“Sir, a simple signal from you is all we need to make the American people quake, afraid even to go out on the street, turn their night into day and their day into an eternal hell” — Qusai, Saddam Hussein’s youngest son, addressed his father thus at a party meeting last year. However, it appears that the tables have been turned and Iraq has become the sleepless nation — dreading the light of day and fearing the darkness of night.

On the day the UN inspectors made public their historic report on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, Saddam and his military leaders held a televised meeting. The reasons for the meeting: One — to launch a psychological war on the enemy, and two — for Saddam to show his military leadership to the world thus ensuring that if any of them even thought of running away or of betraying him they would find no shelter anywhere.

In that narrow room crowded with men the same worn-out religious phrases were repeated: “God willing” “Right” will defeat “Wrong” — God will render the “Believers” victorious and destroy the “Infidels.” As expected Saddam’s military leadership showed its loyalty and willingness to wage a war and once again be victorious just as they were in the battle of Qadisiya.

The meeting was steeped in the culture of violence and the air was thick with the suggestion of corpses, of destroyed homes and the threat of such massacres as that of Al-Amiriya Shelter, where women, children and the elderly died. The faces of those men in the meeting had long ago lost every trace of humanity. Not a single female voice intruded on that meeting.

The Dagestani poet, Rasoul Hamzatof, said that only two things are worth fighting for — one’s homeland and a beautiful woman. All other quarrels are worthless. Women on the other hand don’t lean toward violence — Golda Meir, Margaret Thatcher, Condoleezza Rice being exceptions to the rule.

War is a male industry because men thirst for power. Historically such men as Ariel Sharon, Saddam and George W. Bush have been the ones who started wars, increased the methods of oppression and developed destructive weapons. This isn’t true of all men for enmity is not hereditary. It has been found that some so-called primitive peoples do not have a culture of war and their language lacks even a word for the concept. As for woman, one writer has called her the source of life and its eternal light. She started the agricultural revolution, taught men to cultivate the land, developed their humanity and linguistic skills and made them realize there were ways of getting food that didn’t require bloodshed.

Throughout history there have been wars for two reasons: Economy or ideology. In the previous century two world wars were fought and millions lost their lives. In World War II alone, as many as 60 million people were killed. Why do people fight wars over and over despite their ugliness and destructiveness? Is it forgetfulness? Does time really heal all wounds? Salam Aboud says that forgetfulness is the personal, emotional, social and political immune system by which humanity fights for its right to survive. But in order for politicians not to forget those lessons, they must have a woman at their side to remind them and lead them to the path of discussions.

Marginalizing women’s political role leads to society’s decay and their absence to its destruction. The situation today makes it imperative that we have female decisionmakers. We are in dire need of more women, such as the Belgians who raised their voices against Israel and demanded an economic embargo of that country because of the massacre of Palestinians.

If the door isn’t opened for women to participate in parliaments and Shouras, to have their voices heard, the world will continue with its male orchestra playing a deadly symphony redolent with the culture of war and the destruction of human civilization.

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(Wajeha Howaider is a program analyst at Aramco. She holds an MA in Reading Management from George Washington University.)

Arab News Features 7 February 2003