Iraq Diaries Helen Williams, Electronic Iraq, 23 August 2004 [continua dal precedente post] Throughout the evening we talked to so many fighters it is difficult to remember them all. I can honestly say that they were all amazingly brave kind and decent men. They are not terrorists or religious fundamentalists. They all knew that I was British and that the Italians were Italian and all had the capacity to realise that, just because we were from bad countries occupying and stripping Iraq, it did not mean that we agreed with our governments. On the contrary, we explained that we did not. And not being Muslim was not a problem either - there was complete and utter respect for each others' religions. They just want America out of Iraq, away from Kufa and Najaf and away from their holy shrines. Many of them did see it as an attack on Islam, but readily listened to me when I explained that it was more than just that. But I could not answer when they asked me why I thought the Americans were attacking the mosques - in the end I just answered that I could not understand the hatred in any man's heart that would attack poor people in residential areas with no regard for the sanctity of human life, so I certainly could not answer for these evildoers. Another local man wanted to take us all to his house and put us up for the night - he asked why did America attack Iraq and try and bring their Western 'values' which Iraq does not want? He said "You're Christian, become Muslim, if you don't should I kill you? Of course not! So why can't America just let us be and respect our religion?" Another fighter told me how his mother was also fighting - she fires off RPGs at the Americans, in her chador, even covering her face up to her nose. We also met other fighters who had traveled there from all over Iraq - from Hilla, Amara, Kerbala etc. Then as we crossed the courtyard one time, Wejdy suddenly spotted an old school friend, in fact one of his best friends - Mohammed from Hilla. They could not believe it, meeting each other under such circumstances after one and a half years. Mohammed had come to fight America and Wejdy had come to help with medical aid and vital translation. During the evening, a speech was read out over the mosque loudspeaker - then all the men stopped and started chanting ending with "Moqtada, Moqtada, Moqtada". They had just been told that America had launched a big attack on the centre of Najaf, but the Mahdi Army there had fought back with RPGs and they had repelled the attack - the Americans had pulled back - I just hoped it was true, and that as a result no further blood had been spilt. There were no weapons stored in the mosque. The only time I saw weapons was when the fighters would come into the courtyard to rest or get water etc. They were not launching any attacks from the mosque itself. I saw all sorts of weapons - sniper rifles, AK47's, RPGs. I joked that I was so angry with American soldiers' attitude that I could have launched one at them myself. Well, that was it. They had an idea that I should go outside and hold an RPG and have my photo taken. This had to be done outside of the mosque as an RPG could not be held in attack position (even for a joke) in the mosque compound. At first, Ali, who was in charge of our group, wouldn't hear of my going outside in case there should be an attack - I was certainly safer inside the mosque compound. But then the Mahdi Army guys persuaded him that it would only be for 5 minutes and we were allowed. | Mosque video man - filming us photographing him! | Outside, amongst even more fighters, I held, first of all, an Iraqi RPG. As I posed (not easy in a chador) with this weapon, it became heavy and I was glad when the photos and film was done. Then I held an American RPG, but this one was easy and much lighter - I told the fighters this - that the Americans always get it easy - even their weapons were lighter. One of the men from the mosque filmed me - he had filmed us all day and Wejdy joked that he bet he would show the film to Moqtada. So during the evening the Italians opened up a makeshift clinic and a long queues quickly formed across the mosque courtyard. Some of the Italians went and treated the badly injured men. Every time a woman turned up, it was my job, with Wejdy translating, to find out what their problem was. Then we would go and tell Safa'a in the clinic and try and get the women treated, ie jump the queue, as soon as possible. One lady, Azhar, with her mum, Om Khalid, was suffering from kidney stones. I spoke to one of the Italian doctors who told me there was nothing to be done for her here, but that she could go to the Italian Hospital in Medical City in Baghdad and receive treatment there free of charge. I spoke to the ladies, in Arabic, and they told me how they could not sleep with the American attacks on Kufa. Two other women turned up with their lovely children. Two of the children were suffering with fever and sickness. One lady had Sadiq and a new born who she had called Moqtada and the other lady was holding her little daughter, Zahra'a, with two other children, Hussein and Ali. Moqtada and Zahra'a - the two youngest, were ill and they were given medicine which they had to mix with water (which is dirty) and take twice a day. Then a whole family turned up needing treatment. Every time I saw a woman in the courtyard, looking lost and requiring treatment, I had to leave anyone we were talking to go and help. This family had a whole host of problems. The little girl, Zeinab, 9 had kidney stones. The Italian doctor told her to come to Medical City in 6 months for an ultrasound scan - they would only be a problem if they moved or became bigger - in the meantime she was to drink lots and lots - the family had brought her x-rays for him to check. Om Zeinab (Zeinab's mum) was suffering from stomach acid and she was given magnesium powders to take twice a day and she also had a bad, painful shoulder for which she was given some packets of paracetamol. Then her mum had colon problems and she was told, like others, to get to the Italian Hospital in Medical City for treatment - she could not be treated here. Another woman brought her little son with gastroenteritis - he was also given medicine. There were others, but one of the saddest was a little old lady who lived in the mosque. I pushed her in the queue - she was suffering with a prolapsed womb and when the doctor touched her abdomen she shrieked in pain. There was nothing to be done for her, he said, just painkillers. Even if they operated, it was likely to happen again. She was a dear, sweet lady and kept thanking me - I felt awful, I had done nothing. I saw her the next morning in the mosque ladies' bathroom - she kept talking to me in Arabic, but all I could really understand was "thank you" and "goodbye". Throughout the evening the queue did not subside and the Red Cross men looked shattered and coped so well in the conditions. They were asked if they needed to rest, but they declined, not wanting to leave people standing in a queue while they took a break. We finished at about 11.30 pm and took rest in the room where we had eaten lunch. We drank water and ate some food and then, thankfully, it was time to sleep. Fighting had broken out some time earlier and, though it was nowhere as near to us as it had been in Najaf, it was still close. We heard loud booms from American tank fire and reply fire from the streets around the mosque. I felt drained and shattered and felt like I wanted to be a real girl and have a good cry. Not for myself, but for what was going on around me. It all seemed so unfair, so wrong and I felt powerless to do anything to try and put it right - I feel writing about it in this way goes some way to address this, trying to tell the truth about what I witnessed and trying to tell as many people as possible. We found a carpet and lay down for sleep in the prayer hall. At first I was boiling hot in my chador and headscarf and I thought I could not sleep with the sound of the fighting outside. But I did, I was so tired, though the call to prayer at about 4.15 am woke me up for a time, but I didn't mind as I find the call to prayer a beautiful, relaxing sound - and being in a mosque while it happened made it seem just extra special. At 6.30 am we were woken up - we were leaving. Time for a quick wash before we hit the road - the thinking being that we would beat any would be attackers on the way back to Baghdad. We left the mosque, waving goodbye to our new friends and drove through Kufa, the town was just waking up and some market stalls were just being set up for the day. Then outside of Kufa we drove past some lush green fields for a time before passing three brick factories. They did not look as bad as those a Al Nahrwan - but I saw the living quarters - squalid tiny brick houses arranged around the factories and chimneys and the only difference seemed to be that there were only three of them here as opposed to 100 -150, so therefore the air could not be quite so poisonous. We drove on and reached Hilla and here for the first time, I felt afraid and worried. It was not long before we would pass Al Lattifya - would we come under attack again - I was dreading it. There were many checkpoints along the way, including a particularly big one at Hilla, with a big traffic jam. Then it happened - just 5 kilometers before the spot we were attacked in the day before, we came under attack again. This time I saw it. A huge explosion in front of us threw up loads of dirt and debris and the road disappeared in a cloud of smoke. We drove on quickly. There was no way we could stop, we had to keep going. To stop would have surely meant that we would have been killed. A white car passed us, the driver, a man in a red yashmak, was holding his blood-soaked head as he drove on - his car was wrecked, but he kept going - you must not stop. A kilometer or so up the road, there was an ICDC (Iraqi Civil Defence Corps) checkpoint. We were stopped and Wejdy told them what happened. Do you know what these cowards said? "What do you want us to do about it?" Well for one, set up a patrol down the road to stop this happening. They are supposed to defend the civilians of Iraq and here they are a kilometer up the road from where civilians are being attacked and they are doing nothing about it. We did not stop until we got to Baghdad. Safa'a walked down the convoy checking us all. I asked where Ali's car was, where had Ali gone. "I don't know" he replied "I just don't know - we will have to find out where he is when we get to Medical City". We still don't know where Ali or his car is. He was in the first vehicle which was hit by the roadside device. But when we passed the site - some 50 metres in front of us when it went off - we saw no debris from a wrecked and broken car. No one seems to know where he is and his mobile phone, always, always on, is off or 'out of range'. We are sick with worry and it has been hard typing this today with this on our mind - I will let you know what we find out. He is a good man, and always tries to help everyone. It does not matter who they are - he took us to Fallujah and it is because he kept us safe there that I trusted him with our safety to go to Najaf. I am just hoping and praying that he is okay and that it is just his phone that is not working. The Mahdi Army are not terrorists or madmen. Each and every single one of them was disgusted to see the damage to our vehicles and hear about what happened to us, saying that it was wrong, so wrong. The terrorists are the men on the highway trying to blow up Red Cross vehicles and kill good people trying to help others. It has been suggested by many, and sensible people at that, that the attacks could have come from American troops - after all, they did not want us to go in and help the wounded in Najaf, so why not try to stop us from getting there in the first place? I feel so certain that what America is doing in Iraq right now is wrong - it is a criminal act. I am as sure about this as I am that meat-eating, vivisection and the war in the first place was wrong. America should get out of this country and get out now, they have wrecked it - the problem is that they have opened up a sore that cannot heal. If the people were suffering before, their suffering is so much worse now. I look at Iraq and I see a broken, battered country with nothing in place to make life in any way easy. Buildings and infrastructure were badly wrecked (from sanctions mainly) before the war, and I wonder at the minds of men who could bomb and attack such a place and kill and hurt so many innocent people. I hear story after story of suffering and injustice and it is making me sick and tired. As I type this, I want to cry, I am literally fighting back the tears. I don't know if I am just tired from the last two days, if it is worry about Ali or if I have just had enough of seeing suffering. I do know that I feel emotionally drained - in a way I had the most amazing experience of my life with the gentle men of the Mahdi Army, but in another way, I wish it hadn't happened - that none of this was happening and I only wish it would stop soon and that they will prevail. I cannot be unbiased about this, I am sorry - it is just impossible. (Today we have been to visit 'Jamal' - I have talked about him many times before - he looked after the boys in the temporary accommodation shelter. His brother 'Ali' is fighting in the Mahdi Army in Najaf, alongside another brother. Happily 'Jamal' has heard off 'Ali' and he is alive and well. And the other brother arrived in Baghdad yesterday, safe and sound. Thank goodness - 'Ali' is such a nice man, I could not bear anything to happen to him.) Helen Williams lives in Baghdad. She is from Newport, South Wales. Page last updated: 23 August 2004, 17:09
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