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Dear List, I was shocked by the amount of mistakes in the article. Mr. Beeman’s knowledge of Iraq is less than shallow; it shows an incredible amount of ignorance.. <Present-day Iraq was three provinces of the Ottoman Empire before World War I. It was cobbled together by the British for their own convenience after that conflict.> Iraq existed as IRAQ for at least 1400 years before the British colonialists came. It was part of the Ottoman Empire ONLY because it represented the continuation of the Muslim Empire, otherwise it was the seat of the Abbasid Empire. IRAQ as an entity precedes the coming of the Ottomans to the area by centuries. The way Mr. Beeman (and most scholars in the West) presents the case, one is led to believe that Iraq came into existence through the Good Will of the British, and not before that!! <The British installed a king, the Saudi Arabian son of the chief religious official of Mecca (Faisal, of Lawrence of Arabia Fame) and glued the whole mess together with the resident British Army.> Faisal was from Hijaz and NOT from Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia came into existence as an entity in 1934, after Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud conquered all of the Arabian Peninsula (with help from the British), destroyed his opponents and established a Kingdom; the only Kingdom in the world which carries the name of its founder. In reality, the IRAQIS rejected the British appointed King Faisal (even though he was a Heshemite), and suggested their own nominee, Talib Al Naqib from Basra. The British refused of course.. That shows that those people believed they belonged to one country, and throws into the garbage bin Beeman’s theory of the British gluing three regions that were “incompatible in ethnicity, religious confession and interests.” In 1920, all of Iraq rose against the British; the North, Centre and South, with one unified voice. Their unified interest was a free IRAQ, that can determine its own affairs.. The British wanted the Sunni Arabs to be dominant, because their policy has always been based on the concept of divide and rule. They never wanted to allow the majority Shi’a in Iraq to rule. But that doesn’t mean that they didn’t have loyalists among the Shi’a of Iraq. <They wanted this both to reward Saudi Arabians for helping them fight the Ottomans, and because they had existing clients in the sheikhs who ruled the Arab states of the Gulf.> First of all, the house of Saud had not come into power in Arabia by then. Second, the house of Saud hated the Hashemites to whom Faisal belongs. Third, there wasn’t a single state among the Sheikhdoms in the Gulf... In fact, until 1923, the whole East Coast of the Arabian Peninsula, down to Oman, belonged to the Wilayat (Province) of Basra. The British drew the artificial borders, creating artificial states that never existed, and cutting Iraq from the Gulf; an issue that was a major cause behind the 1990 invasion of Kuwait.. <When the British were finally expelled, and their Saudi ruling family deposed in Iraq in a 1958 nationalist coup, the new Ba'athist Iraqi nationalist rulers had a supremely unruly nation on their hand.> Once again, the Hashemite family was NOT Saudi.. And the rulers after 1958 were not the Ba’athists... <It is still not known who set off the explosion that killed him at the shrine of Ali, grandson of the Prophet Mohammad.> Imam Ali is NOT the grandson of the Prophet Mohammad, but his cousin and son in law.. <It could have been Sunni Arab factions who fear the rise of Shi'a dominance in Iraq, or it could have been his own Shi'a supporters, disappointed with him for cooperating with American policies in Iraq. Or it could have been someone else.> Or it could have been the Americans.. Beeman does not mention here what he later states: Washington opposed the rise of Shi'a power in Iraq, and it is within its interests that chaos continues, because that is the only way it would justify its stay in Iraq. Ayatollah Al-Hakim opposed the occupation and, though he rejected the use of armed resistance now, he did not rule it out if the US continued in its occupation. Such threats are not tolerated.. <Shi'a fury will be directed at the Sunnis to the north.> Or perhaps at the Sunnis in the south: Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Fingers are already pointing at al-Qaeda and it supporters in those states, and Iraqis accuse Kuwaitis of being part of the looting of Iraq and the destruction of its infrastructure. The Kuwaitis are also accused of stealing Iraqi oil and cattle, and their cars have been attacked, and yesterday two Kuwaiti businessmen were killed in southern Iraq.. <Could the United States have done anything to have prevented this tragedy?> Of course. It could have NOT attacked Iraq in the first place. It could have not imposed sanctions and killed hundreds of thousands. It could have... It could have.. < When the factional shooting starts, where does the U.S. army, caught in the crossfire, aim its own guns?> Good question. Why doesn’t Beeman provide the answer?? < William O. Beeman, Director of Middle East Studies at Brown University. He is author of the forthcoming book, Iraq: State in Search of a Nation.> If a scholar, who is supposed to be an expert on the subject, makes these kind of mistakes, no wonder Dubya and his gang continue their blunders in Iraq and elsewhere... __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk