Remembrance

She was wailing bitterly on the radio “Oh my dear boy, he was only 17, when
I heard that a British solider was killed I knew it was him, something inside me told me it was him. I signed his papers when he joined the army last year, I signed his death papers, I agreed to put my signature and register a 16years old with the bloody army”.

I felt for this mother who lives in a previously mining village where jobs are scarce, and career choices for young poor men are very slim.

Later she said “I did not know that he will be sent to this horrible country to die”.

I felt hurt, deeply hurt and switched off the radio.
My country is not horrible how dare she say that, or is it?

The next day was Remembrance Day. Newspapers were paying tributes to all dead soldiers since the First World War by listing their names and their ranks. Special prayers and speeches were held and later shown on TV.

I sat there watching, reading and wondering about our unknown soldiers and unknown victims; who will list them and pray for them? Who will compensate our children for their stolen childhood? Who will compensate our youth for the lost years?

I cannot stop myself from thinking that the prosperity and stability in here were only accomplished because countries like ours live in hell.

They initiate wars to get cheaper fuel for themselves, they starve Africa to get better food and they incite hatred to cause civil wars and find markets for their filthy arms business.

And don’t they sell it well? Exporting democracy to the third world; introducing fair-trade by backing small farms and banning child-slavery produce and last but not least selling arms through intermediaries to cover their backs.

Even when they sympathise with us, you cannot help but feel humiliated. They look at us as aliens or lower species.
When someone asks me for an explanation of what is going on and why are Iraqis killing each other, I can’t see it as an innocent question anymore.
They believe something is wrong with our race, there must be, otherwise what?

This belief somehow authorise them to think, decide and execute on our behalf.
Otherwise how do we explain An Iraqi Study Group with no Iraqi in it?
And if we skip that how come there is no military official involved in this group? Isn’t it about a country that is soaking with blood? Let alone having more than 150,000 foreign troops in there?

So we are waiting for a decision of yet another arrogant bunch of politicians to decide on how to save face or overcome the irreversible damage they caused.

And they will definitely come up with the same conclusions of how great their policy was and how difficult it was to implement it in a depraved and un-compromising society.

Why the Americans and the British have to train our police and army forces?
Our army was established in the twenties of the last century. Those two forces have to have ethics before fighting skills, our own ethics to be precise.

Why the current government is completely chained and thumbed down?

When I ask my family and friends back home whether it is better for the foreign troops to leave us alone, I find their answers more confusing. They became accustomed to the fear they know and cannot take another shock.

Writing all this really hurts me and hurt all Iraqis.
My posts and a lot of the others are becoming like obituaries, let alone some which are sinking unintentionally in the sectarian drain.

Once there was love, once there was hope and once there were memories.
Now there is nothing, and if there will come a day when this nightmare is over, I am sure no one will want to remember.

There will be no remembrance day for us.