'Shells and rockets were falling like rain'

Family who escaped bombing in Falluja tell how feelings towards coalition changed

The Guardian
April 12, 2004
By Jonathan Steele in Baghdad

Umm Samir sits in a Baghdad garden in the shade of two palm trees, worrying about the sons and grandchildren she left behind in Falluja.

On a balmy spring evening, with the smell of freshly mown grass around her, her present refuge with relatives seems a world away from the nightmare city she left on Saturday morning.

"It was the bombing, the constant bombing, and the children being so afraid, and the journey across the open desert to escape," she said when asked what was the worst thing about the week under siege.

Hundreds of families have driven out of Falluja over the last two days, taking advantage of the ceasefire the Americans offered. Families in Baghdad have provided food and money at mosques to help them, and many have taken refugees in.

The stories they tell have a common theme: how the Americans used to be good when they first arrived in Falluja, how arrogance and in sensitivity gradually alienated people, and how now under the pressure of so many deaths almost everyone supports the resistance, the mojahedin.

Brigadier general Mark Kimmitt, the US army spokesman, talked yesterday about getting Falluja "back under Iraqi control", as though it was in foreign hands.

He accused the insurgents of using the population as "human shields". But, as the refugees tell it, the resistance is home-grown and mushrooming all the time.

"The mojahedin are our sons. I would become a mojahed myself. I can't bear to see Falluja being bombed and do nothing about it. Even my older sister wants to join them," said Umm Samir, who is 62.

She is proud that her four sons all have college degrees -a doctor, a road engineer, an agronomist, and a psychologist.

"After the war we were very happy they had removed Saddam Hussein from power.

"Then they started to behave disrespectfully. Armoured cars drove on the pavement. They began treating Iraqis as though we were beneath their feet. My doctor son was studying in the Czech republic and came back via Syria two months ago. There were about 20 US checkpoints on the road. They flung his papers around and when he said he was a doctor and should not be shouted at, they just swore," she said.

Ali, 28, the psychologist, explains how part of the family escaped Falluja, crammed into two cars with his parents, his two sisters-in-law, their young children, and a niece.

They planned to join a convoy crossing a bridge on a back road controlled by the US marines on Friday.

Neither Ali nor his married brothers came because the troops were not allowing men of military age to leave.

"There was a terrible incident. One man in an Opel drove his wife and children to the bridge so they could walk over. As he drove back to town, an American sniper killed him," he said.

That night, perhaps because of the ceasefire, the marines withdrew.

Early on Saturday morning the family tried again, and this time Ali took a chance and came with them.

He was clearly unnerved by the experience, and perhaps by guilt at leaving the other men.

His legs fidgeted constantly as he spoke, he frowned constantly, and when the others talked he looked blank and far away.

"The worst thing was going to the hospital to give blood. There were many other dead and wounded," he said.

In a garden chair beside him Marwa, 13, explained how last Sunday, in spite of clashes that could be heard from the far end of town, she urged her father to let her go to school to do her Arab grammar exam.

At first he refused but she convinced him. Only two other girls turned up and the headmistress postponed the exam.

"Why not?" she replied when asked if she would have joined the mojahedin, were she older. "The Americans are cowards. They fight people who are young and only have light weapons.

"The Americans have powerful guns and the mojahedin are taking big casualties. But they really hurt the Americans and have caused a lot of casualties too. The strongest army there is couldn't defeat the mojahedin," she said proudly.

Mohammed Mohsin Slaibi, 63-year-old father of the family, retired as an army sergeant 15 years ago. The worst night was on Thursday, he recalled. That was when they decided to flee.

Dozens of terrified people fled to his neighbourhood of Jumhuriya, and sheltered in their house for the night. "Shells and rockets were falling like rain," he said.

He remembered the days of the monarchy when his uncle was a police sergeant and lived near the RAF base at Habbaniya.

"There were protest marches, and people threw stones, and burnt cars. But the British didn't shoot back.

"But now Britain joins America. Please write this. Is this the freedom and democracy they promised?" he said.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

Original link

 
_____
Nieuwe Oorlog 2004 | Ander Nieuws week 16