Beginning

I am starting this blog both to discuss and to enable my own education about the diversity within the "Muslim world". I want to begin by contesting that term: there are approximately 1.6 billion Muslims in the world, in countries including Malaysia, France, Morocco, Iraq, Afghanistan, Indonesia and Bangladesh. Just that small list should let you know that speaking or writing as if all Muslims think or act in the same way cannot be true. 

I begin this blog for two reasons: I'm writing a paper about women's movements in Iraq, and the way that amending the Iraqi constitution can help stabilize Iraq as a state. FYI, there have been women's movements in Iraq since the 1920's. More on that later. Anyway, the reason I started this blog today was because of my reaction to the interview on The Daily Show last night with Matthew Alexander. The video is worth a watch. Also, Mr. Alexander was on Hannity and Colmes last week to discuss his book and his time as an interrogator of terrorists in Iraq. 

Mr. Alexander's interrogation philosophy seems to be to develop rapport with the subject of interrogation and to refrain from using physical torture whenever possible. He says that it was more effective when he was interrogating associates of al-Zarqawi than physical torture would have been. He comments on the surprise that the subjects evinced when they were not physically abused, but rather shown respect for their culture. Alexander even apologized to one particular imam for American missteps in the early years of the invasion. He also mentions that physical torture enables al Quaeda to recruit new members who hate America.

Listening to this interview, I could not believe that this country continues to physically torture people when there is an effective alternative. Why, when we are the "liberators" of Iraq, are we not making the effort to communicate with Iraqis? Surely those who are desperate enough, like the imam in the example above, to bless suicide bombers show a hopelessness that perhaps we can assuage. Torturing these people does not help their representatives on a national level cooperate with us. Torture forces our interrogators to sublimate their own humanity and ignore the humanity of their subjects.  Alexander's methods indicate that he resisted dehumanizing the subjects he interrogated. 

I am hoping there is a larger lesson in Mr. Alexander's method: are Americans in Iraq now fighting Iraqis without listening to them, and can we be more successful with negotiation across the cultural divide with negotiation? And, more importantly, is developing rapport with subjects of interrogation a long term strategy for diminishing the number of people who are willing to join al Quaeda?