My roots are being destroyed by my branches
By SusanUnPC on November 9, 2007 at 8:42 PM in Iraq
The following is by SHIRIN, a regular visitor to NoQuarter. She wrote the preface, and e-mailed the following article:
I AM PROUD TO SAY that the subject of this article and his wife are very dear friends going back more decades than I care to admit. I cannot add anything to this article, but must point out that the author hugely underestimates the number of Iraqis who have been killed as a result of the U.S. invasion and occupation. The most recent scientific estimate is over one million, not the 80,000-500,000 figure that he uses.
And allow me to emphasize this incredibly powerful and insightful statement from my dear friend Fadhil:
“Although my roots are in Iraq, my branches are in this country—my children, my grandchildren, my citizenship. The feeling I have sometimes is that my roots are being destroyed by my branches. I remember every bit of my childhood, and I feel those roots being destroyed by the part of me that has branched off in this nation.”
And this description of an all-too-common occurrence in Iraq since 2003:
“My last living uncle was killed three years ago. He was 81 years old, driving his own car in Mosul, in the north of Iraq. An American unit shot him. One reason they said they shot him was that he was driving too fast and didn’t obey their signal to slow down. The other report was that he was driving too slow and was suspicious. Witnesses said he did not see the military unit and he didn’t even know there was a military unit in the area.”
And I would like to emphasize this statement:
“I would like to meet as many Americans as possible, and have them meet me, just so they can see what an Iraqi looks like before they kill him.”
Will my family survive?
PHOTO CAPTION: “Fadhil Al-Kazily devotes Sunday mornings to catching up on news from his large family still in Iraq. ‘Although my roots are in Iraq, my branches are in this country. … The feeling I have sometimes is that my roots are being destroyed by my branches’.”
A local Iraqi-American calls Baghdad once a week to find out if his loved ones are dead or alive
By Jaime O’Neill
Every Sunday morning, a man who lives in Davis makes a phone call to Iraq, a call he makes with the gravest of trepidation. This end-of-the-week phone call has become a ritual, an homage to anxiety and dread. The man has many relatives in Iraq, his native land, and all of the other days of his week are clouded over with worries for the safety of kin back in the place he left so long ago. He phones home on Sundays to gather the news, to see how his relatives have fared, to see, in fact, if they’ve survived another seven days.
“My name is Fadhil Al-Kazily,” he tells me, in measured tones. “I was born in Iraq in 1935. I’m an old man now. I lived in Iraq until I finished high school. I am an American by choice. I came here when things were good between my nation and this nation. Although my roots are in Iraq, my branches are in this country—my children, my grandchildren, my citizenship. The feeling I have sometimes is that my roots are being destroyed by my branches. I remember every bit of my childhood, and I feel those roots being destroyed by the part of me that has branched off in this nation.”
He pauses, thinks, begins again.
“Baghdad was a very nice place when I was young, in many ways similar to Sacramento. It has the two rivers—the Tigris and Euphrates—so there was a lot of greenery and many trees. There was a plentiful water supply, and palm trees all over the place. Now it’s a horror show. Now it looks like a war zone. Not even a third of the streets are useable, and Iraqis can’t drive on them, anyway. Going out in a car is an invitation to die.”
Al-Kazily moved to this country in 1964, along with his wife, “a lovely young Englishwoman,” to use his own descriptive phrase. They met and married while he was doing undergraduate work in Liverpool. After that, he got a job with Bechtel in the Bay Area and then returned to graduate work at UC Berkeley, gaining a doctorate in engineering. He’s been married for 49 years, and the couple has two grown children. He currently teaches engineering at Sac State.
“I also still have a very large family in Iraq,” he says. “I have seven brothers and one sister, and all are in Iraq except one, so I keep in touch with them every Sunday. Every Sunday morning is devoted to catching up on news from my brothers and my sister, and their children.”
The war in Iraq, as it is in the majority of American households, is unpopular in the Al-Kazily home. But unlike many Iraqi-Americans who lay low for their own safety, Al-Kazily has gone public with his dissent.
Very public.
“I am a proud Iraqi-American, but most of my family are all in Iraq,” he said on the Capitol steps at a September 7 peace rally. “I live their daily life with them from here. You cannot imagine what they go through.”
Fighting back tears, he told the crowd that day, “Enough is enough. The crime has to stop.” … READ ALL.
, the basis for the Best Motion Picture Nominee (Golden Globes) starring Brad Pitt.
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