The heart of Mr. Allawi's popularity is that he is totally secular. This fact is important for many Iraqis after the catastrophes of the sectarian war of 2006-7.
Mr. Maliki is not a secular leader yet. He is a half-secular and half-sectarian Shiite Islamist. Many secular Shiites -- if not all of them -- voted for Mr. Allawi, even though he was identified as the candidate of choice for Iraq's Sunnis.
"Allawi's victory is a major indication for the change of the Iraqi people's mood over the use of religion in politics," said Dr. Hazim al-Nuaimi, a political analyst in Baghdad. "Iraqis are fed up with the ideological religious parties."
Riyadh Mohammed then breaks it down by region. Andrew North (BBC News) also attempts to analyze the results:
In the southern Shia provinces where Mr Maliki won the bulk of his seats, Dr Allawi still got 10 for himself - holding off competition from other Shia parties too.
Mr Maliki could not match this cross-sectarian appeal in the predominantly Sunni areas where Dr Allawi did best, winning just one.
Crucially, Dr Allawi also picked up nearly as many seats in Shia- dominated Baghdad as his opponent -- effectively sealing his victory.
This still only gave his Iraqiya bloc 91 seats - a long way short of the 163 it needs to form a majority in Iraq's parliament.
Dr Allawi was quick to say he would work with any party, including the State of Law.
Justin Raimondo asks "Who Is Iyad Allawi?" (Antiwar.com):
News stories reporting Allawi’s come-from-behind narrow victory over the parties aligned with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki invariably describe him as "secular," which really only means godless. Reuters hails Allawi as the personification of "hope for secular Iraq," and yet the Ba’athist party was also secular, and "cross-sectarian," as reporter Paul McGeough puts it, and that doesn't make him one of the good guys, as the following from the Sydney Morning Herald makes all too clear:
"Iyad Allawi, the new Prime Minister of Iraq, pulled a pistol and executed as many as six suspected insurgents at a Baghdad police station, just days before Washington handed control of the country to his interim government, according to two people who allege they witnessed the killings.
"They say the prisoners – handcuffed and blindfolded – were lined up against a wall in a courtyard adjacent to the maximum-security cell block in which they were held at the Al-Amariyah security center, in the city’s southwestern suburbs.
"They say Dr. Allawi told onlookers the victims had each killed as many as 50 Iraqis and they 'deserved worse than death.' The … informants told the Herald that Dr. Allawi shot each young man in the head as about a dozen Iraqi policemen and four Americans from the Prime Minister’s personal security team watched in stunned silence."
It was a "secular" execution, embodying all the ruthlessness of a Saddam Hussein, which bothers our CIA not at all: he's their boy, and has been since his defection.
Michael Hastings (The Daily Beast) interviewed Sara Allawi, Ayad Allawi's daughter, earlier this month and raised the rumor with her:
[Michael Hastings]: There's one story in particular -- and they've never found evidence of it, I don't think -- that he walked into a room and killed six suspected terrorists himself. Do you believe that story?
[Sara Allawi]: I asked my dad about it, and he started laughing. I don't think it's true. I don't think my dad would bring himself to do something like that. But I've read articles -- I'm not saying he has done it -- but I've read articles that have said perhaps this isn't such a bad thing, if he did it. One of the comments made by an Iraqi said maybe it's not such bad thing, we need a strongman after all. You can't go easy on terrorists. If you do, hundreds of innocent people will die. My dad believes the same thing.
Queerty announces a 'winner,' "We're sure the Jamaicans might have something to say about it, but Iraq has won the prestigious award of being dubbed "the most dangerous place on Earth for gays." For stuff like this. Congratulations!" As noted Saturday, San Diego Gay and Lesbian News reposts Paul Canning's "Iraq is the most dangerous place on Earth for gays:"
It often shocks people to hear this but talk to Iraqi gays who've made it out and they'll tell you -- Life was better under Saddam. Baghdad played the role that Beirut does now as a sanctuary for Middle Eastern gay life with clubs which men from the Gulf and Saudi Arabia flocked to. In sharp contrast, for the past six years Iraq has been the worst place in the entire world to be gay. Far, far worse than Uganda or even Iran. Hundreds of gays, lesbians and transgender people have been hunted down and killed in the most vile ways imaginable -- and imagination is the right word. Doctors have confirmed reports of men have had their anuses glued shut by militia forces and others have accused the government of being involved. No one has been prosecuted and the Iraqi government has failed to do anything to stop it. So Iraqi gays have helped themselves. They have created safe houses, although many have been discovered and become a new killing field. Many have fled but they have faced a cold wall of indifference and they have needed friends and luck to actually make it to sanctuary. Our government, the British government, has turned its back on those who have arrived here. All have initially been refused asylum. The system instead has told them that Iraq is safe and they should go home.
Ali Hili is an Iraqi attempting to be granted asylum in England, he is also the head of Iraqi LGBT. It is past time for Congress to hold a hearing on the issue of the targeting of Iraq's LGBT community. Among those who have spoken out publicly against the targeting are US House Reps Jared Polis, Tammy Baldwin and Alcee Hastings and US Senator Kirsten Gilibrand. Gilibran and Baldwin led on an effort last month. From the Gilibrand press release:
Gillibrand, Baldwin To Sec. Clinton: Save LGBT Refugees
Take Action to Enforce Human Rights Laws to Protect Members of the LGBT Community in Countries Where Their Rights Are Abused
February 4, 2010
Washington, D.C. – With hundreds of LGBT individuals being beaten, persecuted and even killed in Iraq, Iran and other countries, U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), joined by 11 of their Senate colleagues and 31 of their House colleagues, today wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urging her to work with U.S. Ambassadors, the United Nations and NGOs across the globe to enforce human rights laws that protect LGBT individuals in the countries where they are under threat. Where safe conditions are not possible, the U.S. and the UN must work with refugee and human rights groups to expedite refugees’ flight to safety.
According to Human Rights Watch, there is no official number of deaths since the killing of LGBT individuals began in Iraq, but the U.N. has provided rough estimates range in the hundreds in 2009 alone. Not one murder of an LGBT individual in Iraq has led to an arrest, according to Human Rights Watch.
“It is time for us in Congress to take a strong stand against all hate crimes and persecution – wherever they occur,” Senator Gillibrand said. “People in this world should not have to suffer or fear for their lives because of who they are or what they believe in. It is wrong and it must end. If Iraq, Iran and other countries are not providing the legal protections that members of their LGBT communities are entitled to, it is our duty to join with our partners in the international community, enforce the human rights laws that protect us all, and free LGBT individuals from persecution. While the ultimate goal is safe conditions in these countries, until that happens, the U.S., UN and the international community must ensure that LGBT refugees can reach safety in countries where they won’t face persecution”
“The lives of LGBT individuals in Iran and Iraq, as well as those LGBT refugees who have fled persecution, are in grave danger,” said Congresswoman Baldwin, Co-Chair of the Congressional LGBT Equality Caucus. “I know Secretary of State Clinton shares our concerns for human rights and I hope she will use the full force of her office to respond to the plight of Iraqi and Iranian LGBT refugees and urge the UNHRC to do the same,” Congresswoman Baldwin said.
“Senator Gillibrand’s letter highlights the difficulty that foreign lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) refugees face when their home countries, and their countries of first asylum, permit or condone discrimination and brutal attacks based on sexual orientation or gender identity,” said HRC President Joe Solmonese. “Secretary Clinton has said that LGBT rights are human rights and we agree. We look forward to working with the State Department and Senator Gillibrand to ensure that U.S. foreign policy strongly supports protecting the human rights of LGBT individuals abroad.”
“Today, these Members of Congress have presented a comprehensive set of recommendations that will help ensure the protection of individuals who flee persecution based on their sexual orientation or gender identity only to face further persecution and violence in the countries they have fled to in search of safe refuge,” said Human Rights First’s Eleanor Acer. “We praise their leadership on this issue, and urge the administration to implement these measures including a fast-track resettlement process for individuals facing serious protection risks.”
Gideon Aronoff, President & CEO of HIAS said, ““Refugees who have fled persecution on the basis of their sexuality are among the most vulnerable in the world, as persecution often follows them across borders from one country to the next. Additionally, in some parts of the world the LGBT population is at special risk because of strong cultural mores that reject and demonize all but traditional male/female relationships. For some, resettlement to the U. S. or another free country is the only life-saving solution, but neither the U.S. Refugee Program nor the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is adequately prepared to give LGBT refugees the access to safety which they so desperately need. The Congressional letter organized by Sen. Gillibrand to Secretary Clinton suggests sensible and concrete steps to save the lives of LGBT refugees, and we urge the Department of State to give these suggestions expeditious consideration.”
Senator Gillibrand and Congresswoman Baldwin’s letter to Secretary Clinton is below:
Dear Madam Secretary,
We are writing to share our concerns about the safety of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) individuals in countries where these individuals’ health and lives are threatened and governments provide inadequate protection. Our concern was sparked most recently by accounts of LGBT individuals from Iraq and Iran who have had to flee after being severely beaten or worse, or because they face a significant risk of such persecution. Unfortunately, this situation is not unique to Iraq and Iran. LGBT individuals in a number of other countries are also under threat. Moreover, we are troubled by the fact that a number of countries criminalize or are taking steps to increase penalties against the LGBT community.
We know you share our concern. We appreciate the attention that the United States Government has paid to the special circumstances of people fleeing countries where they face persecution due to their sexual orientation or gender identity, particularly Iraq and Iran. The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, for example, has raised the unsolved attacks on gay men with the Ministry of Interior and the Human Rights Ministry. While we value these steps, we remain concerned about people’s safety in both these and other countries with reports of persecution of LGBT individuals and/or groups. We are likewise very troubled that LGBT refugees from Iraq and Iran and possibly other countries face risks in first asylum countries where refugees often remain for years, and which are often nearly as hostile to the LGBT community as their home countries.
Therefore we respectfully request you to consider several ways in which your leadership and guidance would improve protection for LGBT individuals in both the countries where they are targeted and the first asylum countries where their safety is in question.
1. United States Ambassadors in countries of concern should strongly and consistently raise the fact that laws targeting homosexual activity and a lack of protection for LGBT individuals or groups violate international human rights law.
2. United Nations and its appropriate agencies, such as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, should increase their promotion of the human rights of LGBT individuals and ensure that appropriate programs are focused on support of such individuals and groups.
3. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) should increase the training of all of its employees, contractors and implementing partners following its Guidance Note on Refugee Claims Relating to Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity. UNHCR should maximize its implementation of this important guidance so that LGBT refugees are not disadvantaged by inappropriate conduct or inadequate processing by UNHCR employees or implementing partners. It appears that additional LGBT refugee protection tools would need to be developed. As the largest donor, the U.S. could help foster an appropriate focus on this issue.
4. Ffor LGBT individuals, such as those from Iran and Iraq, who face risks in the countries of first asylum, as well as inside their home countries, resettlement processing should be expedited. This can be done in a number of ways, including:
a. Those LGBT refugees who can articulate a serious protection concern because of their sexual orientation or gender identity in the country of first asylum can be designated “refugees of special humanitarian concern” so they are eligible for Priority 2, or direct processing to the U.S. refugee admissions program. The United States already designated several groups of at-risk U.S.-affiliated Iraqis as P2-eligible in 2007 and 2008, and has used the designation for refugees from other countries in the past. We appreciate that this category of direct-access eligibility is reserved for some of the most at-risk groups and must be carefully crafted to identify a discrete group.
b. Processing of LGBT refugee applications can be expedited by UNHCR or the Department of State entering into agreements with qualified non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to identify or screen refugees who need to be taken immediately out of harm’s way. Those LGBT refugees with serious protection concerns who are so identified by NGOs – or who are otherwise known to UNHCR or the U.S. Government – should be “fast tracked” by UNHCR or the State Department, as appropriate.
c. In appropriate cases, individuals might be moved by UNHCR to its emergency transit centers (ETCs) in order to ensure their safety during refugee processing. Our understanding is that such transit centers are currently used to house populations whose safety cannot be guaranteed while they are in refugee processing. If such centers are used to temporarily house LGBT refugees, UNHCR would need to take steps to ensure that the centers are sensitive to the protection needs of LGBT individuals. In cases where evacuation to an ETC is not practicable, we urge you to work with the Secretary of Homeland Security to expeditiously parole or conditionally admit particularly vulnerable refugees to the United States for processing, as the United States did with applicants evacuated from northern Iraq in 1996 and Macedonia in 1999.
d. Finally, the U.S. agencies involved in the security clearance procedures required as part of the refugee resettlement process should continue to improve coordination in order to enable these procedures to be completed in a timely manner.
Again, thank you for your attention to this matter. We would be very pleased to work with you and support you in any way we can.
Sincerely,
Kirsten E. Gillibrand United States SenatorPatrick J. Leahy United States Senator
Daniel K. Akaka
United States Senator
Jeff Bingaman
United States Senator
Sherrod Brown
United States Senator
Robert P. Casey Jr. United States Senator
Russell D. Feingold
United States Senator
Frank R. Lautenberg
United States Senator
Joseph L. Lieberman United States Senator
Jeff Merkley United States Senator
Charles E. Schumer United States Senator
Ron Wyden
United States Senator
Tammy Baldwin
United States Representative
Jared Polis
United States Representative
Barney Frank
United States Representative
Jan Schakowsky
United States Representative
Jerrold Nadler
United States Representative
Michael M. Honda
United States Representative
Lois Capps
United States Representative
James P. Moran
United States Representative
Zoe Lofgren
United States Representative
David Wu
United States Representative
Edolphus Towns
United States Representative
Carolyn Maloney
United States Representative
Alcee Hastings
United States Representative
John Conyers
United States Representative
Luis Gutierrez
United States Representative
Bill Delahunt
United States Representative
Eliot Engel
United States Representative
Raúl M. Grijalva
United States Representative
Chellie Pingree
United States Representative
Joseph Crowley
United States Representative
Gary Ackerman
United States Representative
Anthony Weiner
United States Representative
Maurice Hinchey
United States Representative
Steven Rothman
United States Representative
James P. McGovern
United States Representative
Lynn Woolsey
United States Representative
Paul Tonko
United States Representative
Mike Quigley
United States Representative
Steve Israel
United States Representative
Howard Berman
United States Representative
Henry Waxman
United States Representative
Brad Sherman
United States Representative
Congress -- especially the DPC -- has had hearings into waste and fraud. It's past time that hearings took place about human rights. Paul Canning believes one of the most helpful things that can be done presently for Ali Hili and Iraq's LGBT community is for the US Congress to invite him to testify before them. To contact Tammy Baldwin, Jared Polis and Kirsten Gillibrand visit their websites. To contact the DPC (Democratic Policy Committee), click here.
Bonnie notes that Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Attitudes of Gratitude" went up last night. We'll close with this from Sherwood Ross' "'Non-Partisan' Think Tank Played a Key Role in Escalation of Afghan War" (Veterans Today):
After Obama's election Flournoy was named to the No. 3 post in the Pentagon and Campbell heads up State Department’s Asia bureau. What’s more, “no fewer” than 14 CNAS “grads” landed slots in the (Obama) Defense and State departments, Hodge writes.
Journalists who accept financial support from CNAS say the organization does not influence their thinking. Greg Jaffe, a Washington “Post” reporter told Hodge CNAS “had zero control or influence” over the content of a book he wrote profiling Army leaders.
But Thomas Ricks, a senior fellow at CNAS and long-time military correspondent, last February published an Op Ed in The New York “Times” calling for keeping 30,000 to 50,000 U.S. troops to remain in Iraq for the long term. About the same time he broke a story on his ForeignPolicy.com blog that the top U.S. commander in Iraq had asked to keep a brigade in northern Iraq past President Obama’s deadline for the withdrawal of combat forces.
These actions came just as Ricks issued a policy brief on behalf of CNAS that "was selling the idea of a long stay in Iraq," Hodge writes. Ricks is not alone. Since its founding, CNAS has subsidized a number of reporters from top dailies.
The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.
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