When I was a child, I often heard my father and his siblings talk about the demonstrations and the strikes they used to join when they were in high school and college. It seemed as if they were talking about a different world. One, that I could not relate to.
They demonstrated against increasing bread prices, against corruption in the government and the high rate of unemployment. It did not stop them that their father had a prominent position in the kingdom that Iraq was at that time. It was only normal for them to go out and express their anger towards the royal family and the government.
For me, these stories felt like parts of a long-gone history. Not more than narratives from our history books at school, where we learned about “some” revolutions that took place in Iraq. They mentioned, among others, the 1920 Iraqi Revolt against the British occupation and the 17th of July revolution led by the Ba’ath party. The revolution of the 17th of July 1968 was always described as the final one.
I had a picture in mind of a boiling and angry Iraqi past. But fortunately, I was born at the end of the movie, where all evil was defeated, and “living happily ever after” is the present. Our parents fixed everything for us. We had no reason to go out to the streets and raise our voices. All is great in this country.
Unfortunately, childhood does not last forever, and the veil was lifted slowly. I started seeing fear, oppression and dark clouds covering the sky of Iraq. I saw injustice everywhere, but no sign of anger. The crowds that once condemned the government for the increasing price of bread was silent.
In 1980, a war against our neighbour country, Iran, started. A war, that lasted eight years and ended after the death of a million Iraqis, most of them young men. But no rage was seen. No angry parents asking the leader: “why did you send my son to die?”
Instead, the local television portrayed the families of martyrs as blessed and proud citizens. I remember a musical act named “The mother of the martyred”. It started with a war scene and a woman receiving the coffin of her son. The woman stands silent for a short while, when suddenly she starts ululating and dancing.
I was confused watching her being happy about her martyred son. I asked myself “Why is she not breaking out in tears? Even a cat cries, when losing a kitten. Why should a human mother be ululating over the coffin of her child?”
That musical was a piece of manipulation and provocation. But no one criticised it.
Perhaps the critical voices were in prison or had fled the country.
In 1982, travel was banned for all 13 million Iraqis. The basic human right of free movement was taken away from all the people in the country and again no voices raised against this decision, and no one held a poster with the words: “I don’t agree.”
But who knows, there might have been a sound of anger that never reached our ears?
On the 2nd of August 1990, after not even two years of peace with Iran, the Iraqi army invaded Kuwait, an Arabic country, a neighbour, a smaller brother.
I was visiting my Austrian grandmother when it happened. I could not believe the international news reports shown on TV. I needed two days to realise it was true and not some misunderstanding. And yes, it was just as bad as it sounded. Nothing could justify the insidious attack. My head was full of question marks “What happened to the Arabic dream we were reading about in school? One big Arab nation from Morocco to Iraq. Where did the words of unity and freedom go? And what about all the slogans that were written all over the country?”
The Iraqi media started a mass brainwashing campaign. Instead of rebelling, people started convincing themselves that it was the right decision to invade Kuwait.
Where was our anger? Why were we hiding it even from ourselves? Why were the parents crying for the loss of their children instead of standing up and saying: “no, enough is enough. No more senseless killing and getting killed”? Why does everybody have this deep fear, that dying from a bomb is easier than going out to the streets and expressing the anger? Questions that stayed unanswered.
And maybe there were voices against the invasion, but they have been silenced before being heard.
The 1991 war ended, and it seemed like “peace” prevailed in Baghdad. But the rumours told a different story. There were demonstrations all over the country. People woke up and wanted change. The rumours became louder, and the local media had to react. On TV they called the demonstrators a mob willing to destroy the country.
The whole act soon went from angry people raising their voices against their government to a massacre in which more than one country got involved. Opposing militant groups, stationed in the neighbouring countries took the chance and started arming the angry people.
There was only one rule for the government troops: Killing as many and with any method needed till the crowd is silenced.
The rage ended after tens of thousands were killed, the marshes (Iraq’s largest wetland ecosystem) was almost completely drained, and the marsh Arabs forcefully relocated. The northern regions that were supported by the US, gained a federal government, and were separated from the rest of Iraq.
An extremely brutal video that showed the torturing and killing of the rebels and their families (men, women and even children), was spread among the people, to show what happens to the ones who dare to raise their voices.
It was then that my teenage mind understood that the silence we experienced was not the outcome of disregard or utter satisfaction, it was the result of extreme fear.
Today I know more about what happened back then and what is still happening in Iraq and many other countries.
People will be intimidated when the punishment is by far greater than the crime, when raising your voice does not harm you alone but will harm your family and beloved once, and when getting killed is not the worst thing that could happen to you.