[Marxism] Halabja people protest Kurd government thievery, face repression as "Islamists"

["Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

It is possible that Islamism is a factor here.  Despite their repression
of Kurds in Iran (despite concessions onlanguage, existence as a
province, etc.), the Islamic Republic long gave support to the Kurds
against Saddam Hussein.
Hussein's gas attack on Halabja (apparently the residents indicate no
doubt that it was Hussein, not the Iranian govt, that carried it out)
took place in the framework of the war with Iran and on the pretext of
alleged links between Halabja.  Given the Kurdish government's
corruption and alliance with Washington, it's not at all excluded that
some Kurds are beginning to see an Islamic republic as preferable to the
current "secular" orgy of greed, collaboration, and indifference to the
common people.
Fred Feldman


Counterpunch

"The Government Says We're Martyrs, But Does Nothing For Us"

Kurds Destroy Monument to Victims of Saddams' Poison Gas Massacre

By PATRICK COCKBURN

Halabja, Iraq.

Smoke was still rising from the burnt-out monument on the outskirts of
the Kurdish town of Halabja yesterday where 18 years ago some 5,000
people were killed in a poison gas attack.

Enraged by what they see as official neglect of the survivors, local
people had set ablaze the museum commemorating the victims of Saddam
Hussein's most infamous atrocity during a demonstration.

"I was hit in the leg by a bullet while I was protesting," said Othman
Ali Gaffur, a 29-year-old-man, his face creased with pain, as he lay in
a hospital bed. "We were demonstrating because the government says we
are martyrs but does nothing for us. We do not even have streets in
Halabja but only laneways of mud."

Mr Gaffur said the riot, which started at 11am, was sparked by anger
over the presence of Kurdish government representatives. The
demonstrators had said earlier in the week that the officials were
banned from the memorial ceremonies on the 18th anniversary of the gas
attack because they had repeatedly failed to do anything for survivors.

It is true that many of the houses in Halabja appear to be little better
than huts with plastic and earth roofs.

Now very little is left of the museum which was opened by the then US
Secretary of State, Colin Powell, in 2003 and which once contained
photographs, clothes and life-sized models of those who died when the
Iraqi army used poison gas on 15 March 1988.

The museum's guards described how the demonstrators, some of whom they
said were Islamic militants, had torn steel bars from the railings to
attack them and had then taken oil and gasoline from the museum
generator to burn down the building. The shooting of the demonstrators
took place when the museum guards were reinforced by a second group of
pesh merga (Kurdish soldiers), who opened fire. A 17-year-old man called
Kurda Ahmed was killed by a bullet in the stomach. At least half a dozen
other demonstrators were wounded.

A different account of the riot was given by Shaho Mohammed, the Kurdish
Regional Government representative. He said local people underestimated
the difficulty of rebuilding Halabja and that he had presented their
demands to the government. He also thought Islamic militants were to
blame for the violence.



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