Category: News and Views
This is a post from Layla Anwar's blog.
She's an Iraqi Woman that lives in Iraq.
Source URL: = http://arabwomanblues.blogspot.com/2007/07/some-thoughts-on-forgiveness.html
I receive several comments and mails urging me to forgive.
I have nothing against forgiveness. Forgiveness frees.
However I do have a problem and am stuck...so maybe you can help me.
How on earth does one forgive when the slight, abuse, humiliation, cruelty, destruction, annihilation is ongoing....Day in, day out. How?
Forgiveness necessitates truce, a time out, a moment of peace...
Forgiveness necessitates distance from the predator, from the abuser.It also needs a time of healing. It needs amends, corrections, rectifications, for
all the damage.
How on earth can you expect anyone to forgive when none of the above conditions are there?
And moreover, why do you expect me, us, Iraqis to forgive you when there is no intention or change of course on your part?
What are we supposed to do with our dead ones, our injured ones, our memories, our lost hopes, our vanished dreams? What are we supposed to do with our
exile, our losses, our uprootedness?
And even if we suddenly metamorphose into sainthood, what do we do with your presence in our faces?
Christ was crucified once. He was able to forgive. It was a one time affair.
But you are crucifying us daily. Daily, since your Desert Storm. And ever since you have done nothing but blow more sand in our eyes.
So how do I forgive? You tell me...
And assuming I have managed to do so.
Will the Tigris and the Euphrates forgive you ?
Will the dead fish and the floating corpses forgive you?
Imagine I forgave you.
Will the deliberately burned down palm trees forgive you?
Will the ruins forgive you?
Will the polluted earth with your toxic waste forgive you?
Will the walls of this city and its crumbled roofs forgive you?
Will Iraq ever forgive you?
I am the wrong person to ask forgiveness from. Ask Her.
But before you ask Her, stop doing what you are doing.
You cannot continue in your ways and ask for forgiveness. It is simply not possible.
In the meantime, She will continue driving you out by the same and equal sheer force that you have used on Her.
Read Her history and you will know.
And trust me, you will come begging for Her Mercy.
I completely agree wih this and this is a good part of why I hate this war and our president!
Dawnielle
Dawnielle hates this war and she hates this president. She'll be a useful assistant in the defeat of Islamism world wide, whether in Iraq, or Islamburg. I wonder is she knows what Islamburg is? As for the South African guy, who knows what he thinks? He's about as silent as we'll all have to be if Islamism ever becomes the dominant force in our societies. Anyway it was something Dawnielle said which provoked me to wonder:
There are several people who "hate" George W. Bush. All you Bush haters hate him because of his policies right? If that is so, what are your feelings towards the leaders of China, Iran, Zimbabwe, Sudan, North Korea, Belarus and Burma? These leaders have done worse things to their people than George Bush has done to the American people. Dawnielle hates Bush because of the War in Iraq, so do many others. Notice how she and many others don't outline their hatred for those who killed Americans on 9/11, free people here on 7/7 and almost again a few weeks ago, free people in Spain in 2004, free tourists in Indonesia in 2002, and other civilians around the world. How much Dawnielle do you feel towards the Islamists who given the chance will behead your father, rape your mother, blow your friends to bits etc? If you hate Bush, how do you describe your feelings towards these far worse, far more evil people? or does cognitive dissonance weaken your ability to passionately hate the evil which is all around us, but which we cannot identify?
The Second Treatise of Civil Government 1690
"That the aggressor, who puts himself into the state of war with another, and unjustly invades another man's right, can, by such an unjust war, never come to have a right over the conquered, will be easily agreed by all men, who will not think that robbers and pirates have a right of empire over whomsoever they have force enough to master, or that men are bound by promises which unlawful force extorts from them.
Should a robber break into my house, and, with a dagger at my throat, make me seal deeds to convey my estate to him, would this give him any title? Just such a title by his sword has an unjust conqueror who forces me into submission. The injury and the crime is equal, whether committed by the wearer of a crown or some petty villain.
The title of the offender and the number of his followers make no difference in the offence, unless it be to aggravate it. The only difference is, great robbers punish little ones to keep them in their obedience; but the great ones are rewarded with laurels and triumphs, because they are too big for the weak hands of justice in this world, and have the power in their own possession which should punish offenders." John Locke - 1632-1704 -
http://www.constitution.org/jl/2ndtreat.htm
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Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe. Frederick Douglass
I agrewith what the erakis are saying in this blog, but I als oagree with the other side. This world seems to be forgetting the real things, the small things in life. All of these wars that we have going on now are offle no matter what the country is, and soon it will get to a point where none of us will be able to forgive because there's no countries that just pull back and stop and think. Its really sad the way the world's headd, and I can't help but think the americans do have a large part to play in i. Well let me refraze, the american president and his admin