Juan Cole reports this disturbing news today:
Iraqi blogger Khalid has been tossed into jail, apparently for being critical of the Iraqi government on the Web. The arrest was first reported by Riverbend.
Please consider writing in protest. The email address is consul@iraqiembassy.org.
Here at BooTrib, I wrote about Khalid’s brother Raed and his mother — also bloggers — on June 30 in “I am an Iraqi journalist.” BELOW:
An excerpt from BoomanTribune.com’s “I am an Iraqi journalist,” June 30, 2005:
And: “Iraqi Blogger Criticizes Western Media For Excluding Iraqi Voice”: “In the States I met staff for the Senators, different staff. And I talk with them about Iraq and what is happening in Iraq these two years, and I discovered that they knew nothing about Iraq.”
– From an interview with Faiza Jarrar on Democracy Now!‘s June 29 show. Jarrar’s blog is afamilyinbaghdad.blogspot.com. Her son Raed’s blog is RaedInTheMiddle.
From Riverbend aka Baghdad Burning:
Thanks for letting us know, Susan. One good thing (if there is such a thing) about this is that he is not an anonymous someone who can be taken and no one ever knows… because he is a blogger, he has not only people who know him from his blog, but thousands of others who will stand up for him because, regardless of which side of the aisle you are on, he is one of ‘us’. (Not that we don’t do that for non bloggers as well, of course, as situations come to our notice.)
I will help get the word out.
I’m sure he’s going through hell 🙁 That’s horrible. His mother and brother must be sick. I’ll have to view that June 29 Democracy Now! program again.
No kidding… and much worse, knowing all the stories swirling around not only Abu Ghraib but every other jail and prison there. We’ll have to hope for the best.
I’ve posted this a couple of places… mostly just saying what you said, with all your links. I need to go back and reread the article you did on them myself.
Ah, yes, freedom is on the march.
This SUCKS. On Raed’s blog, it says that they heard from him and he’s alive and well….but he hasn’t been released yet.
This is the kind of bullshit that if widely known just might open a few people’s eyes about what is ACTUALLY going on in Iraq. What exactly did he say that got him in trouble?
Suggestions/ I will help in any way that I can. I started reading Raed in 2001, and through him found Riverbend and his family’s blogs….they are very brave people. I want to help.
Brinnaine, I’d suggest you contact the State Dept. … that’s what I did for the Yemeni woman who was almost executed.
It’s very difficult to get a response from the State Dept. Finally, beause my U.S. Senator wrote to them, the State Dept. sent me a letter.
THE KEY is if we get enough people writing e-mails, etc….
ALSO: I see that someone has a diary up about this at Daily Kos. Right now, though, Daily Kos’s diaries are inaccessible for me because someone screwed up the HTML.
Well, I won’t be getting any help from my senators (TX), I wonder if there’s another way.
Looks like DKos is fixed now….
DKos diary
Maybe you can combo with RoeyinNC ?
AND (!) Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! will surely cover this on Monday. But just in case she doesn’t know, you could fax her … her fax number, etc. is on her site http://www.democracynow.org
And fax the rest of the media … they probably won’t cover it, but what the hell.
the petition to the US Iraqi Embassy if anyone wants to sign it.
I just sent an email to the folks at Voices in the Wildrerness — I’ll let you know if/when I hear back.
Susan, what sad news…
I still have not heard from my friend Diva, since she instant messaged June 16th when she told me the following:
“”Diva (6/16/2005 9:19:55 AM): my mom called me one day and said that a group of disguised men in two separate cars stopped my driver and told him you and the girl working for the French embassy better stay home or you two dead bodies this very day.”
This led to her emotional collapse and hospital stay and now I don’t know her situation at all.
She said she would write again that day or the next, but nothing at all since.
Very dangerous place, Baghdad, as we all well know.
Oh no, Diane. Don’t you wish you could pick up the telephone?
This is a real longshot, but you might try contacting this journalist who’s back in Baghdad:
Back To Iraq
Thanks Susan, I will check it out. I had Diva’s phone number until she moved and now I don’t even have her address. It is dangerous to citizens to get mail from American, so even when I had her address I couldn’t send her anything.
I am a little worried that the wrong kind of attention to the blogger in your story, could lead to more suffering for him.
I am wondering if we should send emails to Senators on this with links or what????Any ideas, anyone?
I see the journalist has both e-mail and AOL IM:
site
Susan, I do not know if you really know just how important you are to our sight here. I hope you know this for I seem to fail to say it as much as I should. If it weren’t for you, we would not know much. You are so valuable to me, not only as a friend, but as a reporter to our blog site….many thanks again.
Oh My God, this is toooooo surreal and I just can imagine the fear in him/them as they got taken away, what with the history of everything there..
I hope this isn’t the start of a trend where more and more opponents of the current Iraqi regime are silenced and arrested.
I fear that it’s just the tip of the iceberg however.
And they complain about Iran jailing its bloggers … huh.
Signed the petition, emailed the story and links to Flashpoints at KPFA, maybe that will help? I am emailing my Sen., don’t know if he’ll be helpful but he’s on the side of the good guys so maybe. Schumer-who I appreciate more than ever. Thanks for letting us know about this!
I found this a little while ago. Hope this helps out in our quest.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
BlogThis!Raed in the Middle
Caught Between The East and The West
Thursday, July 14, 2005
Fortunately, It’s a Nice Governmental Gang!
My mom called me today at 7 in the morning, shouting with happiness: “Your brother is okay!”. Niki and I were the last members of the family to know the “happy news”. My brother called my dad from the Iraqi mokhabarat’s jail to inform us he was alive; he said he was abducted by the mukhabarat men from his university. My dad called my mom and Majed, and they informed us then.
The feelings of joyfulness in our family now would give anyone the impression that my brother has won the lottery! My mom spent the morning planning my brother’s future, including the arrangements of his wedding party!
If your child or sibling vanishes for two days then calls from the secret service jail in any other place on earth, that would be considered a disaster and a violation of human rights…
In Iraq, however, it’s Happy News.
Because the other options include: To be tortured, executed, and thrown in garbage by SCIRI and their Badr brigades. To be held by the Iraqi police and left to choke to death in one of their cars. To be held by the US troops then disappear and be mistreated for months in one of their many prisons. To be kidnapped by one of the countless criminal gangs and cost your family some tens of millions of Iraqi Dinars and/or your life.
So now you can see why being held at the mukhabarat jail is such happy news!
My dad said that Khalid mentioned something about his writings or his blog. We’re not sure whether our blogs are the reason behind the abduction of my brother, but it’s one of the possible scenarios. In case if they were, we’ll stand for our political values of anti-violence, anti-occupation, pro-dialogue, pro-free speech, and all of the other honourable stands that my family has taken in our lifetime.
Our goal now is to ask the mokhabarat to take my brother to court and reveal what exactly he is being charged with (if anything).
posted by Raed Jarrar @ 10:15 AM 632 Comments & Forum