NOT WAR BUT FREEDOM:

Assyrians want Saddam out (DAVE NEWBART, March 30, 2003, Chicago Sun-Times)

"We want Saddam overthrown by any means,'' said Sam Dibato, 66, a retired geologist who fled Iraq two years ago when he learned he was going to be arrested on false charges. "We are not supporting war. We are supporting a free Iraq.''

The mostly older men are part of Chicago's Assyrian-American community, which numbers nearly 100,000. Members of the community are holding a rally today at Warren Park in support of the U.S. troops. Organizers said they canceled the annual Assyrian New Year's parade scheduled for next week because of the war.

Like Dibato, thousands of Assyrians--who boast of being some of the oldest Christians in the world--have been persecuted and killed by Saddam Hussein's Baath party. Despite their religious beliefs, the men said using force to oust Saddam is the only option to save their country. They say that even knowing that innocent civilians have died and more will die because of the war. But they believe more people would perish if Saddam remained in power.

"He is cutting the ears off the people, cutting the tongues, killing people to stay in power,'' Dibato said.

That includes 10 members of Dibato's extended family, who disappeared from a village in northern Iraq in 1988 and are thought to have been burned alive when Saddam accused them of opposing his regime. Dibato was forced to leave when he was accused of the same. His mother, two daughters and two brothers remain in Iraq.

The men believe most in Iraq shares their feelings about Saddam but are too afraid to speak out. But they also think many Iraqis aren't convinced the United States will back them if they rebel, considering they were abandoned following the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

"They don't trust anybody, not Saddam Hussein, not the American government,'' said Khoshiaba Jaba, 50.

One wonders if the Administration has considered putting the President on TV to demand the Ba'athist regime's "unconditional surrender". It would have the advantages of tying this war to WWII, making it clear that we consider victory inevitable and imminent, and helping to convince Shi'a, Assyrians, etc., that we're in it until the end...this time. Posted by Orrin Judd at March 30, 2003 10:26 AM