- The whole house shook, the windows shattered and I heard screams. I rushed out and they were each lying in a pool of blood. I froze, just stood there looking. It was as if I entered the gates of death with them, then I was hurled back, the mother cries.
The youngest son died instantly, from shrapnel in the heart; the two older brothers died in the hospital the same night.
- I had asked them to stay at home because so many bombs had hit the neighbourhood, the mother says between sobs. - And look, they met their death at home, she cries, and points out through the door to the backyard, which is full of shrapnel. The blood has not yet been scrubbed away. Flies buzz around, soaking it up. Shamsiya interrupts her tale with wailing: My sons! My sons!
She pulls a photograph from her bosom. It shows her five sons. Now only two are alive.
- How beautiful they are, she sobs. - Muhammed was hit in the heart, Hussein in the forehead, Abbas in the chest. Muhammed was only twelve; he was born during war and died during war. The night he was born was one of the worst bombing nights of the Gulf War, the mother recalls.
- They were so young. Still at school. I have breast-fed them, washed them, clothed them, taught them to speak, sent them to school. What shall I do now? Bush has ruined my life. Why does he kill families? Why?
Her lament grows in strength and the other women join in. The wails reach the street and blend with the low hum of voices from the market.
In a room on the other side of the backyard sits Kahlil, the boys’ father. The old man is crying. He sits up against a wall, his legs crossed. This is where he was when the missile struck. - If only my boys had been in this room with me. Then they would have been alive now. How can I go on living, with my sons dead? If only the missile had hit me instead, he moans.
A man enters the room. His eyes are bloodshot.
- Jovid is dead, he says quietly.
Jovid is the boy next door, one of Muhammed’s friends. He was out on the street when the missile came and was hit in the stomach by shrapnel. He was taken to hospital and died in the night. His uncle has arrived to impart the news. Khalil nods silently, grabs the uncle’s hand and prays.
Out in the backyard is twelve-year-old Muhammed, together with his big brother. Not the Muhammed who was killed by the missile, but his friend and namesake. When he heard that the missile had struck his best friend’s house he came running immediately.
- When I arrived I saw Muhammed lying there, the boy says. His eyes are empty. - I ran home and returned with my mother and father. He was our best football player and fastest cyclist. I think of him all the time. Last night I couldn’t sleep.
Out on the street the coffins pass by slowly. They have been secured to the roofs of cars and move in procession through the desolate market place. After the victims had been taken to the mosque to be washed and prayed over, the coffins were returned home for a last night under their own roof, to be buried today.
At the market place people walk around and inspect the damage; the crater made by the missile, the burned-out cars, the twisted iron bars and ripped canvas. Small missile fragments lie everywhere. When the missile exploded the bits penetrated whatever they reached. The bits that didn’t hit anything lie scattered around, hard and cold.
- Allah will make us forget, forgive, says a man who accompanies his friend to the grave.
No one really knows what it was that exploded at the market. Several who were there immediately before the missile hit said they saw a plane circle above. They say it was the plane that dropped the missile. But it might equally have been Iraqi anti-aircraft guns aiming at the plane. When journalists arrived at the market that same evening Iraqi police had cleared away any large bits of missile, probably to prevent anyone from identifying it. The crater was one metre in diameter, too small to have been made by the bombs used by the Americans.
However, undeniable is the fact that Muhammed lost his best friend and Shamsiya and Khalil lost a twelve-year-old, a fourteen-year old and an eighteen-year old son.
Spring has long turned into summer. The mercury is creeping towards thirty degrees. The everyday life of war has reached us: no electricity or water in the hotel, the fridge is useless and the water-boiler superfluous. I bribe the hotel electrician and he connects a lamp in my room to the generator. Amir buys me some wiring and - hey presto - my computer and phone have electricity.
When there is water in the pipes we let each other know, and anyone with time on their hands can take a shower - in cold water, of course. We fill up the bathtubs to wash ourselves and our clothes. The bell boys have long since disappeared and the hotel slowly fills with rubbish. I can sympathise with them not wanting to come to work. They have enough to do looking after their families, or maybe they are doing the security rounds for the Baath Party, like Amir’s brother.
I ask Aliya how her family are coping. - No problem. We have a gas cooker - all Iraqis have one. No one is naïve enough to think there will be electricity every day - not even in peace time. And we have a water tank on the roof and masses of food. No one in Baghdad is suffering because of the war. Well, apart from the ones who are hit by missiles, she adds.
On one of the warmest days we are waiting for al-Sahhaf, as usual. We are expected to be on time, the minister arrives when it suits him. I sit talking to Robert Fisk, one of the most knowledgeable and interesting among us. Always restless, always toying with new ideas. Now he is discussing depleted uranium. It is used in the American missile-heads to penetrate panzers, bunkers and solid surfaces. Following the first Gulf War there was an increase in the incidence of cancer among soldiers who had served in Southern Iraq; the same was the case for the people of Basra.
- Tanks and bunkers which have been hit continue to radiate depleted uranium, Robert says. - And you can be sure that the military vehicles are soon crawling with children playing. They climb on to them, slide down the bonnet, clamber around the burnt-out chassis. Then they go home, with uranium dust in their pockets, in their clothes, hair and little bodies.
Robert is interrupted by the Minister for Information, who strides in. Proudly, al-Sahhaf announces that from now on Iraq will use unconventional weapons against the Americans.
I look at Robert questioningly. Unconventional weapons? Does that mean weapons of mass destruction? Chemical, nuclear?
That same evening Iraq’s first suicide bomber strikes. Ali al-Nawani drives his taxi straight into an American roadblock outside Najaf and blows it up. Four Americans are killed.
The next day we are told that this is Iraq’s new unconventional weapon: suicide bombers.
Aliya is sitting in reception engrossed in The Revolution. Usually she translates automatically, not always able to stifle a yawn.
- What are you reading about?
- Ali.
- Ali who?
- Ali, the martyr, of course.
Aliya shows me a picture of the twenty-year-old. He looks strong and determined, but the picture was probably taken long before he decided on any terror action.
Aliya looks around, thoughtful. - He must be brave. He’s so young and beautiful. It can’t have been easy . . .
Then she becomes serious and whispers. - You know, suicide is forbidden in Islam. It’s considered haram - illegal. But because he gave his life to Allah, haram doesn’t count.
She breathes a sigh of relief, pleased that she has managed to explain such a complicated theological issue.
- Now he’s in Paradise and will get his reward, she assures me, and lightens up; a reward in Paradise compensates many times the loss of one’s life. - He’ll go straight to the top, you know. In Paradise there are seven levels, and he’ll go to al-firdous - the top level. Only the Prophet Muhammed and holy men and martyrs are there.
Aliya translates the article, which is on the front page, or rather what is left of the front page beyond the usual portrait of the president.
‘President Saddam Hussein hails the martyr’ is the headline. ‘The president entreats Allah to open the doors of Par
adise to Ali’. In addition, Saddam Hussein honours the martyr with two posthumous orders. ‘This is Mesopotamia’s first martyr. Ali - one of the military forces’ most outstanding heroes. By turning his body into a destructive bomb and following the example of his Palestinian brothers, he taught the aggressor a lesson. Now his sacred soul rests with Allah.’
Ali had been an NCO. The newspaper reports that one day he had informed his superiors that he was prepared to sacrifice his life in a suicide attack. According to the paper he chose his own method and place. While the Americans claimed that four soldiers had been killed, the Iraqis claimed the figure was higher: Eleven killed and ten wounded, and in addition two tanks and two armoured cars destroyed.
- Most countries in the world condemn acts of terrorism, I object.
- Well, what are the Americans doing? Killing innocent women and children. Isn’t that terror? The Americans might be our superior in arms, but we are morally superior. Anyhow, Allah is on our side, says Aliya.
Increasingly, people resort to religious rhetoric when talking about the war. Paradoxically, as long as Saddam Hussein has been in power, Islamic and fundamentalist religious groups have been brutally persecuted. During his first years in power Saddam Hussein insisted that Iraq should be a secular society. He feared that religious groups would upset his power base and executed tens of thousands of religiously active Muslims accused of radical fundamentalism. During the 1990s his strategy changed, as he believed religious behaviour could help him. In time he started to employ religious platitudes to increase his support in the fight against Bush. The Islamic groups, which had sought refuge in neighbouring countries to escape persecution, are now welcomed home as heroes and liberators.
Over the loudspeakers we are ordered to attend a press conference with Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan. I would rather go into town with Aliya and talk to people about Ali, the martyr. On the way out we are stopped by Kadim. - Where are you going? The press conference is starting.
- We thought . . .
Kadim looks at me with his sad eyes.
- Why do you not go on press conferences? Why do you not go on bus trips? What are you doing here? If you do not turn up we have duty to show you out.
We go and sit at the back of the auditorium, waiting for Ramadan, one of Saddam Hussein’s closest colleagues.
- They arrive with their B-52s, capable of killing lots of people. What is our answer? To wait until we Iraqis have designed the same type of bomb? No, for that we do not have time. Now all Arabs will turn themselves into bombs. If one bomb from a B-52 can kill five hundred or more, our freedom fighters will kill five thousand. Suicide bombers are enlisting every day. This is just the beginning, Ramadan says. - You will get more good news in the days to come. We now have a force of several thousand warriors from different countries. They will martyr themselves for our cause; they have even said they do not want to be returned to their home country after their martyrdom. They want to be buried in sacred Iraqi soil. They seek Paradise and the road leads through Iraq.
We are alarmed when we discover that the recruitment office is in Hotel Palestine. Suicide bombers belong under the same department as the human shields - the Ministry for Peace and Friendship - and share their offices. Between the lift and reception is a door I had never noticed until I saw potential suicide bombers disappear inside. Behind the door is a corridor and down some steps the recruitment office.
With every day that passes, more and more sinister types appear in the hotel lobby. It is easy to distinguish them from the close-cropped Iraqi bureaucrats, each sporting a neat moustache, but otherwise beardless. The sinister types have dishevelled hair and wear either the traditional tunic and wide trousers or various military personal effects. They all wear the Palestinian scarf. They are everywhere, in the reception area, on the roof, in the garden from where we broadcast our TV reports, lying around in the grass. I feel their glowering looks but never dare return their stare. It is a relief that the entire Ministry of Information, together with women and children, live with us, the infidels, in the hotel.
Next door to Antonia a ‘dozen gloomy types sporting Islamic beards’, as she describes them, move in. On the second floor are Tunisians, Syrians and Jordanians.
Lorenzo has been spying on the foreign warriors for several days. He notices that they are marked down on lists before taking their leave and disappearing. None of them stay long at the hotel.
At the beginning of the war they crossed the border without problems. A journalist who had accompanied one bus said that no one was checked at the border; they had been allowed straight through.
One day an entire busload of warriors is bombed. After the Americans gain control of the roads from Amman and Damascus the border crossing becomes more difficult. Travellers report seeing men sitting by the roadside, arms bound, guarded by Americans.
- They still cross the border, a driver says. - Now that they can no longer use the roads, they come through the desert and go straight to their positions.
In Iraqi news media the hero status of the foreign warriors compares favourably with that of Ali. Front page homage is paid to the first two foreign soldiers killed in battle. The Revolution reports: ‘Iyad and Fadi killed many infidels before the two Syrians themselves became martyrs. They are now in Paradise, the enemy they killed in hell. To honour the two martyrs a 24-hour raid against enemy positions was initiated. Twenty-three enemy soldiers were killed. Thirty-five tanks, six armoured personnel carriers and one helicopter were destroyed.’
The newspaper’s commentary becomes increasingly vindictive and poetic as the war advances. The article about the two foreign suicide bombers ends thus: ‘The mothers and wives of the enemy will cry blood, instead of tears, when their men are slaughtered by our hallowed soldiers.’
- They give me the creeps, Lorenzo says one day when a couple of suspicious types trot past us in reception. The TV station transmits interviews with mujahideen warriors. One after the other, Kalashnikovs cocked, they promise the viewers they will liberate them from the occupiers.
- I had a good job in Hamburg as an engineer, says one of them. - But I woke up one day and realised I could not go on living in the same way and so I enlisted.
According to Iraqi TV, two brothers sold their hairdressing salon in Oran in Morocco to pay for a ticket to Iraq. - When an Arab is in danger we must help, they say.
- Why don’t the Americans bomb that TV tower? Lorenzo whispers.
The Corriere della Sera correspondent himself lives a shady existence. He is one of those hated by Uday. He was actually expelled a month and a half ago, but refused to leave. On one of his last days in Iraq he interviewed Tariq Aziz, who told him he could stay as long as he wanted. Uday was informed but he had already expelled him and was so angry he ripped Lorenzo’s accreditation from him when he next saw him. One of Uday’s subordinates picked it up from the wastepaper basket and gave it back to Lorenzo.
Every time they meet Uday snarls. - Get out. No one is protecting you here.
Lorenzo tries to avoid using reception and instead enters and exits the building by the back stairs. The disappearance of the five other unaccredited ‘illegal’ journalists has given him a serious fright. They too were without the ‘protection’ of the Ministry of Information.
- Cossa posso fare? What can I do? Leave Iraq to you guys? he says despairingly, throwing up his arms and inviting us to his room for a cappuccino.
One morning I am woken by loud noises from the car park. I peep over the balcony and see a busload of warriors, fully armed, rush towards the hotel entrance. Has hell been let loose? In that case, safest to stay put. The telephone rings. It’s Tim.
- Thirty suicide bombers from Yemen have arrived, come and have a look.
I shuffle down the stairs to secure an exclusive interview with a Yemeni. I suppose it does not matter where I am if they are going to blow the hotel to smithereens. In the reception area they are performing a war dance, Kalashnikovs raised over their h
eads. They too have learnt Saddam slogans.
The victory is yours, oh Saddam
We sacrifice our blood, our soul
For you, oh Saddam
You are the perfume of Iraq, oh Saddam
The water of two rivers, oh Saddam
The sword and the shield, oh Saddam
After a while I spot Kadim in the background. Naturally, the show’s producer is the press centre’s number two. The suited bureaucrat lets the Yemenis holler for a bit, then ushers them determinedly into the auditorium. They are followed by a handful of journalists clutching notebooks. Kadim claps his hands and nods to one of the dancers.
- We are from Saana in Yemen and are here to fight side by side with our Iraqi brothers. Together we will defeat the enemy of mankind - USA! the leader of the crowd cries.
- Attack! Fight them! Kill them! is the refrain.
- We will attack from all sides. They won’t even draw breath, another chimes in.