Posted on 12/15/2003 12:12:45 PM PST by TheDon
Local Iraqis jubilant about capture
Many learn news from morning phone calls
By Anne Krueger Sandra Dibble and Asher Price UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITERS
December 15, 2003
For thousands of Iraqis living in San Diego County, Saddam Hussein's capture was news many greeted with jubilation yesterday.
But others who spoke out against the Iraqi war cautioned that the arrest of the former dictator should be distinguished from the politics of the U.S. presence in Iraq.
At a park in El Cajon, about 50 Shiite Muslims from Iraq danced and clapped, waving an American flag as they celebrated.
"Happy is a very small word. It's not enough," said Asmaa Alzayadi, an El Cajon resident who fled Iraq in 1993.
Alzayadi hasn't seen her father since he disappeared in 1979, after he challenged Hussein's regime. She said she wants Hussein tried publicly so the world can see the extent of what he did to the Iraqi people.
"Everything they will do to Saddam is not enough," she said. "Saddam hurt every heart in Iraq."
More than 25,000 Iraqis live in San Diego County, the second-largest Iraqi community in the country.
Members of San Diego's Iraqi community – a mix of religions and ethnicities including Kurds, Sunnis, Shiites and Chaldeans – expect to gather between noon and 2 p.m. today outside the Federal Building in downtown San Diego to celebrate Hussein's capture.
Mahdi Shwany, 37, a Kurdish-born engineer and an architect, expects to be among the crowd.
"It's a sort of feeling that never happened to me," Shwany said. "It's like I won a Lotto of $50 million."
Many said they learned of Hussein's capture in morning phone calls, then spent hours watching television to confirm the news.
Baghdad native Safaa Saleh, a cab driver, was at his Spring Valley home when a friend called at 4:20 a.m.
"He told me, 'Turn on the TV. There's a big surprise today,' " said Saleh, a Sunni Muslim who has lived in the United States since 1979.
As she headed into St. Peter Chaldean Catholic Church yesterday morning, Senaa Goryoka said she had been awakened by a call from her brother, who was visiting Iraq. He said the Iraqi people shot fireworks and fired guns into the air to celebrate Hussein's capture.
"I wanted to stay and listen to the news, but I had to come to church to thank God," Goryoka said at the Rancho San Diego church.
Father Michael Bazzi, church pastor, made no mention of Hussein's capture in his sermon. He said later that he didn't feel there was any need to bring it up.
"You don't have to tell them because everyone is rejoicing," he said.
For those who supported the Iraq invasion in April, news of Hussein's capture was viewed as final validation of the U.S. mission.
"This proves to the Iraqis that Americans were intentionally there to get rid of the dictator," said 23-year-old Esra Naama, who had worked on Women for a Free Iraq. "They fought there month after month despite losses to coalition forces."
But for those who opposed the attack on Iraq, the mood was more cautionary.
"We are glad he was captured, but we're still against the war," said Mohammed Nasser, president of San Diego's Muslim American Society. "We as American citizens don't feel the occupation or war is in the best interest of the U.S."
Carole Jahnkow, a member of the San Diego Coalition for Peace and Justice and director of the Peace Resource Center of San Diego, said Hussein's capture still does not justify a U.S. presence in Iraq.
"I think there never was a reason for us to be in Iraq," she said. "I don't think the Bush administration should view this as an excuse to continue our presence."
Now that Hussein has been captured, many Iraqis are now keenly eyeing the possibility of an Iraqi-led trial.
"Are they going to give him to us, to the Iraqi people to prosecute him?" Naama asked. "The Kurds are already out saying they want a piece of him. Everybody wants him."
Several had their own graphic descriptions of what they'd like to see happen to Hussein. One suggested that he should have been buried alive in the hole in which he was found. Another offered to chop Hussein into tiny pieces, giving one of them to every Iraqi in the country and those who were forced to flee.
"Capturing Saddam means the end of fear among Iraqis," said Alan Zangana, director of Kurdish Human Rights Watch. "I don't believe in the death penalty, but Saddam is the exception for me."
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