|
Kelly Hayes-Raitt March 9, 2003 |
||
|
On Wednesday February 12th a delegation of ten American woman returned home after a ten day trip to Iraq. Kelly Hayes-Raitt, class of ’79 Fredonia High alum, was one of the ten women to go to Baghdad to meet with Iraqi woman and children to discuss the possible impacts of the upcoming war. The delegation, opposed to the possible war in Iraq, felt the trip to Baghdad a necessity to get a better understanding of that which isn’t often shown on American television, the human suffering of Iraqi civilians, especially women. Hayes-Raitt, a commissioner on the Santa Monica commission on the status of women, traveled to Iraq to better understand the impact the last war had on women and to learn first hand what impact an impending war might have. “Women suffer the effects of war long after their homes have been bombed and their children have been buried…We hope to bring Iraqi women’s fears, hopes and strengths back home to ignite Americans into speaking out against this war while peaceful negotiations are still possible.” While in Iraq, Hayes-Raitt and her companions visited a children’s hospital where she says treatment is difficult to get because of U.N. sanctions that slow down the importation of medicine. “We visited the children’s Leukemia ward. Childhood cancers have increased as a result of the 1991 bombings.” The 1995 Oil-for-Food program set up by the U.N. was supposed to be a way to keep Saddam Hussein on a tight leash, but an off shoot of the sanctions was that it keeps badly needed medicine and other essentials out of Iraq. “The sanctions were put in place in 1990 as a way to put pressure on Saddam. As oil would be exported from Iraq they could build up credit, and the U.N. would allow more food and medicine into the country,” explained Hayed-Raitt, “but the Catch-22 is that there are duel purpose lists which list items such as chlorine that the U.N. feels could possibly be used for chemical weapons which cannot be imported.” Long before her years as a political campaigner for non-profit organizations in Santa Monica, California, where she currently resides, Kelly Hayes-Raitt caught the activism bug as a teenager at Fredonia High School. “I had my political upbringing at Fredonia High,” she says of her days in school, “ I was so grateful to be living in a place where so much debate was actively being encouraged.” Her years after graduation brought her many opportunities to show her love for activism and study of the environment, including one job working for a Ralph Nader environmental organization in Washington, D.C. “What affected me the most,” Hayes-Raitt said, “is how far down this country has come in a relatively short time. Iraq used to be considered an upper-middle class income society. People were well educated, well traveled. By any standard today, their lives have fallen to nearly third-world status. Life span is down unemployment is up, infant mortality is up – in fact, child mortality is so bad that every other family loses a child under the age of five.” “In fact, this really is a war about children. Of the 26 million Iraqi’s, 13 million are children. Four million are under the age of five, when we start bombing, it’s the children who will suffer the most. What she learned amongst the civilians, when she could steal away from her government appointed chaperones, is that the people and their culture can be surprisingly similar to ours. “I find it very interesting that the Iraqi citizens make a distinction between American government and American people, they were incredibly welcoming to us,” she says that “a surprise came to me when I saw how casual the women dressed and acted. Some wear slacks, not every woman wears a head scarf. “I found it interesting that the Iraqi’s made a distinction between the American people and the American Government, perhaps because they feel their own government doesn’t adequately represent them. I was surprised by how open and friendly the Iraqi women are. I didn’t see any ‘gender oppression.’ Women approached us on the street and spoke in English to us.” Aside from getting to know the culture, a main purpose of the trip was to see how the civilians are living now. She saw first hand how poorly life has become for citizens, not only as an off shoot of the U.N. sanctions, but as a direct result from the bombings during the Gulf War, bombings most are afraid are only a few months away from devastating their country again “American and coalition bombs destroyed sewage treatment plants in 1991. Because of the U.N. sanctions, chlorine and spare parts to repair sewage treatment plants can’t be imported. Today, only half of the sewage treatment plants operate, and 500,000 tons of raw sewage are dumped into the Tigris and other rivers every day, contaminating drinking water sources.” “Drinking water can’t be boiled regularly, because we bombed electrical plants in 1991. Electrical shortages continue today; we experienced a black-out while we were in Baghdad. Consequently, children drink non-potable water. Childhood diarrhea has quadrupled in the last decade; the average Iraqi child has diarrhea 14 days a month!” She concedes that while she, as well as millions of people around the world, are opposed to President Bush’s nonstop forward march towards war, Saddam Hussein is still a problem to his own people. “Certainly Saddam is a tyrant and I believe he’s committed unspeakable atrocities,” she says, “but I don’t think we should go in and liberate the people by bombing them. There’s no adequate justification for it.” She saw very little to convince her in Iraq that this war is necessary. In the end, she believes, it’ll be the civilians who pay the dearest toll. “There’s no doubt in my mind political oppression takes place over there, but we didn’t see it, what we did see was economic oppression.” What sticks in her mind the most after her long voyage to Iraq is the people, the individual stories, the poor and troubled civilians that have no say when American planes are accidentally missing their targets and hitting innocent villages. People like Dhia, a young man of 24 who works in a traditional coffee house with antique finishes who lost many close family members and friends during the Gulf War and supports his family that live outside of Baghdad. “This charming, well
educated man was 12 when he lost two aunts and some friends during the
Gulf War. He has a degree in
English Literature from Baghdad University and has a dream of going to the
United States for his Masters degree, like many young people around the
world do, but he’s afraid. He’s
afraid for his family and he’s afraid that with the impending war will
set back his dream for years.” That, for Kelly Hayes-Raitt, is just one of the many human-interest stories she feels President Bush should think about before committing the country to another war and subjecting the Iraqi civilians to devastation they still haven’t gotten over from the last war. by Adam Suraf
|