#Moqawama: Tahya al-Moqawama al-Iraqiya!
Introduction
George W. Bush, you have asked us to “bring it on.” And so help me, [we will] like you never expected. Do you have another challenge? — Anonymous Iraqi
Moqawama (مقاومة) is the Arabic word for resistance. #Moqawama was created with the Iraqi Resistance to the American occupation in mind, but it could apply equally to any of the multitude of resistance movements being fought across the world today—in Palestine, in Chechnya, in the Basque Country, in Ireland, in Jammu and Kashmir, in Atjeh, and so on.
Moqawama is the M in the Palestinian group HAMAS.
Why does J’raxis, an avowed atheist and libertarian, seem to support Islamic fundamentalist groups?
I don’t. But what I support is people—nations or cultures or however they wish to identify themselves—having the right to choose their own system, their own way. What is unequivocably wrong is an attempt to force an ideology on an unwilling recipient. Whether or not that ideology is agreeable to me personally, and whether or not I believe that it’s superior to the alternative, is irrelevant. What is paramount is people’s right to self-determination—if the Iraqis or anyone else want Islamic fundamentalism, so be it.
If it turns out in the end that they find the ideology of men like al-Sistani and al-Sadr disagreeable, there’ll be a revolution from within, from the bottom up, like what you’re seeing in Iran right now—not a revolution forced upon them by an outside power with ulterior motives.
And of course, America’s invasion of Iraq has little to do with “freedom,”“democracy,” or “secularism”: a régime run by Christian fundamentalists and Zionists, occupying Iraq, merely establishing a new, more coöperative dictatorship, in order to extract the land’s resources and secure a strategic location proximate to Iran, China, Russia and in the heart of the Middle East, is hardly representative of the values of libertarianism or secularism.
Currently, this DALnet channel is mostly frequented by idlers who like having the channel name in their whois—however, it certainly has instigated a number of interesting conversations with a range of users from supporters, Arab and otherwise, to jingoistic American detractors, to pissed-off Kuwaitis (“Fuck Iraqi Defeaters And Fuck Iraq At All And Fuck Who Sits that shitty topiC”).
News
- Iraqi Shiʻite Cleric Pledges to Defend Iran
- Ellen Knickmeyer and Omar Fekeiki, The Washington Post, 2006-01-24.
- “[Moqtada al-Sadr’s] pledge was also one of the strongest signs yet that Iraq could become a battleground in any Western conflict with Iran, raising the specter of Iraqi Shiʻite militias—or perhaps even the US-trained Shiʻite-dominated military—taking on American troops here in sympathy with Iran.”
- The US Has Lost; Let’s Leave
- Dave Lindorff, Counterpunch, 2005-11-18.
- “An unorganized bunch of insurgents armed with nothing but raw guts, aging Soviet-era rifles, and home-made explosives, have routed the most powerful military machine the world has ever known. … American military might can destroy a country. It can kill hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians. It can sow terror through the use of indiscriminate use of such WMDs as DU explosives, phosphorus bombs, helicopter and fixed-wing gunships and computerized drones and missiles. But it cannot defeat a concerted popular resistance.”
- White House Will Not Rule Out Torture
- Al-Jazeera, 2005-11-14.
- “ ‘The president has said that we are going to do whatever we do in accordance with the law,’ the national security adviser [Stephen Hadley] said.” Of course it will be in accordance with the law—President Bush has threatened to veto attempts to explicitly outlaw torture of prisoners. Humanitarian reasons aside, a major argument against mistreating enemy prisoners is so that the enemy doesn’t mistreat your prisoners in reprisal. People would do well to remember these White House statements next time some American soldier gets dragged through the streets of Baghdad, or hanged from a bridge in Fallujah, or worse.
- The White Death
- Chris Floyd, The Moscow Times, 2005-11-11.
- “The documentary—‘Fallujah: The Hidden Massacre’—catalogs the American use of white phosphorus shells and a new, ‘improved’ form of napalm that turned human beings into ‘caramelized’ fossils, with their skin dissolved and turned to leather on their bones.”
- Elusive Sniper Saps US Morale in Baghdad
- Rory Carroll, The Guardian, 2005-08-05.
- “They have never seen Juba. They hear him, but by then it’s too late: a shot rings out and another US soldier slumps dead or wounded. … Some worry that Juba is on his way to becoming a resistance hero, acclaimed by those Iraqis who distinguish between ‘good’ insurgents, who target only Americans, and ‘bad’ insurgents who harm civilians.” Wouldn’t that be a shame?
- Iraq Fighters Name Joint Spokesperson
- Al-Jazeera, 2005-07-04.
- Iraqi resistance becoming more and more organized: “The new spokesperson for the Islamic Army in Iraq and Jaish al-Mujahidin, Dr. Ibrahim Yusuf al-Shimmari, told Aljazeera that the decision comes in the context of the groups’ plans to implement a political programme and be politically recognised.”
- An Anatomy of the Resistance to the American Occupation in Iraq
- Laith al-Saud, Counterpunch, 2005-05-21.
- “[T]he Iraqi resistance has been vibrant in organizing itself politically not only inside Iraq but outside as well. I will mention two events in this regard: the meeting of the Higher Committee for National Forces Rejecting the Occupation and the 16th Arab National Congress held in Algiers. With the former there was even greater consolidation amongst Iraqi resistance groups; the implication of course is that a national liberation front is beginning to emerge that possesses a mandate and doctrine.”
- Insurgency Increases; US Military Recruits Fall
- Kevin B. Zeese, Counterpunch, 2005-05-19.
- “The US Army has missed its recruiting goals for the last three months. On [2005-05-20] they stopped recruiting to retrain recruiters who were misleading and threatening potential recruits. At the same time the resistance in Iraq is growing. Is the US military more successful in recruiting for the resistance than it is for the US Army?”
- This is Our Guernica
- Jonathan Steele and Dahr Jamail, The Guardian, 2005-04-27.
- “Every time the prime minister claims it is time to ‘move on’ from the issue of the war’s legality and rejoice at Iraq’s transformation since Saddam Hussein was toppled, the answer must be: ‘Remember Falluja.’ ”
- An Old US Foe Rises Again in Iraq
- Anthony Shadid, The Washington Post, 2005-04-08.
- Oh, look who’s back—it’s Moqtada al-Sadr and the Jaish-i-Mahdi! “… [T]he Mahdi Army, twice subdued by the US military last year [is] now openly displaying its strength in parts of the south. … Time and again, after battles that left hundreds of Sadr’s followers dead, the movement has managed to rewrite the notion of winning and losing: The very act of fighting is a victory. There is no defeat.”
- Journalists Tell of US Fallujah Killings
- Al-Jazeera, 2005-03-20.
- More American “heroism” in Fallujah—targetting journalists, using napalm bombs, and this: “[A sixteen-year-old girl] watched the soldiers enter and shoot her mother and father directly, without saying anything. They beat her two sisters, then shot them in the head. After this her brother was enraged and ran at the soldiers while shouting at them, so they shot him dead.”
- Americans and Rebels Begin Talks on Timetable for Withdrawal from Iraq
- Patrick Cockburn, The Independent, 2005-02-22.
- “US military commanders are now dubious about the chances of winning an outright military victory over the Sunni rebels who have a firm core of supporters among the five million–strong Sunni Muslim community. The US military has lost 1,479 dead and 10,740 wounded in Iraq since the invasion began in March 2003.”
- The Anti-War Movement and the Iraqi Resistance
- The Right to Resist Occupation
- Sharon Smith, Counter Punch, 2005-01-21.
- “Like most resistance movements, [the Iraqis] combine a motley range of assorted factions. Former Baʻathists, liberals, Islamists, fed-up collaborationists, communists, &c. Of course, it is riddled with opportunism, local rivalry, demagoguery and criminality. But if we were to only support pristine movements, then no resistance will be worthy of our purity. Before we prescribe how a pristine Iraqi resistance must conduct their secular, feminist, democratic, nonviolent battle, we should shore up our end of the resistance by forcing the US and its allied governments to withdraw from Iraq.”
- American “Heroism” in Fallujah
- L. Richard White, The Libertarian Enterprise, 2004-11-24.
- Reports of American atrocities in Fallujah.
- Hub Protesters Back Insurgency
- Michael Levenson, Boston.com, 2004-04-11.
- “All over Iraq, Shiʻa and Sunni alike are struggling, are resisting, against the butchers who are occupying them.”
Channel Profile
| Founder: | Moqawama |
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| Successor: | — |
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| Description: | Iraqi Resistance Channel: Tahya al-Moqawama al-Iraqiya! |
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| Registered: | 2004-06-03T19:38:21Z |
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| Mode Lock: | +tn−sp |
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| Options: | Ident, Verbose, Topic Lock (sOp) |
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| Memo Level: | aOp |
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The Channel Slogan
The channel slogan, “Tahya al-Moqawama al-Iraqiya!” is translated as “Long live the Iraqi Resistance!”; basically an Arabic version of the well-known “Vive la Résistance!” In addition to being the #Moqawama slogan, J’raxis and a few other people have adopted it as their signature on various weblogs and discussion boards. Provided below are details on how to write it in a variety of ways.
In Arabic script, it looks like this—
تحيا المقاومة العراقية
And the actual Arabic letters are—
Teh, hah, yeh, alif;
Alef, lam, meem, qaf, alef, waw, meem, teh marbuta;
Alef, lam, ain, reh, alef, qaf, yeh, teh marbuta.
There are a number of methods of transliterating Arabic script to Roman characters, so each word can be spelt in a multitude of ways. These are just a few variants—
- tahya
- Tahiya, taheya, ta7ya, ta7iya, ta7eya.
- moqawama
- Moqawamah, moqawameh, muqawama, muqawamah, muqawameh, mouqawamah, mouqawameh.
- Iraqiya
- Iraqia, Iraqiyah, Iraqiyeh, Iraqiyya, Iraqiyyah, 3iraqiya, 3iraqiyah.
If someone types the slogan using Windows’ Code Page 1256 character set (e.g., an Arabic mIRC user), and you’re accidentally viewing it using Code Page 1252 or ISO 8859-1 instead, it will look like this—
ÊÍíÇ ÇáãÞÇæãÉ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ
The XML/HTML entities, in decimal and hexadecimal, are—
تحيا
المقاومة
العراقية
تحيا
المقاومة
العراقية
Credits
Thanks go to the following people for helping out with the slogan—
- Badr (بدر) for ta7ya, and for correcting أل to ال.
- Rami (رامي) for the Arabic script.
- Omar (عمر) for correcting tahiya to tahya.
- Google for revealing moqawama is much more common than muqawama.