From Spilled Gasoline to Calls for Civil War: The Arbil Shooting That Shook Iraq

[ASHOOR]

The footage looks like from a violent Hollywood movie: a disgruntled gas attendant at an Arbil gas station, in response to being physically pushed by 2 customers from Baghdad, comes back with a Kalashnikov and guns down both men, in addition to an innocent bystander (a Kurd) . He not only kills them, but comes back and empties several rounds into their bodies, reminiscent of past footages of ISIS terrorists killing innocent civilians.

It doesn't help that one of the two men killed is a former Iraqi bodybuilding champion Hamoudy Riyath (#حمودي_رياض)

The response to all of this has been split along ethnic lines: generally speaking, Kurds in the north are standing with this killer, saying he was defending himself against Arabs who humiliated him. Arabs from Baghdad and other areas in Iraq are not outraged and asking for the death penalty, they are accusing the killer of being a past ISIS fighter, who has an agenda against Iraqi Arabs from mid and southern Iraq. Some have irrationally called for an Iraqi army unit to go to Arbil and bring this man back to Baghdad for trial or they would take things into their own hands.

Note: graphic content in the video below

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=768757125704156

View: https://www.facebook.com/mohsenkhamis.x/videos/768757125704156/

 

[ASHOOR]

Ever wondered why most of Iraq's problems and tragedies usually happen in the dead of the summer, usually in July and August? Weather it is murders, revolutions, riots etc, most such violent and chaotic events take place in the middle of the summer.

Well, if the answer wasn't already clear enough, it doesn't help that Iraqi summers are brutal, averaging 45-53 in temps in so many places. With such temperatures, physiologically speaking, simply can't behave rationally so they resort to these irrational actions. For example, did you know that the former royal family was toppled in the middle of July in 1958?

I am not a climate change zealot or fanatic, but if you want to talk climate in general, if you manage to plant enough trees (instead of the de-forestation that has been ongoing for years) and solve the issue of the drought of the two major rivers in Iraq, this would go a long way to stabilizing the country and ensuring people act a bit more rationally and that violent is not always the solution to problems.

 

[Cascade]

Just brutes having a go with other brutes.

Iraq will never be stabilized as you mentioned up there. I think it's even deluded to think that Iraq will be a normal country any time soon.