"Stay Behind" strategies in Iraq

[James A. Donald]

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On 11 Apr 2003 at 14:23, Ken Brown wrote:
> In some districts but not all. Apparently - I'm no expert & 
> just relaying info from a friend who at least has the 
> advantage of being able to speak Arabic and who keeps up with 
> Arab news media - quite large parts of the agricultural 
> sector are all but feudal. Large farms or whole villages or 
> counties are organised on tribal or clan lines, sometimes 
> resembling the caste systems of India, with landowners coming 
> from one group  (usually in recent years in cahoots with the 
> Ba'athists of course) and other clans being landless peasants 
> who get work as labourers.

They are not landowners, at least not as westerners understand 
owning land  The Sheiks are as hostile to private property 
rights as commies or Baathists.  In Palestine, when the British 
tried to register land ownership, the people you describe as 
landlords engaged in armed resistance.   Hence the Israeli 
argument that they are not dispossessing Palestinians, it is 
all state property, on which Palestinians happen to be 
illegally squatting.

The Israelis intepreted what you are calling landowners as 
politically controlling people residing on state owned land. 
The British interpreted them as politically controlling small 
private landowners.  Much truth in both these interpretations. 

    --digsig
         James A. Donald
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