embarrassed for you that you haven't caught on yet. It shows that you are not fully engaged in teh debate. Of course, we knew that already by reading your posts. You simply do not appear to have any idea of what goes on in the world. It is sad and easily corrected. But you aren't learning very quickly.

Where? I see no question about this. You made a statement about waiting to see the evidence. It appears that you have yet again twisted words to try to make things appear differently than they actually are. This is a minor point to be sure, but it is indicative of your unethical and dishonest ways of debating. You pretend like you did something you never did, and then act like I am the idiot for it. Unless you made a request elsewhere that I didn't see, then you simply didn't tell the truth.

YOU don't google well do you???

Casualties from Iraq's gulag are harder to estimate. Accounts collected by Western human rights groups from Iraqi émigrés and defectors have suggested that the number of those who have "disappeared" into the hands of the secret police, never to be heard from again, could be 200,000. http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=5773

The U.S.-led occupation authority in Iraq has said that at least 300,000 people are buried in mass graves in Iraq. Human rights officials put the number closer to 500,000, and some Iraqi political parties estimate more than 1 million were executed. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-12/09/content_288443.htm

The Anfal operations, during which 182 000 civilian Kurds were rounded up by the Security forces, disappeared and were allegedly killed. http://home.cogeco.ca/~konews/9-9-02-ali-chemical-in-algeria.html

We are going to have a better idea of just how many people Saddam Hussein killed. Before the war, the number was estimated at between 300,000 and 400,000. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/935smrwy.asp

The United States estimates that Saddam's regime killed at least 300 000 Iraqis. However, some human rights groups say the number is closer to 1 million. http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=3&art_id=qw1084605487261B216&set_id=1

Don't need it. All you need to do is learn from history and do your homework. By now, you know that when I post something I have looked it up and have some verification for it. You might disagree with the verificaction or the reports, but you should know it exists. This just illustrates again that you are not thinking clearly about these issues. The 300,000-400,000 number has been common knowledge for several years, going back prior to the Gulf War. You pretend to know everything that is going on and have all the answers and then you miss the most basic stuff. It is all too indicative of the fact that you should learn to just close your browser when you feel like responding. It will save you the trouble of getting shown up time and time again.

 

I see the estimate your source gives are mostly the dead from Iraq's war with Iran, including Iraqi soldiers killed by the Iranians.

Using that argument, we could say that Bush has murdered over 1,000,000 people himself, since the violence in Iraq since we began operations there has killed at least that many people.

This is one of the reasons no one pays much attention to your claims, Larry.