Another peace campaigner – also an Assyrian Christian – comes home from Iraq and recants his opposition to war:
I wept with family members as I shared their pain and with great difficulty and deep soul searching began little by little to understand their desire for war to finally rid them of the nightmare they were living in.
The terrible price paid in simple, down to earth ways – the family member with a son who just screams all the time, the family member who lost his wife who left unable to cope anymore, the family member going to a daily job with nothing to do, the family member with a son lost to the war, a husband lost to alcoholism, the daily, difficult to perceive slow death of people for whom all hope is lost.
The pictures of Sadaam Hussein whom people hailed in the beginning with great hope everywhere. Sadaam Hussein with his hand outstretched. Sadaam Hussein firing his rifle. Sadaam Hussein in his Arab Headdress. Sadaam Hussein in his classic 30 year old picture – one or more of these four pictures seemed to be everywhere on walls, in the middle of the road, in homes, as statues – he was everywhere!
All seeing, all knowing, all encompassing.
“Life is hell. We have no hope. But everything will be ok once the war is over.” The bizarre desire for a war that would rid them of the hopelessness was at best hard to understand.
“Look at it this way. No matter how bad it is we will not all die. We have hoped for some other way but nothing has worked. 12 years ago it went almost all the way but failed. We cannot wait anymore. We want the war and we want it now.”
Eventually, fair-minded people will see the truth about this war and its profound moral justification. Read the whole thing.
The Dish 