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From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date sent: Sun, 23 Mar 2003 08:51:08 -0500
Subject:[I-S] (fwd) [American_Liberty] I was a naive fool to be
a human shield for Saddam
On Sat, 22 Mar 2003 23:57:40 -0800, Tim Starr
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2003/03/23/d
o2305.x
mlsSheet=/opinion/2003/03/23/ixop.html
I was a naive fool to be a human shield for Saddam
By Daniel Pepper
(Filed: 23/03/2003)
I wanted to join the human shields in Baghdad because it was direct
action which had a chance of bringing the anti-war movement to the
forefront of world attention. It was inspiring: the human shield
volunteers were making a sacrifice for their political views - much more
of a personal investment than going to a demonstration in Washington or
London. It was simple - you get on the bus and you represent yourself.
So that is exactly what I did on the morning of Saturday, January 25. I
am a 23-year-old Jewish- American photographer living in Islington,
north London. I had travelled in the Middle East before: as a student, I
went to the Palestinian West Bank during the intifada. I also went to
Afghanistan as a photographer for Newsweek.
The human shields appealed to my anti-war stance, but by the time I had
left Baghdad five weeks later my views had changed drastically. I
wouldn't say that I was exactly pro-war - no, I am ambivalent - but I
have a strong desire to see Saddam removed.
We on the bus felt that we were sympathetic to the views of the Iraqi
civilians, even though we didn't actually know any. The group was less
interested in standing up for their rights than protesting against the
US and UK governments.
I was shocked when I first met a pro-war Iraqi in Baghdad - a taxi
driver taking me back to my hotel late at night. I explained that I was
American and said, as we shields always did, Bush bad, war bad, Iraq
good. He looked at me with an expression of incredulity.
As he realised I was serious, he slowed down and started to speak in
broken English about the evils of Saddam's regime. Until then I had only
heard the President spoken of with respect, but now this guy was telling
me how all of Iraq's oil money went into Saddam's pocket and that if you
opposed him politically he would kill your whole family.
It scared the hell out of me. First I was thinking that maybe it was the
secret police trying to trick me but later I got the impression that he
wanted me to help him escape. I felt so bad. I told him: Listen, I am
just a schmuck from the United States, I am not with the UN, I'm not
with the CIA - I just can't help you.
Of course I had read reports that Iraqis hated Saddam Hussein, but this
was the real thing. Someone had explained it to me face to face. I told
a few journalists who I knew. They said that this sort of thing often
happened - spontaneous, emotional, and secretive outbursts imploring
visitors to free them from Saddam's tyrannical Iraq.
I became increasingly concerned about the way the Iraqi regime was
restricting the movement of the shields, so a few days later I left
Baghdad for Jordan by taxi with five others. Once over the border we
felt comfortable enough to ask our driver what he felt about the regime
and the threat of an aerial bombardment.
Don't you listen to Powell on Voice of America radio? he said. Of
course the Americans don't want to bomb civilians. They want to bomb
government and Saddam's palaces. We want America to bomb Saddam.
We just sat, listening, our mouths open wide. Jake, one of the others,
just kept saying, Oh my God as the driver described the horrors of the
regime. Jake was so shocked at how naive he had been. We all were. It
hadn't occurred to anyone that the Iraqis might actually be pro-war.
The driver's most emphatic statement was: All Iraqi people want this
war. He seemed convinced that civilian casualties would be small; he
had such enormous faith in the American war machine to follow through on
its promises. Certainly more faith than any of us had.
Perhaps the most crushing thing we learned was that most ordinary Iraqis
thought Saddam Hussein had paid us to come to protest in Iraq. Although
we explained that this was categorically not the case, I don't think he
believed us. Later he asked me: Really, how much did Saddam pay you to
come?
It hit me on visceral and emotional levels: this was a real portrayal of
Iraq life. After the first conversation, I completely rethought my view
of the Iraqi situation. My understanding changed on intellectual,
emotional, psychological levels. I remembered the experience of seeing
Saddam's egomaniacal portraits everywhere for the past two weeks and
tried to place myself in the shoes of someone who had been subjected to
seeing them every day for the last 20 or so years.
Last Thursday night I went to photograph the anti-war rally in
Parliament Square. Thousands of people
