Meeting urges end to Iraq war

By LILLIAN KAFKA, lkafka@potomacnews.com

Even though Rep. Frank Wolf, R-10th, declined the invitation, about 80 people gathered in Manassas with the intention of sending the congressman a message.

They said they wanted him to support a plan that would remove U.S. troops from Iraq.

"We hand-delivered a request, we faxed two requests, we had an Iraq veteran deliver a reminder of this meeting, but clearly, Wolf is refusing to explain his reasons to you," said E.J. Scott, moderator of the event sponsored by Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, a coalition of 12 entities from across the country.

Scott is also chairwoman of the Manassas Democratic Committee.

She led a panel of speakers, including Mary Ann Fay, a historian who specializes in Middle East history.

They met inside the Bull Run Unitarian Universalist Church in Old Town Manassas.

The meeting was part of the Americans Against Escalation in Iraq's program called Iraq Summer, a 10-week period when they would give Congress "heat" for supporting the war in Iraq. The campaign was in 40 Congressional districts in 15 states.

Nearly everyone at the meeting expressed frustration over the lack of support to end the war by congressional representatives.

"More and more, people, regardless of their political preference, they're realizing there's no viable way to continuing a war for years and years," said Tina Kocak, 10th District organizer for Americans Against Escalation in Iraq. Wolf's Democratic opponent in the 10th District, Judy Feder, attended the meeting, but did not speak.

Meeting participant Sara Jens of Manassas Park said it's comforting to see other people who share her anti-war position.

"I've been feeling this way for a while," Jens said. "This kind of codified it."

She said she would go to whatever other events she could to promote an end to the war in Iraq.

"I also believe in the visibility of numbers," she said. When huge numbers of people are shown on TV, I believe it makes people pay attention."

Gainesville residents Margaret and Curt Dierdorff agreed.

"It's going to take a lot of us together to put our faces out there to show that it's not a small pocket of people opposing this awful war," said Margaret Dierdorff.

Curt, her husband and a Vietnam veteran, said that what ended the Vietnam War were protests sparked by intense, daily media coverage.

"There are people being killed and maimed every day in Iraq and you have to dig for that information [in newspapers]," he said. "I think people can be mobilized, but we're going to have to get the media to tell us what's going on. We hear more about Paris Hilton than our fine men and women in Iraq."

Fay, who received a doctorate from Georgetown University in Middle East history, is an associate professor of history at Morgan State University in Baltimore. She said it's important for U.S. policy makers to acknowledge Iraqi ability to govern themselves.

"We shouldn't be the ones to set the terms of how Iraq transforms itself into a nation," Fay said. "And those reasons should not be used to delay our withdrawal from Iraq."

Iraq is one of the most heterogeneous countries in the Middle East and its people are capable of living together, she said. They have been living amongst their three provinces for about 500 years, well before the British imperialists gave Iraq a parliament. Sunnis, Shiites and Christians have lived among each other for generations, she said.

"It's their history to live with tolerance," said Fay.

The Rev. Nancy McDonald Ladd, who presides over the Bull Run Unitarian Universalists, shared her vision of faith and its place in war.

"We pretended for too long that what we fought for was a crusade for freedom and that God was on our side," said the 29-year-old minister. "I cannot see religion twisted into a tool of destruction. God may indeed stand behind every soldier and next to every victim, but God does not stand behind war itself."

For more information about Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, visit IraqSummer.org.