At the Erbil Ministry of Culture’s media hall, the Iraqi-Kurdistan Symphony Orchestra has just struck the final chord of the Kurdish national anthem, and the audience — Kurdish Christians and Muslims, Arabs and Turkomens, maybe even an Iraqi Jew or two, all in black ties and gowns — bursts into loud applause, foot-stomping and cheers. It’s Christmas Eve in the oldest city in the world, and the city’s million-and-some residents are in a pretty good mood. Maybe it’s the successful election they had just two weeks ago. 
Maybe it’s the Christmas cheer of the city’s sizeable Christian minority rubbing off on everyone else. Or maybe it’s just that Kurdistanis love being Kurdistanis.
Sure, Iraqi Kurdistan’s got troubles. Corruption hamstrings the economy. Intense security limits civil rights. A dearth of natural resources has ministers begging for foreign investment. But despite all this, and against the backdrop of a country descending into an Arab civil war, Kurdistan is prospering. People are making money, raising their kids, going to school, travelling abroad, making plans, dreaming and enjoying life.
This is it folks, this is what a peaceful, democratic, multi-ethnic and religiously-tolerant Iraq looks like. The Western media’s myopic focus on Baghdad and Arab Iraq means it’s missed a quarter of the story, the northern quarter, where five million people are building the Middle East’s first indigenous democracy from scratch. Every day Kurds thank me, believing I represent all Americans. They thank me for freeing them from a murderous tyrant. They thank me for saving their lives and their families’ lives. They tell me that they understand we went to war for many reasons, some quite bad. Still, they say, no American has died in vain here, for even if there were no weapons of mass destruction, even if Iraq had nothing to do with Sept. 11, there is at least one good reason to fight and die in Iraq.
In fact, there are five million.
Merry Christmas, America. Merry Christmas, Iraq.
–David Axe
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Merry Christmas, IraqLeave a Reply |
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Amen.
And EVERY ONE of them worth it.
Thank you for the this fantastic story, it just
makes the heart sing, to think of what America,
the troops and the leaders have done is sometimes
just really is hard to get your mind around.
I hope the president sees this, he will glow
with joy.
Indeed, there is much more work to do, but it is
shown so clearly this is the result of people
believing in themselves and their countrymen.
Now, that they have the opportunity to do so
by the American their allies and the people of
the countries that are now free and with perseverence and caring, they too will become
a beacon of light in the Arab world. They have shown great courage to date and will, I am sure,
continue to do so.
Wonderful!
“…The Western media’s myopic focus on Baghdad and Arab Iraq means it’s missed a quarter of the story, the northern quarter, where five million people are building the Middle East’s first indigenous democracy from scratch.“
Myopic focus on the large chunks of the country which are in chaos? Must be because they’re anti-freedom or something.
David, aren’t you smarter than this?
Barry: Myopic focus on the large chunks of the country which are in chaos?
Nyah, nyah! My myopia is better than your myopia!
Barry, thanks for the laugh.
Considering that the Jewish population of Iraq is in the three-digit range, it is highly unlikely any were at that concert.
Nice thought, but the Jewish populations of Arab lands were pretty much driven out post 1948. 124,000 fled Iraq alone between 1949 and 1951.
Half of Israel’s population today are Sephardic Jews–Jews who came from Arab lands, or their children and grandchildren. It’s a fact the world likes to ignore.
Wait a minute! Are you telling us that this nation that can’t be trusted to make democracy work is capable of actual culture?
Next you’ll be telling us that people there love their children and want a better life, too! Or that we’re winning!
Praise be to God! Peace on Earth and Good Will to Men Everywhere! [For the atheists, in the interests of multiculturalism, Praise be to Nothing!]
“Myopic focus on the large chunks of the country which are in chaos? Must be because they’re anti-freedom or something“
Barry, those chunks aren’t just in chaos, they are under attack by your friends the terrorists. And yes they, like you, are anti-freedom.
Who is that man up front “terrorizing” all those Iraqi musicians with that thin white stick? Quick, someone call John Kerry!!
Kurdistan was already free of Saddam since 1991. I don’t see why a second war was necessary for Iraqi Kurds to be “free,” if you call being under the thumbs of the Barzani or Talabani clans is true freedom.
I also don’t see why 2,100+ Americans had to die so that the Kurds could grab Kirkuk and or be more prosperous. A lot easier ways to accomplish that than what we did and are doing.
Barry, those chunks aren’t just in chaos, they are under attack by your friends the terrorists. And yes they, like you, are anti-freedom.
ahahah. oh my. Are you all the same guy, or what?
With all do respect; along with the murderous conventional weaponry used by Saddaam’s gangster forces against the Kurds as well as against the Shiites in the south, what do you suppose the “strange mystery gas” was that he had used on the mass of innocent people in these areas…saved up toxic flatulence? If poisonous gases are not weapons of indiscriminate mass destruction, what is?
It must be well remembered that he regularly used these lethal WMDs against Iranians during his territorial war with them. He must have quite a manufacturing arm and continual stockpile in order to conduct such extensive operations…at any rate it should be something to think about before we keep casting “Michael Moorish” fantasms that there weren’t any there to begin with.
There weren’t any there to begin the war with. The Iraq Survey Group found that Iraq had neither produced nor stockpiled WMDs since UN sanctions were imposed in 1991, nor did Iraq have any stocks of WMDs in 2003. Nor did Hans Blix’s teams find any evidence of WMDs in Iraq before the US invaded. Bush lied to you again and again about the case for war.