Rocked by a spate of deadly suicide bombings, the US-led coalition has thrown up concrete fortifications all over the Iraqi capital, infuriating Baghdadis who say they feel as though they are living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
"Welcome to the West Bank on the Tigris," has become the standard greeting for visitors to central Baghdad's Al-Tashree neighborhood, which has been completely fenced in by the US forces who have their headquarters nearby.
A narrow corridor between concrete barriers leads into the neighborhood, at the entrance to which sits a US Abrams tank, where the American troops have set up a checkpoint.
Cars and pedestrians are thoroughly searched by an Iraqi police officer, under the watchful eye of a young American soldier whose hands seldom leave his assault rifle.
An eerie silence hangs over the 5km2 enclave, sealed off by 3m-high and 50cm-thick concrete walls.
The Americans erected the barrier after setting up their headquarters in the nearby palace, used by former president Saddam Hussein before his April 9 ouster.
"First it was concrete blocks, and then the barrier grew at the same time as the number of attacks increased. Since the attack on the UN offices, the wall surrounds us," says Uday Walid, referring to the August 19 car bombing that killed UN top envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello and 21 others.
Walid, a 22-year-old engineer who has lived near the palace since 1987, says he had "never experienced these kinds of restrictions, even under the bloody dictator."
Here, the curfew lasts from 9:00pm to 6:00am, compared to between midnight and 4:00am in the rest of the Iraqi capital.
"There's no more social life, and going to work or school is a daily challenge," says Walid.
At the Al-Quadessiyah primary school, barely half the teachers and pupils show up for classes.
"On days when there are demonstrations in front of the palace gates, soldiers forbid us from entering or leaving the neighborhood," says Umm Saleh, 49.
As her husband waited an hour to drive through the military checkpoint, Saleh and her 18-year-old daughter, Dina, opted to save time and walk the kilometer (half mile) home.
"We are held captive. The Israelis surround Palestinians by a wall in the West Bank. Their mentors, the Americans, do the same in Baghdad," she says.
"Even workers won't venture out here. There has been no garbage collection or draining of septic tanks since September," she adds, pointing to heaps of garbage in the street.
Walls dot the Baghdad landscape -- outside hotels, embassies and political party offices.
Many residents believe these measures draw attention rather than reduce the security risk. They also complain that the walls are bad for business.
"Business has fallen 50 percent; the measures bother our clients and partners and prevent deliveries in front of our stores," says Mohammed Ali al-Kinani, manager of Bahrain, a plastic wares company.
DEATH CONSTANTLY LOOMING: Decades of detention took a major toll on Iwao Hakamada’s mental health, his lawyers describing him as ‘living in a world of fantasy’ A Japanese man wrongly convicted of murder who was the world’s longest-serving death row inmate has been awarded US$1.44 million in compensation, an official said yesterday. The payout represents ￥12,500 (US$83) for each day of the more than four decades that Iwao Hakamada spent in detention, most of it on death row when each day could have been his last. It is a record for compensation of this kind, Japanese media said. The former boxer, now 89, was exonerated last year of a 1966 quadruple murder after a tireless campaign by his sister and others. The case sparked scrutiny of the justice system in
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
‘HUMAN NEGLIGENCE’: The fire is believed to have been caused by someone who was visiting an ancestral grave and accidentally started the blaze, the acting president said Deadly wildfires in South Korea worsened overnight, officials said yesterday, as dry, windy weather hampered efforts to contain one of the nation’s worst-ever fire outbreaks. More than a dozen different blazes broke out over the weekend, with Acting South Korean Interior and Safety Minister Ko Ki-dong reporting thousands of hectares burned and four people killed. “The wildfires have so far affected about 14,694 hectares, with damage continuing to grow,” Ko said. The extent of damage would make the fires collectively the third-largest in South Korea’s history. The largest was an April 2000 blaze that scorched 23,913 hectares across the east coast. More than 3,000
‘INCREDIBLY TROUBLESOME’: Hours after a judge questioned the legality of invoking a wartime power to deport immigrants, the president denied signing the proclamation The US on Friday said it was terminating the legal status of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, giving them weeks to leave the country. US President Donald Trump has pledged to carry out the largest deportation campaign in US history and curb immigration, mainly from Latin American nations. The order affects about 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who came to the US under a scheme launched in October 2022 by Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, and expanded in January the following year. They would lose their legal protection 30 days after the US Department of Homeland Security’s order is published in the Federal
RSS