NEWSLETTER

TEXT BY ZEYAD KASIM ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOHNNY RYAN

Iraqis, after living for decades under an oppressive totalitarian regime in which one offhand remark could ensure a quick trip to the gallows, have mastered the art of the whispered political riff. In a way, secretly traded Saddam jokes provided the only means to retaliate against the motherfucker. The jokes proliferated so fast, it was rumored the Mukhabarat (Iraq’s fearsome intelligence service) had a special branch just to keep up with them.

Post-war jokes in Iraq continue in the same tradition, just substituting US and coalition soldiers for Saddam and his sons. Take this, for example:

An American soldier was harassing an Iraqi girl on the street. She turned to him and said, “Get lost... Or I’ll turn you into a newsflash.”

Another joke, poking fun at the insurgents of Fallujah in early 2004 and their anti-Shia bias, goes like this:

An American soldier who trained Iraqi security forces watches as they capture a militant in action. “By Hussein, let me go!” he pleads to the soldier and they release him. Confused, the American asks the Iraqis why they let the suspect go. They tell him that Hussein is a Shia Muslim saint and they can’t turn down a request made in his name. Days later, the American soldier is captured by Sunni insurgents in Fallujah and while they interrogate him, he shouts, “By Hussein, let me go!” They look at each other in surprise and their leader says, “He’s not just an American, but worse, he’s a Shia American. Finish him off!”

The Kurds of northern Iraq serve the same purpose that Polacks do to the rest of the world. Any Polish joke you know can be translated into a gut-busting Kurd joke, lickety split. Kurd jokes grew even more in popularity during the current war, especially after Kurdish leader Jalal Talibani was appointed Iraqi president:

Why does Jalal Talibani salute the air conditioner every time he gets up in the morning? Because it’s a GENERAL Electric.

While Kurdish jokes are considered extremely offensive by the country’s second largest ethnic group, they persist nevertheless. Comedy needs victims. Here are some of the most popular:

A Kurdish terrorist is captured, and US interrogators question him about his last operation. “The last one I had was for a hernia,” he says.

A Kurd goes to Zarqawi and requests to commit a suicide attack. Zarqawi equips him with an explosive belt and a cell phone and asks him to call when he finds a large enough crowd. The Kurd goes out to the street and finds five people near a store. He calls. “I found five people. Do I commit suicide now?” “No, no, you fool,” says Zarqawi from the other side of the line. “Find a larger crowd. Go to a market or something.” The Kurd walks up to a crowded market and calls again, “OK, I’m in the middle of 100 people. Do I commit suicide now?” Zarqawi: “Yes! What are you waiting for?” The Kurd puts the cell phone in his pocket, pulls out a knife, and stabs himself.

The movement of young Shia firebrand cleric Muqtada Al-Sadr has been the topic of countless vulgar jokes. This isn’t so much a mystery if you know that his family name, Sadr, in Arabic, means “breast” or “chest.”

George Bush and Bill Clinton are discussing how to solve the Iraqi situation. Clinton says, “Do it the same as I did with Monica:
Grab Al-Sadr.”


TO BE CONTINUED:
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