IRAQ: Extremists fuel anti-women violence in Basra

[Lone_Star_Dem]

Source: IRIN

BAGHDAD, 20 November 2007 (IRIN) - Anti-women violence in Basra, Iraq's second largest city, about 600 km south of the capital, Baghdad, has increased markedly in recent months and has forced women to stay indoors, police and local NGOs have said.

"Basra is facing a new type of terror which leaves at least 10 women killed monthly, some of them are later found in garbage dumps with bullet holes while others are found decapitated or mutilated," the city's police chief Maj. Gen. Abdel Jalil Khalaf told IRIN in a telephone interview.

"The perpetrators are organised gangs who work under religious cover pretending to spread instructions of Islam but they are far from this religion. They are trying to impose a life style like banning women from wearing western clothes or forcing them to wear head scarf," Khalaf said.

<snip>

"We do believe that the number of murdered women is much higher as more cases go unreported by their families who fear reprisals from extremists," he added.


Read more: http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=75396

[boricua79]

1. Two things

1) spread of freedom and democracy my ass! (my shot at Western arrogance and hypocrisy)
2) the peaceful, civilized religion my ass! (my shot at Islam).

The West needs to stick to its own affairs, and Islam needs to go through an Enlightenment and Reformation, because modern Islam, as it is mostly practiced, it's still a backwards, medieval religion.

Kudos to Muslims who practice tolerant forms of Islam compatible with modern life. No problems with you. But, I'm not ignoring the elephant in the room. There's millions of Muslims who practice a medieval version of Islam, and it's not cool and we shouldn't ignore it. I have the same scorn for Christian evangelicals who practice their own medieval version of Christianity. So I'm not taking religious sides.

Blame where it is due.

[Tempest]

2. Isn't this where the British pulled out claiming it was a success story?

If I were an Iraqi woman, I'd be fearful of more of these "success" stories.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

4. From their perspective this may be what an invading forces success in Iraq will look like.

I can imagine Basra is an example of what will become of most of Iraq. Those who have the power are the religious extremist and their ultimate goals will become law. Eventually they'll kill, subdue or run off those who appose their beliefs.

If anyone was "bombed back to the stone age" from this invasion it was the women, the non-Muslims and the moderates in Iraq. The fact that this is simply accepted as 'uncontrollable' or 'expected' doesn't make it any less devastating on those whose way of life was completely destroyed.


More from the article:

Like other parts of Iraq, Basra before the US-led invasion in 2003 was known for its mixed population and active night life with social and night clubs. Basra women had the right to choose their own life-style although it was considered a tribal society.

But now vigilantes patrol the streets of Basra on motorbikes or in cars with dark-tinted windows and no license plates. They accost women who are not wearing the traditional dress and head scarf known as hijab. They also attack men for clothes or haircuts deemed too Western.

[Baby Snooks]

3. So much for liberation and democracy

The reality of Saddam Hussein is the people of Iraq were much better off under him than under the "democracy" brought to them by the Bushes.

As for liberation, the only thing the Bushes have wanted to liberate is the oil. And so far, they haven't managed to liberate it. The only thing they've managed to do is plunge the Iraqi people into the Dark Ages of fundamentalist Islam.

We hanged Saddam Hussein for killing the very people we are killing which sums up the hypocrisy of the Bushes and of the Republicans and of the Democrats who supported all of this.

All the Bushes care about is the oil. Which most likely they will never get. They never got it in Iran. They most likely will never get it in Iraq. And millions of Iraqis along with millions of Iranians have died for their misguided and evil belief that they would.

And millions more Iraqi and Iranian women will be plunged into the darkness as well.

[Robbien]

5. This is the same thing which is happening all over Iraq

We took out all the Iraqi civilizational structures and of course the extremists are taking over in the vacuum.