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Lorraine Al-Rawi: One woman's views on
Iraq
Copyright: http://www.iviews.com
Published Thursday January 27, 2000
By Susan Schwartz
What follows is an interview with Mrs.
Lorraine Al-Rawi.
Lorraine is a convert to Islam. Her
husband is Iraqi and
she is the mother of six children, the
youngest a
daughter only a few months old.
Lorraine has travelled
to Iraq, and has reported on conditions
in that
beleaguered nation -- specifically the
disastrous effects
of the United States sponsored embargo.
Lorraine has toured Iraq extensively.
She and two of
her daughters, Kouthar, 12, and Marwa,
11, have
initiated a campaign "One Million
Postcards for Iraq"
that has received national publicity.
Susan: Lorraine, will you tell us how
many times you
have visited Iraq since the imposition
of the embargo?
Lorraine: I have visited Iraq three
times since the
embargo and have spent a total of three
months there.
Susan: Were any of the Iraqis you met
reluctant to
speak out?
Lorraine: None of the Iraqis we met
were reluctant to
speak out. They were actually happy
that someone
wanted to hear the stories they had to
tell and that
their voices could be heard.
Susan: Will you tell us with perhaps
some illustrations
about how the embargo has affected the
infrastructure?
How the embargo has affected schooling?
How has the
embargo has affected the diet of the
population?
Lorraine: The embargo has affected the
infrastructure in
many ways. One example would be
contaminated
water. Iraq is unable to purify all the
water that the
society needs. The power plants are in
a poor state of
repair, and the electricity is cut on a
regular basis.
Believe me, when the temperature is 140
degrees
Fahrenheit, it is not pleasant. The air
stands still, and
breathing becomes difficult. Imagine a
person who
suffers from asthma and has no access
to medicine.
Medicine -- even non-prescription
medication that we
take for granted -- is virtually
non-existent due to the
embargo.
As for schooling, Iraq had a 90 percent
literacy rate
before the embargo. Now it stands below
50 percent.
Children have been forced to leave
school and sell
trinkets and personal items on the
street in order to
survive. I attended a high school
chemistry class that
was experimenting, with no success,
with chemicals
more than 10 years old. Not
surprisingly, they could
not achieve results.
As for diet, I know and know of
children who have never
tasted meat. The current oil-for-food
rations provide a
very basic diet of rice, tea, flour,
beans, oil and sugar.
There are virtually no fruits,
vegetables, eggs or meat
included. The rations last an average
of three weeks,
and on the last week, many of the
families literally
starve. With many of the salaries in
the neighborhood
of $3.00 a month, families still have
to take care of all
normal necessities and extra food, if
at all possible.
Susan: Before the embargo, Iraq had a
medical
program free to all its citizens. It
was on a par with
Western nations and was considered by
many to be a
model. How has that changed since the
embargo?
Lorraine: That system has collapsed. It
has
deteriorated to the level of a third
world country. Iraq
still has an educated population of
doctors, but they
have very limited equipment and very
few drugs. One of
my aunts through marriage died of a
gastrointestinal
ailment that could have been
successfully treated by
items we can purchase in any drugstore
in the West.
Susan: Can you, after your numerous
trips to Iraq,
trace the descent of that nation?
Lorraine: As I answer these questions,
Iraq is
flourishing in many ways, yet dying as
a nation in
others. The people there have faced
extreme hardships
in life, and they continue to survive.
The Iraqis fix things in incredibly
creative ways. In this
country when an appliance is broken, it
is replaced
immediately. In Iraq, a generation of
very ingenious
problem solvers is being born. The loss
of 250 children
a day would devastate any nation.
Susan: People in a nation effectively
under siege must
suffer in their family relations. What
have you observed
in that arena?
Lorraine: I have seen first hand how
family relations
suffer. My sister-in-law's husband has
been out of the
country for four years working abroad
to support his
family in Iraq. She has been forced by
this situation to
raise two teenage sons and a daughter
by herself.
During the important formative years of
their lives, they
had essentially one parent. And, of
course, families
suffer psychological damage every day
from the
incredible stress brought on by the
effects of the
embargo.
Susan: During the Spring of 1999 you
returned from
Iraq with a young child who could not
receive the
medical care she needed in Iraq. Could
you tell us
something about her, her condition and
how she is
faring now?
Lorraine: The child is scheduled for
surgery on March 3
of this year. Her name is Maha, and she
is 11 years
old. She faces several serious
surgeries before she
can get back on her feet. Her
condition, which is
congenital, could have been treated at
an early age
had the medical system present before
the embargo
still been operative. She could have
been spared so
much suffering. As for her daily life,
she has learned
English and is first in her class in
school. Maha was
born with scoliosis, which resulted in
severe deformity
in both feet and stiffness of all
joints.
Susan: Please tell us about your
postcard campaign.
Lorraine: The postcard campaign is
going strong. Two
of my daughters are collecting one
million postcards to
give to the President [of the United
States] to protest
the economic sanctions. The postcards
come from all
over the world and are largely, but not
exclusively, from
children. We will continue to collect
them until the
sanctions are lifted. Everyone is
invited to submit a
postcard. One may join the campaign by
sending a
card to: One Million Postcards
Campaign, P. O. Box
1141, San Pedro, CA, 90733. The card
may contain a
message opposing sanctions or a picture
or both.
More information can be found on our
website at:
http://member.aol.com/hamzaha/iraqichildren.
Susan: Do you have plans for expanding
it?
Lorraine: Yes, we do have plans to
expand it. We
would like to travel more on behalf of
the program and
to have more people join our efforts.
Susan: If you had a message for the
readers about the
Iraqi embargo, what would it be?
Lorraine: The message I have for
readers is that
children are never responsible for
adult actions. No
matter how much governments disagree
with each
other, children should not be the
victims of subsequent
hostile actions. Children have rights,
and the rights of
Iraqi children should be acknowledged.
End the
embargo for the sake of the children! I
wish and pray
that the sanctions are removed promptly
and that the
new millennium will bring renewed hope
for the children
and people of Iraq and for all the
world's suffering
children.
For constantly updated news on Iraq visit the:
Iraq Resource Information Site
http://www.geocities.com/iraqinfo
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