Baghdad-  December 13, 2003 (MMN): The plane landed in JFK. It was an Egypt Air flight from Montreal to Cairo, via New York. We had gone through security checks in Montreal. My travel partner, Babak Salari is a photographer who is always concerned about the rolls of raw film he carries. X-ray machines are a nightmare to him, since they can so eaily damage the sensitive films and render all his work useless, after it becomes too late to do anything about it. I knew that in JFK airport there will be a repeat of the agony of "hand check" of the bag containing his films, that he had to go through in Montreal.

Let me explain: The USA insists that all transit passengers leave the plane, pick up their checked in luggage, get visas if they need, check their luggage in, again, pass through security, before re-boarding the plane they were already on.

So there we were entering the USA. We were still at step one, carry on luggage in our hands and passing through immigration when Babak, who was right in front of me, was sent to a direction different than that of the conveyer belts, and luggage.

I couldn't ask him what happened since any movement out of line is treated very harshly, and very suspiciously, by the US authorities. What came to my mind at that point was that the photography equipment and supplies Babak was carrying were a source of some kind of problem.

I passed immigration without a problem, and waited patiently for his reemergence from the room to which he was sent. I picked up my bag (Babak had his entire luggage hand carried in the plane) and chatted with some other passengers, till they all left to re-board.

Thirty minutes later, Babak was escorted to another immigration officer in a booth at the end of the hall, and a long slow process started which I could only follow up from a distance and from behind a glass barrier.

It was only when Babak raised his right hand and then appeared as if he was being finger printed, that I realized that there was no problem with what he was carrying. The problem was with his ancestry. Babak, although living in Canada for over two decades and carrying a Canadian passport, was born in Iran, one of the "suspect" countries.

Babak's fingerprinting resulted in the delay of the flight. By the time the immigration officer finished with him and we started to follow the procedures other passengers had long completed, there were "final calls for Egypt Air flight …" coming from the PA system.

Passing customs into the US, baggage control out of the US, departure security checks then boarding was all done in a great rush. The result was that the security check and the X-raying of our hand held luggage was done randomly and that the bag containing Babak's film was neither X-rayed nor thoroughly hand checked.

If the goal of these tough, disrespectful, and sometimes humiliating procedures is to establish a leak proof security system, then how can they be so careless in the most important part of it? That bag could have contained anything!

And, if it is not that much about real security, then what is it really about, may I ask.

December 15, 2003 (MMN): We had left the car and started walking in the barricaded Ministry of Interior road. All of a sudden we heard gunshots. Then heavier gunshots. A group of youth passed us by and one of them said, "Saddam," and gestured with his hands what seemed to mean, handcuffs.

We were on that street responding to an invitation by one of the residents of the "Department of Military Surveillance" we met downtown a couple of days earlier. He is one of many squatters, who after the army deserted its buildings all over Baghdad, and probably many other places in Iraq, took refuge in those buildings with their families. Some of them lost their source of income after the invasion and couldn't pay their rent anymore, wherever they lived, others were living in very cramped conditions that these buildings provided a far better residences than where they were before, while a few were homeless, living under bridges or in containers before they moved to this place.

It took us and the squatters a while to get over the news of capturing Saddam, and get to what we were there for: seeing their living conditions and knowing more about their past, their current needs and their hopes for the future.

The situation is difficult to understand without knowing about the socio-economic changes that happened in Iraqi over the past 30 years. In the 1960s Iraqis seemed to have high hopes for a bright future and expectations of economic prosperity. The youth dreamed of owning homes and cars. As the years passed, war after war then sanctions that seemed to be getting tougher by the day, the dreams never materialized. But those dreams didn't disappear either. So, some of the squatters consider that it is their right to own a part of the "new free Iraq". Most of them probably know that they will not be in these buildings forever (in some estimates there are hundreds of such buildings and army camps occupied by squatter all over Iraq), but they want to be secured against sudden evacuation They insist that they won't leave without getting promises of replacement housing by the government. Yet, while they are there, they have urgent needs.

Food doesn't seem to be a problem, but heat does. All these make shift living quarters are created from pieces of old furniture and sheets of metal and wood. There are no doors and no windows. Most of these buildings were looted long before the squatters moved in. The squatters need heaters and blankets more than anything else.

As Iraqis feel that the coalition, or the US, used WMD and Saddam as excuses to take over their recourses, the squatters feel that many political parties and NGOs use them and their suffering to gain popularity and raise funds they only partially benefit from.

The squatters have another problem, sanitation. Most of the created units have no sewage due to the deign of the building. I overheard them talking about designing and building a sewage system for themselves. I don't know how far such plan will go.

The most encouraging part of this whole experience is that in this community, and as I hear in all similar ones around the country, the squatters elected a coordinator to organize their new society, its needs and plans. Maybe right here a new Iraq is being built, from the ground up.

Baghdad-  December 15, 2003 (MMN):  According to one theory circulating in Baghdad, we are not living the few days following the capture of Saddam Hussein. Saddam was caught many days, maybe months, ago, as that rumor goes. It has just become more convenient for the Americans to catch him now. And there are other theories, of course. It is not really Saddam who was caught. It's him but the only reason he didn't put up a fight is that he was drugged; they gassed his hiding place before catching him.

No matter what the truth is, capturing Saddam no more has any practical consequence. It wouldn't have had any even if it happened months ago. The important thing is that Iraq fell to the invading army and is now under American (although maybe disguised in another name) control. And the other truth is that the Iraqis know that very well. Day after day all they care about is what is happening to them now and what is going to happen tomorrow. Life is getting harder day after day and the security situation is not improving.

When I asked one of the perpetrators of the first theory, why would the Americans stage the capture as it happened this week, he said that he and his family, although adamant haters of Saddam who were delighted when the Americans came and toppled the regime, have, as of a month ago, started to lose patience with the occupation.

The attention given to the capture operation at this point serves only one purpose: diverting attention from the problems on the ground and improving - although superficially - the image of the American administration.

As for the Iraqi people, even the groups who were brutalized by him and his regime, the way the capture operation was portrayed and his humiliation throughout just added insult to their injury. To them he is still and Iraqi and a tough one for that, and his humiliation by foreigners is a humiliation to them all.

Baghdad-  December 17, 2003 (MMN):  It was a football field. Now it's a refugee camp. The UNHCR and Iraqi Red Cross provided the tents and Palestinians moved in after the fall of the previous Iraqi regime, providing the refugees.

There are 25,000 Palestinians living in Iraq. In different times they enjoyed different degrees of accommodation by the regime. During the last 2 years before the war some of them lived in fully subsidized houses. Others were employees of the government, e.g. teachers. After the war the housing subsidies sized to exist and the new government wouldn't renew the contracts of its Palestinian employees.

Thus, many ended up having nowhere to live and the Palestinian community decided to support them by setting up temporary living quarters for them in the football field at Haifa club.

The old women living in tents for the last eight months told me, today, that the summer months were too hot and the winter months are too cold. The kids who came back from school at noon complained of being harassed when they praised the Saddam days when they used to live in houses.

Of course the Palestinians could not follow the examples of the other poor Iraqis who, when they lost their living space, occupied abandoned army buildings. Only God knows what would have happened to them if they had tried. The number of Palestinians living in Iraq never reached a critical mass, so they had no weight demographically or politically. They were not even considered refugees by the UN till April 2003, over 55 years after the fact!

I was exposed today to another group of people the US invasion liberated. They were liberated from being second-class citizens to becoming refugees, at last.

Just before we left the camp a minister of the interim Iraqi government arrived to the camp. Till I know more I will just have to keep wondering what will offer them. I hope that it won't be further liberation.

Baghdad-  December 22, 2003 (MMN): The taxi driver said, "I know exactly where it is." He told me that during his last year as an undergraduate, working towards his B.Sc. in Education, he trained there. He drove across the Tigris river to the west bank to avoid traffic (the Western or 'Gharbia' school is, strangely enough, on the east side of the river, the part of Baghdad which is called Ar-Rasafah), drove parallel to the river and then crossed back via the bridge closest to Bab Al-Mua'zam. The part on the west bank, Al-Karkh, is the side where Al-Mansour, the second Abbasid Caliph, built his round city in the 8th century C.E.

Leaving the taxi, I walked through the school gates, which I hadn't walked through for thirty-three years. Al-Gharbia, where I spent one school year before moving back to Cairo, used to be an exemplary and very famous school with a great reputation. Although a public school, it had a very firm discipline system and, unheard of in most public schools, it had a compulsory uniform. The school I walked into today was nothing like the school I left thirty-three years ago.

I looked for the impressive door of the office which the principle used to occupy, and found nothing but damaged doors and broken windows. When I finally saw the sign that read "Principle', it was beside a door that had no locking mechanism, and was locked by a padlock. I asked around and was told that I can find the principle in the teachers' room.

I introduced myself and showed him some photos I was carrying from 1970 and listened to his recount of the deterioration of the school, and the Iraqi education system in general over the past 12 years. He told me that the few teachers who I remembered by name, and the principle of 1970 had all passed away. The only thing left to ask was if I could walk around the school and take some photos.

It was recess time and many students were so exited to see me take photos of their school so I quickly became very popular (I can easily admit that I was never that popular during the earlier days there). Even after recess a few students whose teacher was absent continued the school tour with me. What I saw during the tour only confirmed what I had already seen and heard. The school was in a pitiful state, which I am sure is no different than most schools in Iraq today, except of course the ones the Americans painted the fronts of, to look superficially better.

The best though, was left for last. As I was leaving I saw a room with broken windows and smog marks. I was told that this used to be the computer lab and the arts room and that it was looted right after the war and then torched.

With schools in such a bad shape, no arts lessons and no computer training, can we still hope that the upcoming generation of Iraqis will be able to rebuild the country they will, by all expectations, inherit in quite a bad condition? Am I too optimistic?

Baghdad- December 26, 2003 (MMN): I spent three days out of Baghdad, or maybe I should say, out of Iraq. Kurdistan, which enjoyed self rule for over ten years, is very different from the rest of the country which remained under Saddam’s rule and was affected by the sanctions, embargo, and lately the war. The instability and danger that are felt in Baghdad, Najaf and Karbalaa (I made short one day trips to each of the two later south-western Shiaa cities), disappeared as soon as we crossed the Karkuk-Sulaimania border.

Kurdistan is not a clearly defined or unanimously agreed upon territory. Still, beyond controversy, it includes parts of northern Iraq, eastern Syria, north-western Iran and south-eastern Turkey. The Iraqi Kurdistan, which we partially visited, is also not clearly defined. The five northern governorates of Iraq: Mousoul, Karkuk, Sulaimania, Arbil and Duhuk, all have, or till a recent past had, Kurdish majorities. The three later ones enjoyed self rule shortly after the 1991 Gulf war.

Self governance was not offered to Kurds on a plate of gold. When the 1991 war ended and the two no fly zones were established in the north and south of the country, two uprisings took place against Saddam Hussein: The Shiaa in the south and the Kurds in the north. Both were brutally put down, while the Americans, who had, in more than one way, encouraged the population to revolt, did nothing and offered no support. The Kurds, who had more organized militias tried again. Their second uprising, within the same year, was more successful than the first and, although they did not end up controlling all what they consider Kurdish land, they established their local government in Sulaimania, Arbil and Duhuk.

A few years earlier Saddam had launched an operation he named Anfaal (cheaply borrowing a word from the Quran which translates loosely to ‘spoils of war’) to “Arabize” the Kurdish territories by moving Kurds en-masse out of their towns and villages by force and moving Arabs to replace them. There was no room for objection under Saddam’s rule. Anyone, of any ethnicity, who showed opposition to any order, was brutally punished. Many Kurdish villages were massacred for opposing ‘Anfalization’ (the word has become a verb used by everyone in Iraq), while other Kurds were massacred for other reasons, such as suspecting a village of harboring freedom fighters. The most famous of such massacres was what happened in Halabja using chemical weapons in March of 1988.

The outcome of these tragic events can be seen everywhere in Kurdistan. In Karkuk (which remained under Saddam’s rule till early 2003) we visited camps that house Kurds who returned to the area after the fall of the regime in May to reclaim their property. Some of them had lived as refugees in the self governed Kurdish areas over the past twelve years, after fleeing to Iran for a short period, while others where Anfalized and lived in other parts of the country. Some of the houses they used to own in Karkuk were demolished and the areas turned into military camps, some were put on sale by the government and now have new owners and some exist but are totally uninhabitable. They are waiting to see what the new Iraqi government will offer them.

In Sulaimania, which the prosperity and security of over ten years of stable self rule is clearly apparent in the streets, buildings and on the faces of people, we met Kurdish refugees who fled Saddam’s Iraq and took refuge here. They plan to return to their homes, wherever they were in Iraq as soon as the situation permits. Some of them are from Baghdad (which had a sizable Kurdish population) and had to flee for various reasons, while some are from the non self governed Kurdish areas. They are also waiting to see what the new government in Baghdad will offer them.

Kurds, like other Iraqis, differ in the way they analyze the war and the events that followed. A school teacher from Baghdad, living in the refugee camp in Sulaimania and hoping to return home to Baghdad soon, requsted that we thank ‘Uncle Bush’, for getting rid of Saddam. She was not naive; she said she knows that he wants a price and that she is ready to offer him her share of Iraqi oil for two years. Let him even take it for the rest of my lifetime, she said.

But, don’t be fooled, some Kurds say, Iraq will not be under occupation forever. If occupation doesn’t end soon, the day will come when we, and all Iraqis, will carry arms.

Baghdad-  December 29, 2003 (MMN):  It was late in the evening in Al-Aadamia, just north of downtown Baghdad. There was no electricity, as is usually the case when raids happen. A mother was home alone with her three daughters, the youngest of whom is twelve. First there was a loud bang (that was the garden door being kicked open), then heavy banging on the house door. The mother screamed, "I'm coming, don't break it." But by the time she got to the door she was face to face with the American soldiers who had already smashed the door open.

The house search was quick, while a state of shock took over the four women who spoke little English. They were then told that they have to go with the soldiers. Where to, and what for, are questions that were never answered. They were barely allowed a few seconds to grab shoes and jackets, but not all of managed to get what they needed. The mother, for example, ended up leaving without her diabetes and blood pressure medications, which she needs regularly and one of the girls only had time to grab a pair of sandals she usually wears in the garden.

The four women were blindfolded and put in the back of a military vehicle which was not covered, and they recall being very cold. When the vehicle reached its destination they were led into a building where they heard a lot of screaming and crying. They assume that they were put in the same room but, since they were strictly instructed not to say a word, and were still blindfolded, they couldn't confirm it. Over the next few hours each of them recalls being moved to another room and being interrogated. Mostly the questions were about the resistance and if they knew who owned weapons. The youngest recalls that she wanted to - but never did - tell them that she wished she knew about the resistance and that she would, after this experience, be part of it if she could. Later, the two younger girls were released while the mother and the older daughter were moved to Abu-Ghraib prison, on the outskirts of Baghdad. A name now that is synonymous to detentions without investigation or trial. An Iraqi Guantanamo Bay, if you would.

On the evening this family was detained at least forty people were detained in Al-Aadamia alone, according to a survey conducted by a local resident. By now the number of Iraqis detained by the CPA (Coalition Provisional Authority) varies depending upon who you talk to. In some estimates it is in the hundreds of thousands. And the more alarming information is that there are no dates set for reviewing any case, let alone scheduling trial. The reply usually given by the CPA, when they feel like giving one, is that the cases will not be studied except after the formation of the new Iraqi government (expected in June 2004).

On the other hand, non Iraqis detained by the CPA are held in British controlled territory; in Um-Qasr near Basra in the south of the country. Some of those foreign detainees were foreign students studying in U of B for many years (many of whom are Palestinians who when questioned the soldiers about their crimes were told that it was being Palestinian) and who were preparing for their final exams in April and May of this year. Since they are still there today, they already lost two academic years, but this is not the worst part of what they are facing. There is word that they are considered "enemy combatants" by the CPA. More Guantanamo Bay similarities.

While the Aadamia mother held in the Abu-Ghraib Bay is now taking replacement medication provided by the Americans, maybe the best we can for her, for now, is pray that it is the correct medication, since no one knows for how long she will have to depend on it.

Cairo, Egypt-  January 1, 2004 (MMN): The fastest growing business in Egypt is - without doubt - mobile (cellular) telecommunications. It seems the case will be the same in the "new" Iraq. Two giant companies share the market in Egypt. Orascom, the holding company of one of the two, with operations in Egypt, Pakistan, Algeria, and Tunisia, has won the tender for the first license to provide mobile telephony services in Iraq's Central Region (the Iraqi Telecommunications Minister, Haidar El Ebadi announced in October). While I was in Iraq, shops were selling the mobile lines and the phones. Service is scheduled to start during this January for the public. The test phase had already become functional in Baghdad sometime during December, while I was there.

How could an Egyptian company get a contract in Iraq while Egypt is not a "willing" country (i.e. did not participate in the war as a part of the "coalition of the willing")? In Cairo I managed to find the answer to this, although one that is not fully satisfying. This contract will be paid for by Iraqi money (oil revenues), and not by the rebuilding fund provided by the US. A member of Iraq's Governing Council assured Egyptians (as reported by Reuters) that "the council would not follow the United States in discriminating against companies from countries that opposed the U.S. invasion." Does this mean that this happened in opposition to the American will? A question which I do not have an answer for.

Another question raised by a few Iraqis I talked to, related this issue, was: Why was the original telecommunications infrastructure damaged during the war not rebuilt as fast as it was after the 1991 war?

Standing in front of the Elweya telephone exchange - which is still in ruins, and in front of which four technicians were manually splicing cables over nine months after the bombing - Ghazwan, an Iraqi friend, told me that it took no more than a three months to repair it in 1991. Do the Americans and the new ruling council have fewer resources than Saddam did?

Why is there a delay in providing people with three basic needs: Fuel, electricity and communications? Is it to keep the population tense and increase people's frustration? This state of frustration that may not be easily expressed against the strong occupying force may be expressed in factional violence; something occupiers, in every day and age, want so that it would be easier for them to control the people. Iraq, with its diverse population, is obviously a very fertile ground for implementing this strategy.

Or is there a financial aspect to this delay. Isn't it in the interest of companies providing alternative solutions to delay the repair process? Being Egyptian, many Iraqis accusingly asked me this question. I am not related to Orascom, I usually answered.

I wish everyone, but the underdogs of the world before the rest, a happier new year.

Montreal, January 17, 2004. The day I left Baghdad (December 29, 2003) the US dollar would buy over 1,600 Iraqi dinars.  On January 15, 2004 the value of the US dollar was 
down to 1,100 Iraqi dinars.

Although the increase in the value of the ID (Iraqi dinar) may be 
regarded in a way as a positive sign for a currency that was once worth 
three US dollars, it has had a negative impact on many Iraqis' lives.

 M, an Iraqi working for a multinational NGO, asked me, when I was in 
Baghdad last December, how much do I think he should be making, in US 
dollars.  I answered, sincerely, that I don't have enough information to 
make an educated guess.  When he told me I found his pay too low, by 
western standards.  But, as I converted the amount to IDs, I realized 
that it was not that bad, taking into consideration the soaring 
unemployment and the high exchange rate of the US dollar.  After a short 
discussion with M, we both agreed that since he can make ends meet, 
although with difficulty, it is better than being unemployed.  His last 
comment on the topic was that at this pay he would never be able to get 
married any time soon. 

 That was at a time when the US dollar was equivalent to 1,700 IDs.

 M today would be making only two thirds of what he was making a month 
ago!  And about half what he was making the day he started work, when 
the value of the US dollar was over 2,000 IDs.

 This is not M's problem alone.  So many Iraqis are being paid in US 
dollars since the beginning of the occupation.  They all have, 
automatically, lost a large chunk of their income over a very short 
period of time.  Meanwhile the prices of most commodities, in IDs, have 
not dropped in any significant way.  Unfortunately the drop in the value 
of the US dollar adds another dimension of suffering to the already 
battered Iraqi people.

 As for M, if he is still working for the same employer at the same pay, 
he has no choice but to further delay any marriage thoughts.

Ehab Lotayef, a Montreal poet and a computer engineer at McGill University was recently in Baghdad with the Iraq Solidarity Project. The Iraq Solidarity Project is a Montreal-based grassroots initiative to help provide international monitoring of occupation forces and the corporate reconstruction of Iraq and protective accompaniment to Iraqis under the occupation.