More 'Mission Accomplished'.
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Published on Tuesday, December 18, 2007 by Inter Press Service
Iraq: ³Bad² Women Raped and Killed
by Ali al-Fadhily
BAGHDAD - Women are being killed by militia groups in southern Iraq for
not conforming to strict Islamic ways, the police say. And, increased
threats from militia groups is driving many women away from their
homes.1218 07
Basra police chief Gen. Jalil Hannoon has told reporters and Arab TV
channels that at least 40 women have been killed during the past five
months in the southern city.
³We are sure there are many more victims whose families did not report
their killing for fear of scandal,² Gen. Hannoon said.
The militias dominated by the Shia Badr Organisation and the Mehdi Army
are leading imposition of strict Islamic rules. The enforcement of these
ways comes at a time when British troops have left Basra, the biggest
town in the south, to the Iraqi government.
The Shia-dominated Iraqi government is seen as providing tacit and
sometimes direct support to militias. The Badr Organisation answers to
the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC), the Shia bloc in the Iraqi
government. The Mehdi army is the militia of anti-occupation Shia cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr.
Women who do not wear the hijab are becoming prime targets of militias,
residents say. Many women say they are threatened with death if they do
not obey.
³Militiamen approached us to tell us we must wear the hijab and stop
wearing make-up,² college student Zahra Alwan who fled Basra for Baghdad
recently told IPS. ³They are imitating the Iranian Revolution Guards,
and we believe they receive orders from the Islamic Republic (of Iran)
to do so.²
Graffiti in red on walls across Basra warns women against wearing
make-up and stepping out without covering their bodies from head to toe,
Alwan said.
³The situation in Baghdad is not very different,² Mazin Abdul Jabbar,
social researcher at Baghdad University told IPS. ³All universities are
controlled by Islamic militiamen who harass female students all the time
with religious restrictions.²
Jabbar said this is one reason that ³many families have stopped sending
their daughters to high schools and colleges.²
Earlier this year Iraq¹s Ministry of Education found that more than 70
percent of girls and young women no longer attend school or college.
Several women victims were accused of being ³bad² before they were
abducted, residents say. Most abducted women are later found dead. The
bodies of several were found in garbage dumps, showing signs of rape and
torture. Several bodies had a note attached saying the woman was ³bad²,
according to several residents who did not give their name.
A Shia cleric in Baghdad spoke to IPS on condition of anonymity to
defend killings.
³We are an Islamic country and we must commit to the restrictions of our
religion,² he said. ³We must not allow corruption to invade our families
under flag of freedom and such nonsense.²
Sunni clerics offered a different view.
³It is against Islamic regulations for women to expose their hair and
bodies,² Sheikh Tariq al-Abdaly told IPS in Baghdad. ³But this is not an
Islamic state, and so all we can do is to advise women, same as we
advise men, to follow those regulations. In any case, punishment for
such mistakes should certainly be much less than execution.²
Iraqi liberals are deeply frustrated by the lack of personal freedom.
³We are so disappointed with the loss of what there was of Iraqi women¹s
achievements under a regime (of former president Saddam Hussein) that we
saw as retarded,² Salim Mahmood of the Iraqi Communist Party in Baghdad
told IPS.
³The Americans promised they would make Iraq a symbol of liberty and
prosperity. Now it has neither.²
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http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/12/18/5883/
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John #1782
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