Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Notes on Contributors
- Introduction: The Iraq Legacies – Intervention, Occupation, Withdrawal and Beyond
- Part I The Aftermath of War: Strategic Decisions and Catastrophic Mistakes
- Part II Iraqi Politics since Saddam
- Part III The Plight of Iraqi Culture and Civil Society
- 8 Doing Democracy in Diffi cult Times: Oil Unions and the Maliki Government
- 9 ‘If You're a Female, You Risk Being Attacked’: Digital Selves, Warblogs and Women's Rights in Post-invasion Iraq
- 10 The Impact of Coalition Military Operations on Archaeological Sites in Iraq
- Part IV Regional and International Consequences of the Iraq War
- Conclusion: The Iraq Legacies and the Roots of the ‘Islamic State’
- References
- Index
9 - ‘If You're a Female, You Risk Being Attacked’: Digital Selves, Warblogs and Women's Rights in Post-invasion Iraq
from Part III - The Plight of Iraqi Culture and Civil Society
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 October 2017
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Notes on Contributors
- Introduction: The Iraq Legacies – Intervention, Occupation, Withdrawal and Beyond
- Part I The Aftermath of War: Strategic Decisions and Catastrophic Mistakes
- Part II Iraqi Politics since Saddam
- Part III The Plight of Iraqi Culture and Civil Society
- 8 Doing Democracy in Diffi cult Times: Oil Unions and the Maliki Government
- 9 ‘If You're a Female, You Risk Being Attacked’: Digital Selves, Warblogs and Women's Rights in Post-invasion Iraq
- 10 The Impact of Coalition Military Operations on Archaeological Sites in Iraq
- Part IV Regional and International Consequences of the Iraq War
- Conclusion: The Iraq Legacies and the Roots of the ‘Islamic State’
- References
- Index
Summary
The intervention of 2003 and several key decisions made by the United States-led forces in the early days of the war set in process a chain of events that have had profound consequences for Iraq's women. In many respects the US-led invading forces failed to understand the complexity of Iraq and to adequately advocate for women's rights and freedoms. Women in Iraq now live in times characterised by surges in violence and state executions, illegal detention and abuse, political unrest, underage marriage, chronic housing shortages and so-called ‘honour’ crimes (Bassem 2013; Smith et al. 2013). Media reports indicate that Iraqi women are ‘victimised’ and have become increasingly unsafe in the streets (Archer 2013; Barwari 2013; McGeough 2014). Zillah Eisenstein (2013) notes that, more than ten years after the invasion, for the most part ‘women in Iraq are left to fend for themselves’. In this time of crisis, women cannot rely on the justice system in Iraq to uphold their rights. As the 2014 elections unfold in Iraq a new bill will be voted on. The ‘Jafari law’, as it is being called, would effectively legalise the marriage of minors (children as young as nine) and marital rape. Further legal injustices are highlighted by the Human Rights Watch report titled ‘No One Is Safe’. The report describes illegal arrests and ‘violations against women at every stage of the justice system … Women are subject to threats of, or actual, sexual assault sometimes in front of husbands, brothers, and children’ (Human Rights Watch 2014b: 2). This confirms what has long been denied by Iraqi officials – including the justice and human rights ministers – that women are being taken into custody and tortured, in many cases to coerce relatives into confessing to crimes they may or may not have committed (Human Rights Watch 2014b: 6; Zangana 2013). ‘No One Is Safe’ is but one record of the ways in which Iraqi women continue to face the consequences of the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq, many of which have been denied, lied about and concealed from the broader public and Western audiences (Carr 2008; Tessier 2007–8). This chapter attempts to contribute to the understanding of Iraqi women's lives, at a time when many people are asking questions about what violence against women means for broader Iraqi society.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Legacy of IraqFrom the 2003 War to the 'Islamic State', pp. 138 - 151Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2015