Now Gays are targets of Iraqi Death Squads

[booley]

Yep, freedom is on the (goosestep) march. :sarcasm:

Shiite Muslim leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani issued a death-to-gays fatwa in Iraq last October, and now squads of the local Badr Corps are systematically targeting gay Iraqis for persecution and execution, veteran political journalist Doug Ireland reports on his Web site. Iraqi gays who have sought protection from U.S. authorities in the “Green Zone” around Baghdad say they have been met with indifference and derision.
................................
"There is a very, very serious threat to life for gay people in Iraq today," Hili told Ireland. "We are receiving regular reports from our extensive network of contacts with underground gay activists and gay people in Iraq—intimidation, beatings, kidnappings, and murders of gays have become an almost daily occurrence. The Badr Corps was killing gay people even before the Ayatollah’s fatwa, but Sistani’s murderous homophobic incitement has given a green light to all Shia Muslims to hunt and kill lesbians and gay men.

"Badr militants are entrapping gay men via Internet chat rooms," Hili continued. "They arrange a date and then beat and kill the victim. Males who are unmarried by the age of 30 or 35 are placed under surveillance on suspicion of being gay, as are effeminate men. They will be investigated and warned to get married. Badr will typically give them a month to change their ways. If they don't change their behavior or if they fail to show evidence that they plan to get married, they will be arrested, disappear, and eventually be found dead. The bodies are usually discovered with their hands bound behind their back, blindfolds over their eyes, and bullet wounds to the back of the head.”
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Tahseen lives in a Baghdad apartment with his two brothers. “Right now, I have five gay men hiding in my room in fear of their lives, because they cannot go outside without risking being killed,” he said. “They are all listening to me as I speak with you.” All those hiding with Tahseen are in their late 20s or early 30s and by their mannerisms would be easily identified as gay by most Iraqis, Ireland wrote.

http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid28282.asp

Good Gods, I feel so sad and helpless and F%&$#*#W(%*$)%&^&*#ING ANGRY over this bushit. Especially when you consider that that these death squads were formed in part becuase of the Pentagon's involvement (aka the Salvadoran option)

I don't beleive even Saddam went this far.

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

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[closeupready]

2. I disagree.

If a faction were going around killing Kurds, you bet they'd try to put a stop to it.

[Name removed]

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[closeupready]

7. Saddam isn't in charge anymore; we are, thus

the responsibility is ours to deal with.

No, we can't contol everything, but this is one thing we should be trying to control.

[sui generis]

4. bullshit - and WOW

Democracy is not a democracy just because you have a mob agree to all vote to do one thing or another.

A REAL democracy has human rights as a value and seeks to protect the civil rights of the minority from being taken away by the majority.

Everything else is just a majority vote, not a democracy. If we install a successful democracy we can't claim that we shouldn't be involved if they start beheading women and hanging Kurds and shishkababbing kids.

Historical contexts be damned. The state sanctioned killing of women or people with green eyes or gays or presumed gays or anyone who is merely accused of being gay or christians or atheists or bathists or sunnis or wahabis or whatever is NOT ACCEPTABLE. Our tax dollars here in America are today propping up this government. That means our tax dollars are helping to build a "democracy" that condones killing gays.

My tax dollars as a gay man are helping to by the ammo and rope used to kill other gay people.

Oh fucking no it's not okay.

[Name removed]

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[sui generis]

9. having a standard for human rights is not hysterics

There are some "single things" that we damn well better be concerned with on the world stage.

Bush had nothing to do with your post or mine - not sure why the reference.

I do give a crap about our government as a whole though claiming that it's a democracy Iraq (at our foolishness and our expense) while people with purple fingers are hanging other people with purple fingers for being gay. I do give a crap because our tax dollars are rebuilding the infrastructure to jail them and hang them, and whoever is next on their murder list.

We actually DO have to take a stand and it's diminishing and belittling to say it's "hysterics". I don't know you well enough to interpret your position on this, so I'm not putting words in your mouth, but you voice a sentiment that is very common.

I have to repeat, it ain't a democracy until it protects human rights, and that's the part that we as a nation haven't fully comprehended. It is about principle - if we call murdering people for having green eyes a "single thing" but everything else is alright, then we don't have any standards for democracy ourselves.

OBNOSIS there are some Americans who are perfectly happy with rounding up us queers should it start to happen here, so they are even less concerned when it happens elsewhere. As somebody who has family all over this itty bitty planet I do care, just as I cared about Kosovo and the Tutsis and the Rwandan farmers and everybody else having evil done to them in the name of sovereignty. I don't want to condone their views in Iraq by helping to rebuild their infrastructure and give them money just because they know how to dye their fingers purple. Thinking Americans need to question it, need to reject it.

And with anger and resolve, not hysteria and apathy.

[booley]

6. well

the goostsep was more fecetousness.

Shrub says we went into iraq to free it's people and here we are with death squads. And while homosexuality has been illegal in most Muslim countries, that doesn't undermine how bad this is.

In Egypt, for example, gay people are harrassed and arested. But in Iraq , they are being lured into traps and brutally murdered. While being arrested i sbad, being murdered is far worse.

And it's not a matter of 'remaking" thier society. Why do death squads have to be part of iraqi society? We aren't talking about making iraqis Americanized. This is about the US doing nothing while death squads working within the Iraqi government murder people.

I would also add that these death squads seem to have appeared after the Pentagon began considering using the "Salvadoran option" to control the primarily Sunni insurgents. So it's not exactly like the US isn't alread ysomewhat responsable.

[closeupready]

8. Good point. Extra-judicial death squads contribute to a lawless ethos

generally; i.e., if they get away with it, then Shia's will feel justified in killing Sunni's, etc. Anyone with a murderous agenda, basically ("look at them! they get away with it; we can, too.").

[triakis36]

10. I'm absolutely horrified

.... :mad:

[Democrats_win]

11. Death squads operating in Iraq? This is very disturbing!!!!

Posters at progressive sites have warned that this would happen with Negroponte being the U.S. ambassador to Iraq. Recall he was involved in El Salvador where death squads were a huge problem.

This is not a gay issues at all. Every American should be alarmed that this is going on and we all know that it's going on with the tacit approval of Bushhilter. SHAME on the GOP for once again supporting torture and death squads, the most evil things outside of genocide.

[mitchtv]

12. being that Gays are the target

How can it not be a Gay issue? This is damned well a gay issue. And yes, we saw it coming with Negroponte.

[UncleSepp]

13. How can we help get these men out of there?

They're going to die. How do we get them out of there so they don't? Of course, stopping the death squads would be the ultimate goal, but it seems that in the short term, getting the potential victims out of the way is the first step.

[AlienGirl]

14. Realistically? We can write to Senators and Reps

Unrealistically would take a ton of money and resources...

Tucker