in an Arabic Interview with her she said that she get her Husband approval for everything becauseshe beleive she is less than him. Added to that she said that she visited some christian neighborhood  because she heard that the suicide rate in that area was high as if Muslim women in Iraq are living in luxury. I wonder what she was smoking during that interview,  maybe what her husband was smoking since have been doing all the thinking for her. 

Source: Niqas.com

New guidelines on how the Iraqi government’s female employees should dress have caused a furore. The conservative Ministry of Women’s affairs says it is protecting female dignity while women’s rights advocates say it’s an attack on personal freedoms.

http://www.niqash.org/articles/?id=2981

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I can not add anything more to her beautiful words

Source NPR:

"I think the spirit of Baghdad will never change, no matter what. The Baghdad and Iraqi people will endure, but visually, I think the city's just completely destroyed. It used to be a beautiful city, and I'm searching really hard to find its beauty." Aseel Albanna

http://www.npr.org/2012/01/19/145397206/after-20-years-an-iraqi-returns-to-a-changed-land

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Some nice  news to read about Iraq 

Source: BBC

A project to catalogue every plant species in Iraq has been restarted, 25 years after it was put on hold because of the political situation in the country.

Experts from Iraq are once again working with botanists at Kew Gardens in London to finish the reference work Flora of Iraq, the first volume of which was published in 1966.

There are estimated to be around 3,500 plant species in the country but many are not comprehensively documented.

The project aims to complete the final three of nine planned volumes. The most recent was published in 1985.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16317974

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An image worth a thousand word , or in iraq case tells a thousand story  

Source: NYTimes:

Nearly nine years of war in Iraq have produced a growing cadre of world-class, homegrown Iraqi news photographers. Some started out with little technical knowledge but a strong desire to document their country’s experience. Within months, they were producing work that became increasingly crucial to the world’s understanding of Iraq. These are the stories of five of those photojournalists, with a sampling of their images.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/12/19/world/middleeast/20111219-iraqi-photographers.html

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From NYTimes:

That was at the heart of the question that Andrea Bruce, a photographer, posed to the Iraqis she encountered as the war wound down. She and her local colleagues in The Times’s Baghdad bureau wondered, was there reason for optimism?

The answer — like so much in recent years — was complicated.

“There is a belief that Iraqis will be able to deal with and survive no matter what comes their way,” said Ms. Bruce, who has been photographing in Iraq for eight years. “Optimism about what lies ahead doesn’t exist. They’re pretty pessimistic. Politically, they’re worried.”

http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/15/portraits-of-iraqi-pride/?src=tp

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10 Iraqi fils (just few years old) which is about 0.000008554270373768155 US$ is being sold for 2500US$  as memorabilia!!

I am waiting for the "smarty" who will buy it 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Iraqi-Coin-Saddam-Hussein-Basra-Collection-/230717484923?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item35b7d56f7b#ht_500wt_1202

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I dont even know what to say, but it seems to me that most solders are kids who assume war is more like a video game, they would shoot and then keep asking why those people are shooting at us. on the other hands Iraqis seems to expect American solders to fix everything for them. At the end of the day, many live lost for a decision made by 2 so called leaders who did not really respect these lives.

The Irony is that many of these stories are lost in a junkyard.

From NYTimes:

he documents ultimately led to a report that concluded that the Marine Corps’s chain of command engaged in “willful negligence” in failing to investigate the episode and that Marine commanders were far too willing to tolerate civilian casualties. That report, however, did not include the transcripts.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/15/world/middleeast/united-states-marines-haditha-interviews-found-in-iraq-junkyard.html 

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few Iraqi musicians are doing an amazing job and participating in Berlin festival, Amazing and talented kids 

http://mediacenter.dw-world.de/english/video/#!/269451/Striking_Unusual_Tones_Beethoven_in_Iraq/Program=7885 

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This creates new problem with moms who can not register their kids because sometimes they are not married, a problem that Iraqi useless politicians should act to fix it. 

Source CNN: 

CNN's Arwa Damon reports women were often raped by al Qaeda members and forced into marriage in areas they controlled.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2011/09/12/damon-rape-al-qaeda.cnn?iref=allsearch

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Today the government did not allow even the peaceful crowd to mourn there loss as they claimed its a security threat

Source: Human Rights Watch 

“The killing of Hadi al-Mahdi sadly highlights that journalism in Iraq remains a deadly profession,” said Joe Stork  deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “After more than six years of democratic rule, Iraqis who publicly express their views still do so at great peril.”

Iraqi authorities should conduct an immediate, full, and transparent investigation into the September 8, 2011 killing of Hadi al-Mahdi, a popular radio journalist often critical of the government, at his home in Baghdad, and prosecute those responsible, Human Rights Watch said today.

http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/09/09/iraq-radio-personality-shot-dead

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Any decent elected government would resign after such a pathic tactic is used against peacful protesters.

Source: Human Rights Watch

In the days following the attack, Human Rights Watch interviewed more than 25 demonstrators who said they were punched, beaten with sticks or other weapons, or stabbed during the June 10 assault. Human Rights Watch observed and witnesses said that security forces stood by and watched in several instances. Several organizers told Human Rights Watch that the attacks have had a severe chilling effect on people exercising their right to peaceful assembly. In the two Friday demonstrations since then, on June 17 and 24, many regular protesters and organizers have stopped attending the demonstration, mainly because of fear of attacks, they said.

http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2011/06/30/iraq-attacks-government-backed-thugs-ch...

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I dont think I need to add a lot more text than the poinnts mentioned in this article on the their website, even though the article is about the New UNICEF Iraq Ambassador Kadhum Al-Sahir, but the value is really inside the post.

Source UNICEF:

In the 1970s, Iraq was one of the best countries in the Middle East and North Africa to be a child, but due to decades of war and neglect, it has become one of the worst. Some of the issues facing Iraq’s 15 million children now include the following:

• Each year, around 35,000 infants die before reaching their first birthday
• Over 1.5 million children under the age of five are undernourished
• Around 700,000 children are not enrolled in primary school, while hundreds of thousands more drop out before graduating
• 2.5 million children do not have access to safe water, and 3.5 million lack adequate sanitation facilities
• Around 800,000 children between the ages of 5 and 14 are working.

http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/iraq_58476.html

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If Iraq had a decent government, they would of resigned by now, the demonstrartors are trying to send amessage to the politicians, that they have to start doing real work and not only shout slogans, but instead 5 people get killed while demonstrating against them.

the ironic part is this line

On Thursday, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki urged people not to join the protests for security reasons, and accused the protest organisers of being al-Qaeda insurgents and Saddam Hussein loyalists.

this useless politician is using the same Language as Qadafi

Sourse BBC:

At least five people have been killed in anti-government protests in Iraq as thousands take to the streets in cities across the country for a "day of rage".

Baghdad has been virtually locked down, with the authorities banning traffic in the city centre and deploying several thousand soldiers on the streets.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12576613

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 Lets see if the provincial governor will step down after the loss of innocinet live or he will pull a Saddam behaviour   

Source NYTimes

Security forces in the eastern Iraqi city of Kut on Wednesday fired on a group of protesters calling for the provincial governor to step down, killing at least three people, according to a local government official.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/17/world/middleeast/17iraq.html?_r=1&ref=global-home

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Iraqis are protesting in every city, but the news seems to be hidden somehow, some protesters get killed but still the world is not that tuned

Source NYTimes

BAGHDAD — Iraq would seem to have virtually every ingredient for upheaval: crippling poverty, few good jobs, creaky public services, anger at an entrenched political elite and thousands of young people who meet online to vent their grievances and organize protests.But the revolution has not come to Iraq. Not yet, at least. Sporadic demonstrations have rippled through the country over the last few weeks, as oil workers and nightclub owners, communications workers and communists try to yoke the energy and outrage that toppled President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and galvanized much of the Middle East.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/15/world/middleeast/15iraq.html?ref=middleeast

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I dont know whats more disgusting, Saddam reference to causality that 4 iraqi dead to 1 American would be great success, or Bush total dismissal of the cost of Iraqi lives just because Saddam did not go with the withdraw on Bush time frame, we were bombed for many days because of these 2 inhumane politicians

Source: NY Times

As the American-led ground offensive in the first war with Iraq got under way on Feb. 24, 1991, Saddam Hussein directed his frustration at an unlikely target: the Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev. Mr. Hussein had dispatched his foreign minister to Moscow in an 11th-hour bid to head off a ground war.

After prodding by Mr. Gorbachev, Mr. Hussein had offered to withdraw Iraqi troops from Kuwait in 21 days. But the United States appeared to be moving ahead with its land campaign.

“The situation is now is getting worse,” Mr. Hussein had written the previous night in an emotional letter to the Soviet leader. “Our nation and army are confused. We are asking ourselves which one is more significant: the Soviet Union’s proposal or the Americans’ threats?”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/world/middleeast/20archive.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&ref=middleeast

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Source: Not that strong DailyMail but its an interview  

In prison, Green converted to Catholicism and has corresponded with a nun in Louisville about his faith.

Green described prison life as a 'lonely existence' and said other inmates consider those convicted of sex offenses among the lowest, making life 'hazardous' among the general prison population.

For Green, each day is just a matter of getting through 24 hours so he can do it all again the next day. Meanwhile, he lives with memories of the attack that took away the Iraqi family.

'If I thought that was an OK thing now, I wouldn't be much of a human being,' Green said.

I usually refrain from writing a post about issue and provide links to other views, mainly because I see a lot of repetitive information, this post will be an exception because I feel very passionately about this era and most of my beliefs today was shapped based on how humane the world have been in the last 2 decades toward human lives when they look differently than yours. Today I opened my eyes to read the news that the economic sanctions against Iraq are to be lifted, something that took Iraq toward total collapse and got millions of Iraqis to flee the country.

Sadaam the guy who by his practices and disgusting politics dragged Iraq into invading Kuwait for what he described in his speech who he addressed the "honorable" in this world, he said the action was needed because Kuwait played an unfair economical rule that got Iraq to lose a billion dollar of revenue for each dollar the price of barrel went down. Now some may see the economical effect as a huge deal but what he cared about at that moment was really grabbing more power, as he never cared about the economical game, in fact under his rule Iraq went broke right from the get go with Iraq-Iran war.

Now lets see how the civilized world reacted to Saddam's stupid behavior after invading Kuwait, first economical sanctions (which is the reason I felt I need to write this), and then a war in 1991 that killed many in Iraq, then they allowed Saddam to use his Helicopters to attack civilians in the North and South of Iraq (All this under the name of the (Civilized world),  then bombing through the 90's that killed many , one of them is one of Iraq amazing artist "Layla Al Attar", who got killed during one of those bombings in the 90s. 

One of the "most civilized" reaction to the sanctions came from someone I thought at that time she could be a force for good. 

When asked on US television if she [Madeline Albright, US Secretary of State] thought that the death of half a million Iraqi children [from sanctions in Iraq] was a price worth paying, Albright replied: “This is a very hard choice, but we think the price is worth it.”

I could not believe that she said that but then remembered as long as you are not portrayed by the media as a "bad guy" like Saddam was , its OK to make a screwed up policy and  the media would keep calling you sweet names, at the end of the day half a million Iraqi children don't have a media campaign behind them that will make the world stand against such words or actions.

Now many will start blabing about the Oil for food program and how corrupted it was,  It was supposedly intended to be there to help Iraqis to survive, I usually tend to think of those who come up with this argument as "brain dead" at their best. That program was a tool to look less inhumane by politicians and it opened doors for companies to benefit from the huge oil resources of Iraq, through giving Saddam cash. It was never intended to help Iraqis, the only benefit that Iraqis got out of it was simply more food on their table through the government rations that made few more survive another year or 2, Iraq was crippled economically to a point that kids at schools were coming to school without breakfast because their parents could not afford it.

Then we fast forward to 2003 when the evil Saddam was taken out under the promise of "Freeing the Iraqi People" which only the naive believe, even though if you read and educate yourself about the situation you will see that many politicians disregard human lives beyond belief, I have heared so many politicians say these exact words without  hesitation 

Its better to fight ALQAIDA  over there than we fight them here

I have been disgusted by Saddam so many times, but I expect him to be like that because from day one no one beleived he was a good guy, well except for idiots in the Arab world who never lived , but politician who call themselves civilised and humanee and talk about freedom , saying that is beyond disgusting especially when you associate yourself with mainstream politicians.

Iraqis today are reading the news that  the sanction that was installed on Iraq because of Invading Kuwait is nearing an end, guess why this time. So that companies can sell civilian nuclear technology to Iraq.

Brilliant, 20 years of suffering and more than a million Iraqis dead, and what move the civilised international community to remove sanctions is simply money. 

Now we know what the word civilized really mean!. 

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