By Jo Wilding
April 28th

Israa’s mother, her sisters, sisters-in-law and cousins heard an explosion about eleven in the morning and another about three in the afternoon. They hear a couple every day, just in their small area of Thawra, or Sadr City. The second one, the afternoon one, went through Israa’s bedroom ceiling.

“I was in my house,” Israa’s husband said. It was around three on Saturday April 24th. His friend came to visit, so he was sitting with him in the visitors’ room, Nuredin and Huda, the older two children, playing in the same room while Israa lay down with the youngest child, Abdullah.

“I went to ask her if she would make tea for us but she said she was too tired, so I went back to my friend. After a wile I heard a horrible explosion. My friend went out to see what had happened. I thought our house was OK because nothing happened to the room I was in. My friend said don’t come out, stay in the house. I pushed past him. I tried to go out but there were people coming up the stairs towards me saying the explosion is in your apartment.

“I opened the door to the bedroom and saw light coming in through the ceiling but it was full of smoke and dust. I couldn’t see anything. I was trying to feel my way, to touch something, calling Israa, Israa. I found her body with her belly open and her bowels outside. I went out of the room and told my friend she was not there.

“Two of my friends went in and took the little one from her arms. She was still cuddling him. I couldn’t believe something bad had happened to the person I loved. I said if my son was fine then my wife was too. I kept telling myself I didn’t see her body. I gave Abdullah to my friend and then went to check on the other two kids, still in the room I was in before. They were very frightened.

“When I came out I heard one of my friends telling another that Israa was dead. I can’t remember anything else until I woke up with the kids beside me and people crying all around. I can still hear the explosion in my ears. I didn’t see the mortar but I’m sure it was the Americans. They came to the house later and took away the shell pieces. They couldn’t say it wasn’t them that fired it.