More Iraqis Said to Flee Since Troop Increase
BAGHDAD - The number of Iraqis fleeing their homes has soared since the American troop increase began in February, according to data from two humanitarian groups, accelerating the partition of the country into sectarian enclaves.
Despite some evidence that the troop buildup has improved security in certain areas, sectarian violence continues and American-led operations have brought new fighting, driving fearful Iraqis from their homes at much higher rates than before the tens of thousands of additional troops arrived, the studies show.
The data track what are known as internally displaced Iraqis: those who have been driven from their neighborhoods and seek refuge elsewhere in the country rather than fleeing across the border. The effect of this vast migration is to drain religiously mixed areas in the center of Iraq, sending Shiite refugees toward the overwhelmingly Shiite areas to the south and Sunnis toward majority Sunni regions to the west and north.
Though most displaced Iraqis say they would like to return, there is little prospect of their doing so. One Sunni Arab who had been driven out of the Baghdad neighborhood of southern Dora by Shiite snipers said she doubted that her family would ever return, buildup or no buildup.
“There is no way we would go back,” said the woman, 26, who gave her name only as Aswaidi. “It is a city of ghosts. The only people left there are terrorists.”
Statistics collected by one of the two humanitarian groups, the Iraqi Red Crescent Organization, indicate that the total number of internally displaced Iraqis has more than doubled, to 1.1 million from 499,000, since the buildup started in February.
Those figures are broadly consistent with data compiled independently by an office in the United Nations that specializes in tracking wide-scale dislocations. That office, the International Organization for Migration, found that in recent months the rate of displacement in Baghdad, where the buildup is focused, had increased by as much as a factor of 20, although part of that rise could have stemmed from improved monitoring of displaced Iraqis by the government in Baghdad, the capital.
The new findings suggest that while sectarian attacks have declined in some neighborhoods, the influx of troops and the intense fighting they have brought are at least partly responsible for what a report by the United Nations migration office calls the worst human displacement in Iraq’s modern history.
The findings also indicate that the sectarian tension the troops were meant to defuse is still intense in many places in Iraq. Sixty-three percent of the Iraqis surveyed by the United Nations said they had fled their neighborhoods because of direct threats to their lives, and more than 25 percent because they had been forcibly removed from their homes.
The demographic shifts could favor those who would like to see Iraq partitioned into three semi-autonomous regions: a Shiite south and a Kurdish north sandwiching a Sunni territory.
Over all, the scale of this migration has put so much strain on Iraqi governmental and relief offices that some provinces have refused to register any more displaced people, or will accept only those whose families are originally from the area. But Rafiq Tschannen, chief of the Iraq mission for the migration office, said that in many cases, the ability of extended families to absorb displaced relatives was also stretched to the breaking point.
“It’s a bleak picture,” Mr. Tschannen said. “It is just steadily continuing in a bad direction, from bad to worse.”
He also cautioned that reports of people going back to their homes were overstated. As the buildup began, the Iraqi government said that it would take measures to evict squatters from houses that were not theirs and make special efforts to bring the rightful owners back.
“They were reporting that people went back, but they didn’t report that people left again,” Mr. Tschannen said. He added that Iraqis “hear things are better, go back to collect remuneration and pick up an additional suitcase and leave again. It is not a permanent return in most cases.”
American officials in Baghdad did not respond to a request for comment, but the national intelligence estimate released Thursday confirmed that Iraq continues to become more segregated through internal migration. “Population displacement resulting from sectarian violence continues,” it found, “imposing burdens on provincial governments and some neighboring states.”
Dr. Said Hakki, director of the Iraqi Red Crescent Organization, said that he had been surprised when his figures revealed that roughly 100,000 people a month were fleeing their homes during the buildup. Dr. Hakki said that he did not know why the rates were so high but added that some factors were obvious.
“It’s fear,” he said. “Lack of services. You see, if you have a security problem, you don’t need a lot to frighten people.”
It is clear that military operations, both by American troops and the Iraqi forces working with them as part of the buildup, have something to do with the rise in displacement, said Dana Graber Ladek, Iraq displacement specialist for the migration organization’s Iraq office.
“If a surge means that soldiers are on the streets patrolling to make sure there is no violence, that is one thing,” Ms. Ladek said. “If a surge means military operations where there are attacks and bombings, then obviously that is going to create displacement.”
But Ms. Ladek added that, in contrast to the first years of the conflict, when major American offensives were a main cause of displacement, the primary driving force had changed.
“Sectarian violence is the biggest driving factor - militias coming into a neighborhood and kicking all the Sunnis out, or insurgents driving all the Shias away,” Ms. Ladek said.
Her conclusions mirrored the experiences of Iraqis who had fled their homes.
Aswaidi and her family were driven out of the Dora section of Baghdad five months ago when Shiite snipers opened fire on their Sunni neighborhood from nearby tower blocks, shooting through their windows “at all hours of day and night.”
Returning covertly to check on the property in mid-August, she found Sunni insurgents occupying the building and neighboring homes, walking unchallenged through the deserted streets. Nearby, she claims, the same insurgents captured one of the Shiite snipers who drove the residents away, and claimed that he was a 16-year-old Iranian.
She now fears that her entire neighborhood will be taken over by Shiite militias like the Mahdi Army, which is loyal to the radical Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr.
“I don’t want them to take my town, but I think they will,” Aswaidi said. “It will change from Sunni to Shia. The Americans can’t stop it.”
Shiites face similarly overwhelming odds. In Shualah, on the northern outskirts of Baghdad, 400 Shiite families now live in a makeshift refugee camp on wasteland commandeered by Mr. Sadr’s followers.
In a sprawl of cinder block hovels and tin and bamboo-roofed shacks, families have stories of being expelled from their homes by Sunni insurgents.
Ali Edan fled Yusifiya, a Sunni insurgent haven south of Baghdad, when his uncle was killed. He has no intention of returning, even though American commanders claim Sunni sheiks there have begun cooperating with them. “It is still an unsafe area,” said Mr. Edan.
Both humanitarian groups based their conclusions on information collected from the displaced Iraqis inside the country. The Red Crescent counted only displaced Iraqis who receive relief supplies, and the United Nations relied on data from an Iraqi ministry that closely tracks Iraqis who leave their homes and register for government services elsewhere.
Before the troop buildup, by far the most significant event causing the displacement of Iraqis was the bombing of a revered Shiite mosque in Samarra in February 2006. The bombing set off a spasm of sectarian killing, but the rate at which Iraqis left their homes leveled off toward the end of that year before accelerating again as the buildup began, the Red Crescent figures show.
The United Nations figures also include a little over a million people it says were displaced in the decades before the Samarra bombing, including the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s. The Red Crescent data does not include them.
In Baghdad, the latest migration involves an enormously complex landscape in which some people flee one district even as others return to it.
In Ghazaliya, a mixed but Sunni-majority district of north Baghdad, one 30-year-old Shiite said his family was driven out by Sunni insurgents a year ago with just two hours notice to leave their home.
Five months ago, the troop buildup brought American soldiers and the Shiite-dominated Iraqi Army onto his street and his family returned. But even as it did, Sunni neighbors fled, knowing that the army had been infiltrated by Shiite militias.
“They are afraid, because the army has good relations with the Mahdi Army,” said the 30-year-old man, who said he was too afraid to give his name. “My area used to have a lot of Sunni. Now most are Shia, because Shias expelled from other places have moved into the empty Sunni homes.”
© 2007 The New York Times
Obviously, the “surge” is working, Bush is smarter than we suspected. When the last person leaves Baghdad, they won’t have to turn out the lights, because there isn’t any electicity anyway.
Senators Liberman and Levin along with the Brookings Institute’s Saban Center are backing a plan to fracture Iraq into 3 states—a frightening idea. See the link here:
http://www3.brookings.edu/fp/saban/analysis/june2007iraq_partition.pdf
If you throw a rock into a pond, do you actually expect that there won’t be any ripples?
One surge begets another.
I know that if they moved 10,000 marines into my neighborhood I’d be leaving too.
It’s going to get a lot worse before it ever gets better. From the newscasts I see, just about everyone is on the “continue the surge” bandwagon. I was fooled, I thougth it would be well proven, ‘the surge’ was not working when the September deadline rolled around and we’d start to pull out of Iraq.___ Silly me.
It’s been well proven it isn’t working, but the truth is not being told in this country and our national press really is bought.__ Thanks to Common Dreams and the bloggers who post here, I’m learning the sad truths.
KEM its good to see people like you on these boards. Tell others we need to wake the country up before it is too late!
dcbeltway: Actually, I’m not so sure it’s all that frightening. Iraq, like the entire continent of Africa and elsewhere, had its borders carved out by despotic European powers to serve European back-room agreements and sensibilities above all else. For instance, why does Kuwait even exist? Far less detail was paid to geographical, bioregional, cultural, religious or linguistic sensibilities as was given toward how the European powers could best agree on the maintenance of despotic rule.
As such, Iraq may be an artificial construct from the get-go and might arguably benefit from a restoration to a state of lesser tension (ala the collapse of the Soviet Union).
Yeah, eleminate Iraq as one country, divide it into three parcels, but first kill a million or so of the citizens, contaminate the land forever with deadly radio-active dust, run any left alive across the imaginary borders and then take the oil.
Yep, that isn’t so frightening, at least not for those who didn’t call Iraq home. Seems like Hitler had a better idea than that, he’d eventually eleminate France, the Netherlands, Belgum, Russia and England, etc and they would all be one nation,__ Germany. One big happy country with no jews, Arfricans, Orientals, Arabs, or anyone except those with Nordic blood lines. No more imaginary lines on the maps.
I beleive what we have done and are still doing to Iraq is as bad as it gets and we should leave them alone to settle any of their own differences.___ Oops, can’t leave them alone, forgot the oil, the oil, the oil.
Paul but in that report no one asks what the Iraqis themselves want. Majority of Iraqis I speak to want their nation intact. There are also alot of mixed Sunni-Shi’a marriages. Let’s also remember that its Pro-Likud/Kadima party interests that fund the Saban Center at Brookings which put out this report. Follow the money and ask yourself who benefits from a dissolved Iraq. Who pushed for war to begin with and Qui Bono as they say in Latin-who benefits? Although Iraq is an artifical construct as are the majority of nations states in the world many of which had borders drawn by colonialist powers, dissolving these states will result in enormous bloodshed. When India was partitioned look what happened..when Ireland was partitioned look what happened…when Yugoslavia fell apart..well you get the picture.
You know there is a Lt. Colonel in the army by the name of Ralph Peters who drew a map of his vision for a new Middle East. Its gained a lot of traction in Think Tank circles in DC which is quite scary. The map frightens me personally as the administration looks like it is in the process implementing it. Its a balkanized Middle East and its here: http://tinyurl.com/2ce5yk
If Iraq is divided into three along secterian lines both the Shia’a Arab State and the Kurdish state will get the oil fields. The Sunnis will get not get any natural resources. This is a receipe for constant conflict as the Sunnis get shafted in this division. You think they won’t declare war on their neighbors? Iraq was once the strongest Arab state and the PNAC folks wanted that strength disolved. Little states fighting each other are not a threat to Israel or the West. I truly believe the partition was the plan from the get go and that a civil war was encouraged from the start.
I do believe you called it DC Beltway. Why do these people sit up at night figuring how to screw up the world? Is it just for money?
I just re-read my other comment and I don’t believe Hitler had good ideas, I meant he thought it would be good planning. Please excuse me for not being clear there.
I think George will want to stay of course.
He has inserted his Mighty Troop into Iraq and he’s not going to withdraw just as his surge is building.
No he is not and will likely go after Iran. If he does, we are in big time trouble.
Damon13, did you know that banging your head against a wall uses up 150 calories an hour?
I never tied it, but if you happen to be a little on the heavy side, you could give it a bang.
the object from the first has been to divide iraqq int three powerless entitys.
Before we invaded we had already helped carve out what is today Kurdistan and so powerfull were the Kurds Saddams troops left them alone in a semiautonomous entity for the last 6 years of the pre invasion phase of the genocide we had planned to begin before the sanctions ended.
We did the same with the Balkjans and all the dumber than rocks beleived it waas for democrcy and genocide we invaded balakns and today not but one country, Albaniasa is a soveriegn state today; all the rest a re Euro and american run welfare enclaves with no control of the energy pipelines now running through their coutrys.
Hell the real leadership has had this counry divided by black versus white versus mexicans versus amn versus women versus native americans versus democrats versus republicans so why not Iraq.
teh only diffeernence in Iraq is we got them to kill each other thinking each was the bad guy when all the time it was some of our 5,000 so called Free Iraquis we had trained in Czech Republoic for when day of invasion began.
People are still wandering around thinking this is the US of A they read about in history books, the ones who can read that is,and it is no whres near and never was what it was written up to be.
A russian made a film that even snuck past the cnesorchip boards; It wasa about Goatsd, yes goats.
Seems when the sheperds wanted to control the flocks they used to tie a bell around one of the Billys necks and when the time for feed came they rang thew bell until the sheep grew to recognize it.
Well the sheep followed those Billys right inot the barns to be sheared bleating terribly qwhen they lost their coats but once outside went right back to following the belled Billy. One day the Belled Billy led them to a different shed, this time it was the butcher shop and the sheep followed and stood in line awaiting to be fed even upon hearing the miserable bleating form inside the building.
Who is ringing your bell?
dcbeltway: I’m not an expert on that region’s cultures and factions, so I’d have to defer to others. The collapse of the Soviet Union, which required a huge input of force and national/symbollic constructs in order to unite, was largely bloodless — given the sheer size. The Russians would have done well to leave the breakaway Republics alone, but in any case I don’t think of it as a “civil war”. So why can’t Iraq just settle into its natural geographical/historical sectors peacefully?
I think the answer is tightly coupled to our very involvement there. We pulled out one puppet and replaced him with another, under the label of “democracy”. And we’re not happy with our new puppet, and so will pick a new one shortly for the Iraqi people….er….I mean they will pick a new one? Golly, imperial democracy from the outside is a complicated thing to get one’s mind around. Who can balance the needs of the American Empire and western oil companies, get a handle on civil war, and make it all look like Democracy? They’re in need of some Democrats, it seems.
I’m not sure this was the neocon strategy, but they have institgated a civil war, and probaly created a much more dangerous place to live than under Saddam’s reign — however evil he indeed may have been.
It all goes back to Hanlon’s Razor. We don’t know if Bush & Co. terribly miscalculated, or got exactly what they were banking on: a policy of genocide. In any case, they need to GO. And the Iraqis must settle their own affairs. Nothing comes top->down except tyranny.
It is obvious the troop buildup is just a prelude to Bush’s orders to invade IRAN.
British special forces caught with bombs trying to forment Iraqi civil war. As I said this thing was planned.
http://tinyurl.com/84hk5
Oldtimer that’s the whole point of the surge. The troops are currently based on Iran’s borders. We are already at war with Iran Congress just hasn’t declared war yet… offically. Although Nancy Pelosi removed the language from the Iraq funding bill stating we wouldn’t attack Iran at AIPAC’s urging. CIA backed Pakistani organization Jundullah is launching attacks from Baluchistan. I believe CBS or ABC reported on this a couple of months ago. Kurds have been given covert weapons and promised a state, the Arab Iranian Shi’a in Khuzestan (wheere Iran’s oil fiends are) has been bribed off, there are an awful lot of US carriers in the Gulf I believe its at 6 right now, and we have been working with the Mujaheddin Al Khaq for some time. All the administration needs is a false flag incident here (I pray not) or Gulf of Tonkin type incident in the Gulf and they will get their Iran war.
Anyway I hope your passport is in good working order. I know mine is.