Syria; Sanctuary for Iraq's Displaced Christians
August 31, 06
www.theherald.co.uk
Most analysts agree that the trigger to the venomous sectarianism now prevalent in Iraq -- a land hitherto free of it -- was the destruction of the Golden Mosque in Samarra [pictured] last February. In a letter to you at the time (February 24), I said that the collapse of the secular Iraqi state "has unleashed the demons of sectarianism and the incubus of al-Qaeda", their access made possible by Bush and Blair. The iron law of unintended consequences -- well, I think unintended -- has also incubated another horror, the driving out of Iraq's Christian community: after 2000 years, they are going, fast.
Iraqi Christians made up around 3% of the population, a prosperous minority numbering 700,000 pre-war and living mainly in Baghdad, a city with more Christians than any other city in the Middle East. Well-educated, it suited Saddam to offer security and public profile, embodied in the person of Tariq Aziz, like Blair, a Roman Catholic (well, nearly). I could look across the Baghdad skyline and see a rich miscellany of Christian churches, embracing Assyrian, Armenian, Byzantine, Anglican, Mandeans and Methodist, some of them with a presence since the first century, six centuries before Islam began. Christians sold from their shops the local Perido beer, and had a prominent role in banking, urban planning, science and commerce. I had many Christian friends, and like all Iraqis they were very hospitable.
Traumatised by the killing, kidnapping and gangsterism that constitutes life in Iraq since those fine Christian gentlemen, Bush and Blair, liberated their country, 350,000 Iraqi Christians now live as near-penniless refugees, principally in Damascus, Syria, where they have been given safe status.
One such refugee, Shamun Daawd, having received death threats, recently said: "Before the war there was no separation between Christian and Muslim. Under Saddam, nobody asked you your religion. We attended each other's religious services and weddings." This confirmed my own experiences in the years I lived there, Iraq's religious freedom and pluralism being explicit and vibrant. All of this is in sharp contrast to Saudi Arabia, where I have also lived and worked.
Riyadh's religious skyline consists of mosques and minarets, and more mosques and minarets, and the practise of Christianity is a criminal offence (even in private), whereas 15 denizens planning attacks on the Twin Towers are somehow overlooked.
However, Syria, which offers sanctuary to Christians, is one of the three components of the "axis of evil" as defined by Bush. Syria, despite its harsh political regime, has always protected its ancient Christian communities. It is doing so again as it shelters much of the Iraqi diaspora. I can guarantee that not one of the 350,000 displaced Iraqis will be heading for Saudi Arabia. If New Labour refuses to get rid of the Christian killer, Blair, let's make sure, somehow, that he and the Christian killer Bush can be constrained from destabilising Syria.
Another Iraqi exile, Sabah Mansur Nesco, has put it more eloquently to the Scottish writer William Dalrymple: "Bush brought nothing but killing, violence and mass emigration -- not just to Iraq but to Afghanistan and Palestine also. We just pray he leaves Syria alone. For us, it is the last place of refuge."
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