Reflections from a month in Iraq
by Joe Carr
Christian Peacemaker Teams

My month with the Christian Peacemaker Teams in Iraq gave me a much greater understanding of the U.S. occupation and my role in ending it.

Iraq is a very difficult place to be. A cloud of sadness and hopelessness hangs over the country; I couldn’t help but feel isolated and depressed for most of my time there. The security situation makes it difficult to go anywhere, and the heat and electricity problems keep daily life rather wretched. I struggled with boredom and inactivity as much as I did fear and insecurity.

by Greg Rollins
Christian Peacemaker Teams

I recently talked to a foreigner I know who lives in the Green Zone, Saddam’s old palace grounds in the centre of Baghdad. The Green Zone is about four kilometres long and two kilometres wide. It holds the biggest U.S. embassy in the world, the British embassy, along with several others, the Iraqi parliament and dozens of foreign organizations and contractors. The man I spoke to works for a telecommunications company. He said the Green Zone is like a prison. He wants to leave it and live else where in Baghdad but his company won’t let him.

Local Iraqi Boy at Mass Gravsite, Karbala (Photo: CPT)

by Will Van Wagenen
Christian Peacemaker Teams

Recently we visited Karbala, the holiest city in Iraq for Shiite Muslims and the site of the shrine of the Imam Hussein, the grandson of the prophet Muhammad, who was martyred in Karbala in 680 CE. While there we visited Human Rights Watch of Karbala (HRWK), an Iraqi human rights organization founded on April 5, 2003, immediately after the fall of Saddam’s regime. It was the first organization to discover mass graves in the region, and has been involved in opening them, documenting the identities of the victims, and notifying the families of the victims’ whereabouts. Forty-one of the forty-three mass graves near Karbala date back to 1991, when Saddam crushed a Shiite uprising seeking to depose him shortly after the first Gulf War. Estimates of the total number of victims in mass graves throughout the country range as high as 300,000.

In November, 2004, US Marine Colonel Gareth Brandl justified the U.S. attack on Fallujah saying:

“The marines that I have had wounded over the past five months have been attacked by a faceless enemy. But the enemy has got a face. He’s called Satan. He lives in Fallujah. And we’re going to destroy him.”

While “Satan” was not destroyed by the U.S. military, the city of Fallujah was. Independent journalists and NGOs have reported that over 65% of the homes in Fallujah are destroyed or so badly damaged as to be unlivable. Many children are at risk of malnutrition and water-borne diseases. Many of the inhabitants that left before the seige by the US military in November, 2004, now live in refugee camps.

Author Milan Rai wrote:

Estimates of civilians remaining in Fallujah on 7 Nov. varied from 100,000 (US military, FT, 9 Nov., p. 10) to 60,000 (Sunni group, Independent, 10 Nov., p. 5). Estimates for the number of fighters left in Falluja before the assault varied ‘from 600 to 6,000,’ meaning that the overwhelming majority of people in Fallujah were thought to be non-combatants. It was reported that ‘Anyone still in the city will be regarded as a potential insurgent.’ ( Observer, 7 Nov., p. 18 ) A threat to kill every human being in Fallujah.

Christian Peacemaker Teams took these photos in May, 2005. These are the Faces of Fallujah.

View the photo gallery Face of Fallujah

Cantina And Concrete (Photo: CPT)

by Greg Rollins
Christian Peacemaker Teams

Last summer my teammate Max and I took one of our many walks down Abu Nawas St. Abu Nawas runs along side a park adjacent to the Tigris River. When the U.S. ousted Saddam, they closed off part of Abu Nawas to protect the Palestine/Sheraton hotels and several business offices. The U.S. Army occupied about seven blocks of Abu Nawas. Cantina wire, waste-high concrete barriers and multiple checkpoints choked and divided the road. Almost all the shops and homes in the area were closed. Only authorized vehicles were allowed on this part of the street. People who wanted to walk in the area were forced to pass through checkpoints where guards would question them thoroughly about their business. Dust and weeds filled the park.