Who Weeps for Abeer?

I have a friend who served in Iraq for 13 months at the beginning of this war. She told me that amid the horror, she and her fellow female soldiers had lots of positive interactions with Iraqi women. That was when the US occupation was more favorably regarded than it is now, but still, I wonder....

I also think about what we can do to hold candidates' feet to the fire on the issue of mental health care for our military personnel and their families.

And finally, can we elevate the issue of these moral waivers? Do we really want people with serious and documented psychiatric problems and criminal records serving in the Armed Forces of the US?

BlogHer Contributing Editor ( http://www.blogher.com/<a )
Law and Journalism/Media
Professor Kim ( http://professorkim.blogspot.com )

Contributing Writer< ( http://www.ojr.org/ojr/people/KimPearson )

This story is agony; I admire Abeer's brothers for sitting through the trial. Professor Kim, you are a true teacher. Thank you so much for this post.

I believe, given the dereliction of duty the U.S. military has exhibited toward the safety of its own female soldiers, much less civilians who find themselves in close proximity with American troops, that Zia is right: Cortez' statement is the tip of the iceberg.

Women who are soldiers

Cortez' leading comment about so-called "sex with Iraqi women" is a terrifying reminder of the chain of newsreports on assaults against women (both civilians and comrades-at-arms) that have trickled onto the Internet in the past few years. If we circumvent the conflict between Iraqis and Americans, and focus only on the safety of women in the military, the stories keep on popping up -- only the women assaulted get older and better educated. For example, in July, 2006, Rose Aguilar reported on AlterNet that "Female Soldiers Treated 'Lower Than Dirt' ( http://www.alternet.org/story/38942/ ):

"WVA estimates that nine out of 10 women in the military have been either harassed or assaulted. "Look at the numbers that have been presented. You have to realize there are far more that have not come forward," Mussolino says. "When I counsel women and help them with medical benefits, I find most were too scared to report the assault. It's such a horrible thing that you just keep it to yourself for years."

"The military is closing its eyes," she adds. "They don't want to deal with it. They may be battle-ready, but when it comes to assaults on women, they don't know how to handle it."

And this story is just one of the most recent reports. I am really impressed by the Denver Post series Betrayal in the Ranks ( http://extras.denverpost.com/justice/tdp_betrayal.... )[PDF], based on a nine-month investigation of female soldiers who experienced sexual violence.

Women who are living under occupation

When I hit Google to surf for stories of Iraqi women, the women get younger, less educated, and absolutely vulnerable -- the combination of culture and war zone erase these girls (and so many are) from family, neighborhood and self.

Doubt me? For a solid round-up of reporting on the status of Iraqi women, I turned to UC Berkeley Prof. Ruth Rosen's piece, Iraq's Hidden Victims ( http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/07/14/iraqs_... ). Rosen pulls data from 2003-2006, a four year period in which Americans re-elected George W. Bush. She writes:

"The U.S. State Department's June 2005 report on the trafficking of women suggested that the extent of the problem in Iraq is "difficult to appropriately gauge" under current chaotic circumstances, but cited an unknown number of Iraqi women and girls being sent to Yemen, Syria, Jordan, and Persian Gulf countries for sexual exploitation.

In May 2006, Brian Bennett wrote in Time Magazine that a visit to "the Khadamiyah Women's Prison in the northern part of Baghdad immediately produces several tales of abduction and abandonment. A stunning 18-year-old nicknamed Amna, her black hair pulled back in a ponytail, says she was taken from an orphanage by an armed gang just after the US invasion and sent to brothels in Samarra, al-Qaim on the border with Syria, and Mosul in the north before she was taken back to Baghdad, drugged with pills, dressed in a suicide belt and sent to bomb a cleric's office in Khadamiyah, where she turned herself in to the police. A judge gave her a seven-year jail sentence ‘for her sake' to protect her from the gang, according to the prison director."

"Families and courts," Bennett reported, "are usually so shamed by the disappearance [and presumed rape] of a daughter that they do not report these kidnappings. And the resulting stigma of compromised chastity is such that even if the girl should resurface, she may never be taken back by her relations."

And, of course, these stories get much less coverage than Anna Nicole Smith. But for a true case study of the utter lack of American reporting on Abeer's rape and murder, I urge you to read Third Estate Sunday's piece, Abeer ( http://thirdestatesundayreview.blogspot.com/2006/0... ).

What's next?

These links I offer up are old -- at least one year old. And I could not stomach testing any of the graphic or youtube links I found. So my question now is...now that Kim has written this beautiful post and we're all aware -- how do we answer Kim's question? How do we keep weeping for Abeer?

Lisa Stone
BlogHer Co-founder ( http://www.blogher.com/member/lisa-stone )
Surfette ( http://surfette.typepad.com )

I can honestly say that I did. I have a daughter her age and when I first heard about this atrocity I wept real tears of sorrow for what she must have suffered and what her remaining family continues to suffer.

It's a reminder to all of us that the war is all to real and that the people in that country are suffering for what our government wants us to believe is a good reason. Even worse is the nightmare that is being forced on men and women who believe in our country so much, they sacrafice their own lives, both physically and mentally so we don't have to.

Reports of this nature make me ashamed of my Army service and wonder what happened in the 20 years since I left. :(

Jim Heivilin