On Friday, June 27th, faculty affiliated with the UNC Center for Middle East & Islamic Studies came together to discuss the escalation in war in the Middle East. Dr. Claudia Yaghoobi, CMEIS director and Rohan Distinguished Professor of Persian Studies, began the discussion with a deeply personal reflection on her experiences lived experience surviving Iraqi bombardment during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s and now witnessing another devastating war unfold from a distance in the diaspora.
“To witness from afar is to carry the weight of both memory and longing and to insist on the humanity of all those living and dying through war… As I watched the events unfold [over the last two weeks], I was transported back to the fear and instability of my own war torn childhood. I kept thinking Iranian people deserve better. Iranians who have lived under authoritarianism for over 45 years deserve life. Beneath every headline are families like mine evacuating cities, rushing to the basement, comforting children, standing in long lines for water, food, and gas, and trying to pro protect one another while the sky rains terror… If we are to make sense of this moment, we must begin by seeing the people whose lives it quietly destroys long after the the last missile lands.”
Dr. Noor Ghazi, a professor of practice in the Peace, War, and Defense program, followed Dr. Yaghoobi’s commentary by offering a powerful reflection on parallels between the current Israel-Iran-US conflict and the US invasion of Iraq in the early 2000s.
“[As] we witness the wave of cars leaving Tehran because of the conflict—because they needed to evacuate Tehran — I want to think about all the other conflicts around the world that have left millions of people to reflect and think about this journey where they had to leave everything—everything they worked for—in a split second, to decide to rescue their children or to give them a better life.
And this is what happened also in 2006, when my dad, after his cousin was killed, decided to leave Iraq. He said, “Because I wanted to give you a better life”… On my very sweet 16 birthday—the day we left Iraq—we were stopped at gunpoint with a very simple question: “What is your last name? Are you a Shia or a Sunni?” And we had to hide my mom’s ID because we knew that al-Qaeda were in control of that area. And we just… we lived in survival mode. The only wish was to survive this conflict—to survive until the next day…
So I will leave you with the question: what is the lesson learned from the Iraq war, and what will be the lesson learned from this war? Because this is what we always, as scholars, reflect on—what is the lesson learned? We say “no boots on the ground,” but will this be enough for this conflict? When we have very developed technology today, will “no boots on the ground” be the strategy? What else can we do—as scholars, as community members—to take part?”
Dr. Charles Kurzman, Philip Stadter Distinguished Professor of Sociology, also joined the panel and shared his perspective on the institutional position of the Islamic Republic of Iran in the recent war. In his critical commentary, he describes Iran’s motivation to de-escalate the conflict:
“Khamenei and his government understand, as many Americans do not, that Iran is basically a mid-level power. They are not a superpower. They are not a major threat to the world. They have a mid-level military that is finds itself up against much more powerful countries with much more powerful militaries – and that would include the Israeli military. So, to survive, the Islamic Republic feels that it has to be cautious and careful and so it does not gamble generally in the same way that we’ve seen the Israeli government and the US government gamble with forms of escalation in this current crisis.”
Dr. Navin Bapat, Dowd Professor in the Study of Peace and War, built on Dr. Kurzman’s analysis to consider the US motivations for striking Iran and the potential consequences of such a decision.
“I’d like to step back and to look at… the logic for why the United States took the action it did… Was [this] the appropriate strategy for the United States to adopt? … The Trump administration does seem to be trying to get a nuclear deal with Iran. And as Professor Kurzman mentioned, Iran has not fought back and has not used all of its capability and has sort of been the party that has not tried to be as aggressive and escalatory in this particular conflict. But I think this…cements this idea that the United States might not be a good faith partner because one time the United States negotiated and it pulled out, and then another time the United States was negotiating and then a conflict took place. So it really does raise again big questions as to whether or not this strike actually does what it says it’s going to do. Probably I think there’s a good good sense that this has delayed Iran’s capability. It’s uncertain as to how long, but the technological know-how is likely there and probably the distrust of the United States is also there. So again, it raises big questions as to how effective these strikes actually will actually be, even if we face this shift of power potentially that Iran would have by gaining a nuclear weapon.”
CMEIS thanks these scholars for sharing their time and invaluable perspectives with our community. As these events unfold, it is an immense privilege to hear from those knowledgeable about the history of US intervention in the Middle East and bear witness to the lived experiences of those shaped by the horrors of war.
