SPEAKER DEMANDS IRAQ WITHDRAWAL

Dr. Dahlia Wasfi gave Stonehill students a behind-the-scenes look at the impact of the Iraq war on ordinary Iraqi people, including her own extended family, during an address at the Martin Institute on Feb. 7.

If you pick any country on the face of the earth, it's made up of families," said Wasfi. "Families pay the price" for war.

Wasfi's talk before a crowd of 160 was blunt and controversial. She called for "immediate unconditional withdrawal" of troops from Iraq and likened the Iraqi insurgency to the uprising against Nazi Germany in the Warsaw ghetto.

"I would argue that there's no such thing as an insurgent" in Iraq, said Wasfi. "It's a label given to the legitimate resistance in Iraq. It's the legitimate resistance to an illegal occupation, the same as the ghetto uprising of the 1930s." 

Wasfi, born in New York in 1971, lived in her father's native Basrah, Iraq, until 1977, when her family moved to the United States. She returned to visit her father's family in Basrah and Baghdad in 2004 and 2006. 

Though she holds a degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Wasfi has dedicated herself to opposition to the war through public speeches and outreach.

Iraqi Civilization
She portrayed Iraq as the birthplace of civilization 7,000 years ago and challenged the perception that "these people, they're so violent, they've been fighting for thousands of years."

Iraqis have only been fighting one another since the American invasion in March 2003, Wasfi said. With civil society dissolved, a civil war has erupted to fill the power vacuum, she argued.

Sunni and Shia lived in peace in Iraq for 1,400 years, Wasfi said. In fact, her grandmother was a Sunni and her grandfather a Shia, with some Kurdish blood mixed in. That was a common occurrence in Iraq, where intermarriage prevailed, Wasfi said.

The limitation for Americans is that "we don't understand tribal histories," said Wasfi. "We don't have clue." 

Enduring Dictatorship
Wasfi said her father's family has endured the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, the first Gulf War with its 42 days of bombing, 13 years of economic sanctions that killed a half million people, an invasion that began with three weeks of "shock and awe" bombing, and now a "brutal occupation."

"'Shock and awe' basically is terrorism," said Wasfi.

She showed photographs of her family in the 1960s, with women wearing Western hairstyles and short flowered dresses. She contrasted that with a photo from 2004, when women going outdoors were forced to don long dark robes and cover their heads.

Until the war, Iraq was a socialist and secular society, Wasfi said. Its medical system was considered the "jewel of the Arab world." Now, with war damaging the infrastructure and wiping out electrical plants and sewer systems, children die of diarrhea because of a shortage of pediatric needles, she said.

Meanwhile, depleted uranium, a byproduct of uranium mining, has been introduced to the environment. A dense material that cuts easily through metal and bursts into flame on impact, it is used to coat American weapons, Wasfi said. The substance is absorbed into the air and water supply and is leading to increases in childhood leukemia and lymphoma, she said.

"We are not helping in Iraq. We are not winning hearts and minds," said Wasfi.

Martin Institute Director Peter N. Ubertaccio, noting that the Institute encourages "people who have strongly held beliefs," called Wasfi's remarks "sobering and controversial." 

Audience Reaction
Listeners challenged some of her assertions, including that the Iraqi death toll stands at 1.2 million. One student said her friend, a Marine, was thanked by Iraqis for his service and planned another tour there. 

Another student suggested the United States remain in Iraq to help rebuild, as it did for Japan after the bombing of Hiroshima. "To think that after 7,000 years (Iraqis) would need our help is misguided," countered Wasfi.

She thanked students for an "incredibly excellent turnout" and planned an informal breakfast with them the next day.

"So you see (Iraqis are) just families facing the struggle of life just as we are, but they have war and occupation on top of it," Wasfi concluded.

Issued February 8, 2008