The Fear of Women

The Fear of Women
March 7, 2004

Hi everyone,I am trying to send a note I've already written on the bombing which Iwitnessed in Kadhamiya earlier this week. The disk won't load it, so I'llsend it tomorrow. I didn't have time to send the letter I wrote beforethe bombing. Here it is now:I saw a poster today pasted several times on the large concrete walls thatare the hallmark of U.S. interests in Baghdad. The picture showed a USsoldier pointing his rifle at children and saying, "GO!" The captionsaid, "No Holiday Island for Iraqi Children." I gleaned from localpassersby that the military is using the area around a popular amusementpark for part of its operations. I also noticed that several of theposters had the graphic scraped off, and wonder who did that.Several people asked me if Iraqi women are being subjected to sexual abuseby US forces here. I answered on the speaking tour that I did not thinkso, I had not yet heard any stories. Sadly, things are coming out nowthat are so much worse than what we found last fall. Women detainees areapparently even sending messages to family members to bomb the prisons,even if they are killed in the process, because they have been disgraced.A women's human rights organization here is documenting the cases as itcan. This is some of the most difficult human rights work one can do. Ifnames of the detained women are released, they the so-called 'honorkillings' by extremist groups. I might have written last time of thestories one Imam told us about members in his congregation, where thewomen are forced to share sleeping space with hundreds of men, where awoman was strip searched in front of her brother and several other men,and so on. Another of the human rights groups we work with here hasdocumented at least one case of male homosexual rape of an Iraqi prisonerby US forces. To add rape of either gender to the list of theseexploitations, I don't know. I guess by both I am not suprised--it hasbeen a fairly common element of our US military history, especially inVietnam, Korea and Japan, but I am still saddened. What on earth were theythinking? Give me a truckload of bricks, and if you really must havethese women in prison, I'll build some privacy walls. I'll have 10million horrified brothers, fathers, husbands and sons to help me. Damnit all.If I have not mentioned it earlier, it seems now like we had barelyscraped the surface last fall. Now we are swirling in the mud.Relatives of detainees, who are not themselves accused of crimes, aretaken as hostages by our military to coerce the wanted person to turnthemselves in. There are child detainees also, one of whom is only 9years old. His parents have no idea where he went since being picked up.I cannot imagine the horror they feel.Maryam, my Assyrian Christian friend down the street, told me when Ivisited this week, "I don't really know what's out there, what's happeningin Baghdad. I only know what I see from my balcony on our street, andwhat you come to tell me." She doesn't even go one block onto Karrada tobuy groceries like I do. "I am afraid," she says. I can see that. Thistime when I came to visit, she had a large red iron gate over the door toher apartment. It's padlocked during the day. She has come to ourapartment with Um Ashraf, another lovely neighbor, but really I thinkshe's serious that she never leaves the house.I compose these letters on scraps of paper while I am sitting in taxis orotherwise waiting for things to happen. For this letter, I have jottedthings in margins in 16 different directions. There is a lot of waitingin taxis to cross town, the traffic is so terrible.I have truly, as I said in my first letter since returning, jumpedstraight into the fire. I'm getting on top of my feelings of 'overwhelm'now. The team has been working nonstop since I left, including onSundays, which are supposed to be our day of rest. However, that practiceis catching up with them. People are looking tired, and beginning torealize that spending more time 'in the office' does not necessarily makeone more productive. Without rest, you simply slow down like a dyingbattery and slog through everything you have to do. I am trying to geteveryone to agree to a rejuvenating retreat in the next week or so. Thereare actually people who are hard to convince here, but I think it willhappen. I have fortunately, gotten people to begin seeing Sunday as a daynot to schedule meetings and appointments.I've spent quite a bit of time thinking about the upcoming elections andhow they tie in to what I am experiencing here. I have previously felt itimperative to vote for anyone who was not Bush, but I am beginning tothink this itself can be a trap. Several people I've met who care deeplyabout Middle East peace voted for Bush because they thought Gore andLieberman would be worse. The US origin of human rights abuses is indeedlarger than one presidency, even though this president made huge stridesin expanding the suffering of people all over the world. Single-issue andelimination voting I guess are both fallacies. I don't think it'spossible to coast through the rest of campaign season just because there'sa strong opposition candidate. Basically, those of us who care abouthuman rights still have to advocate for them now.When I say that the US regime of human rights abuses in other countriesspans more than one presidency, I am amazed at how many Palestinians andIraqis respect Clinton as a statesman. I hear this often from the taxidrivers, who are all-knowing voices of public sentiment. Even despite thebombing campaign here in 1998 which killed so many people, or the faultypeace talks in '99--'00 which led to the Intifada, they respect Clintonand want me to know that. I have not yet met an Arab person who respectedBush. Although one told me at our vigil last week that 'Bush is strong,like Saddam.' I don't know if that was meant as respectful or not.I met a cartoonist this week who is designing posters for the 'HumanRights Solidarity Week' which several Iraqi HR groups are planning here.He showed me one cartoon he drew of a 'Trojan Dove' which was covered instars and stripes and had US troops coming out the side. I guess thatsums it up well.Call me stupid, but I had not realized until now that the military paysbig bucks to Iraqis who inform on their neighbors' activities. We'veknown for a while now that many of the fatal house raids are based onfalse intelligence, including bad tips from neighbors with a grudge.These tips, even according to military personnel we meet, are often thesole source of intelligence used to carry out a house raid. Have we notlearned the lessons of World War II and McCarthyism? Like so many other'turn in your neighbors' programs this past century, when people aredesperate, when people want to deflect attention away from themselves,they will always turn in their neighbor, even if innocent. Theconsequences--even just languishing in prison for six months withoutcontact from your family or a lawyer, or having any idea what will happento you--are so devastating as well.I think it's funny that these days I am always pegged as being from Russiaor Hungary. It has to be the Clausen high forehead and my round cheeks.It's been a long time since anyone has thought I was American.I like watching Iraqi men go about their days. The men here areultra-genteel, almost feminine, [but also have streaks of extrememacho/masculinity as well]. I see this in how men hold hands or link armsas they walk together down the street; how taxi drivers decorate theircars with silk flowers, fake fur, beads, fringe, and stuffed animals (asan aside, also multiple passages from the Qu'ran and pictures of the Shi'amartyrs). Men make the tea, and it is considered the highest hospitalityfor the man of the house to serve his visiting guests. I have a feelingthis culture could make North American men very uncomfortable. NorthAmerican men are somehow in the middle of two extremes and yet somehow Ithink miss much. The only thing I see which is encouraging is that manyN.A. men now consider parenting an involved, important duty--and are evenwilling to stay home with their children. The family is central in thisplace, after God, and that is how I think it should be. North Americanwomen are also beginning to find a balance between home life, work life,and practicing the folk arts--like knitting, embroidery, and cookingwell--which I think was lost for a while. I am stunned by all the thingsmy friends were working on when I was home last. Perhaps we are growingafter all.Fasting has gone well, and I am quite acclimated to the pattern now. Thereis no need for me to eat now, which is amazing. The first two days lastedforever and all I could think of was food. The body goes into a panicduring that time and then begins to attack the muscle tissue, beforeacclimating and attacking the fat stores instead. You can also feel alittle sick because all the toxins are being released from your body andexpelled. Actually, having already forgotten about food, I sometimes haveto remind myself to drink enough. Like right now, actually, I realizeit's been hours. Sadly, it is hard to pass up all the incrediblehospitality. Maryam brought a canister of chocolates to me when I arrivedhere, and all my friends have wanted to invite me for lunch. I'm tryingto convince them to make soup. Actually, the physical results of beinginvited for lunch so many times in the fall was one of my less spiritualreasons for fasting now!I don't think I'm any thinner after one week, though. I'm certainly notsuffering, either, except those lunch invitations. One family down thestreet invited us for coffee, which was not just coffee. The wife hadprepared a beautiful cake with raisins and coconut on top, and made Iraqipizza (which smells and looks and I know tastes so incredible compared tofast food U.S.) and bowls of fruit for us. She was really pushing me toeat it, but I held out. That was painful though. Katrina also keepsasking me what I really want to or can eat. "Macaroni? Chicken?" She isstunned that I'm not eating anything. So now we have gotten better atnotifying our hosts when we accept invitations.I think about Neta and how she shared a can of beans a day with two otherpeople for a month two years ago in the Muqata in Ramallah, Palestine, orall the people in Palestine during the sieges, or the family I met inHebron one day who had only tea and cucumbers to feed a family of 11children. I remember the children hauling blue plastic buckets of soupfrom the Waqf's soup kitchen near the Tomb of Abraham in Hebron's oldcity. I think of how many big meals I have enjoyed here, and also theneighbors around the street who are still squatting in an old storefrontopen to the wind; I think about the women who are sitting on the streetbegging for food when they should be in their kitchens making lunch fortheir families.I have offered, in my final full-time stint on a project, to do all thecleaning and cooking for the team. Basically, I think I just want to bethe 'Mom' of the house for a while and let everyone else go out and do thethese-days-all-too-exciting stuff that we do. My teammates smiled, andthen assigned me to coordinate the Lenten campaign here instead.It's time to go, I have church in an hour, I miss you all, will write moresoon.peace,Le Anne