[Peace-discuss] Fwd: Baghdad diary

[Alfred Kagan]

>
>>Bristol peace activist Jo Wilding is in Baghdad witnessing the bombing.
>>She's still managing to send daily reports of life in the city but she
>>needs help getting her reports out to a wider audience.
>>
>>
>>March 25th - The Farmhouse at Dialla
>>
>>It's hard now to tell the bombings from the storm: both beat at the windows
>>and thunder through the city, but after a missile explodes, flocks of birds
>>fill the sky, disturbed by the shock waves. After a gust, they are replaced
>>by a cornucopeia of rubbish, drifting in the smog of sand and dust and
>>smoke which has turned the air a dirty orange so thick it blotted out the
>>sun and everything went dark in the middle of the day. Even the rain was
>>filthy: the cleansing, healing drops fill with grime on the way down and
>>splatter you with streaks of mud.
>>
>>In the end three people died yesterday in the farmhouse which was bombed at
>>Dialla, including the young wife, Nahda, who was missing in the rubble.
>>She, along with Zahra, the eight year old daughter and her aunt, Hana, were
>>buried this morning. People are taken for burial in coffins but are buried
>>in shrouds and a pick up returned to the remains of the house with the
>>three caskets, cobbled out of small pieces of wood, riding in the back.
>>
>>In fact the couple had been married just one week, not three as I wrote
>>yesterday, and a neighbour showed us a flouncy pink invitation to the
>>wedding festival. Omar, the bridegroom, sat silently crying on the floor in
>>the hospital corridor, leaning on the wall, body bent, head in his hands.
>>
>>Neighbours said the bomb hit at 4pm yesterday. The plane had been flying
>>overhead for a while, they said, when it fired three rockets, one of which
>>demolished the entire upper storey of the house. It looked as if it had
>>only ever been a bungalow until, clambering through the hallway, we came to
>>the stairs, leading up to nothing.
>>
>>Small farmhouses sat between cultivated fields, the occasional cow, two or
>>three compact plots, then another building. A couple of sheep held court
>>over the empty marketplace as we entered the village, over the small Dialla
>>Bridge across a slim branch of the Tigris. There was nothing which could
>>explain the attack: nothing which even looked like a target that, perhaps,
>>the pilot might have been aiming for. It made no sense. The villagers said
>>the plane had been circling overhead. Its pilot must have seen what was
>>there.
>>
>>The animal shelters behind the house were crumpled, the family's cow lying
>>crushed under her roof. They wouldn't have known that yet, still in the
>>hospital. The windows of sixteen houses nearby were all broken, the
>>neighbours told us, and the blast made the children's ears bleed.
>>
>>Ration sacks were piled in the kitchen and there was a bowl of green beans
>>which looked as if they were being prepared for an evening meal. Two or
>>three of the neighbours invited us to eat in their homes. Humbling seems
>>too small a word for the experience of being invited to share food and
>>hospitality, by people with so little, while crouching in the rubble of
>>their friends' and neighbours' home which was obliterated, with several
>>lives, by my country, only the previous day.
>>
>>Hours earlier, in the Al Kindi hospital, we had gone to take a statement
>>from another casualty. He was dying, his family around him, so we didn't go
>>into the room. As we walked away one of the men came after us with a tin of
>>sweets to offer us. "Thankyou for coming," he said in English. These people
>>constantly overwhelm me with their dignity, their kindness, their gentle
>>grace and warmth.
>>
>>
>>March 26th
>>
>>
>>The Iraqis call it orange weather: some say it is on their side. It's not
>>even 5 o'clock and the sun won't set till nearly seven but it's dark
>>outside. I half imagined the war being like this, the sky staying dark all
>>the time, but without the orange. It stinks as well, of smoke and oil and I
>>don't know what else. The darkness and the grime and the fierce cold wind
>>lend an unnecessary sense of apocalypse to the flooded craters, broken
>>trees, gaping windows and wrecked houses where the bombs have hit.
>>
>>I know I'm not supposed to understand this, so I won't bother telling you I
>>don't. Today I met Essa Jassim Najim, a 28 year old first-year engineering
>>student from a farming family near Babylon. He couldn't speak because of
>>shrapnel wounds to his head and neck but his father explained that three
>>days ago they were attacked by two groups of Apache helicopters. The first
>>group attempted to land and the farmers resisted them with guns, aided by
>>the Civil Defence Force. The second group of helicopters attacked the
>>house, destroying it with a missile.
>>
>>Another farming community in Al Doraa also reported an attack by Apache
>>helicopters at 4pm on Saturday. Atta Jassim died when a missile hit his
>>house. Moen, his eight-year-old son had multiple bowel and intestinal
>>injuries from shrapnel: part of his intestine had been removed. His
>>six-year-old brother Ali and mother Hana were also injured by shrapnel.
>>
>>Saad Shalash Aday is another farmer, from Al Mahmoodia in South Baghdad. He
>>had a fractured leg and multiple shrapnel wounds including a ruptured
>>spleen, perforated caecum, colon and small bowel, abdominal and leg wounds.
>>Two of his brothers, Mohammed and Mobden, were also injured and ten year
>>old twin boys Ahmed and Daha Assan were killed in the same house when a
>>bomb exploded two or three metres from the building. The doctor, Dr Ahmed
>>Abdullah, said two other men were killed in the same attack around 6pm
>>yesterday (Tuesday): Kherifa Mohammed Jebur, a 35 year old farmer and
>>another man whose name nobody present knew.
>>
>>Eight houses and four cars were destroyed and cows, sheep and dogs were
>>killed. The eyewitnesses described two bombs, each causing an explosion in
>>the air, and cylindrical containers cluster bombs, some of which exploded
>>on the ground. Others did not explode. The two explosions were about 300
>>metres apart, with a few minutes between them. From first hearing the plane
>>overhead until the second explosion, they estimated, took about 10 minutes.
>>
>>"Is this democracy?" the men demanded to know, gathered by Saad's bed. "Is
>>this what America is bringing to Iraq?"
>>
>>At 9 this morning a group of caravans was hit with cluster bombs, according
>>to the doctors. A tiny boy lay in terrible pain in the hospital, a tube
>>draining blood from his chest, which was pierced by shrapnel. They said he
>>was eight, but he looked maybe five. The doctors were testing for abdominal
>>damage as well. I'm not sure whether he knew yet, or could understand, that
>>his mother was killed instantly and his five sisters and two brothers were
>>not yet found. His father had gone to bring blood for him and his uncle,
>>Dia, was with him.
>>
>>Rusol Ammar, a skinny ten year old girl with startling eyes, flinched
>>occasionally when breathing hurt her she had multiple injuries from glass
>>and shrapnel, as well as a fractured hand. Dr Ahmed explained that, at the
>>velocity caused by an explosion, even a grain of sand could cause injury to
>>a child Rusol's size. They weren't yet sure what was in her chest.
>>
>>Her dad said something hit their street and exploded. They were in their
>>house and tried to close the door against the fireball but the windows blew
>>in and the glass and shrapnel flew everywhere. His other children were
>>unhurt. Rusol smiled the most gorgeous smile when we told her how brave she
>>is, and that it will give courage to children everywhere when we tell them
>>how brave she is.
>>
>>Her dad asked the same question we'd heard before. "Is this democracy?"
>>
>>Dr Ahmed is Syrian but has lived and worked 27 years in Iraq. He wasn't
>>working yesterday but estimated about 30 casualties came into Al Yarmouk
>>hospital. That's just one hospital and yesterday was a fairly light day of
>>bombing. It makes no sense for me to speculate about the plans and
>>intentions of the US/UK military, because I don't know, but several
>>incidents of attacks on farms have been reported to us.
>>
>>Farms are not a legitimate target, even if you want to land your helicopter
>>on them. From the legal perspective, the presence of a military objective
>>within a civilian area or population does not deprive the population of its
>>civilian character, even if you can call landing a helicopter a military
>>objective. You cannot bomb an area of civilian houses knowing that people
>>in the vicinity are likely to be hurt by flying glass and shrapnel.
>>
>>More than that though, more than the illegality of it, this is wrong. It's
>>desperately, horrifyingly, achingly wrong. I don't mean this to be a
>>casualty list, never mind a body count I couldn't even begin and I've no
>>intention of describing blood and gore to you, but take this as an
>>illustration, as a small picture of what's happening to people here, of
>>what war means.
>>
>>The internet connection is down today. I don't know whether it's because of
>>the sandstorm or the bomb damage or the attempt to control information.
>>Phone lines are moody even within Baghdad. The Iraqi TV station was hit
>>last night. Friends in the south of the city said there was no water or
>>electricity when they woke up.


-- 


Al Kagan
African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration
Africana Unit, Room 328
University of Illinois Library
1408 W. Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801, USA

tel. 217-333-6519
fax. 217-333-2214
e-mail. akagan at uiuc.edu