An Actual War On Christmas

[cali]

03 Jan 2011 11:01 am

Perhaps it's understandable that Fox News is a little off its game, since its own former president and its own political party launched the war, but it's real enough. As my colleague, Jeffrey, rightly notes, the attack on a Coptic church in Eqypt really was a huge story that got lost in the Holiday melee (and is now being compounded by disgusting anti-Semitism). The good news is that many Egyptians seem genuinely distressed. The bad news is that the dark hand of religious cleansing is sweeping across Mesopotamia once again. Here's the hideous latest:

A survivor of the Christian church massacre in Iraq two months ago was killed in the continuing spree of violence targeting the community in the country. A Christian woman in the Karrada district of central Baghdad was shot to death at dawn on Monday while she was asleep, reports quoting Iraq's interior ministry said. The assailants also robbed Rafah Butros Toma, who lived alone in Al-Wahda neighborhood, of her possessions. She was a witness to the massacre of worshipers in a failed rescue operation by Iraqi security forces in a Catholic church in central Baghdad on October 31.

44 congregants and two priests who assembled in Our Lady of Salvation Church for an evening mass were killed hours after militants held them hostage demanding the release of all al-Qaeda prisoners in Iraq and Egypt, including two Muslim women. Seven security force personnel who were deployed for rescue operation were also killed. Rafah Toma survived the suicide-bomb attack but her cousin was killed. It was followed by a threat from 'Islamic State of Iraq' that it will attack Christians in Iraq and other parts of the world.

Who among the neocons would have thought that one of George W. Bush's final legacies would be bringing pogroms, bombings and genocide to Christians in his new zone of freedom?

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2011/01/iraq-in-2011.html

[timtom]

1. Religious freedom was much better under Saddam

Seriously.

[Igel]

3. In some ways.

The Sunnis had all the cards and were on top. They got lots of money for mosque construction and lots of Shi'ite mosques were confiscated and given to Sunnis. Ashura and a number of Shi'ite celebrations were heavily restricted. (Some religious freedom was far, far more important than others. In the Iraq-Iran war the Shi'ites were cannon fodder, but the Sunni tribes from largely Salafist areas were Saddam's "base".)

Christians had less persecution. It took a second source of physical power to mount such persecution. None are allowed in most tyrannies--if there's another source of political power it may threaten the top dog, and that's no serious no-no. But since the Sunnis were occupying their proper place in the world, or nearly so (at least wrt Xians and Shi'ites) there was no need to beef up their honor and mitigate humiliation: Some might feel the need because they're at the bottom of the Sunni hierarchy to make sure that the next rungs down are way, way beneath him, but there's also a strong tradition of viewing one's self as the protector of the lesser, subordinate Peoples of the Book. (In Iraq, Turkey, Egypt, and other places there's a long tradition, continued by Hamas, Mubarak, Faisal, and many others of saying that as long as Xians abide by the laws they're under the protection of thes state--invariably seen as a Muslim state--and so the state and Muslim have a duty to protect them.)

After the US invasion a lot of things happened. Other actors suddenly had physical force behind them. Persecution by private groups was possible. Moreover, the Sunnis that were the top dogs suddenly had their hero deposed. Convinced they were naturally to be the rulers and to benefit disproportionately, many convinced they were a majority of the populatin, they were suddenly shocked to find that they were a minority (not even a plurality) and that they were going to be #2 or maybe even #3. They'd get disproportionately less. How humiliating.

In fact, they were dispossessed of their Allah-ordained and Saddam-provided gains by Xians. (Remember, one legacy of the Ottomans is that "Christian" is often viewed as an ethnicity.) Xians are Xians, just like many Americans view "black" as "black", regardless of differences between them. To take revenge on the Americans you can kill some Chaldeans. In fact, that accomplishes two goals: It keeps the uppity Xians in their place *and* it exacts revenge against the Xian invaders.

But it really pays to note that while a lot of SE Europe's problems were largely created by the Ottomans, a lot of Iraq's post-Saddam problems were largely created by Saddam. In the '60s and '70s the tribes and Salafists were being disempowered. He reinstated their prerogatives, told a new generation how superior they were, and got them used to thinking they really were superior. If the program of the '60s and '70s had continued, Iraq would have continued to become "modern" instead of becoming more medieval. Even the Kurdish split in the north was created in large part by Saddam's repressive ethnic policies, and his forced population relocations certainly created some problems for the years after his fall.

Religious freedom for the obedient and subservient was better under Saddam, unless you were Sunni then it was a lot better and if you were a Shi'ite it wasn't better, it was worse. For Xians it was better because while the state didn't allow some practices in public in mixed areas the generalized repression defanged their enemies and, as long as your primary religion was Saddamism your secondary religion was less important.

The US really did help let the nasties loose--it didn't create them. It also helped make the nasties pissed off, but stating why requires losing a kind of cultural blindness. Even on DU, where it's easier to blame the US for letting the nasties loose than it is to understand why the nasties are nasty and blame them and both homegrown political and cultural reasons for being nasty. As in Yugoslavia the loss of a strongman revealed the pathologies that were present. As in Yugoslavia, some of the pathologies are of long standing--and yet others were created by the strongman to keep him strong and his enemies weak.

[timtom]

5. Wow! Great response!!!

I was being superficial and looking at it more or less from a Christian perspective (read Tariq Aziz). But your response is a masterpiece unto itself. Thank you for taking the time to lay it out.

Thanks again.

[Kingofalldems]

2. That's the irony of this whole thing

And not a peep out of one of the filthy neocons on this matter.

[blondeatlast]

4. I don't think Jesus cries when a store clerk says "Happy Holidays," but I sorta bet he

feels like it whaen he sees violence rooted in religion.

Where's the outrage?