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Voting in Iraq.
A new constitution if prepared for Iraq, and people voted for it.
The fact is the former Iraqi constitution was one of the most liberal in the world. But it was not very effective under a dictator...
Yet, it granted very expanded rights to women, and foresaw free education and a social system.
Iraqi students were allowed to study abroad, and according to pictures of the seventies I saw, it was a very secular state.
-This to the anger of the surrounding countries. One of the main reasons Saddam ruled a policy of Islamization in the nineties, was to get support from these countries in case of a new war with the US.-
In the new constitution some strange things appear:
Article 2 defines Islam as "the official religion of the state" and "a basic source of legislation". It is unclear how this article will be applied in light of another article further down in the document, which proclaims that all Iraqis, men and women, are equal before the law, and no one is to face legal discrimination based on gender or ethnicity.
In my humble opinion, the change of this constitution is dramatic, and means the consolidation of a new large islamic state in the Middle East.
I guess it is inevitable due to the circumstances.
But this means that the rights of the Iraqi women -who were entitled to work, and study (and many of them were high educated as doctors etc.)- are endangered.
It also means that islamic law will be taught to children. -we have to admit: we are not fully aware of what they learned until now... I went into schools in Iraq and surely they learned how to hate the West over there. But the situation now is not going to be better if not supervised strictly.-
I don't understand why US agrees to this solution to set up an islamic state in the Middle East, if that might mean an even bigger danger for them -because in the end, an islamic constitution in a political unstable country surely opens up possibilities for fundamentalists.-
Al Quaeda already integrated in Iraq and we might see that instability in this region serves Al Quaeda even better.
Money out of some rich oil countries will build mosques and schools, just like happened in Gaza with Hamas. The lessons taught there might be frightening.
Am I too pessimistic? I think it is rather realistic.
Let's hope the Iraqi people are smart enough to see the danger and fight against it. The only problem is: today they are to busy with finding water and electricity...
Posted on October 16, 2005
in Limit of my knowledge
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