MRZine, 08.08.14

Here we go again, the US is using a humanitarian catastrophe to implement imperialist objectives and pour petrol on fire.

It is sickening to see Obama and the Western media shedding crocodile tears for the Iraqi people, after the US-led occupation pulverised Iraq as a society and killed a million of its people. It is obscene to now suggest that the US will fight terrorism and protect the Iraqi people, when the rise of terrorism was the direct result of the US-led invasion of the country.

Emergency humanitarian help to Yezidi, Christian, Shia communities and all victims of ISIS is essential. But this has to be done through genuine humanitarian organisations and the UN (like in Gaza).

Defeating ISIS and the other terrorist groups is vital, but it is also vital that we oppose US intervention, which will make matters worse and is designed to bolster US presence and use Iraqi Kurdistan as a base of operations and aggression against the Iraqi and Iranian people.

Obama’s declaration to intervene militarily (humanely of course) in Iraq is the US Vice President Joe Biden Plan (2006) in action: to create a very weak central government in Baghdad and 3 statelets, led by racist and sectarian forces.

The US is already dominating the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and using some of the Kurdish leaders, particularly Masoud Barzani, as their main asset in Iraq. They have told them not to declare an independent Kurdish state now, because that will mean loss of US influence in Baghdad, where Kurdish leaders have a massive share in power and resources and a strong presence in the central security apparatus.

In unison with this plank of the US’s policy in Iraq is the formation of a sectarian “Sunni” army. Many of the leaders of these pro-US Iraqi ‘Sunni’ organisations, including the Saddamist faction of the Ba’ath party, are now in the Kurdish capital, Arbil. See the Wall Street Journal report on US plans for the ‘Sunni’ army.

Barzani’s first statement after the fall in June of Iraq’s second city, Mosul, to ISIS and its Saddamist allies was to declare the death of the “old Iraq” and the birth of a new one. He stressed that his Peshmerga forces “will not fight outside Kurdistan” and promptly moved his Peshmerga forces to enlarge the KRG area by 40% and stopped along lines manned by ISIS terrorists. The de facto alliance with ISIS on the ground was clear to all.

ISIS, on its part, moved against areas dominated by the other Kurdish Peshmerga force led by former Iraqi president Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, which rivals Barzani’s forces. They also moved brutally against the Shia communities, Christian villages and Kurdish religious minorities, such as the Yezidis, in the Mosul (Nineveh), Diala and Kirkuk provinces. All these minorities are in areas not under the control of Barzani’s Peshmerga. Obama made it clear that his forces will back KRG, the American consulate and a strong military presence in Arbil.

The actions of the Kurdish leaders run against the interests of the Kurdish people. A similar policy was followed by the Kurdish leaders in the 1960’s and 1970’s. They, like today, relied heavily on US and Israeli backing. They became so dependent on the US, and its ally the Shah of Iran, that they had to abandon the Kurdish people when the US decided to ditch them.

Henry Kissinger brokered an agreement between Saddam and the Shah in 1975 to crush the Peshmerga. Mustafa Barzani was then the leader of the Kurdish forces, which were defeated following the cessation of Iranian support and supplies. The US flew Barzani to Washington where he died four years later. His son Masoud has not learnt the historical lesson and is gambling with the fate of the Kurdish and Iraqi people in general.

In a process similar to the rise of al-Qaida in Afghanistan, the US has been turning a blind eye to the rise of ISIS and in some cases backing terrorist groups and secret militias in Iraq for many years.

The US and Gulf sheiks took a strategic decision in 2006 to back the so called “Sunni extremists” to divide and rule and isolate Iran in the region. See this article on the emergence of the strategy. And see two articles on sectarian violence in Iraq and the Joe Biden Plan.

Another important dimension to the rise of ISIS terror in Syria and now Iraq is that these barbaric forms of terrorism are also serving Israeli interests in the area. It was noticeable that the ISIS “Caliph” and Israeli war criminal Netanyahu declared the death of Sykes-Picot borders between Iraq and Syria on almost the same day.

The Caliph did not mention Israel or its war crimes in Palestine and the region, while Netanyahu declared that the Jordan river will be where Israel will “defend” itself. He also declared his support for an independent Kurdish state.

Meanwhile, Israel’s ambassador in Washington explained why Israel and the west should support the ISIS “bad guys” in preference to other “bad guys”. Injured terrorists are known to use Israeli hospitals before they are sent back to fight in Syria.

It is clear to me that ISIS is serving Israeli and US economic, political and military objectives in the region. The US is also using ISIS terrorism as a stick to impose conditions on Baghdad, i.e. to cut links with Iran and Syria.

Similarly, the US is using ISIS terrorism to make Iran halt supplies to the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance movements and to cut its aid to Syria. Generally, the aim is to make Iran more amenable to US objectives in the region. See my article on the reasons for the rise of ISIS and the composition of its allies in Iraq.

History shows us, not least in the years of the ‘war on terror’, that when the US and its allies intervene in other people’s countries, it is invariably catastrophic. Understanding the imperialist intentions that lay behind the talk of “humanitarian assistance” is essential if we are not to be duped again -- even after the disasters of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya -- into thinking that this time intervention is benign and well intended.

Sami Ramadani, a former political refugee from Iraq under Saddam Hussein, is a member of the steering committee of the Stop the War Coalition in the UK.

Statement Condemning ISIS

(Hundreds of Indian Muslim intellectuals, activists and organizations issued a statement saying ‘Not in Our Name’ to the ISIS atrocities against minorities in Iraq and Syria. A protest by civil society groups was also held in Hyderabad against the atrocities on Yazidis, Christians, Shias, Kurds and other minorities, as well as women by the ISIS. The Statement is reproduced below.)

Indian Muslims are shocked and pained by the brutality and atrocities being perpetrated by the ISIS (Islamic State of Syria and Iraq) against Christians, Shias, Kurds, Yazidis and other minorities in the regions now under their control. We strongly condemn such barbarism which is against the teachings of Islam. We express our heart-felt sympathies and solidarity with the survivors of those whose near and dear ones have been mercilessly butchered, and the tens of thousands of Iraq’s minorities who have been dispossessed, forced to flee their homes and are now living in extremely difficult circumstances.

The barbaric conduct of the ISIS is all the more reprehensible because its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, proclaims to be the ‘Caliph’ of the entire Muslim world and his armed group are supposedly acting in the name of Islam. We welcome the fact that most religious leaders and Islamic scholars from across the world, including India, have debunked al-Baghdadi’s claim of being a Caliph.

Alongside the ongoing tormenting of common citizens and persecution of religious and ethnic minorities in areas under their control, the ISIS has been enforcing its own intolerant, extremist, violent, distorted interpretation of Islam on Muslims who are also Sunnis. This too deserves to be condemned in the strongest possible words. We call upon Muslim religious leaders in India and elsewhere to add their voice to that of Muslim organisations and individuals who have already denounced al-Baghdadi and his ISIS for distorting Islam’s message for peace and for their barbaric conduct.

The unspeakable atrocities and mass crimes against Iraq’s minorities are nothing short of ‘crimes against humanity’, ‘religious/ethnic cleansing’. We appeal to the United Nations to urgently intervene, create the circumstances where those forced to flee feel secure enough to return to their homes and cities with full honour and dignity, and hold the ISIS accountable for its heinous acts.

While the ISIS must be held fully responsible for its unconscionable acts, the United States, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait etc. cannot escape their share of the blame in fuelling the flames. The worsening plight of Iraq’s Christians is but a legacy of America’s illegal, unwarranted and criminal invasion of Iraq in 2003 and its subsequent engineering of sectarian strife to divide the Iraqi resistance to the occupation.

Dictator Saddam Hussain was no angel but under him the country’s 1.4 million Christians were free to practice their faith. Many occupied high government posts. It is ironic that the US is now bombing the very ISIS to which it had earlier provided training, arms and ammunition in an attempt to dislodge Syria’s authoritarian President, Bashar al-Assad. For their own myopic ends, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait etc have been backing an array of radical Islamist outfits of which the ISIS -- a monster now seemingly out of control -- was an integral part.

We urge a global condemnation of the ISIS and all its allies, overt or covert.