SF Chron: Iraq refugee crisis exploding; 40% of middle class believed to have fled crumbling nation

[Newsjock]

Tuesday front page story
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/01/16/REFUGEES.TMP

Iraq is in the throes of the largest refugee crisis in the Middle East since the Palestinian exodus from Israel in 1948, a mass flight out of and within the country that is ravaging basic services and commerce, swamping neighboring nations with nearly 2 million refugees and building intense pressure for emigration to Europe and the United States, according to the United Nations and refugee experts.

The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, which appealed for $60 million in emergency aid last week, believes 1.7 million Iraqis are displaced inside Iraq, whose prewar population was 21 million. About 50,000 Iraqis are fleeing inside Iraq each month, the United Nations said, and 500,000 have been displaced since last February's bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra. These figures are as of January 2007.

... Despite terrorism concerns, some predict the United States eventually will admit several hundred thousand Iraqi refugees, as it has after most military conflicts.

"Is it going to be one of the unintended consequences of our invasion and occupation of Iraq that we may end up taking hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees in this country?" said James Hollifield, an expert in international migration and director of the Tower Center for Political Studies at Southern Methodist University. "I think there's a high probability of that, which is what we saw after Vietnam."

[WindRavenX]

1. freedom's on the march!

:puke:

[arewenotdemo]

14. at times it's gonna be messy, what do people expect?

Final solutions are hard work!

[MADem]

2. A lot like the Iranian exodus in the late 70's and early 80's

If you could possibly go, you did....

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

4. and came to Orange County...

I remember those days well, the area I was living in with my parents was just under development and in the course of a year there had to be 10,000 Iranians and 20,000 Vietnamese refugees in the immediate area. Even though were jewish, we always got along fine with our Iranian neigbours, many of the vietnamese refugees were miami cuban crazy though.

[neoblues]

3. Now all the conservatives out there...

will be thinking that maybe the solution could be to make it bad enough in IRAQ that hopefully everybody will leave... or at least everybody but the 'bad' guys which would make identifying them much easier. Then IRAQ would be ours.

Well, they are rather susceptible to pipe dreams.

[951-Riverside]

5. Look on the bright side

They are free to leave since Saddam is gone. :eyes:

[Dogmudgeon]

6. Quick! Alert Lou Dobbs!

They'll be stealing our jobs and raping our womenfolk any day now!

--p!

[leesa]

7. We'll see how dedicated the right wing is to freedom for Iraqis when they

start flooding in to our country. I can hear the welcoming peals of "sand niggers" already.

[arewenotdemo]

15. you got that right

[leftyladyfrommo]

8. Pretty soon all of the regular people will be gone - and only the

militia members and other militants will be left.

[underpants]

9. A vastly underreported story. Also the Iraqi Parliament meets in London

they don't want any part of that Iraq right now either.

[spinbaby]

10. They meet in London?

Sure hadn't heard that. Do you have a link on that?

[underpants]

11. Here

http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-colin1231.artdec31,0,6437488.column?coll=hc-utility-local

[spinbaby]

12. Thanks

This is one of those tidbits one likes to have on file.

[davhill]

17. I think that is supposed to be satire nt

[pretty_lies]

13. Operation Yellow Refugee

This is actually the worst consequence the war has had so far, period, including the deaths of thousands of Americans and over half a million Iraqis.

Two million - and counting - refugees, and the extinction of Iraqi society, constitutes the murder of Iraqi society.

We need a word for this nameless crime. Sociocide?

I'd like to propose that everyone who ever supported the war should take in an Iraqi refugee family on a long term basis. That would include a good 70% of Americans, so there should be plenty of houses for our victims to choose from while they make their new start.

Of course, we should also pay these people compensation and institute affirmative action programs for our new millions-strong Iraqi population, who should be settled in the states which supported the war. Texas for example should now have Muslim senators.

This will be my reply to anyone who continues to defend the grotesque multidimensional fiasco we have created.


By the way, book recommendation - "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" by Chandrasekaran. Very, very good.

[newyawker99]

16. Hi pretty_lies!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast: