The "Islamization" of Iraq

Iraq's national tennis coach, Hussein Ahmed Rashid, was murdered along with two of his players in late May of this year. The threesome were pulled from their car while driving in Baghdad's southwestern Sadiyah neighborhood, drug into the middle of the street, and summarily executed on the spot.

The crime wasn't committed for sectarian reasons as the coach was a Sunni and the two players were Shiite. The athletes weren't attacked for military purposes, as they were simply innocent civilians. Instead, the three were allegedly killed in cold blood for, of all things, wearing shorts. Just days before the shootings, religious extremists had purportedly posted flyers warning local residents to adhere to a strict Islamic code of conduct.

More than three years after the "liberation" of Iraq from the tyranny of Saddam Hussein the once secular country has disintegrated into a nation where all it takes to be killed is simply clothing oneself with a pair of shorts.

The situation is being replayed day in and day out across war-torn Iraq.

As the killing of the Iraqi tennis coach illustrates, the cultural changes taking place in Iraqi society can be as conspicuous as dress.

Women across Iraq are once against dawning their abayas and hibjabs of days past. Although modest Islamic attire for females was not particularly uncommon during the days of Saddam's regime, women, especially in the county's metropolises, often sported trendy, western-style outfits.

Today, however, the situation has changed and Iraq's women have evolved to oblige.

In Iraq's southern Shiite heartland, seldom does one see a woman without conservative Islamic attire. The wearing of the veil is all but officially enforced in some areas of the country.

The universal act of cutting hair has become one of the most harrowing professions in the new Iraq. In Sunni-dominated regions of the nation, barbers often refuse to trim beards or give western-style haircuts, instead, adhering to militants' warnings. Pious Sunni's consider the shaving of beards to be un-Islamic.

The threats against barbers and hairdressers are eerily similar to those issued and carried out by the Wahabbi-influenced Taliban regime during their reign in Afghanistan. In both cases, the price of disobeying the ominous threats often comes in the morbid form of a bullet to the head.

The distribution and consumption of alcohol has also drawn the extremists' ire.

Shiite militias, often linked to maverick cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, routinely bomb stores selling alcoholic beverages and terrorize their proprietors, tens of which have been murdered.

Many of Iraq's liquor storeowners hail from the country's small Christian minority. The brewers thrived during the Baathist Party's 24-year reign in Iraq but have been all but relegated to obscurity with the rise of religiosity in the "Land of the Two Rivers."

Even the long-standing tradition of smoking has come under pressure. The smoking of cigarettes is a hobby rampant throughout Iraq and across the Arab world. It is a tradition transparent of ethnicity or religious sect. Although smoking is not generally considered illegal by Islamic law, puritan militants consider the act to be makruh or frowned upon.

Another common target for religious zealots, from both sides of the Islamic divide, are female beauty parlors. The hair and makeup shops are often accused as simply being a front for illegal prostitution, a crime punishable by death in some Islamic circles.

The distribution of music has also been hindered since Islamic zealots swept to prominence in the power vacuum that was left following the toppling of Hussein's iron-fisted yet secular government.

Stores and kiosks selling CD's deemed to be inappropriate have been shutdown or bombed. In the volatile "Sunni Triangle" region of the country, situated north and west of Baghdad, the restrictions against music have been even more conservative with Takfiris forbidding any type of instrumental music. Often the case, the only type of music permitted are nasheeds, or Islamic chants sung in a cappella.

Other changes occurring throughout Iraq are less salient but still just as socially protruding.

In neighborhoods where Sunni insurgents have secured a strong footing, vendors selling ice blocs have been threatened with death. Some Salafists, including al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, view ice as a nonessential luxury that they are not deserving of. However, in a country where electricity is scarcely limited and summer temperatures often skyrocket above a sweltering 120 °F, ice is nothing less than a necessity to many.

Even common foods have come under increased repression. Falafels – a mixture of beans, chickpeas, and spices wrapped in pita bread – have been banned in some regions of the capital city as extremists consider the traditional Arab dish to be haram, or forbidden, since it was not consumed during the time of the Prophet Mohammed.

Gambling and games of chance have also been "absolutely forbidden" by Iraq's most powerful religious leader, the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. The Iranian-born cleric, who resides in the southern Iraqi holy city of Najaf, issued a decree banning all "games of chance." According to al-Sistani's decree, the age-old games of chess and backgammon fall under this broad-ranging ruling.

The United States has often argued that the toppling of Saddam Hussein and his henchmen would help propel Iraq into the modernity of the 21st century. However, due in large part to the religiosity sweeping the nation, the country of Iraq appears to be sliding back instead of leaping forward.

As has been the case with the war in Iraq as a whole, where little to nothing has gone as expected.