Posted by andreas from dtm2-t9-2.mcbone.net (62.104.210.101) on Friday, December 27, 2002 at 6:05AM :
How many flaws & mistakes can you find in this?
This is a piece labouriously crafted by Hanna Hajjar.
At least he TRIES to make some points - even if it should only be for self-legitimization and/or self-justification - and that distinguishes him from the inarticulate Pawlowian jingoists on AINA.
But how do comment on his ideas?
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Assyrians & Peace vs. War in Iraq!
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Beth Suryoyo Assyrian (Othuroyo) Forum
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Written by Hanna Hajjar on 27 Dec 2002 06:49:55:
Let’s look at the situation of “War & Peace in Iraq” from an Assyrian perspective and see which one is better for Assyrians! In other words what could Assyrians lose and what could they gain from either option.
First, let’s assume that peace prevails, (i.e. no war); that means the continuation of status-quo, (i.e. things will remain as is). If that is the case then:
1. Assyrians will remain subjected to discrimination by Arabs and Kurds.
2. Assyrians will remain with no representation in their own homeland, with no Assyrians as members of the Iraqi Parliament, (i.e. Assyrians will have no say in their own destiny, which means Arabs and Kurds will decide for them and run them like cattle).
3. Assyrians would remain not able to teach and use their own language in their own homeland.
4. Assyrians will remain not able to freely practice their Christian religion freely in their own homeland.
5. Assyrians will remain subjected to persecution by the Arab Ba’ath regime, and the Kurdish tribes.
6. Assyrians will not be recognized as an ethnic group, they will be forced to be labeled either as Arabs or as Kurds (which they are neither0.
7. As a result of all above, Assyrians will be forced to mass migration and exodus from their homeland Assyria (i.e. Assyrians will be plucked from their homeland and dispersed all over the world), Leading to the extinction of Assyrian culture, and civilization.
Second, let’s assume that war takes place in Iraq; that means the change of status-quo. If that is the case, then let’s see what could Assyrians lose if war breaks up in Iraq?
1. Assyrian language might get banned.
Their language is already banned! It can’t be banned more than what it is now.
2. Assyrians might lose their privileges in Iraq.
They have no privileges whatsoever to start with to lose. They can’t lose what they don’t have!
3. Assyrians might lose their freedom of worship.
They are not free in practicing their religion, to the extent that Mr. Saddam who is a Moslem Arab is dictating Christian practices as he pleases, so if Assyrians have no religious freedom, how could they lose it!
4. Assyrians might be subjected to persecution.
They are already being persecuted, and some have even been executed too, so what else is new!
5. Assyrians might be subjected to ethnic cleansing.
This has been the policy of Arabs and Kurds since the independence of Iraq, Assyrians are already being ethnically cleansed on a daily basis! And status-quo will continue that.
6. Assyrians might be discriminated against.
As if they are not being discriminated against now. Assyrians are already at the bottom of the totem pole as third class citizen, how much lower than that could they be pushed down to!
7. They might lose their villages.
Assyrians had already lost hundreds of their villages (occupied by Arabs and Kurds, or bulldozed), and they are losing more villages on daily basis, what else is new!
8. War Increases immigration.
Immigration is already at its highest; and whoever has a chance to leave, is grabbing it. Status-quo will empty the region from Assyrians.
9. War would bring many casualties, pain, suffering and hunger etc.
Sure no one can deny that, but let’s look at it statistically: Since Assyrians are about 10% of the Iraqi population, then the Arab and Kurd occupiers will be hit with casualties at a larger scale. And if war escalates to chemical, biological and/or nuclear warfare, then there will be even much larger numbers of casualties. This is the normal result of any war!
Nothing is new to Assyrians, they have been subjected to this kind of suffering for the past 2500 years, and if war takes place, then the occupiers would have a taste of what Assyrians have been subjected to for centuries. Maybe that would give the occupiers a wakeup call to realize their mistreatment of Assyrians, and maybe that war would bring the occupiers to a minority status in Iraq (just like they brought Assyrians to), and then all parties can sit at a round table on equal footings (all as minorities) and discuss the future peace in Iraq and an independent Assyria, because no nation should ever be ruled by its persecutors, and Arabs and Kurds have a long track record of persecuting Assyrians.
It is not an issue of love for Peace or love for war that should dictate the decision to support war or peace by Assyrians, but rather they should compare both options and analyze what they could lose and/or gain from either option, comparing the pros and cons of both options, then coming up with a decision that is in the best interest of the Assyrian nation.
If you look at the above comparison you will realize that Assyrians have no stakes in the preservation of Iraq, because Iraq mistreated them from the day it got its independence and all the way to this date! It was Iraqi Arabs and Kurds who massacred unarmed Assyrian men, women and children in Simele in 1933. In other words Assyrians have nothing to lose at all if Iraq collapses! A person can’t lose what he doesn’t have!
It is not the fault of Assyrians that it turned out to this; this is the fault of the successive Arab and Kurdish occupiers who kept on taking away Assyrian rights and stepping all over them. Now Assyrians have nothing left. They are in a situation similar to a case where some stranger takes away your home and kicks you out of it, and then it happens that your occupied house catches fire, would you give a damn if it burns to the ground?
It is to the disadvantage of Assyrians if war does not break up in Iraq, because that means the continuation of status-quo, where Assyrians will continue to suffer as they have been all through the history of Iraq as an independent state. It is about time to have a change in Iraq, and the only way to bring up that change is through war.
If war breaks up, (sure no one can predict its outcome), but no matter how bad it turns out to be, the results and conditions after the war will be different than status-quo, (i.e. Assyrians might have a chance to improve their conditions in their homeland, one way or another, [compared to no way of changing their situation under the current Arab dictatorship regime]). If war breaks up Assyrians have nothing to lose at all, on the contrary they have high chances of gaining their legitimate rights.
We hear the Arab media complaining about the suffering of Iraqi Arabs because of the sanctions on Iraq since the Gulf war, but we never heard them complaining about the suffering of Assyrians under Arab persecution since the independence of Iraq, or since Arab occupation 1400 years ago. Ironically if the Arabs have given the Assyrians some rights in the past, Assyrians would have had some stakes in Iraq and they would not have wanted war, but the chauvinistic attitude of successive Iraqi Arab regimes had pushed Assyrians to the edge, and this is the result of their mistreatment of Assyrians. Arabs have no one else to blame other than themselves for what is happening and what will happen in the future in Iraq.
To Assyrians, the issue is not whether Mr. Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction, to Assyrians it is not an issue of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons in the hands of Mr. Saddam. Assyrians look at Mr. Saddam as an occupier even if all he has is a sling shot! The bottom line is that Assyria is under foreign occupation, and the only way Assyrians can achieve freedom is through liberating a small part of their ancestral homeland and establish their independent sovereign Assyrian state. It doesn’t have to cover all of the Assyrian homeland, but enough to handle the Assyrian population, the Assyrian triangle would be more than enough.
Hanna Hajjar
12/26/02
-- andreas
-- signature .