Many Bay Area Iraqis upset by course of war
They worry about increased violence, sectarian divides
Vanessa Hua, Chronicle Staff Writer
Saturday, March 18, 2006
Jawad al-Mamori and 265,000 other Iraqi expatriates around
the world voted with great optimism just over a year ago in their
homeland's first free election.
Now, Bay Area Iraqis' hope has turned into despair as Iraq
has descended into bloody sectarian violence, with daily reports
of suicide attacks, car bombs and mortar barrages.
Monday marks the third anniversary of the United States invasion
of Iraq, which initiated a conflict that has taken the lives
of more than 2,300 U.S. troops and at least 30,000 Iraqis.
Al-Mamori flew to Iraq to visit his mother, brother and sister
in Assamawa on the border of Iran in January. The contrast with
his visit in January 2004 was stark. Then, he could travel freely
between cities. In his recent visit, U.S. troops were shooting
at civilians who approached too closely because the country has
become so much less stable, he said.
Iraqis must unite to establish a permanent government, said
the father of four.
"If they don't work together, then they will always
be losers. They have to work against the terrorists," he
said. "They have to try to make a democratic life in Iraq."
Ben Samuel, 54, of San Jose, thinks American forces need
to sweep through Iraq and take out "every bad person"
coming through the borders.
Samuel, an Assyrian Christian who left Iraq in 1970, blames
Islamic religious leaders for inciting violence, and he sees
no future for Christians in Iraq, who were oppressed under Saddam
Hussein.
"The troublemakers are coming from all the Arab countries
to try to cause war and disruption," he said.
The country needs a strong leader to control all the factions,
said Samuel, a general contractor. He admires President Bush
for ordering the invasion but said Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld has bungled the war.
Hasan Alkhatib, 55, of Saratoga, said the Bush administration
has been waffling, and that has emboldened the insurgents. He
charged that U.S. forces have failed in their duty to enforce
laws and keep peace.
Hussein's army should have been crushed in the initial invasion,
he said, but it has reassembled itself as insurgency with the
help of Sunni Muslim sympathizers.
"If we stay this way, we will eventually pull out of
Iraq in disgrace," said Alkhatib, a Shiite Muslim. "We
need a change in administration that will pursue a single course.
The situation is getting worse day by day."
The split between Sunni and Shiite Muslims dates to the eighth
century, but Hussein, a member of the Sunni minority, exacerbated
it by placing Sunnis at the top of the political hierarchy as
he disenfranchised Shiites and other ethnic and religious groups.
Rauf Naqishbendi, 53, of Pacifica and others say there are
many ethnic and religious groups with competing interests in
Iraq.
"Most Iraqis don't care about their 'Iraqness.' Kurds
care about being Kurds, Shiites about Shiites, Sunnis about Sunnis,"
said Naqishbendi, a Kurd. "There is not going to be a peace."
Instead, he said, Iraq should be broken into three states:
Kurd, Sunni and Shiite. Kurds, who predominate in northern Iraq,
have long struggled for autonomy and were attacked with chemical
and biological weapons under Hussein's regime.
The north has suffered less violence in the current war,
but people living there must deal with skyrocketing prices, shortages
of gasoline and intermittent utility service, Naqishbendi said.
"The world is a better place without a despot and tyrant
like (Hussein)," Naqishbendi said. "But how we went
about the invasion, that's questionable. And what we did in the
aftermath, nobody denies mistakes were made."
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