When taking a taxi becomes haram for a woman

 

Badly affected by the corona pandemic as well as an economic crisis, the Kurdistan Region of Iraq is facing a rise in domestic violence, while conservative imams increasingly oppose women’s rights activists.

Kurdish Salafist imam at book fair in Erbil  FOTO JUDIT NEURINK

By Judit Neurink

The corona crisis has had a huge effect on the position of women in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, as it has in many Middle Eastern countries. As Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed of the United Nations recently warned: without immediate action, “the pandemic could set back women’s rights by decades”. 

All over the Middle East, violence against women has increased since the pandemic began. Women’s shelters are packed to capacity and beyond. But in Kurdistan, even shelters could not prevent disasters. A young woman divorced by her husband for perceived infidelity was collected from just such a shelter by her family, who even signed a promise for the court that they would keep her safe. Within days, three of her brothers had murdered her.

This is just one of many incidents in the autonomous region, which is known as the safest part of Iraq. And while Kurdistan was a major player in the battle against the Islamic terror group ISIS, the rise of the group rise drew attention to the attraction Islamic radicalism continues to hold for some Kurds. At the start of this century, the region brought forth Al Qaida affiliates like the Ansar al-Islam group. To fight the attraction of ISIS, the Kurdish authorities closed mosques and banned a number of radical imams from preaching. 

Preaching

Since the group was largely expelled from Iraq in 2017, these measures have slackened off once again, and imams are back preaching their radical messages. Corona, together with an economic crisis in Kurdistan, has had a big impact on women as well as on the work being done to improve their rights, says Bahar Ali (52), director of the Emma Foundation for Human Development. “The mollahs make my work very difficult,” she complains over Whatsapp from the Kurdistan capital of Erbil. “Because of the economic crisis and the ongoing political conflict, they are even more active. For now less attention is being paid to women’s issues.”

Kurdistan has not been able to pay salaries to government employees and pensioners for months now. Because everyone is focused on surviving and mostly remain inside the home, domestic violence is on the rise again. “Politically, women’s issues are not a priority. There is also less money for our organizations and our activities.”

At the same time, conservative imams have started attacking women activists. Feminists have been painted as a key enemy, seen as being against Islam and its values. “They say we import strange ideas from the West. That we want the number of divorces to go up. That it is us behind the dwindling respect for fathers and brothers,” Ali sums up. “The problem is that our patriarchal society listens to the imams.” Their reach is huge, through their 5000 mosques in Kurdistan. “Plus, almost every imam has his own TV channel, and many followers on social media. There are personal attacks on us, too, by the same media and in personal messages.” 

Artwork

Just how influential they are was made clear in Kurdistan’s cultural capital, Sulaymaniya, where an artwork treating violence against women was destroyed within a day of its installation. Artist Tara Abdulla (24) had collected the clothes of 100,000 victims of domestic violence and sewn their dresses, shirts, scarves, bras and panties into a 5-kilometer-long washing line hung along the city’s main street. Her intention of spotlighting bad practices in a conservative society received support, but the artwork also came under fire for tarnishing the city’s image.  Abdulla: “Is the city tarnished by pain and violence, or by this piece of art?” Hours after the washing line was officially installed, a teenager on a motorbike set the clothes on fire. The whole line was then taken down.

Addressing violence against women directly touches upon the power over women that conservative men feel is theirs, says Xelan Nawzad (23). “It angers our religious men, and their influence in Kurdistan is huge.”

From a conservative family herself, she divorced and moved away to escape the wrath of her brothers. As a sociology student at the University of Sulaymaniya, her research into the Quran made it clear to her how religion impacts on culture and on women’s lives. To her, religion is “the first subject feminists should address, as it is the main reason we do not have freedom.” She wants to fight the mollahs with the same tools they use to maintain their hold on women’s lives: texts from the Quran.

She cites a recent example. An Iraqi bank is offering loans for second marriages, and is supported by one of the most conservative and vocal Kurdish imams, Mollah Mazhar Khorasani. He propagates polygamy, even though a Kurdish law placed tight restrictions on the practice. He has stated that the measure would be good for widows and single women, because men are numerically a minority in Kurdistan. “I could not find that particular argument anywhere in the Quran. Only that, after a military victory, women could be taken as wives and slaves.” 

Quran

With this practice employed recently by ISIS against Yezidis, the mollah had to find another, more acceptable, excuse, she says. Yet when Nawzad wrote an article on this subject, a feminist website refused to publish it. “Their argument is that the Quran is not our subject. So who should tell our women about it, then? Our women, who are scared of men and society?”

How big an influence religion is was also made clear when the Fatwa Council of Islamic Scholars in Kurdistan issued a fatwa on women travelling alone by taxi. In conservative thought, it is damaging for a woman’s honor to be alone in a car with a man she does not know. Although there have been incidents where drivers took advantage of such situations, declaring a taxi ride haram (forbidden) for women not only puts the responsibility on her, it also makes traveling difficult for women in a country where public transport hardly exists. After protests by Bahar Ali’s organization among others, and with many women ignoring the fatwa, it was finally withdrawn.

Bahar Ali is frustrated most of all by how hard it is proving to reach out to conservative women. “We don’t have enough platforms, especially compared to the imams. Also, it is not easy for uneducated women to understand the issue. Many think it is all in the Quran. We tell them not to be misled by the imams, as this concerns their own personal freedom.”

This is exactly why Xelan Nawzad prefers to improve women’s knowledge of the Quran than to make texts by western feminists available to Kurdish women by translating them, as other feminists in Sulaymaniya are doing. “The sexuality of western women is not our business. Much more important are the barriers we keep finding in our way: those conservative ideas about virginity and honor.”

Her message might find a bigger audience soon. Because of the worsening situation, more women are coming forward to fight for women’s rights in Kurdistan. A new generation, bringing its own experiences and ideas with it. “Five years ago, we were all about my age,” says Bahar Ali. “Now we are seeing more and more young women with critical minds coming to gain information. Those we train. For they are our future.”

A trial sparks a wave of desperation and distrust in Iraq's Kurdistan

The trial of five Kurdish activists and journalists for 'spying' has left Kurds furious with their leaders. As hardship increases, they recoil against growing authoritarianism, writes Judit Neurink.

One of the journalists being led away after the trial.   FOTO TWITTER

by Judit Neurink 

 

"But Your Honour, they threatened to rape my wife!"

This exclamation, by a Kurdish journalist to the judge who would go on to sentence him to six years in jail for spying, may have made an even greater impression than the verdict itself.

Based on notes and pictures on the journalists' phones, plus confessions they refute or say were made under duress, five Kurdish journalists and activists had been convicted before the trial in the Iraqi Kurdistan capital of Erbil even began.

At a press conference days earlier, Prime Minister Masrour Barzani of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq denied that the 70 or so Kurds imprisoned during anti-government protests were journalists and activists.

He said they were "spies" working for "foreign powers" and provoking conflict, and "armed vandals who tried to bomb foreign missions". The prime minister, who headed his party's secret service before taking office, offered no proof to back up his allegations.

Given the number of judges Barzani's ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) has appointed in recent years in those parts of the Kurdistan Region it administers, the verdict was seen as a foregone conclusion. At least one of the trial judges was also a prominent member of the KDP, and court documents circulating on social media indicate that Barzani ordered the verdict personally. Even if these claims are not true, the independence of Kurdish justice is clearly in jeopardy.

Read the whole story here

Are Iraqi youths losing their religion?

Despite the influence of religion in Iraqi politics, recent studies show that young people in Iraq are increasingly identifying as secularist. 

by Judit Neurink

“It’s about my identity,” Yara Ali said with confidence. Ali is an Arab-Iraqi lawyer and prominent activist living in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq; for security reasons, she uses a pseudonym.

“I was forced to wear it. It was to protect me, but it wasn’t me.” Yara, 29, told Al-Monitor. A couple of years ago, the modern, educated woman who had become a professional and loved her job decided to take off her headscarf.

Her internal conflict was caused by her upbringing by a pious mother and a secular father. “I was raised to be independent and strong, with my mother setting limits,” she said. The emancipation process gained speed when she traveled for her work and studies and was introduced to people with different backgrounds from her own.

“Extremist groups were another layer,” she said of the process that ended with her eventually taking off the headscarf. The policies that the Islamic State (IS) promoted in captured areas inside Iraq and Syria, and the atrocities they committed there, shocked the world. “It made me worry how people saw me — because of IS many people now view Muslims as bad people.”

Although Arab Barometer, a research network at Princeton University and the University of Michigan, suggests that the political system in countries like Iraq and Lebanon reinforces religious identities, which serves to maintain the religious influence in daily life, the same body concluded its 2019 polling surveys by writing, "There has been a decline in religious faith and trust in religious parties across the Middle East and North Africa."

Read more here:

Three months on from referendum, Kurds feel frustrated

ERBIL, Iraqi Kurdistan — “A local minimarket like mine should have worked! If things are going this badly here, then how bad is it elsewhere?” said Badr Mahmoud, who just reopened his shop in Kurdistan's capital city of Erbil. It's smaller this time because of the lack of income, with fewer products and less stock than before. “I must figure out how to survive because the neighborhood and even the kids in the street need me.”

Iraqi Christians return after IS amid safety concerns

QARAQOSH/BARTELLA Iraq — “We want our own guards. It is too difficult without them,” said 70-year-old Sarah Kriaqosh Hannah. “Before, they were our sons. Now we do not know who they are.”

Iraqi Kurds play the blame game

Ignoring all warnings, the Kurds of Iraq in September held a referendum on independence and consequently lost most of the territory they controlled outside their autonomous region when the Iraqi army was sent in to punish them. A development that has increased the divide between their two main power bases--as well as the calls for unity.

(published in Arabic on October 29, 2017 in Huffington Post Arabic)

Erbil, by Judit Neurink

After the Iraqi army and Shiite militias mid-October took control of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk back from the Kurds, the Kurdish president, Massoud Barzani, was not seen in public for many days. The referendum over independence from Iraq for the Kurdish region, held on September 25, had backfired badly, but Barzani offered no comfort and remained silent.

This added to the fury of many Kurds, and to the grief of as many others, because the fall-out from the referendum had destroyed even the last shreds of unity the president had hoped it would create. As Iraqi troops and Shiite volunteers rolled in to take back control of most of the areas that Baghdad and the Kurds have been disputing since 2003, Kurdish politicians and civilians started blaming both each other and the outside world.

The blame game is being played along geographical lines: in the western half of the Kurdistan Region under the control of Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), the blame is mostly placed on the competition: the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) based in the eastern part of the Region, near the Iranian border. The PUK’s leaders blame the KDP, as they tried to convince Barzani to give in to pressure from most of the world--and most importantly Baghdad, the neighbors Iran and Turkey, and the Americans--to postpone the referendum. And when the Iraqi army, in retaliation for the vote, stood poised to take over the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, the PUK ordered their peshmerga troops to retreat—in order to prevent bloodshed and the destruction of the city, they claim. 

Demonstration outside the UN compound in Erbil (Picture Judit Neurink)

The Barzani front are calling this treason. Of the activists present at a small peace demonstration outside the United Nations compound in the Kurdistan capital, Erbil, most agree with that notion. Like Chiman Khaled, whose father was a peshmerga fighter killed by the former Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein. She blames part of the PUK for the loss of Kirkuk: “A wing of the party accepted help from outside, which led to betrayal,” she says, choosing her words carefully.

She is so precise in putting the blame on just part of the party, because one PUK leader, Kosrat Rasul, took the KDP side, promising to defend Kirkuk. But when the other PUK battalions pulled back, he too was eventually forced to quit. The retreat of the peshmerga led to thousands of Kurds fleeing the city, fearing abuse by the Iranian-led Hashed al-Shabi militias, which have earned quite a reputation for brutality in the fight against the Islamic group ISIS. Weeks later, many have still not returned home, while many more Kurds have fled other towns and villages that have come under fire.

The part of the already badly-divided PUK that didn’t fight was led by the sons and nephews of the recently-deceased PUK leader, Jalal Talabani. His eldest son, Bafel, took the lead there, after opposing the referendum, even though he only holds a minor position in the party. The day before it was due to be held, he called on the KDP to postpone it; Barzani replied that it was too late for that. In PUK-majority towns, many stayed home, and the turnout was barely fifty percent.

Bafel Talabani (front left) and his brother Qubad (back left) with their cousins (picture Twitter)

 Jalal Talabani’s funeral, which took place just days after the referendum, would normally have been an opportunity to smooth over conflicts. However, no solutions were forthcoming. Soon after, when it became clear what measures Baghdad was preparing in response to a referendum it deemed illegal, Jalal’s son Bafel called for a meeting with other Kurdish parties in the lakeside town of Dukan--a symbolic venue, as his father’s guest house there had welcomed many fugitives from the wrath of previous Iraqi leaders. He presented a plan to pressure the Iraqi Prime Minister, Haidar al-Abadi, into much-needed talks; the plan included a freeze on the referendum outcome and the peaceful handing over of Kirkuk, which was to be placed under joint Kurdish-Iraqi control. 

Barzani is said to have left the meeting in a rage—perhaps because it was clearly arranged following stiff pressure from neighboring Iran, which has traditionally been a major influence on the PUK and other Kurdish parties. Iran’s Republican Guards’ Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani had traveled back and forth between the different Kurdish cities and Baghdad, first to warn against holding the referendum, and later to threaten death and destruction if the outcome was not annulled and Kirkuk was not handed over. 

“Rather than face thousands of dead and fighting in Kirkuk, we decided to make a tactical retreat,” Bafal Talabani told France24 when confronted with the accusations of treason. He called for an investigation into what had happened, as fighting had still led to the death of dozens of peshmerga fighters. He also indicated that Abadi had been willing to reach agreements when the Kurdish leaders met in Dukan “to stop the trouble in Kirkuk,” but that the leaders—he didn’t blame Barzani by name--had not been able to decide fast enough.

Both Iran and Region’s other neighbor, Turkey, are worried about the impact the referendum--and a subsequent process leading to an independent Kurdish state in Iraq—could have for their own Kurdish minorities. They therefore sided with Baghdad to punish the Iraqi Kurds as a clear message to their own citizens: do not even consider anything like this! 

Tehran closed its border to maximize pressure on the PUK, as oil exports to Iran and petrol imports from that country account for much of the income of both the party and the Talabani family. In this respect, too, there is a clear split between the PUK/Talabani family on the one hand and the the Barzanis and the KDP-dominated government, which has been working closely with Turkey over the past decade, with major Turkish investment feeding into an economic boom and the transportation of Kurdish oil through Turkey, and Turkish loans, helping out during the recent recession.

But given the Kurdish leaders’ failure to show unity, and Barzani’s refusal to agree to Abadi’s demand to annul the vote, the Iraqi military take-over did not stop at Kirkuk. The army has since taken back most of the disputed areas, while fighting has broken out between the Kurdish peshmerga and Iraqi and Hashed troops at some strategic locations. This was probably partly because the KDP had been ready for a fight, as an advisor to the Kurdish Prime Minister, who wants to remain anonymous, admitted just after the referendum was held.

The adviser indicated that the vote had not been postponed, partly because elements within the KDP, mostly led by Barzani’s son Masrour, who heads the security forces, had decided that only now would they receive enough international support to counter any measures taken by Baghdad and the Region’s neighbors militarily. They argued that the Americans and Europeans would stop supporting them just as soon as the Kurds were no longer needed in the battle against ISIS--“And then Baghdad will use chemical weapons against us again, just as Saddam’s Baath party did before them,” the advisor said, promising mistakenly that the Peshmerga would fight for Kirkuk and win, because they were considered the stronger force.

This is another clear break with the PUK, which predicted such a battle would be lost: the Kurds had mainly been successful in the fight against ISIS, PUK analysts argued, because of the daily air support they received from the coalition. Meaning they stood no chance against the Iraqis and their mostly American-supplied weapons. These analysts included Bafel Talabani, who had set up the PUK special forces now led by his cousin, Lahur.

But in the KDP, the view was that the battle would come sooner or later anyway, as Baghdad has been unwilling to reach agreements over the disputed areas since the constitution was accepted in 2005, and according to which, the process for deciding who took control there, which included a census and a referendum, should have been completed by late 2007. Since that never happened, Baghdad would someday send the army in to take back the territories the Kurds had been able to take over. When they did, any excuse would do. 

This view has been echoed on social media by KDP supporters, as well as during demonstrations held recently in Erbil. “What happened has nothing to do with the referendum. Abadi and the militias were already planning this,” says Mohammed Jamal, holding a number of small Kurdish flags and expressing “sadness and grief” over the loss of territory. University professor Fatima Sinda points out that the Iraqi constitution, the legal justification claimed by Baghdad for its actions, has been abused by all parties. “The Iraqi government has been undermining it for years, ignoring it in its actions against minorities and now attacking us with American weapons.” 

Demonstration outside the UN compound in Erbil (Picture: Judit Neurink)

At the Erbil protests, many blamed the Americans for not helping the Kurds, and for allowing the Iraqi army and Shiite militias controlled by Iran to take over the disputed territories. Many simply had not believed the Americans when they warned the Kurds that, if the referendum went ahead, they would be unable to shield them from the consequences. By carrying Israeli flags and portraits of the Israeli leader, Benjamin Netanjahu, next to those of the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, some revealed where they had now placed their trust. 

The aforementioned advisor declared to be disappointed in the Europeans, who had talked about human rights and democracy but were now taking Baghdad’s side. This same attitude showed in the press releases Masrour Barzani’s Kurdistan Region Security Council (KRSC) put out about the clashes with the Iraqi army—or, in his view, primarily with the Iranian-led Shiite militias whose leaders he mentioned by name. “The US-led Global Coalition and US Government in particular has signaled tacit approval by dangerously--and incorrectly--referencing the need to implement the law. That position sanctions forces reporting to Hadi Ameri and Abu Mahdi Mohandes to launch unprovoked attacks against the people of the Kurdistan Region. It also gives Iran an opening to expand its influence and destabilize the Kurdistan Region.”

Many within KDP feel that the battle will have to be fought in order to get Baghdad to the negotiation table. This view is clearly expressed in this tweet from a Kurd calling himself 4K: “Baghdad don't want peace, we can see this through its aggression and demands, only force can stop Baghdad it's aggression and sit to listen”.

At the other side of the Kurdish spectrum, deceased PUK leader Jalal Talabani had declared in the past that he could not keep his people “from dreaming about their own Kurdish state, but that secession from Iraq is not realistic.” This view is shared by his sons, who call for Kurdish unity in order to get the best deal possible to stay within the Iraqi federation.

As deputy Prime Minister, Talabani’s younger son Qubad is, interestingly enough, working closely with Massoud’s nephew and Prime Minister, Nechirvan Barzani. The latter stayed out of the limelight during the referendum campaign, but has now resurfaced as a strong supporter of unity. He is the main candidate for taking over part of his uncle’s job after he steps down.

Calls for Barzani’s resignation have come from all sides of the divide, although more loudly from his opponents. “That went well, Mr Barzani. You lost everything the Kurdish people have fought for over so many years, and for what? Time to resign & step down,” tweeted Kurdish Solidarity‏ @Hevallo. The leader of KDP’s former coalition partner, Gorran [Change], is openly calling on Barzani to resign. (which he has since done, JN)

A coalition of three opposition parties has come up with a road map for addressing the crisis, which calls for the abolishment of the office of president and the transfer of his authorities to government institutions. It also promotes the formation of a provisional government to negotiate with Baghdad and prepare for new parliamentary elections to be held in Kurdistan, leading to a new parliament and the formation of a new government.

Barzani’s decision not to give in to pressure to delay the referendum is seen by many as a grave mistake that led to the Kurds losing most of what they had achieved since the fall of dictator Saddam Hussein in 2003. The deal offered by American Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, which was leaked, has even convinced members of the KDP, showing as it does that had Barzani delayed, the Americans and the United Nations would have worked with the Kurds and Baghdad to solve the points of conflict between the two. If after two years that did not work out, the deal stipulated, the option of holding the independence referendum would be on the table.

Prominent PUK politician Mahmoud Othman, while supporting the proposal, warned that Abadi’s demand to nullify the results of the referendum could not be met. “(The) proposal could create a platform for dialogue. Request to cancel referendum results not feasible, all sides should be flexible”, he tweeted. 

Cancelling the referendum outcome completely is not popular, even among those who were not in favor of holding it, like the poet and lecturer, Choman Hardi, who wrote on Facebook: “Many tried to warn the KRG that the referendum was ill-timed, that internally and externally the preconditions for statehood were not met. But the referendum went ahead anyway, raising high hopes only to rapidly smash them when the federal government forcibly seized many Kurdish-controlled territories. And after all of that to freeze the vote? Even though I did not vote, I feel grieved by this news.”

Even so, many will not budge in their support for their president, and keep on blaming others for the crisis. Like Kurdish activist Nergiz‏ on Twitter: “There are no regrets in having voted yes in the referendum. Given the chance, would vote yes again. Thank you President @masoud barzani”. And even stronger, Mêrdîn Dilêmine‏, who lives in Toronto and defends Barzani blindly for having put Kurdistan on the international map: “He is not loser, he was brave& let the world know d will of people of Kurdistan. In that sense he is a true winner in the hearts and minds”.