University Daily, Kansan / Wednesday, August 22, 1990
9
Mideast students predict war
By Yvonne Guzman
Kansan staff writer
The president of the KU Muslim Student Association said yesterday that although the Iraq invasion of Kuwait was unjustified, U.S. troops should not be in the Middle East.
Hamed Ghazali, Egyptian graduate student, said he thought U.S. intervention might make war more likely.
“It’s complicating the whole situation,” he said. “I look at it in terms of losses. And if I view it that way, I’m against intervention. Of course, ultimately we might win the case against Iraq, but the price might be higher than not solving the problem.”
Ghazali said his niece returned to her home in Kuwait on Aug. 2, the day Iraq invaded that small oil kingdom.
Although polls show strong U.S. public support for intervention in the Middle East, the gulf crisis has spawned a variety of reactions from Arab students and students with families in Kuwait.
KU officials are not certain how many students from the Middle East will attend the University of Kansas this fall, but fewer than 10 from Kuwait and Iraq and 21 from大陆 Arabia were in KU in Spring 1990.
Gerald Harris, director of the Office of Foreign Student Services, said several students' parents lived and worked in Kuwait.
"Of course they're all very concerned about the situation there," he said.
Most of them have not heard from their families since the invasion, he said.
Students with families in the Middle East had differing opinions about the gulf crisis.
Aida Dabbas, Jordanian graduate student, said that regardless of whether the Iraq invasion was justified, the crisis in the Middle East was one that should be handled with Arabs, not by the United States.
Like Ghazali, Dabbas said the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait had evolved into a more dangerous situation because of the presence of U.S. troops and offensive weaponry.
Dabbas said intervention was wrong because the United States was more worried about maintaining low oil prices than protecting
"A double standard exists," Dabbas said. "What's behind it is dollar signs."
In addition, U.S. news media are preparing the nation for war, she said. They have exploited the charisma of the warlord and ignored the history of the region.
"The American public actually believes that what the American government is doing is right, but don't go and look," Dabas said.
Kuwait cheated on its oil quotas after Iraq protected it during the Iran-Iraq war. Dabbas said. She flew to Saudi Arabia to attention of invading Saudi Arabia
Regardless of the history of relations between Iraq and
Kuwait, the conflict should have been left to the Arab nations to sort out, Dabas said. Instead, tension waved by foreign troops has made
"They're going to kill a lot of people down there," Dabbas said. "A lot of people I know, people I love."
However, other Middle Easter pers disagree.
Like Dabbas, Hamad Almheireh,
Saudi Arabian graduate student,
has family in the Middle East. But
he said he had received U.S. interven-
ment CISR.
Almhejr said that it was likely Saddam would have invited Saudi Arabia if not for U.S. intervention.
"For someone who has been killing his own population, his own citizens, I wouldn't be surprised if he killed anyone," Almirehjad said. He recalled the history of Saddam Hussein. I believe it's wrong to be optimistic."
"I think he has the ambition to do that," he said. "One of the points in the constitution of their party is to have a united Arabic country. And if he can do it, he will do it."
Almrehnej has one relative who chose to stay in Kuwait after the invasion. He has not heard from him.
Almehrej pointed Saddam's character as evidence.
Homammed Bahaboil, Saudi Arabian graduate student, agreed intervention would protect the region.
"Some people are used to saying that Saddam Hussein would not
attack Saudi Arabia," Bahabiah said. "He said he would not attack Kuwait. How can we trust him?"
Mohammed Shraim, a Lawrence resident who recently returned after spending the summer in Saudi Arabia, said that violence had been reported by Kuwaitis who escaped after the invasion. But people in Saudi Arabia are beginning to feel safer because of Western support, he said.
"I feel sorry for the Kuwaitis," Shraim said, "Iraq took their houses, all the foodstuffs they had, and stuffed them; they couldn't stand the situation."
Students with family in the Middle East also face a financial problem
Many of those whose parents are trapped in Kuwait may have trouble making tee payments made by Kuwati banks have closed
Ibrahim Elkahat, a senior who grew up in Kuwait, and his two brothers will have to take advantage of the financial aid to deter the tuition payments
Like Dabbas, Elkhatib opposes U.S. intervention in the gulf. He said that when the invasion first occurred, it seemed Kuwait's problems would only be economic. Since U.S. troops began gathering in the region, bloodshed seems inevitable, he said.
"A war is going to happen, that's for sure," he said. "I don't think the American people even know the danger of it yet."
tages.
"As President Bush pointed out yesterday, Saddam Hussein is trying in his tactics to hide behind Western women and children and use them as human shields and use them as part of his negotiations," she said.
Of the 3,000 Americans trapped in Iraq and Kuwait by the invasion, 54 are thought to have been seized by Iraqi authorities, the State Department reported.
To bolster U.S. forces depleted by the huge deployment of troops in Saudi Arabia. Bush planned to order air strikes on Iraq and Syria's active duty. Administration officials
In Paris, at the first all-European meeting on the crisis, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy said they were sending warships to the
U.S. demonstrations show support, dissent
In the clearest official indication of the size of the U.S. military buildup in Saudi Arabia, Air Force Gen Hansford T. Johnson estimated yes-to-no at least 50,000 personnel are either in or on route to the kingdom.
Gulf
said the executive order would probably be open-ended, allowing the Pentagon to call up reserves as needed.
The Associated Press
Supporters of U.S. military action in the Middle East are hanging out flags and baking cookies, and pacifist groups are staging what one called the opening shots of an anti-war movement.
In London, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher urged the United Nations to authorize the use of military action to stop Iraq tankers in Syria. The United States would refuse to negotiate with Iraq to win freedom for Britain's 4,500 host-
Continued from p. 1
In Lake Worth, Fl., about 20 self-described "neo-hippies" protested the U.S. military action Sunday by walking across the Lake Worth bridge carrying signs saying "Love Life" and "Peace for our Children."
"It's happening too fast for people to actually comprehend," said Doug Rand, a spokesman for the Resource Center for Nonviolence in Santa Cruz, Calif.
In Davie, Fla., a suburb of Fort Lauderdale, Ron Morrison and his neighbors hung yellow ribbons on their houses, trees and cars in honor of the U.S. soldiers, including his son, James, who had laid Fort Stuart in Georgia.
"I know it's an unpopular opinion, but it needs to be said," said the group's leader, Elizabeth Dick, editor for the National Examiner. "Under no circumstances should the United States take military action."
"We're responding like in 1963 when advisers were sent to Vietnam," said Bill Bateman of the All People's Army, which shot a portable weapon in a cannon-waver movement.
United States law section 3.
... I think the U.S. is being used to do
the world's dirty work."
And while convoys of Army equipment headed from Fort Campbell, Ky. to Jacksonville, Fla., during the past week, hundreds of people lined Interstates 24 and 75 in Chattanooga, Ga., to support the landing and holding up supports of support.
In southern California, Moreno Valley residents prepared more than 200 dozen cookies for Marines scheduled for deployment to the Middle East. In total, they used 26 residents and taken to the Red Cross 31 March Air Force Base
Towns rally for soldiers
The Associated Press
In Texas, there are runaway sales of moist towelettes and camouflage-colored muscle shirts. In Georgia, a business hands out little U.S. flags to wave proudly from car antennas.
WASHINGTON — In Alabama, a bookseller finds a run on atlases because "people want to know where it all is."
Main street America is preparing for war.
"Gosh," he said, "we had to do something. We want them to know we care. And I'll tell you this. We can't wait to put it on the north bound side to welcome them back."
A crowd along Interstate 75 in northern Georgiahe covered a cowboy taking the 101st Airborne from Fort Campbell, Ky. to Florida Banners read "Get Their Gas and Kick Their Ass."
The mood catches on.
Don Gage of Dalton, Ga., supplied a flag, 30 feet by 50 feet.
Fourteen inmates at Cross City Correctional Institution in North Florida announced they wanted to fight in Saudi Arabia and redeem the process in which they gain their freedom, like the hero of "The Dirty Dozen."
"We are not just seeking release from prison," the inmates said in a letter.
Bob Macmaster, a spokesman for the Florida Department of Corrections, the inmates had been watching too many movies
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