The Common Ills: Iraq snapshot

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Iraq snapshot

Thursday, March 31, 2016. Chaos and violence continue, Moqtada al-Sadr's rallies end, Haider al-Abadi finds men to nominate for his Cabinet (no women), a famous Iraqi has passed away, and much more.

The faux-test has ended. For weeks, a fake 'protest' has taken place and now it's finally over. AFP reports, "Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr today ordered his followers to end a two-week sit-in at Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone aimed at pressuring the government to carry out reforms."

Cleric and movement leader Moqtada al-Sadr staged rallies, not protests.

Rallies.

Rallies to support the prime minister.

He met with Haider beforehand. He met with Haider during.

This was not a protest nor was it an independent action.

Moqtada al-Sadr called the rallies to back Haider al-Abadi.

State of Law was against the 'reforms' that Haider had said he would push for.

State of Law is a powerful Shi'ite bloc.

It's headed by Nouri al-Maliki.

Nouri's a thug.

He was also made prime minister of Iraq for a second term in 2010.

Not via the ballot box. He lost the 2010 election to Ayad Allawi.

US President Barack Obama decided Nouri would get a second term. He did that via the US brokered Erbil Agreement -- leaders of Iraq's political bloc signed off on a legal contract granting Nouri a second term and, in exchange, Nouri promised to give them certain posts and referendums.

Nouri used the second term to terrorize the Sunni population. This is what led to the rise of the Islamic State in Iraq.

Eventually, Barack decided 'enough.'

Not soon enough.

Nouri was targeting Sunnis, persecuting them, killing them.

The April 23, 2013 massacre of a sit-in in Hawija resulted from Nouri's federal forces storming in. Alsumaria noted Kirkuk's Department of Health (Hawija is in Kirkuk) announced 50 activists have died and 110 were injured in the assault. AFP reported the death toll eventually (as some wounded died) rose to 53 dead. UNICEF noted that the dead included 8 children (twelve more were injured).

That didn't bother Barack.

It was only when the Islamic State seized Mosul in June of 2014 that Barack began to make noises about replacing Nouri.

In August of 2014, it was announced Haider al-Abadi would replace Nouri.

He would, we thought, serve out Nouri's term which would expire that same year.

Instead, the 2014 elections never happened.

And Iraq has nothing but an illegitimate government.

Smoke and mirrors attempt to conceal that.

Moqtada provided smoke and mirrors.

The rallies for Haider's reform were to silence other Shi'ite factions.

Moqtada's followers in the street were supposed to scare them from speaking out -- the National Alliance, elements of Dawa (the political party Nouri belongs to but chose not to run with in 2010), Ammar al-Hakim's Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, the Ribes of Iraq Coalition, the Islamic Dawa Party, etc.

And they did.

Their presence in support of Haider's proposals meant that State of Law stood alone in rejecting them publicly.

That's what the faux-test was about, silencing Shi'ite objection.

If you missed that fact, you missed a whole lot. Stephen Kalin, Saif Hameed, Maher Chmaytelli, Isabel Coles and Richard Balmforth (REUTERS) point out, "Sadr, whose opinion holds sway with tens of thousands of supporters, warned party leaders last week that they would face street protests if they obstruct the government overhaul."

Ben Kesling and Ghassan Adnan (WALL STREET JOURNAL) report:

Mr. Abadi trimmed the size of his cabinet from 22 ministers to 16 and submitted a list of 14 new names for parliamentary approval. He kept only his defense and interior ministers, citing security reasons.
“I submit this list…you have the right to accept, adjust or refuse it,” Mr. Abadi told lawmakers.
Parliament will vote on the names in 10 days, said Speaker Salim al-Jabouri.
Mr. Sadr said that if parliament didn’t approve the list, he would press for a no-confidence vote in Mr. Abadi’s government.

14 new names? And the most the press has been able to scare up is 12. MIDDLE EAST MONITOR and RUDAW both note these 12 people for the following positions:

Ali Alawi - Minister of Finance
Nzar Salim - Minister of Oil
Sharif Ali bn Ali - Minister of Foreign Affairs
Ali Jabouri - Minister of Education
Ali Mubarak - Minister of Health
Hassan Janabi - Minister of Oil and Water Resources
Aqil Yousif - Minister of Youth and Culture
Hoshiyar Amin - Minister of Municipality and Reconstruction
Yousif Assadi - Minister of Transportation
Mohammed Nasrollah - Minister of Justice
Ala Dashir - Minister of Electricity
Wafa Mahdawi - Minister of Immigration and Displacement

A 13th name Dr Abdul Razzak Aleisa for Minster of Higher Education.

The losers are many.

Women.

Women are yet again losers in Iraq.

14 positions.

Not one woman qualified?

Iraqi women are stupid and uneducated?

Is that it?

That lie is told on the same day Zaha Hadid has died.

Who?

A woman who rates two reports from ALSUMARIA today -- here and here.

Donatella Rovera ‏@DRovera 9 hours ago

RIP #ZahaHadid , larger than life, fabulously creative. #Iraq

20 retweets 17 likes

The 65-year-old Iraqi woman was an architect whose designs were known throughout the world and included the London Aquatic Centre. In September of 2015, BBC NEWS reported:

Dame Zaha Hadid has been awarded Riba's royal gold medal for architecture, making her the first woman to be awarded the honour in her own right.

The renowned Iraqi-born, London-based architect designed the Aquatics Centre for the 2012 London Olympics.
She has designed buildings in cities from Guangzhou in China to Glasgow.
The gold medal is given in recognition of a lifetime's work by the Royal Institute of British Architects and is personally approved by the Queen.

DESIGN MUSEUM offers this timeline of Hadid's life:

1950

Zaha Hadid born in Baghdad, Iraq

1977

Graduated from the Architectural Association, London

1980

Established Zaha Hadid Architects

1982

Competition winner for ‘The Peak’, Hong Kong

1993

Vitra Fire Station completed, Weil am Rhein, Germany

1994

Competition Winner, Cardiff Bay Opera House, Cardiff, Wales

1997

Competition Winner, MAXXI: National Museum of XXI Century Arts, Rome

1998

Honourable Member of the Bund Deutsches Architekten

1999

LF One/Landesgartenschau completed, Weil am Rhein, Germany

2000

Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, London
Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters
Honorary Fellow of the American Institute of Architecture

2001

Hoenheim-Nord Terminus completed, Strasbourg, France

2002

Bergisel Ski-Jump completed, Innsbruck, Austria
Commander of the British Empire (CBE)

2003

Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Arts completed, Cincinnati, USA
Mies van der Rohe Award for Honheim-Nord Terminus

2004

Laureate of the Pritzker Architecture Prize

2005

Phaeno Science Center completed, Wolfsburg, Germany
The BMW Central Building completed, Leipzig, Germany
The Hotel Puerta America interior completed, Madrid, Spain
The Ordrupgaard Museum Extension completed, Copenhagen
Spittelau Viaducts Housing completed, Vienna, Austria
Member of the Royal Academy of Arts
Designer of the Year, Design Miami
RIBA Stirling Prize Finalist, BMW Central Building

2006

Maggie’s Centre completed, Fife, Scotland. Lopez de Heredia Winery completed, Haro, Spain
Zaha Hadid exhibition, Guggenheim, New York
RIBA Medal, European Cultural Building of the Year
RIBA Jencks Award
American Institute of Architects (UK) Award
Finalist for the RIBA Stirling Prize, Phaeno Science Center

2007

American Institute of Architects (UK) Award, Maggie’s Centre
Finalist for the Mies van der Rohe Award for European Architecture
Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Architecture Scottish Design Award, Maggie’s Centre
Installation for Serpentine Gallery, London
Zaha Hadid: Architecture and Design exhibition, Design Museum, London

2009

Exhibited in Design Museum and Beefeater 24 present Super Contemporary

2010

Stirling Prize winner for MAXXI, Rome

2011

Stirling Prize winner for the Evelyn Grace Academy, London

2012

Appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) for services to architecture

2014

Dongdaemun Design Plaza & Park opens in Seoul, South Korea
Awarded Design of the Year 2014 by the Design Museum for Heydar Aliyev Cultural Centre

2015

Awarded 2016 Royal Gold Medal, the first woman to be awarded the prestigious honour in her own right.

2016

Zaha Hadid dies in Miami aged 65, following a sudden heart attack

That's quite a life, quite a list of accomplishments.

Yet on the day she dies, a US puppet over the Iraqi government can't even think of one woman to nominate for his Cabinet?

And Hillary Clinton, running to be president of the United States and claiming to be a defender of women, spends all day fretting over statements from blowhard Donald Trump instead of calling out the continued assault on Iraqi women?

Other losers?

The Iraqi people and democracy.

Iraq does deserve a new cabinet.

But one named by a new prime minister.

A new prime minister who results from national elections -- which were due by 2014 but still have not taken place.

No elections, just bombs.

The US Defense Dept announced/claimed today:

Strikes in Iraq
Rocket artillery and attack, fighter and remotely piloted aircraft conducted 25 strikes in Iraq, coordinated with and in support of the Iraqi government:

-- Near Habbaniyah, a strike damaged an ISIL defensive fighting position.

-- Near Haditha, a strike struck an ISIL tactical unit.

-- Near Hit, three strikes struck an ISIL tactical unit and an ISIL safe house and destroyed two ISIL supply caches, 15 ISIL rockets, three ISIL bunkers and an ISIL tunnel.

-- Near Kirkuk, three strikes struck two separate ISIL tactical units and destroyed five ISIL assembly areas and an ISIL beddown location.

-- Near Mosul, eight strikes struck five separate ISIL tactical units, destroying three ISIL assembly areas, an ISIL vehicle, an ISIL beddown location, two ISIL safe houses and an ISIL fighting position and suppressing two ISIL mortar firing positions.

-- Near Qayyarah, four strikes struck an ISIL improvised explosive device factory and an ISIL communications facility, destroying an ISIL mortar position and denying ISIL access to terrain.

-- Near Sultan Abdallah, four strikes destroyed four ISIL assembly areas, five ISIL fighting positions, an ISIL tunnel system and an improvised ISIL ferry system.

-- Near Tal Afar, a strike struck an ISIL communications facility.
Task force officials define a strike as one or more kinetic events that occur in roughly the same geographic location to produce a single, sometimes cumulative, effect. Therefore, officials explained, a single aircraft delivering a single weapon against a lone ISIL vehicle is one strike, but so is multiple aircraft delivering dozens of weapons against buildings, vehicles and weapon systems in a compound, for example, having the cumulative effect of making those targets harder or impossible for ISIL to use.

Accordingly, officials said, they do not report the number or type of aircraft employed in a strike, the number of munitions dropped in each strike, or the number of individual munition impact points against a target. Ground-based artillery fired in counterfire or in fire support to maneuver roles is not classified as a strike, officials added.

In the US, one candidate supported the Iraq War -- Hillary Clinton.

And her vote for the war is not a minor issue even all these years later.