Marked Women: A rash of unpunished honor killings highlights the

[geek tragedy]

harrowing dangers females face in the new Iraq

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101040726-665048,00.html

<snip>
When U.S. forces overthrew Saddam Hussein 15 months ago, the Bush Administration proclaimed that women's rights would be a centerpiece of its project to make Iraq a democratic model for the rest of the Arab world. But for many Iraqi women, the tyranny of Saddam's regime has been replaced by chronic violence and growing religious conservatism that have stifled their hopes for wider freedoms — and, for many, put their lives in even greater peril. For women like Shaima, the most terrifying development has been the rash of honor killings committed by Iraqi men against sisters, wives, daughters or mothers whom they suspect of straying from traditional rules of chastity and fidelity. Although such killings are hard to quantify and occurred during Saddam's regime as well, Iraqi professionals believe that women are now being murdered by their kin at an unprecedented rate. On the basis of case reports provided by police, court officials and doctors at Baghdad's forensics institute, the number of victims of honor killings in Iraq since the U.S. invasion in March 2003 may total in the hundreds. (By comparison, in neighboring Jordan, where women's-rights advocates have succeeded in bringing attention to the issue, activists report an average of 20 honor killings a year.) "This isn't just an issue about women. It's about the whole society," says Safia al-Souhail, a female Iraqi politician who was appointed ambassador to Egypt last week. "We have to stop it. It's going on everywhere, and no one is speaking about it."
<snip>

[LoZoccolo]

1. This is one of the reasons we shouldn't pull out yet.

Of course, some people will easily dismiss this article as pro-war propaganda because stuff happening on the other side of the world doesn't affect them at all.

[geek tragedy]

2. Pro-war propaganda?

I think this article demonstrates just what a tragic farce the invasion was. Iraq in 2004=Afghanistan in 1998.

Great going, Mr. President!

[LoZoccolo]

3. Regrettable, yes.

But already done.

[redqueen]

5. NPR had a feature story on last week

Interviewed a family that was fundie muslim (Iraq was secular before the war).

They made it sound as if educational opporunities are so much better now for women, because they can go to all-girl schools where fundie muslim customs are followed.

This just ONE DAY after they relayed bush's claim at a campaign rally that 'iraqi girls can go to school now', with NO COMMENTARY on what an egregious example of mendacity it was.

[Solly Mack]

4. and I bet you anything that Abu Ghraib aided in the increase

as many of us said it would