As if there was any doubt that things in Iraq were better under Saddam, a reader named Nee-Nee sent me this story. Amnesty International has reported that abductions, rapes, and honor killings towards women have been on the rise in Iraq. Perhaps the families of these women would like to weigh in on whether “the surge is working”.

The images in the Basra police file are nauseating: Page after page of women killed in brutal fashion — some strangled to death, their faces disfigured; others beheaded. All bear signs of torture.

The women are killed, police say, because they failed to wear a headscarf or because they ignored other “rules” that secretive fundamentalist groups want to enforce.

“Fear, fear is always there,” says 30-year-old Safana, an artist and university professor. “We don’t know who to be afraid of. Maybe it’s a friend or a student you teach. There is no break, no security. I don’t know who to be afraid of.”

Her fear is justified. Iraq’s second-largest city, Basra, is a stronghold of conservative Shia groups. As many as 133 women were killed in Basra last year — 79 for violation of “Islamic teachings” and 47 for so-called honor killings, according to IRIN, the news branch of the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs…

… After the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, Sawsan says, the situation was “the best.” But now, she says, it’s “the worst.”

“We thought there would be freedom and democracy and women would have their rights. But all the things we were promised have not come true. There is only fear and horror.”

read more…

Christian Neocons (along with fascist atheists like Christopher Hitchens) often point to Islam as the cause of such extremism, rather than the horrible economic conditions and desperation which they’ve created with their war. In extremely chaotic situations an equally extreme doctrine will develop to bring some semblance of order. It’s dishonest and cowardly to blame your victim for the problems you’ve created for them while claiming a position of moral superiority. There is obviously no justification for these crimes, but the true source of it must be recognized if we ever hope to end the violence rather than move the blame around.