I spent the morning reading blogs from bloggers in Iran and Iraq. Their understanding of our language is great, but the way they use it is astonishing. The voices, filled with despair over the horror and helplessness of today and the morbid fear of tomorrow. Some of the passages are filled with anger, and some wax poetic on memories of the place that they call home. Almost all would rather be somewhere else, the "freedom" that the Americans promised has turned into an occupation where no one is safe, and there are no "sides", just the sound of gunfire and the beat of helicopter blades and the screaming of the wounded and the soon to be dead.
Iraqi's speak of things that you don't hear in our media. It didn't take me long to find actual eyewitness accounts of what is happening on the streets of Baghdad. This is some of what I found: A newly married Iranian woman that calls herself "A Neurotic Iraqi" writes about A "Nation of The Damned"; A hundred Indian rupees is about $2.27. An Iraqi is now worth less than that. Yes, Iraqi blood has become so cheap that even haggling is not worth the effort. Bravo humans of the world. Bravo to everyone who talks about humanity and human rights. Bravo to you, the so called honourable neighbours of Iraq. Bravo to United States and Britian. Bravo to all of you for lending a helping hand.
To be an Iraqi today equates to someone carrying a fatal contagious virus. No body wants you, no body wants to help you, no body wants to be near you, no body wants to touch you. To be an Iraqi today, you have to get used to "friendly" neighbouring countries slamming their doors in your face. To be an Iraqi today, you have to fend for yourself, for you are alone, alone in a world that preaches human rights, yet do nothing, nothing to save you. Nothing to save you from a mortar, a rocket, a suicide bomb, a militia gang, a bullet. Nothing to save you from the savages that are eating your flesh while youre still alive.
Another Iraqi, a Dentist writes:
Saturday, February 17, 2007
Scenes from Baghdad
A view of the dozens of corpses lying in the streets of Baghdad, often for weeks. These scenes of Iraq's civil war have become such a daily part of people's lives so much that they don't bother to remove the bodies. Those were taken in Adhamiya a month ago and the victims were judged as "strangers" or "spies" before they were shot and thrown with the garbage in the street. People in the neighbourhood just covered them with blankets and moved on. Those bodies are rarely counted in the daily death toll, and when they are counted they're just "unknown corpses."
The words of Iranian's can sound almost as if they could have come from the heart of an American writer, the words and style so familiar, but the description is Iranian:
In recent days, as Mr. Bush's camp have heightened their pro-war rhetoric and activities, there has been increasing alarm among Iranian activists, journalists, and/or intellectuals that Mr. Bush is seriously preparing for an all-out bombing of Iran. Former State official Wayne White, who has seen the planning, claims that this will be a devastating and broad based attack; "You're not talking about a surgical strike", he emphasized.
There is so much more to see. I got these clips from blogs at Liberal Oasis under "Get Iraqi Blogged", and "Get Iran Blogged". If you haven't checked these blogs out you should. It would give you a little perspective from the other side. One more thing, I tried to get a video of a Humvee driving down a street in Iraq pushing other cars out of the way by smacking them in the rear. It's here on this link:
http://benevis-dige.blogspot.com/
Well, that's it for me. Have a nice Sunday afternoon.