Sharia

Have you heard the one about democracy in Iraq? It’s a good one.

In the burning quest to get the new Iraqi constitution finished, the US negotiators have thrown their support behind the Shiites who demanded making Islam the main source of Iraqi law. And got it. Sharia law.

Via Juan Cole, quoting from the London based Arabic newspaper, Al-Hayat:

"Also, an agreement was reached that Islam is the religion of state, and that no law shall be enacted that contradicts the agreed-upon essential verities of Islam. Likewise, the inviolability of the highest [Shiite] religious authorities in the land is safeguarded, without any allusion to a detailed description. The paragraph governing these matters will specify that Islam is ‘the fundamental basis’ for legislation, though there will be an allusion to the protection of democratic values, human rights, and social and national values. A Higher Council will be formed to review new legislation to ensure it does not contravene the essential verities of the Islamic religion.” Personal status law, concerning marriage, divorce, alimony, inheritance, and so forth, will be adjudicated by religious courts in accordance with the religion or sect to which the individual belongs.

This strikes a wrong chord, doesn’t it? After spending hundreds of billions of US dollars and sacrificing the lives of nearly 2000 US military personnel and untold thousands of Iraqi citizens for the cause of freedom and democracy—it looks as if the Iraqi women won’t get a piece of that pie for which they too have suffered the trauma of a war thrust upon them. (We can toss Iraqis of other faiths into the pile, too.)

No, indeed. For the first time in in almost a half a century of secular government and equality under the law, the women of Iraq are threatened with becoming second class citizens—for the first time in their lives, for many—with the full force and authority of a new Islamic Republic to ensure it, encouraged by the US. Well done, Bushies. One more of your noble causes down the drain.

This is a useful primer on how to use democratic principles to create a theocracy. Are you paying attention Dr. Dobson?

”...And the way to defeat that ideology in the long-term is to spread a hopeful ideology, one that says to young girls, you can succeed in your society, and you should have a chance to do so; one that says to moms and dads, you can raise your child in a peaceful world without intimidation; and one that says to people from all walks of life, you have a right to express yourself in the public square.

It’s the spread of liberty that is laying the foundation of peace, and is very important for our citizens—no matter what side of the political aisle you’re on—to understand that the mission is a vital mission and it’s one that will be—that we obviously couldn’t complete if—if we—if we didn’t fulfill our goals, which was to help the Iraqis.

George W Bush, press conference, 11 August 2005