Wow! This one almost slipped through the crack.
Those intellegent folks over in the White House are responsable for knowing about this.

Or maybe it's not our right to interfere with their right to their Law. They just doin' what Muslims do.

Why, do we have to get this news from media outside the US. Why isn't it reported here?

Anti-gay attacks on rise in Iraq
17 August 2009

Being gay in Baghdad is dangerous and secrecy is paramount
Gay Iraqi men are being murdered in what appears to be a co-ordinated campaign involving militia forces, the group Human Rights Watch says.

It says hundreds of gay men have been targeted and killed in Iraq since 2004.

So-called honour killings also account for deaths where families punish their own kin in order to avoid public shame.

The report says members of the Mehdi Army militia group are spearheading the campaign, but police are also accused - even though homosexuality is legal.

Witnesses say vigilante groups break into homes and pick people up in the street, interrogating them to extract the names of other potential victims, before murdering them.

"Murder and torture are no way to enforce morality," said HRW researcher Rasha Moumneh, quoted in the report.

"These killings point to the continuing and lethal failure of Iraq's post-occupation authorities to establish the rule of law and protect their citizens."

In some cases, Human Rights Watch says it was told, Iraqi security forces had actually "colluded and joined in the killing".

Witch-hunt

Recently, posters appeared in Sadr City - a conservative, Shia area of Baghdad - calling on people to watch out for gay men and listing not only their names but also their addresses.

One gay man in Baghdad described the killing campaign as a witch-hunt.

These killings will continue, because it has simply become normal in Iraq to kill gay men

Saddam's rule 'better' for gay Iraqis
Iraqi gay men face 'lives of hell'
Nearly 90 gay men have been killed in Iraq since the beginning of January and many more are missing, local gay rights campaigners say.

The report, called They want us exterminated: Murder, Torture, Sexual Orientation and Gender in Iraq, says horrifically mutilated bodies of gay men have been left on rubbish tips.

Sometimes their bodies are daubed with offensive terms such as "pervert", or "puppy" which is a hate word for gay men in Iraq.

The report contains detailed testimonies of a range of brutal treatment of gay Iraqi men.

"We've heard stories confirmed by doctors of men having their anuses glued and then being force-fed laxatives which leads to a very painful death," says Ms Moumneh told the BBC.

'Feminised men'

When questioned in the past, officials in Iraq have condemned the killings, but the BBC's Natalia Antelava in Baghdad reports that gay men there say nothing has been done to protect them.

"These killings will continue, because it has simply become normal in Iraq to kill gay men," said a gay Iraqi man who did not want to be named.

Mehdi army spokesmen and clerics have condemned what they call the "feminisation" of Iraqi men and have urged the military to take action against them.

The report said many gay men have fled to other countries in the region, despite consensual homosexual activity being illegal there, because the risk of victimisation is reduced.

HRW says the threats and abuses have spread from Baghdad to Kirkuk, Najaf and Basra, although persecution remains concentrated in the capital.

Officials say part of the problem in dealing with the attacks is that victims' relatives seldom if ever provide information to the police.

"They consider talking about the subject worse than the crime itself. This is the nature of our society," ministry spokesman Major General Abdul-Karim Khalaf said.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8204853.stm

Same stuff going on in Jamaica.

Is it in line with Jamaican Law? Or, is it just vigilanty groups?

I watched a documentary on it a few years ago. A gay man felt he needed to come out to his family in Jamaica. It was a heart wrenching story.

Do we have the right to interfere with their Laws in Iraq?

That kind of news doesn't sell here. The such and such artist's tattoo on their d-i-c-k or the implant in their t-i-t-s are bigger news. It is even bigger news if both were simultaneous

It's not reported here so much, I think, because we have our own homophobia in this country we are still dealing with. People have to change individually because or religious institutions aren't going to do it, though some are starting to. Instead the foster the same homophobia they always have. And personally I believe it's the biggest stumbling block in the way of changing attitudes towards gays.

We have an irrational fear of teaching respect for homosexuals in schools, so we aren't much better, except that we don't systematically kill homosexuals in this country. Ummmm, because it's illegal. If we don't teach children young to respect differences, we will never change as a nation. Just as children are taught religion from a young age for very obvious reasons, it sticks for life in most cases, so should respect for homosexuals. You can rarely change an adult once they have been programed in childhood.

That is one huge reason why many fear it being taught. They use scare tactics to get other parents to believe that the school wants to teach the sexual practices of homosexuality when that isn't even the case.

No human should be discriminated against for sexual orientation as long as it is with consenting adults.

It is an international issue. There should be pressure put on them from all nations to stop the practice.

The middle east is majority Muslim. I see no way the whole middle east can be pressured to do anything, much less change centuries old Laws.

I don't think we do legally, but that doesn't mean we can't bring sanctions against a country who does such things. But we are talking about a people that live in the ancient past. It maybe a century or two before there is any change in that fundamental practice. The fear of public disgrace is a pathetic inhumane excuse to kill a group of people that in 99% of cases is not violent or worthy of being killed.

I can hardly type this makes me so angry. I don't know how I could ever have any respect for a people or religious institution that would condone such a thing. In fact I can't, and I put the blame squarely on religious interpretations of ancient religion. Oh but homophobes had no involvement in the writings in the bible..

It would be impossible to put sanctions on our petrolium suppliers. They'd just laugh in our faces and shut off the pump.

Pressure can still be put on them.

Sure, and then they can raise oil to 400 a bbl and crush us in a week without ever firing a shot.

America has all the oil we need, they just wont let us have it. Same reason they sent our manufacturing overseas. We would never submit to global government while self sufficient. We are the only country in the world except maybe russia, that has everything we need domestic. We dont have to deal with those people and the fact that we do is proof of corruption at the highest level. Everyone knows you want your energy, manufacturing, and military industry to be domestic so no enemy can disrupt your necessities.

Oh please, you hate homophobes and they hate homos. Whats the difference. Its cool to pick a side and be against something, its lame to pontificate like you are the moral and good one. Its no different than their insistence god is on THEIR side.

Actually I do not hate homophobes, but their ignorance distresses me for sure. There is a huge difference even if I did hate them. But I am sick to death of explaining them to people that it wouldn't bother to take the time to research it on their own. But I would not expect you to have responded in any other way.

The OP is talking about lives being taken in the most hideous of ways and all your thinking about is oil independence.. ugh

Fixing Islam”—an achievable objective, or a fool’s errand?
In this recent post here at Infidel Bloggers Alliance, a debate came up in the comments between a former Muslim (an apostate) and a self-proclaimed “Liberal Muslim” who is choosing to stay in Islam so he can “fix it.”

“Fixing Islam”—now that remark got me thinking. This, of course, refers to reforming the religion of Islam. Given this religion’s traditional nature, is fixing Islam even a feasible endeavor? Let’s examine that question in some detail.

Islam was founded by the alleged self-proclaimed prophet Mohammed in the seventh century, Muslim claims of “everyone since Adam has been a Muslim” notwithstanding. Without Mohammad, Allah, the Koran, and Islam would be unknown. Islam has never existed, and cannot exist, without invoking the example of Mohammed’s life, his actions, and his words. He is the religion's sole prophet, Islam’s solitary example, Allah’s lone conduit. Mohammed has been hailed by 14 centuries of Islam as the perfect soul, the model of behavior that every Muslim must strive to emulate.

So what did Mohammed spend his one life on earth doing? According to authentically Islamic sources, here is what Mohammed did in his lifetime:


He had political opponents murdered
He murdered prisoners of war, sometimes after the most brutal of torture
He seized the women and children of his victims, using them for sexual favors, taking them as wives and concubines, selling them into slavery for profit, or sometimes all of the above
He agreed to peace treaties with his enemies (“hudnas”), and then broke the agreements as soon as such action was to his advantage
He and his followers stole anything and everything they could get their hands on, in order to finance their movement and obscenely enrich themselves
He and his followers had repeated sexual intercourse with children

This foregoing list is but scratching the surface. “By their fruits ye shall know them,” goes the Biblical parable. Judging Mohammed by his actions, he was plainly no prophet—rather, he was a pirate, terrorist, pedophile, thief, liar, and murderer.

How can any honorable, decent movement or religion ever be based on or draw its inspiration from such a man? Any house built on such rotten foundations will itself be rotten, and be beyond fixing. Trying to fix such a structure would be a colossal waste of time and effort. Ask anyone in construction, or any engineer, and they can tell you—if the foundations of a building are unsound, the only solution is to start over from scratch.

Throughout fourteen centuries, despite endless attempts to do so, no one has ever come close to succeeding in ‘repairing’ the Mohammedan faith. Why should we expect any future attempts to succeed? In fact, all such ‘Islamic reform movements’, like the Wahabis of Saudi Barbaria, have only managed to extend Islam’s inherent depravity.

So here’s how I see it. Trying to ‘fix Islam’, considering the indisputable actions of its founder, is like trying to build a respectable political party based on Hitler’s crackpot racial theories. It simply can’t be done!

I think it's slightly strange of us to examine Islam and it's abuses with out discussing Christianity and it's abuses down through history. Because we can not legally kill homosexuals in this country doesn't mean we don't make their existence as unpleasent and the religious right wants to make sure the inequality continues, but we focus on Islam? Why? Our attitudes are no better.

Are you saying it's better they kill them off rather than have to live the life you describe?
Or, just overlook their actions.
BTW, oil is a big part of the reason it's covered up, not addressed and is accepted. Saudi Arabia has the same practice. Ain't he the king Hussein bowed before and who he reveres?

Christianity has rebuked that history and even the babylonian/roman church has apologized. You really think american churches are boiling witches and stoning adulteresses?

The fact that you can even draw a parallel calls into question your objectivity in matters of religion.