Japanese Anti-War Movement Hosts Iraqi Civil Resistance

by Bill Weinberg

Japan is one of the minor members of Bush's "coalition of the willing" in terms of troop commitment, but the Asian superpower's anti-war movement has made more progress than any other in the world in establishing direct links of human solidarity with the civil resistance in Iraq—groups of the embattled secular left which oppose the US-led occupation and the Islamist insurgents alike.

From a late-breaking AP account, Feb. 22. A day after the bombing of a Shiite market in Baghdad's Dora district, killing 22, comes the destruction of one of Shia's most sacred shrines in Samarra. Somebody is apparently hell-bent on plunging Iraq into civil war at any cost...and perhaps igniting sectarian warfare throughout the Islamic world.

A statement, apparently not yet posted elsewhere on the Web, from the UK branch of the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq (OWFI) and allied groups:

Civilised humanity must take a stand in defence of freedom of expression, against Islamists and racists
The recent controversy over some caricatures of Mohammed gave the Islamists an opportunity to wage a hysterical protest internationally. In many cases, this took a violent form and was clearly aimed at silencing those who dared to even portray Mohammed. In these demonstrations - across the world and in London, the very heart of Europe - many of the banners on show were emblazoned with shameful slogans. These included - "Those who insult Islam must be beheaded" and "Freedom go to hell" plus various other fatwas and threats against cartoonists and others who have the temerity to "insult" Islam.

A press release from Minority Rights Group International:

New York, (Jan. 26, 2006) Iraqis head a new list of peoples most under threat from persecution, discrimination and mass killing according to a comprehensive new report released today by Minority Rights Group International (MRG).

From Arab Monitor, Jan. 8:

US occupation troops burst into the Umm al-Qura Mosque compound in western Baghdad and ransacked the offices of the headquarter of the Association of Muslim Scholars. The troops arrested a member of the Association, two employees and two guardsmen. Pictures taken by Reuters TV showed that many doors had been forced open and explosive charges and shotgun shells strewn on the ground, while Christian crosses had been scrawled on the shelves used for deploying the worshippers' shoes.

Part Three in a Troubling Series

by Michael I. Niman

Remember Fallujah? It's the Iraqi city of 300,000 that we had to destroy in order to save back in April of 2004. Over 30 Americans died and over 400 American troops were wounded and airlifted away. And at least 1,200 Iraqis were killed. A Red Cross official reported that American forces used cluster bombs and chemical phosphorous weapons inside the city. The target of the U.S. assault, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, along with up to 80 percent of his fighters, managed to slip out of town, leaving the Fallujans to catch the brunt of the American attack. In the end, some 10,000 homes in the city were completely leveled, and an estimated 150,000 residents displaced.

An Interview with Gilbert Achcar

by Bill Weinberg

Gilbert Achcar is the author of The Clash of Barbarisms: September 11 and the Making of the New World Disorder (Monthly Review Press, 2002) and Eastern Cauldron: Islam, Afghanistan, Palestine and Iraq in a Marxist Mirror (Monthly Review Press, 2004). A native of Lebanon, he teaches international relations at the University of Paris, and is a frequent contributor to Le Monde diplomatique. On Nov. 3, he spoke in New York City at an event organized by the Campaign for Peace and Democracy entitled "The Case For Immediate Withdrawal: Wrestling with the Hard Questions." The following day, he spoke with WW4 REPORT's Bill Weinberg at his apartment in Lower Manhattan.

Nir Rosen has a piece in the December Atlantic Monthly entitled "If America Left Iraq: The case for cutting and running." Rosen poses the following questions and answers them all himself:

Would the withdrawal of U.S. troops ignite a civil war between Sunnis and Shiites?

No. That civil war is already under way—in large part because of the American presence. The longer the United States stays, the more it fuels Sunni hostility toward Shiite "collaborators." Were America not in Iraq, Sunni leaders could negotiate and participate without fear that they themselves would be branded traitors and collaborators by their constituents. Sunni leaders have said this in official public statements; leaders of the resistance have told me the same thing in private.