It is Called “Kurdophobia"
Kurdishaspect.com - By Vahal Abdulrahman
How is it that this oh-so-proud American nation with all its obsessions with anything that is Iraqi so boldly ignores Iraqi Kurds' success stories since 2003? Every decent American voter ought to ask him/herself that question. Out of 4115 US casualties in Iraq since the start of major combat operations in 2003, zero have been killed in Kurdish administered areas. Nowhere in the Muslim world can one find a community that appreciates and supports the US-led war on terrorism as much as in Iraqi Kurdistan. Over the past five years, the Kurds of Iraq have successfully paved the way towards a democratic, progressive and economically prosperous society. Yet their success story, much like their plight in the preceding decades is by and large unnoticed.
The engineers of the Iraq war, influenced by a meticulously crafted pro-Turkey agenda have compelled themselves to believe that the Kurds simply do not matter to the bigger picture. Their thinking is not unlike senior Department of State officers who, for decades have believed that befriending dictators in the Middle East is a wise policy for the US. It's ironic that the neoconservatives never miss an opportunity to criticize those bureucrats at Foggy Bottom over their established thoughts on the Middle East, yet they do the same vis-à-vis the Kurds without any hesitation.
While on the right side of the spectrum, Turkey's friends deliberately dismiss the Kurds, the left does the same for very different reasons, their thinking is that any good news from Iraq is bad news for the world. Making Bush look bad is far more important to the editors of the New York Times than the quality of life of Iraqis.
So why are decent American taxpayers deprived of the truth about Iraq's Kurds? Why are they not told that their sons and daughters in uniform are not only safe in Kurdistan but are appreciated and welcomed? Why is the truth hijacked from so many hard-working Americans who deserve to know that within Iraq, there are those who pray for the safety of their sons and daughters and that within Iraq there are those who have always welcomed the Americans as liberators? The "those" in question are the citizens of Iraqi Kurdistan.
As somebody who has lived and worked in both Iraq and the United States in the past few years, I can say that the answer to that lies in an important factor that I like to call, Kurdophobia. Yes, the neoconservatives are afraid of the Kurds because their second best friend after Israel, Turkey sees Iraq's Kurds as a "threat." So the neoconservatives' cheerleaders, the self proclaimed "experts" on Kurdish issues, the likes of Michael Rubin never miss an opportunity to mislead the American people by pointing out the mistakes of the Kurds rather than focusing the far outnumbered successes that have been achieved in the past few years.
But while the neoconservatives dismiss the Kurds, for the benefit of their friends in the region, the left also has a grand fear when it comes to pointing out the fact that Kurdistan is a success story, because any success story from Iraq is credit to George W. Bush and any credit to George W. Bush is a potential threat to the "change" they so desperately await!!
The Kurds have an historical obligation to tell their story to the world. Phobias and misinformation do not have a chance with the truth and the truth is, long before there was a surge, long before there were any good news from Iraq, the Kurds of the provinces of Dohuk, Erbil and Sulaimaniyyah were reaping the fruits of the Bush doctrine and the courageous American decision to overthrow the Saddam regime.
Vahal Abdulrahman is an Iraqi Kurdish writer, he can be reached at Vahal101@gmail.com
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October 16, 2008
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