Ishtar at the gallows.

What kind of government hangs its women?
This is precisely what the IraNqi/American government in Baghdad is planning to do.
Three women not older than 31 are to be hanged with no trial, no legal counsel, no defence, no witnesses and obscure charges that no one has bothered to elucidate.
These three women Zainab, Liqa and Wassan are held in the Khadimyiah prison in a " predominantly shia area" (see I caught the virus too) (see articles here and here).
If you remember well, this is exactly the same place where the late President Saddam Hussein met his fate. At the gallows of the Khadimyiah prison H.Q
Another sectarian lynching is about to take place not too far from Imam al Kadhim shrine.

Ahmadinajad and Khamenae will be giving Muqtada al Sadr, Al Hakim and Maliki the highest medals of the Quds Brigades for bravery and patriotism.Those same brigades that have trained their militias in the art of rape and torture.
And they will be providing M.Al Sadr with a new set of more performing drills whilst he is hiding in Teheran or have them door delivered in Najaf.

Or maybe they should ask Mr.Cockburn to deliver them himself. Our new Lawrence of Arabia with a nasal twang, behind his red and white checkered kuffieh and carrying a copy of the New Yorker...so he can pass incognito.
Can anyone get more orientalist than that?
That partly explains his fascination with Muqtada al Sadr in his new article on Counterpunch.
Again, Cockburn proves to be the expert,par excellence,in the art of disinformation.
Read his article and you will find a good deal of his insidious twisting and turning, rock and roll style.
To start with and I shall not give Cockburn more than a few lines, he states that 70% unemployment rate in Iraq remains unchanged from the days of Saddam Hussein.
Either Cockburn cannot read or he is simply lying.
The CIA Economic report on Iraq from 1989-2003 states that the unemployment rate was 28% and not 70% as Cockburn claims.
Moreover, the unemployment rate has been steadily increasing since the "liberation" of Iraq because the American administration under the CPA had decided to monopolize ALL the following industries : Construction, Dairy, Food, Agriculture, Oil...
And when a group of Iraqi engineers from various specializations met with CPA officials in late 2003, they were told that Iraqis can settle for blue collar jobs for 150 dollars a month! Alternatively they can branch out into small enterprises and the CPA guy giving the lecture gave as an example "A mushroom farm."
"Let Iraqis grow mushrooms" he said...

Furthermore when Cockburn states that Sadr is the only anti-imperialist that needs to be included in the political process, how does he explain than more than 6 sadrists members of parliament are already actively involved in the political process? And that Sadrists are in charge of the ministries of Education, Health and Labor?
Moreover his claims that Al-Sadr family was killed by Saddam Hussein is disputable-read what Roads to Iraq has to say about that.

Moreover Cockburn fails to mention that in 2004, Muqtada al Sadr deposed his arms against 50 dollars for each of his boys only to take them up again upon directives from the hardliners in Teheran who bought him off both politically and financially and turn his arms against the Iraqi sunnis calling them "Jihadists and Wahabists".

And last but not least, when Cockburn states that the sadrists militias have not infiltrated the Iraqi Army and the Police,he is not only blatantly disinforming, he is also belying what thousands of Iraqis already know and have experienced at the hands of these street thugs. Hence disrespecting not only the victims of the "sunni pogroms" (the only truthful thing he alluded to) but also in the typical condenscending, patronizing, orientalist manner that we are so used to from both Western Academia and Journalism, discounting the Iraqis experience of their OWN reality.
I am offering Cockburn this video by Muqtada al Sadr where he mentions clearly that his boys are to infiltrate the Iraqi army followed by scenes of mass detention of what the extremist shias call "Jihadists and Wahabis" i.e. a) anyone who opposes the current state of affairs-the resistance under its different forms and b) anyone who is not a shia.
And let him find a real Iraqi to translate it for him in his Green Zone living quarters.

No wonder Cockburn was a finalist for the National Book Critic Award...He knows the music all too well!
Enough on Cockburn, he deserves no more.

Mind you Cockburn is not the only one,there are a few others who hold the same line.
They are almost teary eyed at the "oft demonization" of Muqtada al Sadr.
How about I have a few boxes of tissues sent to them special delivery. You can all sit together with Cockburn and cry your droopy eyes out. Too bad those Iraqis who had their eyes gouged out by the Al-Sadr militias will not be able to join you lot.

For those of you who can't be bothered to read daily news coming from Baghdad and yet profess themselves to be "experts" on Iraq, and that includes the "reporter" above, just so that you know, not less than 10 people were found in a Shia mosque, being tortured to death plus another 40 plus already dead. All this information can be found on www.uruknet.com.
Check the various articles gathered from different newsources.

Moreover, a reliable source informed me today that there has already been an infiltration of the Resistance by sectarian shia militias in al Anbar province for a final inner purge and I heard the same for Baghdad.
A lot of these sectarian militias are now pretending to be anti-occupation.You have been forwarned.
Furthermore, I was told and I personally cannot confirm since I did not go around personally interviewing resistance fighters, that there is a request that all of you who support the resistance to ante up your prayers and the sentence told:" We are at hour zero, this is the decisive hour, either make or break."

Back to these three young Iraqi women, daughters of this land who are going to be executed by none other than "Iraqi" men.
What horror, what a predicament, what a message for the rest of us surviving women.
It seems they were involved in anti-occupation resistance but nothing more was said and no proof given.

Their possible execution if we don't act now, should be seen in the general context of the sectarianism financed by Iran and encouraged and planned by the USA for the ultimate partition of Iraq. I will keep on repeating it until I am blue in the face.

The "pogroms of the sunnis" are part of the partition plan. Change the demography first, then partition. It is no civil war as some of you like to believe.

No shame, no morals, no ethics, nothing but a filth ridden bigoted, sectarian, fascist thugs in full cooperation with the Americans. Disgusting, nauseating sons of bitches.
Where have these bastards emerged from? The womb of Iran's government?
What kind of "men" throw the women of their own country in filthy jails and am sure these women were raped too, with no trial and no real charges?
What does that tell us about these people?
And the irony of it all? It is all done under the name of "liberation and democracy."

Where are the famous Iraqi "democrats" males and females who supposedly underwent torture under the previous regime? How come they have not filled the daily newspapers with their stale, jaded rethoric?
Or is it because they have suddenly felt an upsurge of sympathy towards their own sect?
Where are the Kanan Makiyas and his like who made millions from lamenting to the Western press about their ordeals in pre-liberated Iraq when they themselves had left Iraq since childhood?

It took someone like Saddam Hussein to keep this sectarian filth off our backs and rightly so.
In retrospect, everything he has done, mistakes and all, was absolutely correct.
Let Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch sue me now.

Execute the women of Iraq, young and old. Execute anyone who speaks out against both the occupation by America and Iran. This is it. This is what it boils down to.
Yet so many deliberately refuse to see these stark facts.
How many more Ishtars will it take?

Anyone who knows about mythology, will also know that Ishtar is not only the Goddess of fertility and love in ancient Sumerian legends but she is also the Goddess of War, capable of great cruelty and capable of foresaking her self in search of her ultimate love Tammuz.
She plunged into the underworld looking for him and resurfaced triumphant.

Daughters of Ishtar, you too will return triumphant. I do not know when, but I know you will.
I know this analogy is not of much help...and I feel totally powerless.
I know it will not bring your lives back. But when everything is being uprooted around me, pulled out from its origins, I have nothing to go back to but the ancient ones.
It may be my own helpless way of comforting myself even though I know fully well it is not of much comfort to you, daughters of Ishtar.

On the same subject of Iraq. I saw this call for action by "Troops out now", the anti-war movement, for a march on the occasion of the 4th "anniversary of the "war" i.e the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
It was no war, it was/is an occupation - call things by their names will you!
When I read it, I did not know if I should laugh or cry.
On the agenda are the following items:
- Withdrawal from Iraq - well thank you.
and listen to this:
- End colonial occupation from Africa to Asia passing by Puerto Rico and the Phillipines, Palestine, Iran, Lebanon, Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia... wait it gets better...
- Solidarity with immigrants and Katrina survivors, stop racist policies, demand education grants...

Hey, why don't you add protesters against the rising price of cucumbers too?
You know, just to complete the picture.
Or maybe chronic back pain sufferers ...like myself for instance. Why don't you invite me to join your wonderful march? I have been suffering from back pains ever since 2003. Do you think you might have anything to do with it or should I blame Puerto Rico for being a pain in the ass?

Well, well,well...What a wonderful way to DILUTE it all...
Anyone reading this tract will say...Hmm, Ok Iraq figures about once or twice...
What a wonderful way to demand for a FIRM END TO THE OCCUPATION OF IRAQ NOW and nothing else.
The 17th of march "Anniversary" as you like to call it, should be your friggin priority...IRAQ is your PRIORITY.
And if 3 million dead and 3.7 million displaced because of YOUR government are not a priority then you are either a stupid lot or a bunch of sell outs and I would personally settle for the latter.

Back to Baghdad...
Spoke to Naeema earlier on.
-How are you?
-Al Hamdullah we are alive
-What do you mean we are alive, I know you are alive but how are you?
-The important thing is that we are alive

I put the receiver down and I simply broke down...
You know it is these sentences that come out almost automatically, in a semi unconscious mode, blurted out from some deep recess that conveys it all best.

We are alive, it does not matter how we are alive, it does not matter how we are living, it does not matter what our situation is, it does not matter what we are going through, it does not matter that we don't have water, electricity, food, jobs, hospitals, medication...the important thing is that we are alive...

This is what you have rendered us into. A people counting their breaths and making sure they are still alive.
You took the whole of Iraq, Ishtar to the gallows.
Old and young, men and women and you have hanged all of us gasping for air and thanking God for being alive.
You will never be forgiven for that, ever.
And I have no other cheek left to turn.

Postscript: This video just came out, showing what happened in Haifa Street. Massacres conducted by the Americans and the torture conducted by the Shiite militias of which Jaysh Al Mahdi that Cockburn defends. He said in his article, for Iraqis , all the militias are the Mahdi Army, they cannot differentiate .WE were waiting for that SOB to give us the nuances...F... you Cockburn.

Painting: Iraqi female artist, Betool Fekeiki.