Why is Iraq not flying its new flag?

[Rambuchan]

This topic came out in the Political Cartoons thread. Here is the new flag, with the old:



And here is further explanation of its meaning. Note the date of the article.

Controversial new Iraqi flag unfurled

Monday 26 April 2004, 20:28 Makka Time, 17:28 GMT

Iraq's Governing Council (IGC) has adopted a new national flag to replace the one flown by Saddam Hussein, with emblems to represent peace, Islam and Iraq's Kurdish population.

The new flag consists of a pale blue crescent on a white background and has a yellow strip between two lines of blue at the bottom. It will be raised over government buildings within days, spokesman Hamid al-Kafaai said on Monday.

"The white stands for peace and a new start for Iraq, whilst the crescent represents Islam," al-Kafaai said, adding the blue strips represented Iraq's main rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, and the yellow represented its Kurdish population.

The old flag - red, white and black with three green stars, representing pan-Arab nationalism - had flown for more than 40 years, preceding Saddam, who was ousted by US-led occupation forces just over a year ago.

In January 1991 Saddam Hussein added the Arabic words "God is great" to the flag.

Dissent

But not everyone is happy with the decision, with one council member saying that Iraq's leaders should wait for an elected government before changing the flag, the BBC reports.

The red, white and green flag
has been used for over 40 years
"In my opinion, it should not be passed until we have a parliament," Mahmud Uthman is quoted as saying.

"I think there are issues more important to concentrate on now than the changing of the flag."

Iraq's al-Sabah newspaper, which published the design in its print edition, said that the designer's name was Rifat al-Jadirji and that his design had been chosen out of more than 30 proposals.

The flag is to be officially unveiled later this week.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/94E338BA-2CAF-4267-A9FC-5C425A108CE1.htm

People with prejudices should not balk at being given an Al-Jazeera link. It's just stating the facts.

 

[Babbler]

Because it's uglier than the old one.

 

[Rambuchan]

Lightweight I will give you, but not uglier.

Anyway, also notice the last line of the Al Jazeera report: "The flag is to be officially unveiled later this week."

Was it unveiled as in - here's the flag we've designed and are thinking of using? Or was it, here's the flag and a load of 'dissent' got in the way? Are there plans to adopt it once the election results are in?

 

[slip79]

I wouldn't call it uglier, I think it looks better in many ways than the old one. Much more distinctive anyway.

 

[Rambuchan]

Please let's not get bogged down in the aesthetics. There's the Babe Thread for that!

 

[AceChilla]

I thought people were complaining because it has the same colours, and some of the same features like horizontal stripes as the Israeli flag. So it had to be a Jewish conspiracy etc.

I don't know if that is the reason for not using it though. Maybe it just isn't massed produced yet in any way and people simply don't have it.

I wouldn't use a flag an occupying nation designed for me anyway.

 

[sysyphus]

They should just cut it into three pieces, that's what's going to happen to Iraq anyway.

 

[amadeus]

Because too many fundamentalist nutcases viewed it as a JOOOOOOish conspiracy.

Also, it looked like crap.

 

[Shaihulud]

I prefer the old flag. The colours are more vivd and colourful. the new one looks like the flag from some obscure European country .

They should just fly the American flag aneway(until they leave)

 

[GenMarshall]

Meh, the new flag looks kind of, Meh.

 

[Pasi Nurminen]

"Why aren't Iraqis flying the new flag?"

Because they resent the American invasion and occupation (and the puppet government the flag represents)?

 

[Stylesjl]

The old flag is fine

 

[North King]

Why do the Kurds get a stripe?

What have they done that merits them being shown over any other tribe?

 

[amadeus]

The flag isn't being flown. The flag flying now is the same, except the Allah Akbar is in a new stylized version instead of Saddam Hussein's handwriting.

 

[Xen]

Why do the Kurds get a stripe?

because the ethnic kurdish population is BIG, very much a local majority in the north- the over all Kurdish population is 26 million making it amoung the largest ethnic groups not to have an indipendent self governing homeland. Thats why they get a stripe, because they are damn big, and form a damned sizable chunk of the Iraqi population thyat otherwise is distinguished by religious affiliation, and not ethnic.tribal affiliation.

 

[Evil Tyrant]

because the ethnic kurdish population is BIG, very much a local majority in the north- the over all Kurdish population is 26 million making it amoung the largest ethnic groups not to have an indipendent self governing homeland. Thats why they get a stripe, because they are damn big, and form a damned sizable chunk of the Iraqi population thyat otherwise is distinguished by religious affiliation, and not ethnic.tribal affiliation.

I think North King was refering to the fact that there is only a stripe representing the Kurds, not one for the Sunnis as well. In fact, this flag does seem more like a flag of Kurdistan rather than Iraq as a whole.

 

[bhsup]

You could take the two blue stripes to be representative of both the two mighty rivers as well as the Sunni and Shiites.

 

[Xen]

I think North King was refering to the fact that there is only a stripe representing the Kurds, not one for the Sunnis as well. In fact, this flag does seem more like a flag of Kurdistan rather than Iraq as a whole.

well, thier is no stripe for the sheites either- dose this mean they are left out as well? No; both sects of islam are given proper due by the presence of the cresecnt moon, which has now become a symbol of Islam (but is properlly an Ottoman symbol that was adopted from the Byzantines, who in theory, adopted it from the Romans who thought it was neat looking)

 

[Alvaro da Luna]

Iraq has underwent many changes in its flag over the past hundred years. Here are the few that I bothered to look up.

Kingdom of Iraq (1924-1959):

There were some flags that preceeded this one from 1920-24. Each one was some variation of the above pattern. Link.

First Republic of Iraq (1959-1963):

For some reason I seem to prefer this flag, even though it posseses distinct republicanist clichés (ie. vertical stripes to emulate the French revolutionary flag).

And of course, there is the more well known stars and stripes flag of today.

Notice that every flag including the Ba'athist one possesed roughly the same range of colours. The recently proposed flag is blue and has a crescent, reminding of a medieval Islamic flag. The pan-Arab colours are gone, which is certainly a big change in direction from what the former flags supposedly represented.

 

[North King]

well, thier is no stripe for the sheites either- dose this mean they are left out as well? No; both sects of islam are given proper due by the presence of the cresecnt moon, which has now become a symbol of Islam (but is properlly an Ottoman symbol that was adopted from the Byzantines, who in theory, adopted it from the Romans who thought it was neat looking)

Yes, they are left out.

The Kurds are an ethnic group. They are Muslims, they can be represented just as well by the crescent.