Iraqi Youth and the Future

By Paige Gray

Ausama Idres can faintly recall the sirens and bombing from the Gulf War.  He remembers leaving his home in Baghdad as a child with his parents, gas masks in tow, worried the city might get nuked.

He thinks about his experience growing up during that war--which unofficially lasted less than a year--as compared to

what Iraq's youth today must be enduring through the current extensive battle, which began in 2003.

"For those young teens, they're growing up in a very hostile environment and they haven't experienced peace before; most of their terms are growing violent," says Idres, now a medical student in Northern Iraq, in an e-mail interview.

While the war continues in Iraq and uncertainty remains as to what direction a new administration will take, many believe the key in rebuilding the Middle Eastern nation begins with its youth and education. 
Controversy may always surround the United States' decision to invade, but experts, Iraqis and Arab-Americans hope children, teenagers and young adults can overcome the effects of living amongst destruction, death and anxiety for more than five years.

"Iraqi youth need education, need to learn that it is okay to think, and that they must think outside the box--the box that was build by the religious leaders and radical ideologies," says Dr. Wamith Alkssab, youth projects director of Baghdad's Iraqi Al-Amal Association.

Some believe a new administration may positively influence the mindset of Iraqis, particularly the youth, but only to a certain degree after continuous exposure to violence during their formative years--violence which will presumably carry on even after a new U.S. president.

"It's important that Iraqi children see that the administration responsible for their suffering in the war leave office," says Khalil M. Marrar, a visiting political science professor at DePaul University. "However, I am not sure the message of ‘regime change' in the U.S. will reach young minds of Iraq, or anyone in the country."

Marrar says, unfortunately, there may not be a bright spot in the immediate future.

"I think what they are more likely to see is a continuation of their suffering in a protracted war if John McCain takes office, or the same result--but without the U.S.--under an Obama or Clinton presidency."

Mark Goldstein, who works directly with the country's youth through the London-based Children of Iraq Association, says the Unites States must also work with Israeli-Iraqi relations to secure a better future.

"[Iraqi youth] hope a new American administration will break the connection with Israel that is feeding the war in Iraq. Many young Iraqi fighters have told me they have encountered foreign forces from Israel causing havoc," Goldstein says.  "The Iraqi youth yearn for their own destiny and the ability to defend themselves. They hope a new U.S. president will end the occupation and U.S. forces will leave Iraq."

Similarly, Michael Kelly, a law professor at Creighton University, says good could come from conversations about
other Middle East situations, catalyzed by the Iraq War.

"One very slight silver lining might be that it has forced us into a dialogue with Iran that never would have happened otherwise," Kelly explains. "If a suitable rapprochement can be developed that would tamp down on Iran's support of Hammas, then perhaps a more positive peace effort for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict could begin."

Goldstein notes that young adults in Iraq acknowledge the positive outcome of Saddam Hussein's downfall.  And though Idres thinks the war has brought new opportunities and freedom for some people "to do many things," he says the prolonged fighting since the fall of the Iraqi dictatorship has ruined possibilities for much of the next generation.

"This war, I believe has changed so much of the Iraqi youths' futures. It changed it dramatically if I may say so.  I don't know how to put that in words...It abolished so many opportunities to many young people."

Contempt and confusion still stirs inside Idres regarding President Bush's choice to attack.

"Even though we were living under a dictatorship regime, it was somehow a peaceful environment and under a peaceful environment sometimes you can plan ahead," he says. "But after the war we never had a peaceful environment and that disrupted everything, every plan that someone can make."

The war's costly impact on Iraqi life has ruined Idres' opinion of and faith in the American government.  The decision to interfere in a conflict the U.S government knows nothing about has devastated the country and its next generation, he says.

"I'm well-educated and I understand that the soldiers on the ground are doing what they're told to do, and I understand that the American people don't want this war from the beginning so I know for sure that the U.S. Administration is behind everything," he says.  "I hate them for that and I don't appreciate anything they've done so far, because they clearly stick their noses in something they don't understand a thing about."

That suffering can be witnessed not only through newscast images and front-page photos, but through the blogs of Iraqi teenagers. Days of My Life is a blog written by a 16-year-old girl who calls herself "Sunshine." 

Describing herself, she writes, "I grow up among well educated family. My school is far away from my home and the way to it is dangerous, so every day considered as a challenge. I have many dreams and ambitions, I wish that one day they become true. I want to be an engineer or a pharmacist in the future, my mom always support me to accomplish my ambitions ... optimism is my strategy always."

Sunshine uses that optimism to deal with her daily struggles and heartaches, such as the threat on her father's life in March.  Letting the blog serve as her personal diary, Sunshine wrote about her pain and anguish for all to read, letting an international community experience a small part of the situation some Iraqi youth and families face.

"It has been the hardest two week in my life. First we were threatened by terrorists who wanted to kill my dad, I spent the whole nights thinking, and crying, I was in shock, and terrified.  I couldn't study anything, I couldn't concentrate and I did horrible in all of my exams, I am expecting low marks, during the classed I kept wondering with tears in my eyes, what will happen next?" Sunshine writes, trying to balance school responsibilities with the fear of losing her father.

"Will they kill my dad? Kidnap one of my family members? Why ?  We're not rich, don't belong to any political party, very simple family, and never harmed anyone, what do those terrorists want? Money? Or they just want to terrify us?"

Marrar says the next president must take the constant state of terror distressing Iraqi children and teenagers into consideration if the United States wants a stable nation to emerge.

"It's in the long term interests of the United States to help provide a secure Iraq for all of its people, particularly its youngest members, who are the future of the country," he says.  

Marrar says a "three-pronged policy" should be implemented that would work to "reduce the negative impacts of the American occupation, whether if it's by relaxing it or fully withdrawing," and "pump as much resources into the Iraq education system as possible."  But Marrar believes before these can be accomplished, the United Stated must "provide for a peaceful political resolution between the various parties in Iraq."

To best instill stability in Iraq's young adult population, Kelly thinks a new administration should undertake specific "building efforts for civil society--civic and community centers with a youth orientation along the lines of American YMCAs-- in tandem with more educational efforts with a democracy-based human rights focus that empowers the sense of the individual in young Iraqis."

For a hopeful future, Idres says a new administration may help by "opening their eyes "and "considering all the facts." Then, he says, the current, pessimistic outlook of the next generation may change.

"I don't think there's any young guy or girl in Iraq who don't think of leaving the country at the moment."