A reader brings a personal perspective to a recent thread:
An issue that must be addressed is how Muslims in the Middle-East view Mid-East Christians in the context of the West’s recent military forays in the region: Mid-East Christians are viewed as subversives and American collaborators, because the US is considered a “Christian” nation.
During the 2003 invasion, Iraqi Christians were under constant watch by their neighbors who were looking for signs that these Christians were working with the American soldiers that were, in their view, unjustly occupying a Muslim country. There are many first-hand accounts of Chaldeans and Assyrians in Iraq being intimidated or threatened by both Shia and Sunni Muslims because they were perceived as traitors. This is especially true when American units would conduct sweeps of whole neighborhoods.
My aunt’s family was in Baghdad in 2005 when such a sweep hit their neighborhood.
After ransacking my aunt’s home (whose family is Chaldean), the Marine unit detained several “insurgents” in a nearby home. The next day, several dozen neighbors gathered in front of my aunt’s home and demanded that her husband explain what information he gave the Americans. One of the neighborhood elders (known as a “mukhtar”) demanded that the family turn their two young daughters over to the local militia until the detainees were freed.
My aunt’s family was lucky, as her husband was a well-known merchant with the financial power to bribe his way out of the predicament. Yet many other families were not able to meet the demands of their neighbors and ended up having family members kidnapped, raped, and/or killed. Any one of the neighbors could have been the ones to give some information (if any) to that unit; but it was the Chaldean family that became the prime suspects.
This is the reality that many Mid-East Christians live with every day. It is difficult enough for these Christians to publicly look to the West for help, much less to publicly voice support for Israel.
The Dish 