Fierce clashes in Adhamiya

As usual, I couldn’t sleep last night. It was warm and of course, there was no electricity to turn on the fans. But what made me unable to sleep wasn’t the hot weather. It was the clashes that broke out in central Adhamiya. This time the shooting wasn’t as every day’s. It is continuous and accompanied by heavy sounds of explosions.

Last night’s fierce clashes erupted in central Adhamiya started at 1 a.m. when shootings and sounds of explosions broke out the silence of the night. Thank God that I don’t live in the center of the neighborhood. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be able to read this entry. I might be either killed or jailed in my house.

These clashes have never stopped until this moment. When I left to work, I was so worried. My mother told me to call the office and tell them that I cannot come because of these clashes. My father suggested that I use the canal road instead of the high way that connects our neighborhood to central Adhamiya. Finally, I found my way out but the situation is still dreadful.

People of our neighborhood were all talking about how they spent the night under the sounds of explosions and shootings. Some of our neighbors did not even send their children to school. A neighbor of mine told me that his relatives called from Adhamiya this morning telling him that the neighborhood is cordoned off.

Since I arrived to the office at 8 a.m., I tried to reach a friend of mine who lives right in the middle of Omar Bin Abdul Aziz Street where the fighting erupted. I couldn’t reach him as cell phone network was down. Finally at 2 p.m., I reached him on the landline which was not working at the beginning of the day.

“It was a horrible night!” my friend said. “Even during the war, we did not go through such a thing,” he added with his voice tired as neither he nor his wife and mother slept the whole night. He and his family were moving from one room to the other as they started hearing the sounds of explosions. “A mortar fell over the house of our neighbor but thankfully, it did not hurt any of the family members. We feared that mortars will also fall on our house.”

Adhamiya is a neighborhood where most of its residents are Sunnis. After the Samarra incident where the Askariya Shiite Shrine was attacked and the aftermath chaotic situation of attacking both Shiite and Sunni mosques, residents of Adhamiya took up arms to protect their neighborhood. No interior ministry forces are allowed to break into the district. It was only the Iraqi army that is allowed to go in. People fear that the death squads which they allegedly say belong to the interior ministry enter, kidnap, and kill the Sunni residents like what happened in other Sunni districts in western Baghdad.

Insurgents and residents had made a deal with the army: if they don’t raid randomly, they are free to protect the area. And that’s what happened, my friend told me.

“The residents fought against the armed men first. The Iraqi army heard the shootings, so they came from the nearby base and fought against the armed men. By that time, the residents entered their houses while US forces came to back up the Iraqi army who called them for support,” my friend said.

People of the area where scared enough not to go out and see what is going on in the streets. “Some of my friends saw a few bodies in Siham Mitwalli and Omar Bin Abdul Aziz Streets. People say these bodies belong to the armed men,” he added.

The Associated Press reported that at least one civilian was killed and seven wounded in the gun battle, Numan hospital officials said.

The last few weeks witnessed an escalation in the insurgent operations in Baghdad by the time politicians continue fighting on positions. They failed today to hold the session of the parliament which was supposed to be held this morning. Dozens of Iraqis are being killed everyday by car bombs and roadside bombs while authorities find at least five dead bodies of innocent people per day.

My heart sank this week when I read Baghdad newspaper reporting that Baghdad is the third worst place in the world for quality of living.

According to a survey by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, Baghdad ranks as the world’s third worst city for quality of living, Baghdad paper reported.

This morning, an article on the Sunday Times made me almost die of laughing. I am even laughing now while I am typing these lines. The article says “The American military is planning a ‘second liberation of Baghdad’ to be carried out with the Iraqi army when a new government is installed.

Seriously, isn’t it funny? Enjoy it and let Iraqis enjoy the successive “liberations” until Iraq becomes totally “liberated”. I wonder whose Statue they are going to collapse now! Maybe Hakim's new ones that replaced Saddam's.