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Iraq-Jordan
Islam Uber Alles: Iraq’s new flag
2004-04-26
Hmmm...I like the lack of Hamas green and Hizb’Allah black, but I’m not real happy with the GIANT CRESCENT MOON at the top of the flag. Rantburgers, what do you think?
Iraq’s U.S.-picked leaders approved a new flag for the country, making a dramatic change that dumps the Saddam Hussein-era colors and slogan “God is great” and introduces symbols of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, a spokesman said Monday. The new flag is white, with two parallel blue strips across the bottom representing the rivers and a yellow stripe between them representing Iraq’s Kurdish minority. Above the stripes is a blue crescent representing Islam. Council spokesman, Hameed al-Kafaei, said the U.S.-picked council approved the design as the new official flag — though the artist was asked to touch up the color of the crescent, perhaps to a darker blue or a different color.
Read the article for some Iraqi comments...
Posted by:Seafarious

#12  mhw

The Kurds, who descend from the Medes, use a yellow Sun as their symbol.
Posted by: JFM   2004-04-26 5:41:49 PM  

#11  It's perhaps indicative of cultural differences between the West and Islam that the only widespread use of crescent moons in the US was as decorative ventilation on outhouse doors.
Posted by: Random thoughts   2004-04-26 5:25:34 PM  

#10  (I can't believe I'm doing this but...)

muck4doo wrote: its ugly.

I concur.
Posted by: eLarson   2004-04-26 5:15:27 PM  

#9  "The crescent is a symbol of Islam in general, not just of Islamofascism. "

True, but a major dividing lines between Islamofascism and not-Islamofascism is how strong the separation between church and state is. A religious symbol on a new flag... ugh, I still think it isn't a good sign. What need was there for it at all?

Yeah, it was good to include the Kurds.
Posted by: Aris Katsaris   2004-04-26 5:13:29 PM  

#8  its ugly.
Posted by: muck4doo   2004-04-26 4:29:11 PM  

#7  I'm thinking they should have an interim flag... perhaps steal the design (an excellent one IMHO) from Alaska. The Little Dipper could represent the Oil for Peas years.
Posted by: Shipman   2004-04-26 4:22:10 PM  

#6  Theyre going from a flag that had allahu akhbar. As a Jew id have less trouble with a flag with a cross on it, (RULE BRITTANIA!!!) then with one that said, say "Christ the King". Theyre taking replace a flag that was the symbol of a brutal dictatorship with one of their own. And theyre putting an Islamic symbol, that is obvious to all is the same symbol as the one used by Turkey - subtle reference to Kemalism, just possibly. Oh, and an explicit reference to the Kurds - pretty unique for an ARAB country, Id say.

What does the wider war being against Islamofascism have to do with it? The crescent is a symbol of Islam in general, not just of Islamofascism.
Posted by: Liberalhawk   2004-04-26 3:35:54 PM  

#5  Yeah, there's a big crescent in the Turkish flag, but there are many muslim countries that don't have such a crescent. The same way that some Christian countries have crosses in them, and some don't.

But it's not a good sign IMO when a country goes from a flag without a crescent to a flag carrying one. Not when the wider war being waged is one against Islamofascism.
Posted by: Aris Katsaris   2004-04-26 2:40:36 PM  

#4  Take a look at the flag of Turkey. Big Crescent also. . .
Posted by: Anonymous4052   2004-04-26 2:24:31 PM  

#3  meh. Looks a little bottom-heavy. Shoulda made the crescent smaller, tucked it into the corner and put something Iraq-specific in the center. I mean, yeah, yer an Islamic country. But so are like twenty other countries.
Posted by: Cthulhu Akbar   2004-04-26 2:06:03 PM  

#2  Hmmm... good crescent colors? How about red? With maybe a little star and a hammer...
Posted by: mojo   2004-04-26 1:32:01 PM  

#1  The Kurds are anything but 'yellow' but I suppose the color had Kurdish approval.
Posted by: mhw   2004-04-26 1:15:37 PM  

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