“Live from Iraq: A First-Hand Witness Account”

Mr. Sami Rasouli came to Asheville on April 20^th. I met up with him and three UNCA students at our local Representative’s office, where we talked to Mr. Peterson. Mr. Rasouli spoke to Mr. Peterson about the reality of life in Iraq, and why he left the USA to live in Najaf. He also spoke on why he joined the Muslim Peacemaker Team, and of his friendship with Tom Fox (who was part of the Christian Peacemaker Team and killed in Iraq).

The funniest response that Mr. Rasouli gave was to the question “What do you think will happen if the US troops leave Iraq?” Mr. Rasouli said that New Orleans will finally get repaired.

After meeting with the staff of Representative Shuler, we went to dinner at La Paz restaurant. I took Sami there because I had taken Cindy Sheehan there when she was in town. It serves excellent Mexican food. We had a great time, and then we left to go to UNCA for a talk by Sami. They could not get the computer to hook up with the overhead, so it was just a talk without pictures (unfortunately). It was an interesting talk, however, and he clearly says that the US troops and “contractors” need to leave Iraq. He talked about the time when the US forces were looking for an Iraqi-American translator in Baghdad, and then after four days they left and then four car bombs went off soon after. Sami says peace will happen after the US forces leave the country. He also said that you cannot blind fold and tie the hands of Iraqis and then push them into the ocean and tell them “don’t get wet!”

Sami said that Fallujah had 350,000 people displaced and 30,000 homes damaged with 5,000 homes destroyed. He feels Hakim has a lot of blood on his hands, and he is closely aligned with the Iranians. Sami also told us that Sadr is quite shy and that of all the political forces in Iraq currently, he is probably the best one. Sadr is a nationalist, and not aligned with Iran or any other country. Sadr is anti-US and anti-Iranian. Sami felt that a lot of what has happened is because AIPAC is in control. Sami is confident that Iraqis will rebuild their country once US forces leave.

Sami said the deaths and violence in Iraq come from these sources:

1. US and collaborators (including death squads)

2. Resistance – which is 100% Iraqi

3. Criminals

4. International intelligence agencies and their actors

Sami says there area about 150,000 private contractors in Iraq and there are 325,000 Iraqi police and army at this time. The Iraqi people do not have a lot of trust in the police and army, however.

Sami lives in Najaf, which he says is home to one million people. It is also the home of Sistani. When Sadr called for demonstrations last month (to tell the US forces to leave) there were two million people there, per Iraqi sources in Najaf.

Sami is doing a project of sending letters from Iraqi children to American children and vice-versa. It is called “Letters for Peace” and is an attempt to create some understanding and communication between the children of the two countries. They will have translators who will interpret the letters, and the letters may end up published in a book. Sami had many pieces of Iraqi artwork with him, some by adults and some by children. These were to support the Muslim Peacemaker Team in Iraq.

Sami says that they are getting two hours a day of electricity in Iraq, and that fuel is scarce and the Iraqi government is corrupt. It was a cold winter last year, with no heating at the schools. Even worse, much of the glass in the school windows was broken from bombs. He said that there were one million widows because of this war, and that there is 60 – 75% unemployment now in Iraq. Sami says a high number of the population has hepatitis A, B and C, along with other diseases.

Sami is a friendly and funny guy, always making jokes. One of the jokes he told was “why are all the Prophets from the Middle East?” Answer is - they like good food, too!

The next morning, I picked Sami up and drove him to Greensboro for the rally there. Above is a picture of him at the rally. I spent most of my time at the rally getting people to sign the postcards going to dole, burr, bush and Representative Shuler to say we want the troops out of Iraq now, so I did not take notes on what was said.

Sami Rasouli, in an interview on Democracy Now said:

“The US administration, through its occupation in Iraq, has failed, has failed profoundly, and every day passes by indicates more violence happening in Iraq and more failure for their role. And, actually, I don't know what is their role in Iraq and what is the objectives that the US intend to accomplish in Iraq so far. I see nothing. I see the war as pointless. It caused lots of agony and disastrous result for the Iraqis.”

He went on to say:

“we cannot justify the presence of the US troops in Iraq by saying, well, they will -- or they are doing anything good for the Iraqis to prevent such as civil war, so-called fight between Sunnis and Shias. This is not a civil war. This is a political war between who supported the US invasion, which is the current government and its death squads, and the people of Iraq, who resisted, resisted this occupation and is still resisting this occupation”.