"Under Saddam Hussein, Iraq's million or so Christians for the most part coexisted peacefully with Muslims, both the dominant Sunnis and majority Shiites (New York Times October 17, 2007).... Sunnis, Shi'ites, and Christians lived side by side; many intermarried"
Yeah, isn't it strange how sectarianism and mosque bombings only start when we show up?
This confirms what I already knew, and I'm sick of the smiley face painted on Iraq after all these years and all the lies.
"In sign of stability, Sunni-Shi’ite marriages on rise again in Iraq" by Bushra Juhi and Deb Riechmann, Associated Press | August 6, 2009
BAGHDAD - Muhanad Talib, a Sunni Muslim, married his Shi’ite bride because she was a “suitable woman’’ for him. It also didn’t hurt that their vows made them eligible for a $2,000 payout from the government.
You just can't help insulting the Muslims, can you, you Zionist piece of crap?
Yeah, they are doing it fo the money.
Talib and his wife are among more than 1,700 newlywed couples who have accepted cash from a government program that encourages Sunnis and Shi’ites to tie the knot. The government has held 15 mass weddings for intersect couples from all over Iraq, with the most recent taking place last month at a club in western Baghdad once used by Saddam Hussein’s army.
While the Iraqi government doesn’t track marriages bridging the two major Muslim sects, experts say mixed couples are on the rebound after a dramatic decline during the days of heavy violence. The rise, or rather the return, of mixed marriages appears to be one more sign that Iraqi society is gradually recovering from the war, and that things are more peaceful than they have been in years.
I'm SO SICK of the "WE WON" propaganda when Iraq is a hellhole.
EVEN OUR ARMY KNOWS IT:
"Perpetual War for Perpetual War
Get ready for a “lasting military presence” in Iraq
By Jeff Huber
U.S. Army Col. Timothy R. Reese says it’s time for the U.S. to “declare victory” in Iraq and “go home.” It was time to declare victory and go home in January 2007, when the Bush administration decided to ignore the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group and charged off on its cockamamie “surge” strategy....
According to Colonel Reese, chief of the Baghdad Operations Command Advisory Team, the surge’s real objectives still haven’t been met and never will be. In a recent memorandum, Reese asserts that “the ineffectiveness and corruption” of Iraq’s government ministries is “the stuff of legend.” The government is “failing to take rational steps to improve its electrical infrastructure and to improve their oil exploration, production and exports.” There is “no progress towards resolving the Kirkuk situation,” transition the Sons of Iraq into the Iraqi Security Forces “is not happening” and “the Kurdish situation continues to fester.” Violent political intimidation is “rampant.” Iraq’s security forces are a disaster. The officer corps is corrupt. Enlisted men are neglected and mistreated. Cronyism and nepotism are rampant. Laziness, lack of initiative, and absence of basic military discipline are endemic. Iraq’s military leadership is incapable of leading; it can’t plan ahead, it can’t stand up to the Shiite political parties, it can’t stick to its agreements.
The U.S. military in Iraq has accomplished “all that can be expected,” Reese says....
--MORE--"
And yet the MSM is SELLING us this S***, 'murka?
As security improves, Iraqis are returning to their homes in mixed neighborhoods and spending more time at offices, universities, and other places where they meet their future spouses, said Shi’ite cleric Sayyid Ahmed Hirz al-Yasiri in Baghdad’s Shi’ite stronghold of Sadr City.
“There was a time when families were reluctant to consent to such marriages because of concerns created by certain conservative people from both sects,’’ he said. “That is over now and things are getting back to normal, like they were before the fall of Baghdad. In the past two months, I married 40 to 50 Sunnis, including 20 mixed weddings.’’
Excuse me?
The frothing at the mouth Shi'ites are all tolerant and s***?
Oh, man!
Marriage in general is coming back into strong favor. Official figures show that 274,014 couples were married in 2007, when sectarian violence was raging. That jumped to 357,593 last year when violence waned. In the first three months of this year, 62,626 marriages were recorded across Iraq, excluding the semiautonomous Kurdish region.
Sheik Hamid al-Adhami, a Sunni cleric and marriage official, said he’s marrying four to five couples a month, two or three of whom are mixed sect. Two judges - Ahmed al-Azzawi in the civil court in Baghdad’s central commercial district of Karradah, and Karim al-Ithawi in the appeals court in Baghdad’s eastern Rusafa district - both said that more people are getting married, and that mixed marriages are now as common as same-sect ones.
The 14-century-old animosity between the sects grew out of a dispute over the succession of Prophet Muhammad. Yet mixed-sect marriages were very common in Baghdad; religious identity was less important than allegiance to Saddam Hussein.
Yeah, I'm not buying the sectarian bit anymore.
It's tortured logic, and it doesn't make sense unless.... cui bono?
In February 2006, a revered Shi’ite shrine in Samarra was bombed. Death squads slaughtered people and hundreds of thousands fled the increasingly segregated capital. The incident marked a new high in violence between the sects.
See: Islam's 9/11
A few months later, the Sunni vice president started a program doling out $2,000 to any Sunni-Shi’ite couple that tied the knot, in the hope that love would help overcome war. It’s no small savings to get help footing the bill for expensive weddings in a nation where nearly one in four people live below the poverty line, defined as living on $2.50 or less per person a day, according to a study released in May by the Central Statistics Authority.
That is BUSH'S LIBERATION and the BEGINNING of STABILITY?
See: Occupation Iraq: Country in Crisis
Pffft! That explains everything.
Hind Khalaf, an Iraqi women’s activist, said mixed marriages never completely disappeared from society, but dropped off during the worst years of violence. To apply for the money, mixed couples write to Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi’s office with legal proof of their union. They are handed the cash in an envelope during a mass wedding celebration.
Raad Karim, a Sunni university professor who married a Shi’ite, received the money last month on a white stage adorned with purple fabric and flowers. “We have to resume our Iraqi traditions even though terrorists are trying to erase them,’’ Karim said.
And we know who the "terrorists" are.
Oh, about that sectarianism: Memory Hole: The Dream Vacation
Memory Hole: The Uniters of Islam
Occupation Iraq: Sectarian Saviors
Are we CLEAR, readers?
Slow Saturday Special: Iraqi Surge of Violence
Occupation Iraq: 15 Attacks a Day
Occupation Iraq: MSM Censoring Conflict Again
Slow Saturday Special: "Al-CIA-Duh" Back in Iraq
Are we CLEAR, readers?
