April 13,
2005
- It was days after the Liberation of Baghdad! Hope
was in the air! Everybody that could manage it were
holding demonstrations in front of the then
headquarters of the US in Iraq - the Palestine Hotel.
It
made me angry! Having been in Iraq during the time of
Saddam and seeing how desperate the people were to
have it out and then how happy to have him gone here
were a weird, fringe group of people demonstrating
against the US.
As
always made up of the people Iraqis always refer to a
the "crazies" from the south and always connected to
next door "crazy" Iran the whole world was taking
their demonstrations as the "will of the people."
I
knew from talking to so many how different the average
people thought. They were delighted to be liberated -
desperate that the Americans stay, and yet the only
ones demonstrating were the "weird" ones.
I
returned home and asked a group of our people - we are
Assyrian Christians - "lets do our own demonstration!
The "bad guys" are all doing demonstrations and the
world world think they speak for all Iraqis."
Isnt
everybody delighted to have Saddam gone and to be
liberated? "Of coure" everybody responded.
That
was when thing got strange.
"Its
too dangerous!" was the reaction of the young people.
"Of
course all Iraqis are delighted at the liberation. Of
course, those demonstrating are the "weird" ones from
the south influenced by Iran,.
If we
demonstrate now, though they will remember who we are.
We love the Americans, but the Americans are
impatient.
They
will be in Iraq for a year, maybe two but then they
will begin to leave and we will be left to deal with
the "weird" ones."
Suddenly
I got the picture!
The
"silent majority" of Iraqis are all the same. Talk to
them as I have all over Iraq.
"We
are not religious - we do not want to become like
Iraq! We just want to be normal, to live regular
lives."
Testimony
to the "silent majority" is the explosion in Baghdad
of all that is "normal"!
internet
Cafes, every sort of electronic equipment, cars etc
etc.
Imagine
for the first time in your life being able to use a
cellphone, surf the internet, watch non-Saddam TV,
talk on the telephone without fear. - why would one
not be delighted!
We
were in the middle of a meeting with the Coalition
Forces when a British former anti-war activist turned
NGO worker began a long diatribe against the
liberation.
"The
eeltricity doesn't work, the water doesn�t work, the
telephone don�t work . . . " on and on she want
blaming the American for all that was wrong with Iraq
even though they had only been in the country for
days.
After
she finished there was a long silence. Suddenly one of
the Iraqis stood up and said "Maam, with all due
respect, all the thing you just said . . . none of
them worked under Saddam either . . .
As
I looked over the crowd of wild eyed "weird" ones
screaming out
