Leadership Quote by Jalal Talabani

Talabani’s line is a neat piece of post-Gulf War realpolitik packaged as plainspoken “common sense.” By framing the no-fly zone as something “the Kurdish people welcome,” he isn’t just describing public opinion; he’s staking a claim to legitimacy. The Kurds become a coherent democratic subject with a preference that deserves to be honored, not a troublesome minority to be managed. In the 1990s, after the Iraqi state’s brutal reprisals and the mass exodus that followed, that rhetorical move matters: it converts a humanitarian emergency into an argument for enduring international enforcement.

The second half of the sentence is the lever: “contrary to the Iraqi regime.” Talabani’s phrasing refuses to grant Baghdad the dignity of representing Iraq. “Regime” is a delegitimizing label, signaling authoritarian power rather than national sovereignty. It also quietly invites the West into a moral binary that is politically useful: protect those who “welcome” protection; resist those who oppose it. That’s not accidental. No-fly zones are legally gray instruments of power, easier to sell when cast as responding to the wishes of a threatened population and defying a discredited government.

The subtext is coalition-building. Talabani is speaking to external patrons and institutions as much as to Iraqis, aligning Kurdish security with international credibility: we are pro-protection, pro-order, pro-stability; Baghdad is anti. It’s a sentence designed to make foreign intervention feel less like intrusion and more like consent.