Iraqi doctor moves South Carolina audience

An Iraqi doctor, Rashad Zidan, gave a powerful and thought-provoking presentation on the war in her country to a meeting of the American Association of University Women in this small college town on March 23.

Rashad, a pharmacist, works in Baghdad and Falluja with the Women and Knowledge Society to aid victims of war, especially orphans. She told how the Iraqi people have nothing against the people of the U.S.; their problem is with the U.S. government and its troops in their country.

The people of Iraq do not want a civil war, she said. Most people in Iraq are Muslims; Sunni and Shia people often intermarry. They do not hate or want to fight each other. The top religious leaders in Iraq have called for no civil war. But hostilities are being generated by the occupation forces.

Rashad spoke of the horrors of the invasion and occupation. Before the war, she lived a normal life with her husband and children and had her own pharmacy. Iraq was the most modern country in the Middle East, comparable to Western countries.

Now, she said, most children don’t go to school, especially girls, for fear of violence. Women in Iraq must fight for the rights they once had before the occupation. American soldiers get drunk at night and go to Iraqis’ houses, where they tell the men they want to “dance” with their daughters and wives.

In Baghdad, electric power lasts only one hour a day. Iraqis must wait four to five hours in line to buy gasoline at jacked-up prices while a sea of oil lies beneath their land. The whole infrastructure and all the government ministry buildings were intentionally destroyed and/or looted at the time of the U.S. invasion—except the Ministry of Oil.

There are not enough medicines in the hospitals. Doctors have had to perform surgery by candlelight. Many, many children have been made orphans by this criminal war and occupation.

Rashad showed photos of what the occupation really looks like. These photos are easy for anyone with internet access to find.

She stressed the responsibility of the people here doing everything in their power to end the occupation. She said we are the only ones who can end it. We must tell the truth to everyone so that the U.S. government’s lies are exposed.

Her presentation was filmed and will be aired on public access television.

Rashad is part of a delegation of Iraqi women touring the U.S. Two who were scheduled to come were denied visas by the U.S. government because all their family members in Iraq had been killed. With twisted logic, Washington says these women might try to stay in the U.S., since they have no families to go back to. They had been killed by U.S. troops.