damage to the infrastructure: education
what to take to iraq [excerpt]
Barbara Nimri Aziz
*****
In April of 1991, soon after the bombing ended, I reentered Iraq and found everyone still in a state of shock. Everyone I spoke with detailed their long nights, the waiting, then the familiar sounds of the bombers. They watched where the bombs unloaded, decided if and where they might go to escape. There was no water because pumping stations were bombed. There was no electricity because the bombs took out the entire electrical network of the country on the first night of the war. Families set up a place to cook in their hallways, away from any window. They brought their bedding there. They cooked in the dark halls and slept together with children and grandchildren. Farmers, artists, college students, diplomats, drivers, and teachers—everyone endured those deprivations.
So did Gaya. But Gaya drew my attention to a particular need. "I couldn’t read," said Gaya, talking about the forty-two days of bombing. Gaya is an archeologist and she loves history, any history. She knows Iraqi history especially well. Nothing had unnerved this Iraqi more than being unable to read. She was the first who alerted me to that loss, and I have seen it grow more acute with time.
It has been eight years since Gaya’s distressing remark. Today, conditions are better in some ways. Electricity is 75 percent restored in the cities so she and eighteen million others have light to read by—most of the time. Yet, more than ever, Iraqis cannot read.
Those who don’t know Iraq will expect the fault lies within the country. We often hear how oppressive the government is, how little freedom exists, how severe the censorship is. Especially at a time when the leadership is under siege, we expect even more repression. The Baathists are surely to blame, we conclude. "Anyway, there’s no food!" we argue. "Books should be a low priority at times like this. Forget about books."
But Washington’s Iraq policy makers didn’t forget about books. Neither did the U.S.’s staunch sanctions ally, Britain. The ban on books to Iraq lies squarely on the United States as chief architect of this embargo policy. Yes, Iraqis are bereft of books because of U.S. censorship! And it’s worse than weeding out seditious reading material. It is a total ban.
excerpt from CHALLENGE TO GENOCIDE
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