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Scheherezade Faramarzi, a reporter for the Associated Press in Lebanon and member of the Class of 2009, was a guest speaker at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs on Tuesday, Dec. 9.

The seminar, titled “Rethinking the Conflicts in the Middle East: Can the New U.S. Administration Play a Constructive Role?” was part of the Herbert C. Kelman Seminar on International Conflict Analysis and Resolution series.

Below is the transcript of her speech:

Let me talk about the people who are affected by the decisions and policies. For too long, Middle East policies have been dominated from politics above. What I would like to look at is what happens below, in the streets.I want to talk about the views, perceptions and feelings of the people that should matter and should be taken to heart by the future American Administration.

I’m not going to address big policy questions, such as an Iraq exit strategy, Afghanistan, closing down Guantanamo, renditions and other illegal prisons, re-evaluating the war on terror and of course the most difficult of all, the Israel — Palestinian question.

I want to talk about people like Sheikh Saad al — Hardan, leader of the Dulaimi tribe in Iraq’s Western Anbar Province who gave the most honest and forthright advice after the Americans apologized for detaining him for 12 days and asked him how they could open a new chapter with the Iraqi people.

“It’s simple. Stop humiliating us. Do not wound our dignity,” the tribal leader told them.

Unfortunately the Americans never really heeded his advice as they continued their operations to quell the insurgency, hurting many innocent people along the way.

U.S. forces came in full force to take Sheik al — Hardan at 6:30 in the morning — with more than 120 troops, several tanks and other armored vehicles and six helicopters. They laid siege to the house and surrounding fields. They found nothing when they searched his residence, but left with more than 70 men and boys. Sheikh Hardan was among them. Most of the captives were hooded, handcuffed and transported to nearby military bases. They were left in the sun for hours, not allowed to use toilets.

Sheikh Hardan’s arrest appeared to be American suspicions that he was leading a resistance group financed by Saddam Hussein.

His 70-year-old uncle, sheikh Tarik, remembered with some kind of fondness when the British ruled Iraq early last century.

“They would shake our hands before they came to search us,” he told me. “At least”, he said, “they did not humiliate us in front of our families.”

I want to stress the importance of language, style, attitude, and respect that play a big role in the way the U.S. makes itself felt in the Middle East. This is one area where I think the new administration might put some attention. The new president has to be attentive to these.

After years of entanglement in the region, Americans still ignore the fact that Middle Easterners are very proud, sensitive, and let’s not forget very intelligent people. I would like to stress this because Americans are still wedded to generations-old perception that Arabs are illiterate and are nothing more than goat herderers in the desert.

Early in the occupation, in my communication with the Iraqi people, including those who still held strong feelings for Saddam Hussein, I was struck by how easy it was to win them over if only the Americans just cared more, listened and helped.

There was a very angry 60-year-old woman whom I got to know in the northern city of Mosul, a former stronghold of the Iraqi army. Mazlooma, was her name. She was an avid supporter of Saddam Hussein and of course resented the American occupation of her country. She even defiantly hung a big picture of Saddam in her room, even though it was a risk to her and her family.

One day when I was visiting her, I told her that I was meeting with Gen. David Petraeus that afternoon and asked her if there was anything she wanted me to tell him. Gen. Petraeus was then the commander of the 101st Airborne Division that controlled northern Iraq.

“Tell him to give us electricity,” was all she wanted.

I did relay the message to Gen. Petraeus who gave me all the infrastructure reasons why this would take a long time but that the Americans were doing their best to provide power to the area.

A few days later when I went to see Mazlooma again, she greeted me with a big smile and a thank you. “What a kind man,” she said, referring to the general. “Ever since that day, we’ve been having more hours of electricity,” she said.

Of course it was just a coincidence and short-lived, but she wanted to believe that the American general had listened, had cared and wanted to help the Iraqi people.

Even if intentions are not so accommodating, the power of the word is phenomenal in the Middle East, something the Americans have rarely used appropriately.

American officials usually speak about Arabs or Muslims as if they are not in the room, that they don’t understand English. They forget that they are also part of the global media and internet world and can hear loud and clear the language and rhetoric that reduce them to crazed or irrational zealots who are innately murderous.

American leaders need to think carefully before using inflammatory rhetoric that play right into the hands of terrorist leaders and recruiters, and the U.S. has provided plenty of ammunition to al Qaida-like groups to exploit frustrated young men who have nothing to lose.

Effects of insensitive comments like Madeleine Albright’s when she said that sanctions against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq was worth the death of 500,000 Iraqi children, or Condoleezza Rice’s likening the continuation of Israel’s bombardment of Lebanon in 2006 as the “birth pangs of a new Middle East,” linger for years and sow the seeds of hatred.

Respect and appropriate language when used by the new administration will be echoed by the mainstream media, which have unfortunately had their own share of demonizing Arabs and Muslims. Labeling and stereotyping is the not uncommon.

It would give an opportunity to the media here to repeat the more constructive phrases, tones and avoid insensitive terminologies in their coverage of international issues.

Terms such as ‘Axis of Evil’ every time referring to Iran are liberally used in the media, even if the story is about growing saffron in the northeast of the country.

Unfortunately this is the trend the new generation of journalists has become accustomed to for the past eight to ten years. Skepticism is almost absent in mainstream media that carry Pentagon or American official statements – despite repeated lies — as the absolute truth.

The real casualty here is the truth and the integrity of journalism. Many stories or parts of stories don’t make it because of stereotypes, biases and fears of offending one side or the other.

In radio and TV interviews journalists still refer to U.S. enemies as the ‘bad guys’ and the Americans the ‘good guys.’

I must say that Barack Obama has not got off to a good start himself in that domain.

He is right about a responsible withdrawal from Iraq. But his statements that the U.S. is spending $10 billion a month on its war efforts in Iraq “when they have a $79 billion surplus, at a time when we are in great distress here at home,” can come across as a little irresponsible and insensitive.

Compare the distress of the American people to the suffering of the Iraqis, whose babies die of the most basic diseases such as diarrhea and dehydration.
Take 3-month-old Ali Mohammed Jabbar — whom I called Baby Ali in my stories. He died of a bacterial blood infection that was easily treated if more advanced medical care had been available.

Obama never mentions that it was America’s war that ripped apart the entire nation’s infrastructure, that daily 24-hour power cuts are the norm, that the streets are rivers of sewage, and hospitals have no medical facilities.

And let’s not forget that Baghdad remains the most dangerous city in the world. Almost every Iraqi family has lost a relative, and usually more than one. There’s no official figure for the Iraqi dead — reports range from 250,000 to half a million to a million.

More than two million are refugees, the majority living in appalling conditions in neighboring Syria and Jordan. The United States only allowed 800 and last year said it would let 7,000 into the country.

Obama doesn’t mention the billions of dollars that private U.S. contractors profited from the conflict and the so-called rebuilding of Iraq. A recent BBC investigation estimated that around $23 billion may have been lost, stolen or just not properly accounted for in Iraq by these contractors.

The next president shouldn’t wash America’s hands of its moral responsibility for the, damage and destruction wrought by its military operation in Iraq over the past six years.

In a perfect and just world, it should pay compensation to Iraqi people for destroying their country and causing the death of nearly a million people.
That officials in the corrupt U.S.-backed government will pocket much of the $70 billion surplus Iraq receives this year is another story, but nonetheless it should not relieve the American people of their responsibility toward the suffering Iraqi people.

People like Anwaar Kawaz who was nine months pregnant when American soldiers opened fire on her car as she traveled home with her husband Adel, 18-year-old son Haydar, her daughters, 17-year-old Olaa, 13-year-old Hadeel and 8-year-old Mirvet. Only she and Hadeel survived.

It was an August night in 2003. The sweltering heat blew up an electrical transformer, plunging the north Baghdad suburb of Slaykh into total darkness. Fearing an attack, American soldiers immediately went on alert, setting up new and unannounced checkpoints on the dark street intersections. Within 45 minutes, six Iraqis driving home before the 11 p.m. curfew and unaware of the checkpoints were shot and killed by U.S. soldiers. They all had their windows up and the air condition on.

A couple of blocks away, 19-year-old Sayf Ali who had just received his high school diploma was driving with two friends to celebrate the good news with his aunt. Loud music blasted from his car stereo. He didn’t see or hear the American soldiers ordering him to stop. They opened fire on the blue station wagon which kept moving after Ali was shot. His friends managed to jump out. Soldiers kept firing until the car caught fire incinerating Ali’s body.

About the same time, 31-year-old Ali Salman, also unaware of the unannounced American checkpoints was driving home. He too, was killed.

Only Anwaar Kawaz received compensation from the Americans — about $10,000 for taking the lives of four members of her family. She was grateful. With the death of her husband she had lost her livelihood.

But the Americans accused the two dead Iraqi men of being terrorists. They never apologized, never took responsibility and only sowed the seed of hatred in the hearts of their families.

The August 2003 incident was one of the first in a series of unprovoked American killings of innocent Iraqis that set the stage for anti — American sentiments in Iraq resulting in the deadly insurgency that now claims the lives of so many Iraqis.

Even Americans opposed to war hardly mention the Iraqi dead. Their concern is mainly the five thousand or more U.S. soldiers killed. It’s not because of the destruction of the country. It’s because of the tax-payer’s money spent on this senseless war.

This is insensitive. It’s hurtful to the Iraqi people and Arabs generally.

The Iraqi dead are faceless victims and unlike the American casualties, we don’t know their names, their faces are not splashed on TV screens, they are not honored and we don’t know how they lived their lives.

The next administration should also take full responsibility for the welfare of the millions of Iraqi refugees in Jordan and Syria and those displaced inside Iraq. As alarming as it sounds, they should either allow them to settle in the U.S. or provide all the care they need wherever they are.

A gesture such as this would go a long way to restore some of America’s lost credibility and respect in the world.

A very symbolic gesture would be to apologize to the Iraqi people for the suffering it caused them — something that will probably not even sit well with the American people and could even have a whole lot of repercussions. But if Obama is sincere about change this is the path he could take.

In an off the record interview with the Washington Post in 2003 when there was talk that General Anthony Zinny (former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command) might become the Proconsul in Baghdad if John Kerry won the election, he was asked what was the first thing he would do when he takes the job.

“APOLOGIZE,” he said.

I think he understands the world and the Middle East well.

Since the war in Iraq, grievances against the United States are no longer just about double-standards in its unwavering support for Israel. Many in the Middle East now regard U.S. policy amounting to war on Islam.

Until the Iraq conflict, people had come to expect Washington use its veto power to kill one U.N. Security Council resolution after another that condemned Israel for its actions against Arabs.

I don’t think anyone even expects the U.S. to abandon its support for Israel or stop giving it billions of dollars in aid and military assistance. But what it needs to do is stop rubbing the noses of Palestinians in the dirt while doing so.

It expects it to be just a little fair. This is how bad the situation is and how low expectations are.

I am not sure if Barack Obama is willing to take this challenge. Already he has disappointed many in the Middle East. Any expectation that he just might be a little fair and understanding was all but dashed with his speech to AIPAC (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee) in June. It confirmed what they had always known to be an unspoken fact in American presidential politics.

Obama, who used the familiar insensitive language and tone, didn’t mention Palestinian rights or security when he spoke of the sanctity of Israel’s security. What the Palestinians heard him say was that their lives are not as important as the Israelis’, that their security is only guaranteed if they accept the sanctity of Israel’s security.

He did not even condemn Israel for building settlements on Palestinian lands. He only called for no new settlements and said that Jerusalem is the undivided capital of Israel.

Even Israel’s outgoing Prime Minister has shown more understanding of the reality. In a recent interview with the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper Ehud Olmert conceded that Israel should give up parts of Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Golan Heights, if it’s really serious about peace with the Palestinians.

The West Bank, which is hardly talked about these days, is a mess. Palestinians are restricted from moving around their areas because of the walls that protect the Jewish settlements. They have to wait for hours at Israeli checkpoints.

When I was there in May, I accompanied an Israeli friend and human rights activist, who gave rides to sick Palestinians to hospitals in Israel.

One was 5-year-old Diaa who suffered from bone cancer and had to travel for hours everyday from his home in Jenin to get to the Hadassa Hospital in Jerusalem. His father Samir was ever so grateful to my friend Rachel for driving him to Jerusalem that day. If he had to make the trip himself, it would have taken him three hours by bus — uncomfortable for a sick child.

We stayed with them at the hospital for five hours as Diaa received his chemotherapy and played with the other kids, all Israelis. They all got along.

I asked his father who he voted for in the last election in 2002. For Hamas, he said, even though he worked for Mahmoud Abbas’ Municipality in Nablus. “Not for religious reasons,” he stressed. The Palestinian Authority, he said, “is too corrupt and doesn’t care for us.”

Despite Obama’s remarks about Israel, Middle Easterners hope against hope that he may still come through. Part of the optimism is simple joy at the imminent end of the Bush administration. This is how desperate the situation in the Middle East is. The new administration has to move quickly to ease the tension, to ease the suffering there.

There’s a close and acute inter — relationship between all the issues of foreign policy regarding the Middle East. This inter-connectedness requires full attention to all the components, it requires a comprehensive policy.

If Obama truly wants to resolve much of the conflict — that affects the United States as well — he must speak to adversaries before it’s too late. The U.S. has to speak to Hamas, to Taliban (those who are willing to talk), to Iran and Syria.

He cannot continue Bush’s policy of piecemeal diplomacy, he cannot speak of spreading democracy and then reject Hamas’ election and even help Fatah stage a coup against the group in Gaza as President Bush did.

To Arabs — even those who do not support Hamas — this was another example of American hypocrisy.

There was substantial evidence that if Hamas was given the time and opportunity it would have — like the PLO did before it — eventually recognize Israel.

IRAN:
The new administration must make Iran central to its Mideast policy. It is a big player in the Middle East — Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and the Arab — Israeli issue as well as in the Caucasus.

Obama’s choice of Hilary Clinton as Secretary of State may be a bit problematic if he wants to open dialogue with Tehran. Mrs. Clinton took an uncompromising position toward the Islamic Republic during her own campaign when she threatened to ‘obliterate’ it after its president Ahmadinejad said the Israeli regime would be destroyed.

Now Mrs. Clinton may have to sit down with the leaders of a country she wanted to destroy. We’re told that she said those words in the heat of the election campaign and should not be taken seriously. However, we are expected to take Ahamdinejad seriously when he threatens Israel.

Obama has to meet with President Ahmadinejad, who has the ear of Iran’s supreme leader, before the Iranian election in the spring. He’s better positioned to seriously engage the United States because there is nobody more hard-line than him in Iran.

Ahmadinejad’s comments about Israel have won him supporters around the Arab world. People in Morocco, Egypt and other countries that are no friends of Iran’s, speak fondly of him for standing up to the Americans.

Even Iranians who oppose him are behind his stand against America’s tough talk over his nuclear program.

I was surprised to learn that some of the people I know well and who are opposed to the regime support Ahmadinejad in his quarrel with the United States.

One is a young lady who is so unhappy with living in Iran that she has applied to emigrate to Canada. She asked my thoughts about Iran having nuclear weapons. I told her I was against it for every country, including Iran. I expected her to agree. “I am for it,” she announced proudly, defiantly, I couldn’t tell the tone. Was it because she believed in states having nuclear weapon or because of the way Iran is picked on so much. I was relieved to hear it was the latter.

If Iran is not brought in line, Obama wants to tighten sanctions against it which are only hurting the people, not the regime. In fact the regime is making huge profits out of black-market business. So he will continue punishing the nation without making much progress with his Iran policy.

Talks on the nuclear issue as part of a comprehensive negotiation will be difficult and will take a long time and the U.S. will not necessarily get entirely what it wants. The new administration has to be patient and not give up after a couple of failed sessions, tighten sanctions and then come under pressure to launch an attack.

Obama has said the threat of military action will remain on the table. If they go with that attitude, there will be a lot of pressure from hawks to give up on talks and go to war.

As I said America’s inflexible approach toward Iran has even antagonized Iranian liberals opposed to the regime.

Human rights groups rightly have accused the West of overplaying the nuclear issue and Ahmadinejad’s comments about Israel at the expense of the regime’s human rights violations of its own people. The voices of dissent are being drowned out by Ahamdinejad’s daily rhetoric and the West has given him the audience and attention he needs. He’s happy because internal problems have taken a back seat. And Iranians can only thank the West for this.

Again, only good attitude, respect, proper language along with the right and smart policies that benefit both sides — not just the Americans and the Israelis — will bring about some success in America’s Mideast policy. It will take a long time and a great deal of effort to repair the damages and regain U.S. credibility in the Muslim world, perhaps a whole generation to trust America even if it began working on it today.

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