Yasir Qadhi – Genocidal Sanctions The Destruction of Iraq

			And what really is painful to note, and everybody here who has studied Middle Eastern history, or is
an Arab can tell you this firsthand. And you can find lots of videos online about this as well.
Iraq, this country was one of the shining pinnacles of modern Arab lands in the 60s and 70s. Up
until the 80s. Iraq was one of the most in fact, some would even say, the most developed and
advanced country in the Middle East, it had amongst the highest literacy rates, even amongst females
in the 70s, the female literacy rate reached in the high 80%. That is phenomenal for the Middle
East, in in the 80s, and 90s, the University of not the 90, excuse me, not the 90s. In the 70s and
		

			80s, the University of Boca dad, which is one of the largest universities in the Arab world, was
considered to be the most prestigious university in the entire Middle East, the number of students,
the graduates, the the the quality of education was easily comparable to any Western institution,
its health care as well was the product of much envy and other Arab countries. And frankly, the Iraq
of today can barely be recognized as having anything to do with the Iraq of yester years. So what
has happened from the 70s to 2015? Well, no doubt, the first sign of decline began with the almost
decade long war between Iraq and Iran. And for those of you that are above the age of 35, you all
		

			remember this, the 80s were always dominated by Iraq and Iran war. And this war, of course, was the
beginning, really, it decimated. So much of the economy, millions of people died. And of course,
back then, of course, Saddam has been in power since the 70s. Back then, Saddam Hussein was our
close ally. And we sold him plenty of weapons, and for at the time, were completely ignored. Mass
human rights violations. We couldn't care less that he was gassing his own people. He was using
chemical weapons against his own people, the Kurdish population had their grievances, and they
wanted to revolt and bring attention to their plight, and he gassed 1000s of them, and we ourselves
		

			sold plenty of weapons to Iraq, of course, turns out later with the Iran Contra scandal, but we're
also selling weapons to Iran. But then that's just a footnote that's going to be relegated in the
larger scale of things. Iraq, eventually invaded Kuwait in 1990. All of you remember this, and we
led an international coalition that freed the small and oil rich Gulf state, and in 1990 91, was one
we launched Gulf War One, and we invaded Iraq. But it wasn't a full fledged invasion. We didn't
really send ground troops to be stationed in Iraq. Nonetheless, Gulf War one clearly did decimate
the power plants, the electricity plants of the region, and it is estimated more than 100,000 Iraqis
		

			lost their lives as a retaliation for Saddam's invasion. We then subjugated Iraq to a almost total
financial trade embargo for the next 13 years, beginning in 1990. And lasting in effect until Gulf
War Two, which is 2003 13 years, we basically blanketed we basically cut off the entire population
of Iraq from any type of economic trade. And there are so many statistics that can be said. But
again, time is limited. The average per capita income of an Iraqi in 1989, the year before our
invasion was $3,510, which is a good amount for 1989 for a Middle Eastern country. $3,510. Fast
forward five years, and that income becomes $450.
		

			Imagine if your income were cut not in half, not in 1/3 1/10. Instead of getting 70 80,000 You were
getting $7,000 A year worse by limiting the importation of common vaccines of drugs, even of water
purification resources. The United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, itself estimated that at least
half a million children under the age of five died as a result of this embargo. And so much can be
said, I just want to point out one undeniable fact, not one, not two, three top level United Nations
diplomats resigned in protest, one after the other because of what was happening in Iraq at
		

			to time, beginning with Denis Halliday, an Irishman with over 34 years as a career diplomat in the
United Nations, he was placed in charge of the humanitarian coordination of Iraq in the embargo. And
within a year he tried to protest he tried to change within a year, he resigned from the UN after 35
years. And he wrote in a widely publicized op ed, you can find all of this online, that he was
driven to resignation, and I quote, because I refuse to continue to take Security Council orders,
the same council that it imposed and sustained genocidal sanctions against the innocence of Iraq. I
did not want to be complicit my conscious would not allow this end quote. Okay. So Dennis Holliday
		

			said, in effect, we are provoking or causing a genocide. Those were the terms he's using, and a
person who has nothing to do with the Islamic faith. He is not an Arab. He is a un career diplomat.
he resigns, okay, we put in charge another un career diplomat, this is a German by the name of Hans
von Swannack. Within a year and a half Vaughn spanic, another 30 plus year of the 30. Plus work at
tenure at the UN also resigns, claiming that these policies, quote unquote, violate the Geneva
Convention, which is how you treat human beings decently and dignity, that these policies are
violating the Geneva Conventions, and we're causing the deaths of 10s of 1000s of Iraqis. Shortly
		

			after that, a third diplomat who was in charge of the World Health Organization stationed in Iraq
also resigned, citing her protests as a result of these policies. We don't know how many other
resignations might have followed, had not another tragedy envelope does. And that is the tragedy of
September 11. This tragedy, of course, was a turning point in many of our our own policies or
understandings. Again, much can be said, but for the purposes of this lecture, let's concentrate on
what happened in Iraq. Obviously, we all know after 911, the tragedy of 911 was intentionally
misused to make a completely false and counterfeit claim somehow linking Iraq with September 11 and
		

			al Qaeda, the evidence at the time was completely specious. And frankly, even now, we're just
beginning to realize how intentionally misleading certain members of our own government we're a
congressional hearing that took place in 2004 documents, this is all online. This is our own
Congress. This is not another entity, our own congressional hearing that attempted to figure out
what's going on documented over 275 instances of what they called blatant misinformation, which is a
nice word for basically lying and misleading people. The former US Secretary of State, Colin Powell,
himself, apologized publicly, as we're all aware, and he said that these claims that he made in
		

			front of you and will, and I quote, forever be a blot on my record, he felt bad, he felt guilty, he
basically apologized. Well, apologies are nice, even if they're just from one person in that
administration. But it doesn't change the fact that after 13 years of sanction, after millions of
deaths, we then decided to invade Iraq yet again. But this invasion was different. This invasion
wasn't just a nice clean throwing bombs, as we had done in the first Gulf War. It wasn't just
putting sanctions, it was also sending in our troops and the effects of this gulf war to on the
economy of Iraq, on our own troops on our own economy, including, by the way, the troops by the way,
		

			the PTSD as well than all of the issues, you know, the post traumatic stress that that is undergoing
the the effects of this invasion on our image and our prestige in the Middle East. All of these are
for other topics. I don't have time for all of this in one lecture. Let me just caught you one
statistic that came out last week. And this statistic involves how many innocent Iraqi lives were
lost as a result of our own invasion, the most thorough study ever done of the casualties of Gulf
War Two were just released last week, a non government affiliated nonpartisan NGO called Physicians
for Social Responsibility. And again, these are all American institutions. They teamed up with a
		

			Nobel Prize winning international physicians for the prevention of nuclear war, the IPP and W are
very famous Nobel Prize winning institution. And they examined in detail the toll that the war on
terror has had for on the Iraqi people. The investigators concluded after a number of years on on
the ground research, that the total number of casualties that can directly be attributed to our
wars, over the last 12 years is around 1.3 million people. 1.3 million people and then they add and
I quote directly, I read the report
		

			Are portions of it today. And this is only a conservative estimate. And that in all likelihood is
probably around and closer to 2 million. Now, I've quite literally just quoted you three or four
statistics and a handful of events that have occurred in Iraq. For the last two and a half decades,
much more could be said and should be studied and read on one's own. My point in bringing all of
this is very simple. Is it not relevant in understanding the rise of these radical messianic groups
to look at what exactly has happened in that region for the last 25 years, might not some of this
somehow explain why and how such groups do seem to be gaining some popularity, why the people of
		

			that region seem to have, frankly, an insane psychotic rage against us might not somehow explain now
I want to be as explicit as possible. This is not an attempt to sugarcoat or justify or exonerate
terrorism, not at all. However, let me give you an analogous example. And this is a controversial
one, but it needs to be set here in America. Here in America. There is of course, we are multi
important, there are many cultures here. And there is a dominant culture of one ethnicity and
background. Perhaps 60% of America is of one ethnicity, and another ethnicity, another subculture
the African Americans around roughly 13 to 15%. Now, while the percentage of African Americans in
		

			the broader population might be only less than 15, we're all aware that when it comes to prisons,
they're not 15% of our prisons, when it comes to the rates of violent crime, when it comes to drug
prosecution, when it comes to petty theft, when it comes to gangs,
		

			then this minority becomes an overwhelming majority. So there are two paradigms to explain this.
Sadly, both of them are still around the first paradigm, which was very popular 100 years ago,
sadly, it's still popular in some circles today. The first paradigm is to say, oh, that's because
they are like this. That's because their culture. That's because their values. That's because well,
even rap songs have been blamed as well, right? They listen to rap, so they're going to become
violent people. And it's so easy to fall into this, us versus them. We're so holy, they're so
barbaric, that it's because of who they are, their upbringing, their family. Now, that was very
		

			popular 100 years ago. But over the last 100 years, most of us sadly, some haven't got the memo. But
most of us are educated enough to realize that the color of your skin will not dictate your
propensity to commit in crimes. Most of us have realized that all human beings, literally are
created equal, but then circumstances beyond the color of their skin. circumstances like education,
like poverty, like socio economic status, like lack of jobs, like racism, affect certain communities
more than others. Circumstances, like one's own history, and where you're coming from, what has
happened to you and your culture and civilization for the last two 300 years might possibly explain
		

			beyond just the color of your skin. And of course, this is now the predominant thank God
understanding and interpretation. That's the fact of the matter is that there's nothing in your
melatonin that will dictate whether you're going to go into violent crime or not, however, poverty,
lack of education, having schools that are so desperate, and again, let me be frank, here, we are in
one of the cities that this is most clearly demonstrably visible, certain neighborhoods and their
schools and their lack of education and a lack of resources versus neighborhoods across the street.
So this doesn't justify the drug dealers, the violent crimes, ZZ whatever, it doesn't justify the
		

			people who are involved in drugs, they're still going to go to jail. This is not sympathizing. This
is contextualized thing. This is making one understand. And it's very awkward, because when we do
this, we realize Hold on a sec, maybe us as a dominant culture have done something to kind of sort
of ameliorate or, or make it easier for another culture, to find avenues in ways that our own
children are not going to find those avenues may be our own history of slavery, of Jim Crow laws of
segregation, of depriving people of the rights that we had, maybe that somewhat maybe somewhat
explains what's going on. So what I'm asking you to do is to take that narrative, and then also
		

			apply it to Islamic radical movements. And that's where it really requires courage, because you need
to look at the mirror and ask yourself
		

			because it's so easy to criticize others and there's legitimacy, as I said, nobody's exonerating a
drug dealer or a jihadist. In the end of the day, the guy who pulls the trigger, whether he's a drug
dealer with these agendas, that's the one who's guilty. But as a society, we need to take a step
back and ask ourselves what has caused this young man to be so frustrated that he doesn't find any
other avenue other than violent crime or other than thinking that jihad is going to bring about some
type of solution? And that is where we really do need to take a step back and understand what have
we done in that region for the last 35 years to take Iraq from such a beautiful, magnificent grand
		

			country, the jewel of the Arab world and now it is on the brink of civil war? No, it isn't Civil War
right on the brink it is in civil war. It is one of the most and hospitable places that one of us
would want to go how has this happened when we look at that the fact of the matter not all but a lot
of the responsibility falls on our shoulders and that's why it is awkward and difficult.
		

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