Looking Through the Pinhole: 2013 Reflections of a Woman Living and Working in Iraq

I started to draft this post about a week before leaving Iraq (end of August). It is a reflection of my three years in Iraq, how I was transformed by the people, the country and all the experiences that I had. 

This is a picture I really love because it reflects the diversity of Iraq. This is Baba Sheikh, the Yezidi's version of the Pope. Yezidis are one of Iraq's religious minorities that are part of the mosaic of Iraqi society. We went to visit him to Lalish, the Holy place for the Yezidi's during their  new year in Mid-April.

The Journey

Almost 3 years ago, to be exact, December 2010, I arrived here to work as a volunteer in a local women organization. I didn't have any plans as for how long I would be staying. I was supposed to go back to school anyway by the fall of 2011, to start a new Masters Degree (after kind of postponing my Ph. D in Pharmacy). I thought a few months in Iraq will do a service to my CV, I would improve my Arabic, and I would have a chance to tell Iraqis that not all Americans supported the war in Iraq. After three years, what I thought I would achieve is completely different to the course things took for me in Iraq.

Iraq, (and Israel/Palestine) have been the most amazing three years of my life, both professionally and personally. I thought I came to give something, but it turned out that I was the one who received the most. The kindest hospitality, as I have been received as a colleague, a friend, a sister, a daughter and much more. I have become part of the family and Iraq and Kurdistan have become part of me. I have learned so much from Kurdish and Iraqi activists as well as from activists that work on international solidarity. I had the opportunity to visit Iraqi and Kurdish villages,  meet fishermen, academics, activists, with ministers and government officials, and religious leaders from Iraqi minorities like the Chaldean Patriarch and the Yezidi version of the pope. To experience the real Iraq, the diverse mosaic  of peoples and the cradle of ancient civilisation, I was in Babel and in the Sumerian capital of Ur.

The Ziggurat of Ur, the ancient capital of the Sumerians, Nasriya, Iraq. 

Working with internally displaced children

It is hard to summarize what I have been doing in Iraq for the past 3 years, but I will attempt to lay it down here, as it also helps me in the reflection process, in sinking in what I have been living, and in realizing how I have been transformed.

For the first months, I was living in Erbil and working with a local women organization. The usual struggle was adapting to a very different culture, finding a place to live and establishing my social networks. That was a big challenge. Then, I moved to Suleimaniya, and was working with internally displaced Iraqi children in a camp for those who fled the sectarian violence in Iraq in 2006. The camp was called Qalawa camp. There we had weekly psychosocial activities with the children, ranging from art, music, theatre, journaling, and games to stimulate teamwork, inclusion, and participation of all. I had come from working with Palestinian kids, so I thought this was going to be similar, but it was different in many ways. As we worked with the children for an extended period, we could see the changes, the transformations happening in these little people. Respect, and discipline were evolving through the different themes that we explored with the children. In Qalawa, I learned to feel at home in a place that many would call miserable. I came to teach the IDP children, but they became my teachers, and taught me that unconditional love is above all things, and that love can be the difference between giving all and giving nothing. Love is also discipline. We were giving the children something they didn't have; the space to be heard, to express their feelings and above all, the space to be children. That had a transforming effect although it was extremely tiring. Often times it took hours to get one task done, but the most important thing was that everyone counted. When we went to Qalawa, we didn't look at the poor and ill equipped tents, dirty clothes, and trash all over the camp, or the lack of infrastructures, or the mud that would get to everyone's knees during the winter, or the extreme cold or hot conditions, the lack of toilets, or the lack of basic home appliances. We looked at parents and kids' humanity. We were not there because we had pity on them. Nor be cause we were doing charity works, because we never gave them money (they never asked), or food, or any material things. We were there because of our commitment to change those kid’s lives. We gave them our time, our love and our knowledge.

Women Rights Advocacy

Iraqi Kurdistan might look as a progressive country when you compare it to the rest of Iraq. You see women without the hijab, wearing short sleeve t-shirts and working outside home, but if you scratch the surface, you get to see another layer. Early and force marriages and honor killings are issues that reflect the patriarchal nature of the society, where women are removed from public life and have little or no legal rights. Another aspect of my work was women's rights, working on an advocacy campaign against honor killing organized by Zhiyan Group, with members from 60 different local human and  women rights groups demanding that the government enforce a new domestic violence law, following up cases of honor killing, and exposing the issue to the media and the relevant government and ministries. My role was to document their work, via research and reports, and be an international observer, re-affirming their work and providing strategic insight.  I helped to write a report titled: “No to honor killing in the name of tradition and culture”. In this report, Zhiyan group documented public opinion about forced marriages, honor killing and the domestic violence law in two areas of Suleimaniya, where these crimes are prevalent.

Through this advocacy work I learned that democracy is a process that does not only requires having laws on paper only, but that needs to challenge institutions to get laws implemented and above all democracy requires mobilization. Along with local women activists, we went from the village, to the police station, to the court, to the streets, to the Ministry of Interior and Ministry of Justice, and even to the Parliament, knocking every door unceasingly, raising the voices of women. We learned the important role that the media plays in enforcing democracy. Even when media is not completely independent in Iraq (it is affiliated to political parties), there is an opposition that brings alternate voices. I have seen a women's movement start to gain momentum in Kurdistan, united despite their different approaches; they have understood that they have a stronger voice if they work together. There was a big difference between International Women's Day in 2012, and the one this year. From a small rally of about 30, this year, the demonstration hosted more than a hundred people and delivered demands to the Suleimaniya office of the Parliament. 

I worked with very passionate and committed activists dealing with very delicate cases and risking their lives daily, some of my colleagues were attacked physically and threatened because of this work, but that didn’t persuade them to stop their work, instead they were more convinced that their work was being effective.

Demonstration on International Women's Day 2013 

Water rights and transboundary water issues between Turkey and Iraq

For the last year, I was part of a regional advocacy campaign, working to raise awareness about the negative impacts of Ilisu dam, one of 22 dams built in Turkey on the Tigris River. The campaign gathers people form Turkey, Iraq and internationally to raise awareness about the negative impact of the Ilisu dam, the biggest to be built on the Tigris River and that will have disastrous cultural, socio-economic, and environmental impacts on the population of Iraq. 

The urgency of this campaign is shown by the deterioration of the water quality in Iraq and the risk of disappearance of the Iraqi marshes, an important wetland in the Middle East. The Iraqi marshes have important cultural, natural and economic value to the communities that surround it. The dam issues is a political as well as a resource issue, as Iraq depends on the water of the Tigris for much of its water needs and the construction of this dam will reduce significantly the water available in Iraq. The problem cannot be reduced to this dam. The real problem is that there is no transboundary water agreement between the riparian countries that guarantees reasonable and equitable access to water to Iraq, and Iraqis feel that this dam could give Turkey control over much of Iraq's water and that Turkey could use it as a political tool whenever it wants to get something from Iraq.

I coordinate local and international activists in a campaign to raise awareness inside and outside of Iraq, and to join our campaign to the global movement to protect rivers and people who depend on them. In 2013, I traveled to represent the campaign in Tunis at the World Social Forum. I had the opportunity to organize a session on water grabs and global solidarity. In that session, we gathered activists and local community organizers from Mexico, Peru, India and Europe working against water privatization, mining construction in indigenous communities land and dams that displace people and damage river ecosystems. We shared experiences, strategies and lessons learned from all the movements. In Jordan, the campaign organized a seminar with Iraqi scholars and water experts that made recommendations on how to work with the transboundary water issue at the national and international level. In April and May, members of the campaign visited the Ilisu dam site Turkey, and Hasankeyf, one of the many communities that will be displaced by the dam construction.

Hasankeyf Ingathering 2013. Hasankeyf,  Turkey. April 2013. Photo by: Johanna L. Rivera

Table at the Suleimaniya Green Music and Art Festival, April 2013. Photo by: Johanna L. Rivera

Seminar: The Water Crisis in Iraq, Amman Jordan, May 2013. Photo by: Johanna L. Rivera

International Activists Demonstration at hte Ilisu dam construction site, Ilisu, Turkey. May 2013.
Photo by: Johanna L. Rivera

During June, the campaign organized awareness seminars in Iraq's south provinces of Basra, Missan, Thiqar (Nasriyah) and Diwaniyah, with the collaboration of Iraqi and international activists. The seminars were organized by local activists, and invited youth groups, community leaders, academics, members of the local government and local and national media. All these efforts gained support of youth and local activists and were building up to the campaign’s session on Iraqi Social Forum (ISF) organized in Baghdad in September 2013. The session brought together Iraqi lawyers and International activists to discuss legal strategies to protect the Tigris River. 

Awareness Session in Missan, June 2013. Missan Province, Iraq. Photo by: Johanna L. Rivera

The campaign has been actively working with legal and water experts to develop a legal framework that includes diplomatic as well as international law perspective to solve the water issue and that could give Iraq the leverage to negotiate with Turkey a transboundary water agreement that will guarantee equal shares of the Tigris River. Mobilization has begun after the ISF, a statement from the Iraqi Jurist Union, demanding the government to actively engage with the water issue and with Turkey. In addition, one of Iraq’s most prominent religious leader demanded Iraq to take Turkey to the UN for arbitration on the water issue if the two states were not able to come to a solution on their own. 

Meeting with a representative of the Baghdad Provincial Council, Baghdad, Iraq. September 2013. Photo by: Johanna L. Rivera

This is just the start, and in the beginning I saw no big progress, but as I look back into these years I can see that things are moving, I can see that people are mobilizing. These are big issues that we are dealing with, and I have learned to see each achievement as a small victory in a long journey towards democracy. It didn’t take the west 10 years to achieve the improvements in human rights and democracy that we can see today, and it is easy to take for granted the work that others did to have the freedoms that we have. The same is true for Iraq and Kurdistan. It will probably take one or two more generations, but we have started. And we are moving steadily!  

Domiz Camp: Syrian Kurds forced into Iraqi Kurdistan

The media is so overwhelmed with war and conflict that it is easy to look away or to try to pretend it is not happening. For some time, while watching Al-Jazeera, I was so confused about Syria, after all, wasn’t it supposed to be a revolution, an Arab Spring like the ones in Tunisia and Egypt? Every day they were covering a new attack, more people killed, another town taken by the rebels or back by the Syrian Army. I just thought, ok, please finish fighting so I can have my breakfast without another bloodshed story. But when you meet someone, when you are touch first hand, you think differently.

Iraq, my home for the past 2 years, is one of Syria’s next-door neighbor and many Syrians, especially Kurds have come to the Kurdish part of Iraq. News of thousands fleeing into Iraq were everywhere. They were coming into Domiz Camp, in Dohuk, a camp that had Syrian refugees since 2004 from the previous uprising. Now it has been overflowed by 30-40,000 Syrian-Kurds that have come to escape the violence caused by 20-month-violently repressed revolution now mixed with civil war.

I was in Dohuk last week and visited the camp to see how is the situation of the Syrian refugees here. As we entered, I saw hundreds of tents lined up, I had goose bumps and a sudden sadness, I had to take a deep breath not to cry in front of my colleagues. The camp already looks like a city with street vendors, small shops and improvised restaurants. Hundreds of people, mostly men gathered in the entrance of the camp, as if lined up, more like crowded up waiting for something. I didn’t feel intimidated or scared, I kind of expected what I saw, it was like a giant Qalawa (is the camp that I work now in Suleimaniya). It felt kind of familiar, as if I had been there before.

We went to visit one of the programs run by one of the local NGO’s they provide psychosocial counseling for people in the camp, mostly children. The camp is so big, and they visit the families to see if there are families in need for help. Some children have been treated for trauma. The staff say one problem is that there are no spaces for children in the camp. We went around the camp and there were a lot of children running around. A little girl in a dress and white stockings was trying to cross through the muddy street, careful not to get herself too dirty, I carried her up but it was too late, her shoes were all covered in mud. Many of the kids were carrying backpacks; at least they are going to school, I said as to console myself.  But the consolation lasted a few minutes until we spoke to one of the families, who said they were not sending their kids to schools because it was far and they were afraid that something could happen to the children on the way (to school).

This family said that there have been several tents on fire. The people have organized in the different camp sections to protect the common areas. Until now, no one knows what has caused the fires. The reality is that tents are small, with unreliable electricity connections. They criticized the UN for not providing enough services. One of the women said that they get a monthly ration that includes oil, flour, sugar, tea, and lentils, but that it was not enough to feed the family for a month.

The family said they were thankful for the Kurdish people’s hospitality. They were saying how they remembered the atrocities committed against Kurds in Iraq and how every year they commemorated the massacre of Halabja, where more than 5,000 Kurds were chemically bombed by Saddam’s regime in Halabja. It was powerful to see my Iraqi Kurds colleagues showing respect and solidarity with their Syrian Kurdish neighbors. They also told us that children get sick more often there. Its cold and the kids have to sleep with their jackets on, the UN promised to give them heaters, but the kerosene that the heaters use is expensive. It reminded my of my kids in Qalawa, when we got there, they had their jackets on. I’m angry, and I want to do something. Angry at the international community that is not supporting the revolution, saying that they don’t want to do the same as they did in Libya. Instead of helping the opposition to reach their goals, they are playing a “Little Cold War”. Turkey with supporting the Sunnis, Iran, the Shias and the US neither, prolonging a war that everyday increases its toll on civilians killed. The leftist and the peace movement debating if they should keep their support to Assad’s regime because is anti-imperialist, while ignoring Syrian people’s plight for freedom, which came out decided to overthrow a 50 year dictatorial regime. They were inspired by the success in Tunisia and Egypt and the support of the international community in Libya. They find themselves betrayed by indifference.

Why are we and our governments so hypocrites to call ourselves supporters of democracy and human rights while we watch crimes against humanity happening in front of our eyes? Why we are unable to respond? Why don’t we support the Syrian people’s representatives and encourage them to start drafting a constitution for the new, free Syria? Why are we not talking about a federal Syria, like in Iraq with autonomy for the minorities like the Kurds and start to engage them in drafting the new constitution? Is not straight forward, as the opposition is very fragmented, but Im just saying is not impossible.

These are concrete, diplomatic, non-violent actions that our government and diplomats could be approaching. Instead we keep waiting…. and while we wait, the prospects of reconciliation decrease, and murders, crimes against humanity, hate and division grow.

See the next post where I try to map the actors in the Syrian revolution/civil war....