The Common Ills: A kiss rolls Sulaimani while violence rolls Iraq

Wednesday, October 23, 2013

A kiss rolls Sulaimani while violence rolls Iraq

In 1974, Carly Simon's Hotcakes was released. The opening track, written by Carly and Jacob Brackman, was "Safe and Sound:"

If through all the madness
We can stick together
We're safe and sound
The world's just inside out and upside down

Around the world, in all the madness and in all the violence, people try to have normal lives. It's a basic sentiment, some would argue need. Janis Ian and Kye Fleming's "Some People's Lives" also addresses the need for a connection in a chaotic world:

Some people ask --
If the tears have to fall,
then why take your chances?
Why bother at all?
And some people's lives
are as cold as their lips
They just need to be kissed
Doesn't anybody tell them?
Doesn't anybody see?
Doesn't anybody love them
like you love me?
'cause that's all they need

This theme is addressed in many songs. It's addressed in many art forms. That includes photographs like the ones below.

Rudaw reports:

The destruction of a sculpture to love in Sulaimani’s Azadi Park earlier this month, and a couple openly kissing at the site in protest, has been the talk of the Iraqi Kurdish city ever since.
On October 12, the Statue of Love was set ablaze and destroyed in the city’s famous Azadi Park, which upset many artists, among them the sculptor himself.
“Whoever has done this is against love, against beauty,” said Zahir Sdiq, the artist who placed the statue in the park in 2009.
The news that the sculpture had been taken down, doused in petrol and set afire, made the national news. But it was soon overshadowed by the picture of a young couple who stood and kissed on the site of the missing statue.
“Our kiss was not the first kiss between two lovers in this city or anywhere in the world,” said Kamaran Najm, whose picture of him kissing his Dutch girlfriend went viral on the Internet. “Every day people kiss each other for love, for accepting each other.”
Najm’s act won the support of many intellectuals and artists inside and outside Kurdistan. But it also brought the condemnation of many, among them the public prosecutor in Sulaimani, who said “the couple should be jailed for acting against public.

There are real problems in Iraq. A couple demonstrating life goes on even in the madness is not a real problem, it's something to be applauded and if the public prosecutor in Sulaimani has nothing better to do, sounds like he needs to be fired because he's taking up space and has no real duties or tasks.

While a crazy man rails against a kiss, violence continues to roll Iraq.

Prensa Latina notes, "Twenty-five police officers and three civilians were killed last night and in the early morning hours, in extremist attacks in the western province of Al Anbar, Iraq, official sources are reporting." Mary Casey and Joshua Haber (Foreign Policy) add, "Four of the attacks targeted a police station and checkpoints in the town of Rutba, about 70 miles from the Syrian border. Gunmen also hit a checkpoint in Ramadi, killing three security forces and injuring a fourth. No one has taken responsibility for the attacks, although al Qaeda linked militants have frequently targeted Iraq's security forces. "

Leaving Anbar Province, NINA reports a mall in Mosul was blown up "killing 5 women and two children" with twelve more people injured, an armed attack in Tikrit claimed the life of 1 police officers and left three injured, a Mosul roadside bombing claimed the lives of 2 Iraqi soldiers, a Baghdad roadside bombing claimed 4 lives and left eleven people injured, 1 farmer was shot dead "in one of the orchards near Abu Garmah," and 2 Sahwa were killed in Kirkuk by men wearing Iraqi military uniforms.

Hamza Mustafa (Asharaq al-Awsat) files an overview on Iraqi violence which includes:

For his part, Sheikh Mohammed Al-Hayes, a senior member of the Anbar Salvation Council told Asharq Al-Awsat: “Al-Qaeda has returned to Anbar province, and it has expanded to other regions from here, including Mosul, not the other way round.”
Hayes has blamed the anti-government protests and sit-ins taking place in western Iraq for “opening the door” to Al-Qaeda.
“We said from the beginning that these protests and sit-ins have nothing to do with any kinds of popular demands, whether legitimate or illegitimate, rather they have one central goal and that is to facilitate Al-Qaeda’s missions in the western provinces of Iraq,” the Sons of Iraq Council chairman added.

Oh, that's cute. The little thug is back to attacking the protesters.

Sahwa? Cheap whores. Tuck a dollar in their briefs and put on Tina Turner's "Private Dancer." We usually look the other way on Sahwa. Life's hard for them since they lost their Club Mascot (she switched papers and the new one told her she wasn't going to schill for Sahwa, she since moved on to NPR and Syria). But when you're attacking and killing people and you only stop because you're paid to, you're a whore. It's not that complicated. You're not a hero. You're nothing special. Your kind is a dime a dozen and found on any street corner all over the world.

Sahwa doesn't have their press mascot anymore. Probably a good idea for their trashy leader to stop attacking protesters. We can go over all the lies of Sahwa, we can go over the mob connections, all of it.

Why is Sahwa blaming protesters?

To deflect the attacks that they themselves are carrying out.

Some observers and analysts swear Sahwa has turned and sided with al Qaeda after Nouri's failed to pay them. That could be.

But their whores.

Whores want money.

So it's just as possible that they've created violence in order to argue they're needed to put down violence.

Meanwhile, they're being hunted by Shi'ite militias. They really can't afford to seem unsympathetic right now so someone might want to stuff a sock in al-Hayes' big mouth or accept that the targeted killings will be ignored because there are many more targeted groups in Iraq worth covering.

In the Anbar violence, All Iraq News reports that, "The bridge that links Iraq ith Jordan was detonated by gunmen of western Ramadi." That sounds more like Sunni militants who want to stop the protests. The protesters know sit-ins there get press attention, especially when they close movement. So blowing it up isn't in their interests. It is, however, in the interest of Sahwa. al-Hayes should probably focus a little more on his ties to the concrete industry -- which, by the way, benefits from the bombing since concrete is needed for reconstruction. (As Dahr Jamail exposed over seven years ago, the Iraqi mob -- Sahwa -- is in the cement business.)

Wally's "THIS JUST IN! A WHITE HOUSE FIRING AT LAST!" isn't showing up yet but he and others posted last night and this morning -- that includes non-community sites: Jody Watley, Pacifica Evening News, Black Agenda Report, Ms. magazine's blog, Antiwar.com, Cindy Sheehan and the House Veterans Affairs Committee:

Black Agenda Report

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